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B: Saladin
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Mar 30, 2023 01:55
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Jossar posted:but we found that the sword had belonged to Charlemagne, grandfather of France. One inaccuracy here: Joan's sword in most versions of the folklore surrounding her was said to be the sword of Charles Martel, Charlemagne's grandfather. If I had to guess, the game went with Charlemagne because he'd have a better chance of being known to non-French players.
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Apr 1, 2023 11:46
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Jossar posted:Keep waiting, buddy, that sainthood's gonna take a while. From my understanding, it took the French collective memory a long time to decide whether to be proud or ashamed of Joan of Arc. While it's settled on being proud of her and this campaign is a straightforward hagiography, there's a lot of less pleasant folklore to her legend as well from what I've looked up. Possibly propaganda aiming to villify her, possibly her being a complex figure. Hard to say given how much of her story is tied up in folklore and myth rather than history.
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Apr 2, 2023 17:52
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Again voting A: Saladin. That campaign holds a bit of a special place in my heart, because it was the first time I'd ever seen a depiction of the Crusades that was sympathetic to the Muslims and portrayed the Crusaders as bad guys, hooray public schools in the Deep South of the US. I was awful at this game as a kid, but I genuinely credit the game for being one of my big inspirations for getting interested in history. So many cultures and events I'd never heard of.
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Apr 3, 2023 13:18
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Joan posted:Like what One of the big ones I've found repeated in a number of sources, which I don't know if they're accurate, is that Joan's sword broke during the Siege of Paris because she had a habit of beating prostitutes with it (with the flat of the sword). One of her most common epithets is 'Joan the Maid' emphasizing that she never wed or had sex, a beacon of purity and feminine virtue. However, some historians and folklorists think that this is almost certainly bullshit even before getting into the speculation that she might have been genderqueer or bi/homosexual. It's also been gone back and forth on a lot whether she actually crossdressed much if at all, or whether she did in fact dress 'properly' as a woman should.
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Apr 3, 2023 22:31
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A couple of historical trivia notes for the curious: 'Saladin' is an Anglicization of the guy's proper name, Salah al-Din Yusuf ibn Ayyub, which I don't think this game ever clarifies. And likewise, 'Saracen' is an archaic generic term used in Europe for the Muslim peoples of the Middle East during this time, used in this game as a catch-all for Arab and Islamic forces not otherwise represented by a more specific civilization. They're another good possibility for a future expansion to split up into multiple civs.
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Apr 5, 2023 03:45
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The culture I'd like to see split up into multiple factions to play as would, topically, be the Saracens. It could be a neat thing to make this campaign unique, playing not as one faction but several in coalition as the Crusades grind on.
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Apr 13, 2023 16:37
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VostokProgram posted:I could have sworn the Byzantines had a castle that had square towers and sand colored walls, but I can't find any evidence that a castle like that was ever in the game. Which is weird because I can picture it pretty clearly. Are you thinking of this, perhaps? 
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Apr 14, 2023 02:07
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cncgnxcg posted:That's the eastern european castle, which the Byzantines never had afaik. Yeah but I'm wondering if that's what they're remembering and thought it was Byzantine.
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Apr 14, 2023 18:42
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Barbarossa
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Apr 15, 2023 12:40
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Ah, the Mongols. From the game's original launch to today, consistently one of the top-tier multiplayer civilizations. The Celts and the Franks hover around the second tier of competitive civilizations (Celts are 2nd/3rd imo), and the Saracens are usually considered average to below average with the occasional high-end player really enjoying what they can do in the right hands, but the Mongols have always been a powerhouse.
