If I play the AI then only one of us is toxic 
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A lot of the fun for competitive players in this game is focused upon being efficient with time and actions in-game (and probably quite a lot outside of the game as well). At this level someone hiding in the corner with villagers is clearly trying to annoy and frustrate the opponent, wasting time. You will hear commentators in pro games saying “he has no win condition”, although it can be understandable if large sums of money or a prestigious tournament is on the line and one player one time takes a little longer to quit (although they fight they don’t hide). A game on the ladder/lobby is not on par with this scenario.
Sure in lower ELO games, players may be enjoying a picnic in the corner of the battlefield, however this just demonstrates how different the thinking is between people striving to play the game optimally against the most difficult opponent you can find and those playing for historical reconstruction or [insert your style of game here]. Again that is totally fine, but emphasises why there is often massive chasms when trying to see eye to eye, particularly on the forums.
If a player does hide villagers (or some other griefing tactic or grieving as they just lost) and they are at a level of ELO where the players are striving to play optimally, they know exactly what they are doing. This is definitely something we should not be advocating in a thread about the toxicity of the community. They would be much better off saying GG WP and starting a new game to learn from their mistakes.
Part of good sportmanship is knowing when to throw in the towel and not waste everyone’s time, just as alt-F4 needs to be remedied and elements of the ladder need to be reviewed to make the game more fair and to listen to the community. This in itself will address some of this alleged widespread toxicity.
Finally, a real time strategy game is all about doing as much as possible in real time (including actions and coming up with strategy in the moment). RTS games are more niche these days but I do not think you can blame the design of the genre for why the community may be somewhat toxic. I think turn based 4x games are now more popular and that is because not everyone likes to play super fast (or strive to), but that is what RTS has always been. The toxicity is a human problem that may be exacerbated by parts of the game and the way in which all communities end up getting divided (e.g. casual vs hardcore players or max map bans to everyone should play random everything). It certainly is not because part of AOE2 leans towards e-sports (which is mostly player made content) and I do not think we are seeing 50,000+ people watching someone play the campaign but they are doing that to watch Hidden Cup for example.
First people need to be honest with themselves about these differences otherwise we are going to struggle to improve the situation. Then that just leaves the limited resources of the developers to solve the problem.
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Yeah maybe if you pick Franks every game for freelo and are already fully walled before even clicking to Feudal then maybe its understandable that the other side gets pissed if that works
Imagine thinking Franks are free elo when there at least 2/3 civs better than them LUL.
Also, imagine thinking that you should be mad at someone for walling
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Then we have to agree to disagree.
Like it not, but things like giving feudal stone walls less HP, or making Trebs auto-pack/unpack to attack targets within sight are things that disproportionately benefit faster, more aggressive players.
We don’t see similar changes benefiting defencive playstyles.
You also have new elements like Feitoria, or Burgundian Vineyards which have no consideration for balance in longer lasting gamemodes, such as FFA and Diplo.
The fact that the game is Real Time don’t in any way force it to be Fast Paced. No fence to you, but that’s bullsh*t. Nor does it mean making it more fast paced than it already was is a necessary nor positive change.
We don’t have to agree on anything, that is fine, you have your opinion which you are entitled to.
However we can at least review objective facts about the game. The direction of the game and rise in popularity after 20+ years is what has shaped the development. The game has also been this fast paced since the beginning and continues to grow. The figures speak for themselves and your preference for a slower paced game is fair enough but based on the numbers pulled in on people watching the pros “playing fast”, this is what the people want to see and how they predominantly want to play online (given the largest player base is in RM by a long way - correct me if I am wrong). FFA and diplo are fun game modes but not popular in comparison to RM. It might as well be like Persian arrows blocking out the sun.
I do not know the exact demographics, but if singleplayer is larger than the multiplayer base, the speed of the game is irrelevant and there are plenty of mods to make the game more to your own liking, including a casual speed setting. Multiplayer games are always fast and cutthroat (normal speed is quite forgiving if you ask me) unless the game is designed around a slower pace.
Online where is the evidence that the game needs to do a complete 180 in favour of a game that you are promoting? Respectfully, I would not count on the game completely changing ever and you should make your peace with it. If there was an appearance of 100k+ players demanding the change or a sizeable portion of the community wanting a new game mode to facilitate that it would happen (and would have happened a long time ago).
Money talks and the expansions are aimed at the large multiplayer community and single player campaigns and it is raking in the cash it would seem. If this was “bull” as you put it, then the whole project would have been flushed down the toilet as soon as the demand dried up.
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They basically are, up to a certain point though.
Welcome to the AoE official forums 
Yeah, but generally speaking on arabia you have Mayans, Chinese and Vikings who are favoured against Franks and you also have Aztecs, Burgundians and Lithuanians who have a really good shot against atm.
The problem here is that Mr. Deathcounter loves to claim ■■■■■■■■ as usual. There are at least 3 civs clearly better than them on arabia atm, but the poor fella still thinks it’s free elo
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Seems like I’ve seen a thread/post or two like the below… so I think it might be doing something:
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That is why I said, until a certain point, I agree with Franks being Freelo E.g. Chinese are a pretty bad civ on lower levels, because low ELO players just get confused by the Chinese start.
Block abusive players and try to find players that aren’t abusive. If an ally is being abusive towards you, just resign.
