Yeomen: Allows creation of Longbowmen at Town Center

Yeomen 750W 450G
Allows creation of Longbowmen at Town Center.

Historical Context
In ye olden days of Brittania, Longbowmen were farmhands conscripted by the king from farmsteads and didn’t receive any formal military training. Yeomen were the landlords in charge of training their farmhands in archery.

The Problem
In the current meta, Longbowmen don’t see much play. The reason is that the unit is created at Castles, whereas Crossbowmen are easier to mass produce from Archery Ranges - making them the preferred option for the unit class.

The Solution
By changing the current Yeomen upgrade:

Yeomen 750W 450G
Foot archer range +1, tower attack +2

Yeomen 750W 450G
Allows creation of Longbowmen at Town Center.

THATS OP YOU IDIOT
The new Yeomen upgrade is balanced by the fact that Town Centers are unable to produce both Villagers and Longbows at the same time. The upgrade can boost production rate of Longbows but at the expense of having your villager production halted.
The Yeomen upgrade cost is as expensive as 1 or 2 castles. But castles offer much more than just production of unique units. Their main function is Combat and producing Trebuchets.
The old Yeomen +1 range bonus is replaced, meaning Longbows are nerfed on their main advantage in the late game.

Ok cool story but why?
Britons are a strong civ and don’t need any buffs. Longbows are so easily made OP because of their range. The reason for this suggestion is purely for making Longbows relevant again in a way that contributes to the historical fidelity of this glorious game. Most of the unique bonuses, techs and even units have historical relevance as their main objective - often at the expense of strategic usefulness. The proposed new Yeomen tech has more historically relevant flavor and mitigates a strategic problem in the meta.

Strategic Impact

  • Town Centers become a flexible building that can be used for either increasing Military or Economy as is needed, which offers a strategic dynamic that can profoundly change the meta.

Thanks to YouSeaSwim for his notion on how the meta might change as a result of the change:

  • British have a discount on TC’s, and Longbowmen can shoot while garrisoned (and even get some healing). So forward TC’s could be an interesting strategy.
4 Likes

i’m sorry, but Britons of all civs do not need this type of buff.

you can say this about almost any unique unit in the game.

the problem is that unique units don’t become objectively better in most cases until mid imp at best, and by then most games are over by then.

by the time you want to produce longbows, you’re already at the villager count you want.

i also honestly don’t see this being a good change to the tech. you take away the defensive aspect and the extra range, and in return, in the late game they can make longbows from more buildings. i’m not sure that’s a fair trade at all.

12 Likes

Thanks for reading my suggestion.
The point of the change is not to buff the Britons, in fact the change is intentionally weak - maybe even a nerf. Please read the section titled Ok cool story but why?

I’d like to see that change with equally historically flavorful suggestions as this one.

I’d like to see that change with equally historically flavorful suggestions as this one.

I imagine that’s a result of the current meta, which could change as a result of the implementation of this suggestion.
A hypothetical strategy change would be the possibility to build Longbowmen at the time where you would normally build Crossbowmen, by spending the resources normally reserved for Archery Ranges on additional Town Centers that can be flexibly used for either increasing economy or military.

Just to be extra clear, the suggestion is not meant to be a buff. The purpose is flaveur.

Thanks again

1 Like

except it still does nothing to make them more viable. yeah, when you get to the point where you actually want to make longbows, its better, but the reason longbows don’t see much use isn’t due to archery range solely.
its because Longbows don’t become objectively better then the archer line until imperial age with Elite Longbow researched.
the thing is - the game is moving at such a fast pace that this doesn’t happen much. most games barely reach early imperial age at the pro level these days.

except again, the problem is games aren’t lasting long enough to get to that point.

except it wouldn’t change it at all, games just aren’t lasting that long.

except longbows aren’t objectively better then crossbows. yeah i get 1 extra attack in castle age, but they also have lower accuracy.
it isn’t until arbs, where Longbows have just slightly less accuracy, and 1 more attack and range, that they pull ahead. (But then again, Elite Longbow is much more expensive then the Arb upgrade, so depending on how the game is going it might be better to just keep pushing with the archer line).

so until the game slows down and more games get to mid imp or later, i doubt we see more UU usage.

2 Likes

I see now that the problem is that the unique units are actually designed for the late game and that it’s not the unit’s fault that games most often don’t last that long.

Thanks for your insight!