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Apr 16, 2023 12:55
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anilEhilated posted:Turbo battering rams are pretty great, IMO. Never really tried them in multiplayer, though. It's the turbo siege onagers that make Drill feared in multiplayer, not the battering rams. As far as tiers go in competitive high-end multiplayer, I'd put it something like this: Tier 1: Mongols, Chinese, Burgundians, Bohemians, Poles, Gurjaras Tier 1 are what I'd call the universal powerhouse civs. No matter the map, you can pick one of these and have an excellent chance of winning (depending on player skill). In fact, in organized tournaments it can be kind of rare to see these because players tend to ban one or more of these. Special note about the Chinese, me placing them this high is taking into account high-end multiplayer. They're one of those RTS factions that tends to lose a lot in the hands of players who aren't very experienced and skilled at the game, but correspondingly are extremely powerful in talented hands. Tier 2: Britons, Franks, Mayans, Hindustanis, Portugese, Malay, Khmer These are the civilizations I see as perennial powerhouses who routinely beat the tier 1 civs but nevertheless have some notable weaknesses and just aren't as reliably good. Tier 3: Byzantines, Celts, Japanese, Turks, Vikings, Aztecs, Huns, Spanish, Italians, Burmese, Lithuanians, Bengalis, Dravidians This is what I deem the tier of civs that are tier 1 in many matchups or on some maps, but have real trouble against other civs or maps. Some can consistently hang with the best of them if a player has a particular affinity for the civ and how they play. Tier 4: Goths, Persians, Saracens, Berbers, Ethiopians, Bulgarians, Cumans I'd say that these are the civs that are typically the underdogs facing an uphill climb. Upsets do happen every now and then, but aren't expected. Goths are a weird one here: they're infamously easy to learn and oppressive to new players, but dry up dramatically when you get to the upper tiers of the competitive circuit. Tier 5: Teutons, Koreans, Incas, Magyars, Slavs, Malians, Vietnamese, Tatars, Sicilians These factions have problems. Many on the surface have very high win rates - Teutons are AoE2's classic newbie civ in multiplayer - but appear very rarely in the high-end competitive scene and almost always lose when they do. Almost. The competitive scene in AoE2 continues to evolve, and the organized competitive circuit puts a real premium on encouraging the use of perceived low-tier civs, so it's quite possible to see just about any civ in the high-end circuit, especially as a mind game against a familiar opponent. Although probably not the Teutons or Incas. Cythereal fucked around with this message at 16:10 on Apr 16, 2023 |
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Apr 16, 2023 15:17
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tracecomplete posted:Huh. I haven't watched competitive Age of Empires II in a few years, I didn't know the Saracens were out of the doghouse even on an asterisk'd basis. The last few years have seen a restructuring of the organized competitive multiplayer circuit in an effort to get more civ variety via letting players ban facing civs and draft civs in their selectable pool for tournaments, and the Saracens have been a notable beneficiary of being nobody's first choice but now you need to start making fourth and fifth choices. They're still a fairly rare sight in the high end circuit, and often lose even when they do appear, but they do have their advantages. Outside of market shenanigans, which don't tend to work in the high-end scene, they're mostly just a victim of 'Everything you'd pick the Saracens for another civ does better.'
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Apr 16, 2023 19:25
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Jossar posted:Faster production time because it's easier to spam Archery Ranges than it is to spam Castles. That's about it. Yeah, in competitive multiplayer it's pretty rare to see Mongol horse archers and when you do it's usually because they're short on stone for castles. Which itself tends to be a sign of a downward spiral so it rarely works out. Few civilizations in competitive multiplayer are so thoroughly defined by their UU as the Mongols. Mangudai are routinely touted as one of the most powerful unique units in the game, and I don't disagree.
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Apr 17, 2023 01:42
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V. Illych L. posted:i agree with the other poster that genghis khan's whole Thing is as completely bananas as joan of arc's It's a recurring gag on several history blogs, podcasts, and youtube series that whenever you're talking about general rules of the development of nations and civilizations, you regularly have to add an asterisk for 'except for/unless you're the Mongols.'
