What should Age of Empires IV improve?

[Adribird90]

In AoE3 and AoM static defenses are not as strong.

You can argue about how the metagame is currently, but it is true that the game becomes very slow when you start with the siege ball and you have to play the springalds battle to counter.

[FloosWorld]

@Adribird90

In AoE3 and AoM static defenses are not as strong.

Even in AoE 2. Petards do huge damage to anything building-related to make up for them being a suicide unit. Introducing such a unit to AoE 4 would already help a lot. For reference, below are the numbers of Petards needed to destroy several buildings in AoE 2:

[WintryPainter69]

Some games actually put performance warnings if certain options are chosen depending on the players hardware in question. An option for different map sizes or more visual and lighting toggles in AOE4 overall would be very welcome, and just like they did with the camera mod they can put a warning there beforehand if some of the hardware is deemed to weak.

[MedicMaaan]

Graphics overhaul

There’s a pretty easy fix for one of the biggest problems with the game’s graphics: the textures of the weapons and the way they reflect light. As detailed in the post linked below, many of the game’s weapons are completely emissive, which means they aren’t affected by light sources or shadows. However, the metal textures on some weapons, like the Musofadi sword and the Handcannoneer barrel, do work correctly. This means it’s possible to change this for the other weapons too, hopefully without …

The textures on weapons and shields could do with becoming less bright. This would fix a major flaw in the graphical representation of arms in AoE 4. At the moment, most weapons in the game are not affected by other light sources, this causes them to have a flat appearance. On certain weapons, this also causes metal on weapons to have no difference in sheen from their wood pieces, giving the two materials a similar appearance.

Some units have weapons where this isn’t the case, such as the Handcannoneer, Musofadi warrior, and the Ghazi raider. If all of the other units in the game had their weapons altered to not be emissive then I think that this issue would be resolved. The weapons are still plainly visible without having emissive behavior, so gameplay would not be negatively impacted.

Overall, it seems like the change would be very easy to implement if the texturing was done correctly on the items in question. They just need to lose the emissive behavior that they currently have.

[HasanIchess]

Spam of Springald - very easy mechanics

Vortix also complained about the springald in his video exact minute https://youtu.be/MROoZlja0AU?si=vOT6Vt5Ko7ozVSnq&t=294 A siege unit that has a spectacular range against the siege itself (even though the siege is so weak that they seem made of paper) and the magical ability of the springald to pass through enemy units, palisades and even Forests, the only logically acceptable thing is that it passes through friendly units, nothing more You didn’t hear Vortix, will you now listen to Wam? …

springald passing through forests!!

[Croissantini]

Exactly, and this is an expansion of aggressive methods of making Siege capacity stronger rather than the reverse. The game needs more depth if anything, more flexible mechanics that allow units to breakaway from their set use.

I think we need units to have a broader use and not be constrained so much by a counter system, limiting them to one mechanic alone. Units like the Springald are awful exactly because of this linear design. Torch damage is a super limiting mechanic.

Edit: Thinking about it, it’s funny. We do have those units. Tower Elephant. Grenadier. Now they should have to make them not awful to use.

[FloosWorld]

Reworking the Springald to be more like AoE 2’s Scorpion would also help making siege wars feel less stale imo

[Adribird90]

The last time I asked for something like this on Reddit I got sent to hell xD.

[Chickoo1990]

as a quick game option, it would be better.

[HasanIchess]

@TheAchronic

Because tournaments have time limits and walls can be abused in that way. Pro players cannot afford to not use every tool to their advantage. That is not the case for casual players. Casual games are not determined by some abstract time constraint by a tournament for watchability.

I’ve repeatedly said that Siege needs to be stronger to incentivize making it more often and sooner. However, the removal of walls or weakening them is NOT the correct way to deal with it. This is AoE, not SC or WC.

They prohibit walls because that makes the Boom strategy predominate.

[HasanIchess]

@HasanIchess

Extend the production time of the Zhuge Nu

https://www.youtube.com/live/FwSa9r1oKto?si=joQOw9de8lBSoFr9

What makes the mangudai weak against archers is its disadvantageous production time, do the same with the Zhuge Nu, it is a broken unit

Edit: Extends the production time of the Zhuge Nu. What makes the mangudai weak against archers is its disadvantageous production time, do the same with the Zhuge Nu, it is a broken unit

The Chinese have had a high win rate in the tournament

[_e_o_ka]

Fix the response-delay please, to make the game technically more playable and direct.

Disable steam library sharing and issue permabans for cheating/hacking accounts on 1st recognized violation instantly.

Make lobbies anonymous and don’t display player rank/level.

Fix unit attack prio (units - especially archers - attacking buildings instead of enemy units)

Fix stagnated turtle meta (hre turtle for example → decrease strength of emergency repairs by a large amount or increase cooldown drastically).
Massively increase the time in which a towncenter reloads for the next shot.
Make it at least 3.0 seconds, better 4 seconds.
At the same time, make towncenters be able to garrison more villagers, but cap the damage at a certain number of units garrisoned, for example 10, 15 or 20.

I might come back to aoe4 once all of this is done.

[coobiedookie]

First and foremost HAS to be the cheating. If at the very least they can’t fix it because of the way the game is set up, then give us a breakdown at the end of the game of who DID cheat (or even in game) so others can leave the game and not waste the time on human scum.

If you don’t believe me, check out MEXAlienware game replays and see the zoomed out camera and knowledge of whole map without reveal.

[Kunafa]

In order of importance

1. Correcting Bugs and balancing. A solid game comes before any new additions. one would be considering making stone walls more expensive or available in castle age. discourage players from walling the entire map. kinda ruins the flow
2. New Civs - Definitely need more civs as long as they play differently and are interesting
3. Minor additions to make the game more interesting. could be a new unit, new types of wildlife, a new unit formation, a new mechanic, new type of terrain feature (maybe caves, treasures)
4. graphic overhall (specifically ships and siege, they are a bit underwelming but not bad)
5. map editor down the line. not a priority IMO atm

[V-a-e-l-y-n]

The absolute first and foremost thing that should be fixed as of yesterday is the bug in this image of my event viewer which has been reported by multiple users going back over a year with no solution to the problem ever provided on these forums and, clearly, no patch fixing it.

And, to be clear, this is not some minor problem. I literally cannot make it through most games without this crashing my game. I just attempted to launch the game a few minutes ago and didn’t even make it to the menu. This is absolutely unacceptable nonsense. I would feel much more forgiving if I couldn’t find year old posts about this, but I can so there is no excused for it still happening to anyone.

[Darkness01101]

I think AoE4 has run its course. Has been out 3 years now, so it’s clear we got what we got. No zoom or UI redesigns, no pop cap increases, graphics are what they are, etc. Time for devs to focus most all their efforts on AoE5 now, imo

[KnowingLamb8370]

I demand 2 free new civs for the zhu xi and johanna dark failures.
Edit:i forgot ootd.I want one more free civ for that too.

[OriginalKnot717]

They need to improve their communication. Tell us the release date of patches and keep us up to date on things being worked on, future content etc.

[_e_o_ka]

100%
But they won’t.
They haven’t done that in 3 years and they have let go of communicative roles even…

[OriginalKnot717]

Yeah they’re exactly the same with aoe3 de, despite a dev saying they would communicate more it seems to be out of their hands.