1 Like

Why make them available in TC and not in archery ranges? The reasoning behind the Goth’s Anarchy technology is pretty similar but it makes huskarls available in barracks, not TC.

guys pls stop overrating this unit
Seriously, people think they have a deathball of snipers that will never die, and then they end up getting pummeled to death by kamayuks because they looked away 10 secs.

3 Likes

Hi, thanks for adding to the discussion.
The reason for making them available to the TC is primarily for the historical homage component. It would be even more historically accurate if they were added to Houses or even Farms. But the compromise to TC and not other buildings, including the obvious Archery Ranges, was for balance consideration. The point of the change is not to make Britons even better.

I agree :slight_smile: But look at it from the developer’s perspective. They rather be safe than sorry and leave a potentially OP unit undertuned, than risk having to rebalance it over and over. And also, cowardly tactics, like super range, don’t make for good gameplay.

2 Likes

That moment when you that all the likes given to MatCauthon are due to Civ picker who pick britons and simply win any TG with a braindead build order…

Again, MatCauthon, you see this as a buff to Britons, but you dont seem to understand how much -1 Range mean. The return for losing 1 range is only being able to create Longbowmen in TC. If that’s not a nerf, Idk what is.
At this point you see everything as a buff because they are nerfs instead, and if you marketing these changes as “buff” you will pull more of the “I dont want Britons buffed” people and the “I don’t want Britons to change” people on your side, while in reality this is the most intresting, most balanced nerf suggestion i have ever seen (+ the UT is quite costly)… Basically Longbows will then become the old Arbalest (with 11 Range), and Arbalest weaker (10 Range).
And all of a sudden Arbalest no longer outrange Onager as well (only 1 more Range), and Briton player actually need to watch their units for once.

3 Likes

no i see it as unnecessary and not accomplishing what the OP wants to happen. the problem with the longbowman being seen has nothing to do with it being made at a castle, it has to do with it requiring late game to even be better then crossbow

This sounds like a job for our hero the Spirit of the Law: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zRyRN11zqA
(didn’t watch it yet)

Not sure whats more pointless: Proposing buffs/changes based on “historical accuracy” (in a game where a king can outrun a horse…) or proposing buffs/changes based on “i would like to see this unit more”.

I mean, OP isn’t even trying to make an argument as to why his change would benefit the game, he only says he personally would like it :smiley:

5 Likes

I would assume that landlords live in castles and not the town center which is more of a common use :smiley:

Thanks for adding valuable insight to the discussion.

I would like to remind you that humans do indeed outrun horses.

Horses’ average distance-running speed is 5.8 meters per second — a canter.
Elite human runners, however, can sustain speeds up to 6.5 meters per second. Even run-of-the-mill joggers typically do between 3.2 and 4.2 meters per second.

It goes without saying that a king should be able to run at over 9.000 meters per second.

Please read the section called Ok cool story but why?

Thanks

Hi, thanks for participating in the discussion.

The Yeomen were landed commoners - not quite nobility like the lords and ladies of great estates and castles.

References to the emerging social class of wealthy land-owning commoners began to appear after 1429.
These yeomen would eventually become a social class of commoners below the landed gentry, but above the husbandmen.

Thanks

i did, and its a whole lot of nonsense. Its not even an argument.

2 Likes

Allow me to break down the section into a list form of separate arguments for the proposed change:

Ok cool story but why?

  1. Britons are a strong civ and don’t need any buffs.
  2. Longbows are so easily made OP because of their range.
  3. The reason for this suggestion is purely for making Longbows relevant again in a way that contributes to the historical fidelity of this glorious game.
  4. Most of the unique bonuses, techs and even units have historical relevance as their main objective - often at the expense of strategic usefulness.
  5. The proposed new Yeomen tech has more historically relevant flavor and mitigates a strategic problem in the meta.

Thanks

Thats not a point for any kind of changes, in fact, its a point AGAINST changing stuff.

This is not only not true (the main strenght of Longbow over arbs is 1 bonus dmg, which helps enourmously vs high PA targets), it is simply not an argument to rework the UT.

The historical accuracy argument doesn’t get GOOD just because you use fancy words, you know?

Yeah, it really doesn’t.

It really, really doesn’t.

So, we get two wrong/pointless sentences and then the historical accuracy argument - threefold. Very convincing.

Thanks for the effort.
I suggest re-reading the entire OP and the rest of the thread.

Many thanks

Historical accuracy can be beautiful, but complicated at the same time.

We could also say that Christian civilizations should have a Crusade Button to call 100 Paladins before losing to Islamic opponents, and vice versa.

2 Likes

Everybody knows that Panic Buttons don’t melt steel beams.