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Apr 17, 2023 18:12
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People seemed to find my posts about the competitive multiplayer scene interesting, so I hope Jossar doesn't mind if I offer some further information about the civs in multiplayer as the LP plays them (I'll catch up on the existing ones). Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Mongols Unique Unit: Mangudai - cavalry archer with an attack bonus against siege weapons. Unique Techs: Nomads: Makes Houses keep their population space if they are destroyed. Drill: Increases the movement speed of Siege Workshop units by +50%. Civ Bonuses: Cavalry archers fire 25% faster. Light Cavalry, Hussars, and Steppe Lancers have +30% HP Hunters work +40% faster Scout Cavalry line has +2 Line of Sight. Competitive Rating: Very High The Mongols are proof that sometimes you don't need a plan B if you have a really good plan A. A good Mongol player in competitive AoE 2 multi will use their scouts to find huntable animals right from the start of the game, use their faster hunters to get an early food lead, curtail enemy expansion with their scouts, then go for the kill with mangudai backed up by siege, flooding with light cavalry/hussar meat shields. In the hands of an experienced player, this is a very difficult plan to stop. Just because it's a straightforward strategy, though, doesn't mean the Mongols are easy to play. High-end competitive AoE 2 is all about map awareness and control, seizing small advantages in the dark and feudal ages that can snowball into an insuperable edge in the castle age where the majority of high-end multiplayer games spend their deciding time. The Mongols both cater to this kind of gameplay, and struggle to survive without an excellent grasp of the fundamentals. They also demand good micromanagement and awareness of the ebb and flow of the game. Bowling over inexperienced players with a bunch of mangudai is easy, but experienced players are well aware of how slow to mass they are and how fragile they can be. Playing the Mongols well in multiplayer is about getting those little advantages and shepherding them well with great micromanagement and map awareness. Mongols do particularly well on not only wide open Arabia type maps, but also mixed (i.e. maps with both land and water) maps, as they get a surprisingly good naval tech tree. More recently, the fact that the Mongols get cavaliers and heavy camels has started to get more attention as supplementary tools to help cope with recent additions to the scene like the Hindustanis and the Poles. These units are nothing particularly special in Mongol hands, but used selectively they can create an important edge against other cavalry-heavy civs. When the Mongols lose, it tends to be because of a critical skill mistake later in the game, or if the enemy can curtail the Mongol expansion early and prevent them from getting the advantages they need.
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Apr 17, 2023 22:19
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Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Saracens Unique Unit: Mameluke - camel cavalry with ranged attack Unique Techs: Zealotry: Gives camel units +20 HP Counterweights: Trebuchets and Mangonel-line +15% attack Civ Bonuses: The commodity trading fee is 5%. Markets cost 75 wood. Transport Ships have double HP and +5 carry capacity Galleys attack 25% faster Camel units +10 HP Foot archers have +3 attack against standard buildings Competitive Rating: Below Average The Saracens are a good example of a certain kind of civilization in AoE 2. They get a lot of bonuses to different things, but few of their bonuses synergize with each other to favor a particular kind of unit or a particular style of play. They're kind of a naval civ. They're kind of a camel civ. They're kind of an archer civ. They're kind of a siege civ. They're kind of a monk civ. None of these things are bad, but the net effect is that the Saracens tend to feel rudderless. They have no particularly clear plan of attack or any play style they favor. Also importantly, the Saracens lack a real killer unit. Heavy camels aren't particularly good at anything except killing other cavalry. Siege is nice to have but rarely decisive in itself. Mamelukes aren't bad, but are expensive and slow to mass. What special sauce the Saracens have is the market-driven rushdown. The market bonuses there are deceptively powerful in the hands of someone with a plan who knows exactly how to manage their resources, and when you see the Saracens in mid and low ranking games this is usually the plan. Experienced players tend to not fall for this tactic, but it's always a threat to be concerned about when the Saracens are around. This is usually paired with a reliance on Saracen archers burning down buildings faster than anyone else, a bonus that sadly isn't as good as it sounds in competitive games. At heart, the Saracens suffer from largely playing like a worse version of another civilization - in this case, the Byzantines. The Byzantines have an even broader tech tree than the Saracens, access to better units for the most part (especially in the cavalry department), and more broadly applicable bonuses in general. The draft and ban system that many tournaments use nowadays means that the Saracens have started creeping into greater use in the competitive scene when players can't get their first, second, or third choices, but they remain an underdog most of the times they show up. Given a chance, the Saracens may surprise you. Just don't count on it. 
