I’m trying to understand this. The last Chronicles content pushed the new fortified outpost HARD as an identity for the Macedonians, and that’s nice, but how many times have you honestly seen pros or any serious match utilize outposts at any time? With the Last Chieftains arriving soon, we are, once again, pushing for outpost usage with the new Champi units that can build them. I guess having a unit that can’t gather resources anyway be the reason to make an outpost is more enticing, but making them will still dig into your stone collection especially when scouting with your Champi is free.
I’m glad you guys look at lesser used aspects of the game and try to weave it into something useful. This is something even Blizzard doesn’t do all that much. In Starcraft, Firebats are super niche and Devourers and Scouts are essentially pointless. But we will never see any new balance patches for that game so they’ll never see usage in any meta environment. So it’s odd that outposts don’t get a simple fix to completely make them viable be having just a 25 wood cost. And for Ethiopians, change the cost to 15 as their team bonus.
outposts are fairly common in pro play. outposts not costing stone is already the Ethiopian team bonus. The 5 stone cost is only relevant in one scenario: when you want to build 2 new TCs without collecting extra stone.
I agree… outposts (and castles in the new civilizations like Tupi and Muisca) should cost wood instead of stone, and monasteries should cost stone instead…
Stone cost matters in more scenarios than that (I’ve had a game where I wanted to build an outpost but couldn’t without mining stone because I’d sold my starting 200 stone). But it’s still cheap enough to be somewhat insignificant (but still enough to keep their cost from ever being negligible). Outposts being common in pro play (or at least in Hera’s) is true though. Vision control is quite valuable.
Yes, I was thinking 300 wood and 300 stone or 400 wood and 200 stone… but it makes sense, if you see a building 100% made of wood, it’s rare that it uses stone, unless it uses mud or earth as support for the wooden pillars… In AoE 3, forts cost 600 wood but they also cost 500 coins (which in AoE 2 would be gold) since stone, just like in AoM, doesn’t exist as a resource…
this would make sense from a realism point of view, but I don’t think it’s a good idea gameplay wise. by the same logic the Japanese castle should also mostly cost wood, and the viking wonder should be exclusively wood.
The stone is placed inside the little covered area to stop it from blowing over in the wind lol
But honestly I don’t mind the outpost costing stone. Early on map vision is very valuable and so it forces you to be strategic with where you place your outpost if the cost is a bit prohibitive. If it was just wood cost, people would just spam it everywhere and it would no longer seem important and special.
I agree that it should not cost only wood in dark and feudal age as this would unfavor early raiding too much. But I find it more wierd that people start to unlock vision with house in Castle Age. So a feudal/castle tech that makes it stone-free would be a good middle ground.
Stone cost necessities for decision making. If you want to detect enemy attack. You need to pay opportunity cost.
If outpost is far too cheap, Everyone build it around the bases from feudal age. Then there is no possibility of surprise attack. One of the most interesting aspects of RTS.
If you want vision. Pay the stone. 5 stone isn’t that much if you already have mining camp next to stone pile.
Google says stone was used as foundations for wooden outposts in medieval times…
"Foundations: Stone was frequently used for the base of walls and towers, providing a stable, damp-resistant foundation that prevented the main timber structure from rotting.”
ok but Stone was heavily used to build Monasteries and Universities too.
Why change the cost? But I like the idea to remove the Stone cost with an existing upgrade that is available to all civs. That gives them some usage in late game.
Also maybe remove the hard cap on LoS in general, which would help Ethiopians.