I don’t think you fully understand what I mean when saying the game has gotten more fast paced. Sure, game speed, as in garther speed, unit speed, Etc. Is a big part of game pace, but that’s not what I’m referring to here.
Game pace is also to which extent mechanics within the game affects which player choices are viable within the game.
You have to separate player leverage in an RTS into two main categories:
• Aggressive; is any behaviour that get you closer to finishing an opponent faster.
• Defencive; is any behaviour that makes it more difficult for an opponent to finish you.
There is an argument for calling passive booming it’s own behaviour, but in this discussion that’s irrelevant.
Now when I say the game is now more fast paced that means that overall strategies that makes it more difficult for your opponent to finish you have been nerfed, while strategies that makes it easier to finish an opponent faster has been buffed as a consequence.
Thing like:
- Walls now take longer time to build.
- Normal Onagers can cut through trees.
- Bombard Towers no longer counter Rams.
- Stone Walls have less HP in Feudal.
- Trebs auto-pack/unpack to attack targets within sight.
Are all things that nerf strategies depending on making yourself harder to kill. Personally I like the first 3 of these changes. The problem isn’t even that these changes have been made, but rather that Defencive strategies haven’t gotten any compensation for their losses. Making the game more fast paced, given that strategies reliant on ending the game faster are now proportionally stronger.
When it comes to the FFA and Diplo community, or current lack there of I can only say this. Do you really expect this playstyle to do well after over 8 years of neglect, and what I assume is unintentional sabotage?
This playstyle have been chocked out for years now, leading most to leave for games that now better provide what AOE2 used to give. The changes required to bring this community back are so small, yet there is no initiative taken by the developers to fix the problems.
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they do always find weak excuses for losing too, so it’s basically MP teammates
Thank you for saying this. So I am not the only one with this impression. I don’t like how fast the average game has become. There’s no time to really immerse yourself in the gameplay.
i’m not talking your entire base is built in the corner. i’m talking you have clearly lost (eco in ruins, army dead) and you put them in the corner of the map with a mill a farm and a lumbercamp and wall them in, forcing me to waste time.
uh no. aoe2 was designed very badly at first - there is a reason bloodlines and halbs were added in conquerors. but even then how many civs were actually good back in the conquerors?
if you weren’t playing a meso civ, huns, or mongols you were pretty much not going to win.
anything other then vikings on water maps was a misclick and destined to lose.
sure the devs have overnerfed things here and there (Steppe lancers, Cumans, and Incas trushing) but at the end of the day each of those were oppressive.
and you talk about defensive play being nerfed? how? towers nerfed? they were nerfed because offensive play, not defensive. as for walling being nerfed - you can still endlessly repair a wall with a villager against anything short of the opponent going full feudal. which means any offensive pressure requires ranged units to have any type of success. and that’s even after the nerfs they have done.
aoe2 isn’t fast paced. is it faster then it used to be? yes. but it’s still slower then basically any other popular RTS out there.
and walling is still insanely common, and not only that, but a simple wall tile with a villager repairing it can hold off anything but the most committed of feudal aggression plays.
3 man at arms? 4 feudal scouts? too bad. 1 villager can out repair you. think about that. no army needed. just repair your wall.
good change imho, how many of the original civs actually had siege onager? not to mention how expensive is siege onager? 12 civs to date have siege onager, 6 of those were either AoK or The Conquerors civs. how often is siege onager actually seen in 1v1?
good. they should have a counter that doesn’t involve trebuchets.
doesn’t much matter frankly, no ones going to go feudal aggression against stone walls.
uh no, they still have to be commanded to do something. they aren’t just going to unpack themselves because a unit comes in vision.
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how long, real world time, should the average game last then? keep in mind aoe2 is still slower then pretty much all the other popular RTS games out there.
While I would agree with that - calling it toxic or griefing may be over doing it - a mild irritation in some in instances that’s easily found in 1 vs 1 and somewhat enjoyable in others depending on the mindset of the pursuer and the comments of the opponent. Toxic starts when your opponent upsets you to the point it hurts your feelings in a negative way such as at the end of the match saying ‘easy’ after you say gg, wp - or seemingly stupid comments insulting you or the way you play - that’s toxic and griefing is fairly limited in this game - in my book seems to be mainly in team games where you wall in your ally, target allies with onagers or throwing a fit if they happen to build in a spot you want for yourself and go as far as not really playing at all making the whole team falter because of a childish attitude. As for 1 vs 1 - not allot of ways to grief really that I can name -
Some people probably consider reaching imperial age griefing just cause the game runs longer than they’re used to or usually going over the hour-2hour marks
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Balance and design are two separate things, don’t lump them together.
If you’ve played the original, unpatched disk release of Starcraft you know the difference.
Yo, who here remembers the old fire rate of Photon Cannons and Sunken Colonies?
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Then it wouldn’t have sold so many copies and been a game good enough to warrant the expansion. Not that I completely disagree with you, because some things were badly balanced (e.g. Teutons TC), but the game design itself was pretty sound.
and will be, unless they do something mega-drastic to make it completely unviable, because walling just intuitively makes sense, and why wouldn’t you want to restrict (enemy) movement into your base?
Those RTS games probably became popular for a different reason. I don’t see how AoE2 would be better by trying to emulate other games when it’s already been an iconic game in its own right and by its own unique design. (meaning that a non-insignificant portion of AoE players probably have a different mindset than SC players for example)
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