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Apr 18, 2023 01:49
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Asehujiko posted:I think these overviews would benefit from having a picture of the relevant civ's tech tree somewhere, since unit availability(and lack thereof, see new world civs and horses) is a big part of a civ's balancing too. True, but I'm doing these just as a general overview, not a strategy guide. You can look up a tech tree on a wiki if you want. Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Franks Unique Unit: Throwing Axeman - ranged infantry unit Unique Techs: Bearded Axe: throwing axeman +1 range Chivalry: stables work 40% faster Civ Bonuses: Farm upgrades are free Castles are 25% cheaper Mounted units have +20% HP (starting in the Feudal Age) Foragers work 15% faster Knights have +2 Line of Sight Competitive Rating: High The Franks are an easy to learn civ for players who like brute force, who are so good at what they do that they remain a perennial sight in the competitive scene even if not always in the highest tier. Standard Frankish strategy is to use their food bonuses to advance quickly into the feudal age, pump out some scouts with their bonus HP to assert map control, keep going into the castle age, then drop a lot of castles to secure the map and overrun the enemy with knights. It's a more beginner-friendly version of the sort of style that the Mongols favor, and while it's not subtle or complicated, the sheer power of Frankish heavy cavalry means that they are never to be underestimated. What separates good Frankish play from great Frankish play in the high end scene is how much they use units besides heavy cavalry. The Franks have the full range of upgrades for infantry and spearmen, and in high-end play the Franks will usually make far more halberdiers than they do paladins, and also usually quite a lot of light cavalry. Sure the Franks don't get the hussar upgrade, but their light cavalry are still meatier than average and cheap bodies never go amiss. The Franks, again like the Mongols, also have a pretty good navy and thrive on both open and mixed maps. The Franks are one of the most likely culprits to get champions on the rare occasion swordsmen play a big role in a high end match, the Franks usually want to conserve gold for their paladins but a well executed tech switch into champions is one of those pivots that can win a deadlocked game. Franks are, however, a rare sight on closed maps like Arena and Fortified Clearing. They lack the final tier of archers and archer upgrades, their monks are merely average, and they lack both siege onager and siege ram. Franks excel when map control and mobility are important, but don't fare as well in knock-em-down-drag-em-out brawls.
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Apr 18, 2023 03:20
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Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Celts Unique Unit: Woad Raider - fast infantry Unique Techs: Stronghold: castles and towers fire 33% faster Furor Celtica: Siege workshop units +40% HP. Civ Bonuses: Infantry units move 15% faster starting from the Feudal Age Lumberjacks work 15% faster. Siege weapons fire 25% faster. Enemy herdable animals can be converted regardless of enemy units next to them Siege Workshops work 20% faster Competitive Rating: Average The Celts consistently hover just outside the realm of success in the current high-end multiplayer scene, offering an attractive package of bonuses that keep players trying them but they often fail to seal the deal. The name of the game for the Celts is siege weapons, particularly [siege] onagers. Mangonel/onager micro is an important skill in the competitive circuit, and the Celts have the best onagers in the game. The problem with the Celts is that siege, even the Celts' souped-up onagers, is more a nice to have bonus rather than something you can build a strategy around. They also lack bombard cannons, an important siege tool for winning wars against trebuchets (onagers lack the range). Beyond siege, the Celts have a well-rounded range of units and technologies that include a solid navy, paladins (perhaps French mercenaries or allies?), excellent infantry, and good defenses. Again, though, this all comes down to 'nice to have, now what makes the Celts win?' And that question is where the Celts tend to struggle. They're very player skill dependent in that sense, they offer no real bedrock to build a successful strategy on but offer a lot of bonuses that are helpful to a skilled player. When you see Celts succeed, it's usually on mixed land/water maps where their flexibility makes the difference, or on closed maps where they can put their deadly onagers to work. The Celts are by no means a weak civilization, they just lack that certain killer oomph to reliably place them in the top tiers.
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Apr 18, 2023 16:04
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So in addition to catching up on the competitive multiplayer overviews for the civs the LP has played as so far, here's a few more detailed notes on terminology that I've been using and will continue to use: Map Control: Competitive AoE2 is fundamentally a game about finding all the resources on the map, taking control of those resources, and using them to fuel whatever means by which you intend to kill your opponent. The importance of scouting and map control varies somewhat by faction (civs with farm and forage bonuses care less, civs with hunt or mining bonuses care more), but only in a sense of 'vitally important' to 'extremely important.' Most games are fundamentally won in the dark or feudal ages based on winning small advantages that serve as a springboard for the deciding events in the castle or imperial age. Infantry: They suck. Sorry. Infantry, by which I mean the militia -> champion line, are a mainstay of the campaign but are rarely seen in high-end competitive multiplayer. Infantry cost gold, same as knights, monks, archers, and siege weapons. Gold is an important resource, often the most limited on a map. And infantry, despite an appealing mix of health and damage, are invariably the first thing cut from a composition. They're slower than knights, lack ranged attacks, are more vulnerable than siege, and are easy prey for monks. Early attacks with militia and sometimes men-at-arms see regular play as a spoiling tactic, but it is very unusual to see large numbers of infantry in competitive multiplayer unless the Malay are on the field (they have a peculiar unique technology that drastically alters how infantry work). Unfortunately, this means that civs with a focus on infantry tend to struggle and sit closer to the bottom of the competitive scene than the top. Aside from a few militia for spoiling attacks, when you do see infantry in a competitive game it's usually a tech switch in support of cavalry (to deal with halberdiers) or seeking to overwhelm a siege-focused enemy. Tech Switching: In addition to simply upgrading units directly at the production building, most unit types in AoE 2 have a host of secondary upgrades to be found in buildings like the barracks and university. Upgrading units, and researching their secondary upgrades, costs resources. A lot of resources in the case of things like gunpowder units, and the most significant resource is of course time. Accordingly, players will typically seek to fully upgrade whatever means by which they mean to win the game - usually this means knights, archers, or navy - and spend as little as possible on other unit types. Your opponent will also, if they are an experienced player, be doing this themselves, and you will both be eyeing each other to try to figure out what your opponent is likely to build and what you need to do to counter it. Both aspects are to a great degree dictated by your choice of civilization. A tech switch is, in the castle or imperial age once the game is well underway, starting production of a new unit type and researching their upgrades in a bid to change up the state of the match, either to gain a new advantage for yourself or negate an enemy's advantage. Tech switches are a substantial investment in resources, and it's easy to misplay one, investing too much in the switch rather than living with the current stalemate or disadvantage. Most tech switches also try to hide what you're doing, to keep the enemy from realizing that you're intending to change things up. Some civilizations, like the Byzantines, Chinese, and Hindustanis, are famously excellent at tech switching because they have access to such a wide variety of unit upgrades and secondary upgrades. However, tech switches can be decisive when you switch to something your civilization isn't known for, because that also means your opponent probably will not be expecting it! Many games have swung on Franks suddenly pulling out a brigade of archers, Britons switching into knights, or Mongols deploying monks en masse. Such an unexpected switch, even if not optimal for your civ, can win by the value of surprise and forcing your opponent into a tech switch of their own, or at least a major shift in tactics. Nor does the switch have to actually kill your opponent then and there, just rock them back long enough to tilt the game in your favor.
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Apr 18, 2023 22:28
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Barbarossa. Going in order sounds fine to me.
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Apr 21, 2023 01:57
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Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Teutons Unique Unit: Teutonic Knight - slow but powerful infantry Unique Techs: Ironclad: siege weapons +4 melee armor. Crenellations: gives Castles +3 range and makes garrisoned infantry shoot arrows Civ Bonuses: Monks have double healing range Towers garrison twice as many units Murder Holes and Herbal Medicine are free Farms are 40% cheaper Town Centers can garrison +10 units Barracks and Stable units receive +1/+2 melee armor in the Castle/Imperial Age Units resist conversion Competitive Rating:Very Low The Teutons are easy to learn and play, very popular with new players, and widely regarded as one of, if not the, weakest civilization in the competitive circuit. Teutons are the defensive civilization in AoE2, and the unfortunate fact is that defense doesn't win games. In a high-end game, most of the Teuton bonuses can be summed up as 'lose more slowly' rather than 'help win.' To a great extent, this is a reflection of how the competitive multiplayer scene has evolved, Relic and Wonder victories are typically banned and most maps and play styles are built to encourage aggressive play. Teutonic Knights are likewise regarded as a booby prize of a unique unit in the competitive scene, their stats certainly look appealing, but infantry are very unpopular to begin with in the competitive scene and Teutonic Knights double down on why. They are going to die or be converted, regardless of the civ bonuses. If you need a meat shield to soak up arrow fire, that's one of the main uses of battering rams. Further, the Teutons lack some important upgrades for the competitive scene. They don't get the final tier of archers or the final arrow damage upgrade, they're stuck with scouts for their light cavalry, and they lack the final gold mining upgrade. That being said, the Teutons are always a subject to watch in patch notes. They have very strong monks, paladins with a full suite of secondary upgrades and a small civ bonus, save plenty of wood on their farm economy (important in some maps), and the extra range on castles from their tech makes more of a difference than you might think. One strong buff to how the Teutons work could easily make them a force in the competitive scene in the vein of the Franks (if almost certainly still not as good). As it stands, the Teutons have been severely left behind by the course of the game, with the Lithuanians especially being a simply better version of the same ideas.
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Apr 22, 2023 12:21
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tithin posted:Trusting Henry the Lion to come to your aid seems to be akin to trusting an AI not to try to kill you There's an achievement in one of the expansions named 'Never Trust An Age of Empires AI.' IIRC it's for preemptively attacking and destroying an AI ally before their scripted betrayal of the player.
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Apr 25, 2023 12:12
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In that case, have a multiplayer overview of one of the civs that won't be played for the time being. Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Goths Unique Unit: Huskarl - infantry unit resistant to archers Unique Techs: Anarchy - allows the creation of huskarls at the barracks. Perfusion - increases the working speed of barracks by +100%. Civ Bonuses: Infantry are 20%/25%/30%/35% cheaper in the Dark/Feudal/Castle/Imperial Age Infantry have +1/+2/+3 attack bonus against standard buildings in the Feudal/Castle/Imperial Age Hunters have +5 attack against aggressive huntables (Wild Boar, Javelina, Elephant, Rhinoceros) and carry +15 food. Hunt lasts 20% longer Loom is researched instantly +10 population cap in the Imperial Age Barracks work 20% faster Competitive Rating: Low Well, you can't say the Goths don't have a theme. Unfortunately, as I've discussed before, infantry are bad in competitive AoE2 and the Goths are the most purely infantry focused civilization. Unfortunately, none of their bonuses for infantry help with why infantry aren't used in the competitive scene much: their gold cost (not so much the amount as that they cost gold at all) and their [lack of] speed. The Goths are further hurt by lacking the final tier of archers, having gently caress all for monk upgrades, and godawful defense options. Irony, they don't even get the full kit of infantry upgrades, lacking the final infantry armor research. Goths are oppressive in the lower ranks of AoE2's competitive circuit, but vanish once you climb into the upper tiers. Against inexperienced and unskilled players, Goths can be a horrific steamroller. Experienced players will pick them apart with ease. That being said, the Goths have a remarkably good navy, and if they can reach the Imperial Age with enough resources to get both of their unique techs, even top-shelf players can struggle to cope with the Goths operating at full power. When you see Goths in the high end of the competitive circuit, the choice is almost always intended as a gamble on whether they can hit that critical mass. Most often this is seen on mixed (i.e. land/water) maps where the Goth navy can work in the early game. The gamble does typically fail, because while the Goth endgame is still a thing of terrible beauty, they have very little to help an experienced player get to that point. Even so it does happen every now and then, which keeps the Goths an option in the back of everyone's mind. The other place you'll somewhat regularly see Goths in with high-tier play is team games, where strong early game civs can give the Goths the cover they need to boom and reach critical mass. It's still a significant gamble, the Goths are always a weak link in team games and likely to be focused on early to keep them from doing their thing, but it is a team pick strategy that sees occasional use.
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Apr 26, 2023 02:13
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For the other civ announced to be off the table for the time being: Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Huns Unique Unit: Tarkan - cavalry unit effective against buildings Unique Techs: Marauders: allows the creation of tarkans at the stable Atheism: adds 100 years to Wonder and Relic victory countdowns and reduces enemy relic resource generation by 50% Civ Bonuses: Start the game with -100 wood, but with the population cap at the maximum Mounted archers are 10%/20% cheaper in the Castle/Imperial Age Trebuchets have +35% accuracy against units Stables work 20% faster Competitive Rating: Average The Huns are a very specialized civ best thought of as a cognate to the Mongols. They have similar fundamental styles with their emphasis on mounted archers (regular cavalry archers for the Huns rather than the Mongol Mangudai) and hussars, and a correspondingly cagey but aggressive play that emphasizes map control. Where the two differ is that Huns favor a more macro-intensive approach and the Mongols favor heavy micromanagement, and that the Huns have a flatly inferior tech tree across the board. If I sound like the Mongols are just a better version of the Huns, well, in most respects that's exactly what they are. Atheism is consistently deemed by the community to be one of the most pointless techs in the entire game. What won't be obvious to a new player is that one of the Huns' 'bonuses' is actually a drawback in the highest tiers of competitive play, and that is them not building houses in favor of starting with a max pop cap. A very popular tactic in the competitive scene is what's called 'house walling,' using houses and other structures to ring your base and prevent access instead of or in addition to actual walls. While more expensive than the normal option of palisades, the thinking is that you need to be building this stuff anyway so why not put them somewhere useful? Yet, you'll still see Huns quite a lot in tournaments and they pull down wins regularly. This is largely a result of the draft-and-ban system that most tournaments use to boost diversity in civ picks. Yeah the Mongols are better but what if your opponent drafts Mongols for their selection, or just bans them? The Huns are a fine consolation prize, and as a rule any player who's very good with Mongols is also going to be very good with Huns. Tarkans are also a solid unit in their own right, often mixed into the hussar floods for added punch against castles. As one of the perennial 'second choice' civs of the competitive scene, the Huns enjoy a consistent presence in the highest tiers of play.
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Apr 27, 2023 02:34
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Battles of the Conquerors
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Apr 27, 2023 11:55
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cncgnxcg posted:There was of course a time, about 15 or so years ago, where what competitive scene was left at the time consisted almost entirely of Hun mirrormatches, as they were considered the most powerful by a wide margin, essentially in a tier of their own. This was also the time when people only spammed trash units in Feudal Age, to save gold for later. Both of these ideas were spectacularly wrong, as evidenced by the Huns fall in competitive ratings, despite never getting a nerf, while other civs from the same time are now considered more powerful despite receiving no changes. As best I can tell, mainly this is the result of a shift in the competitive scene towards early aggression and map control. Making an investment early on gold units and techs can help create an early lead that turns into a bigger advantage later. The Huns are just one of many civs with a very powerful late game if they can manage it, but their advantages are significantly less in the early game. The top-tier civs nowadays have both powerful late game setups, and some kind of early economic bonus that helps them get that early advantage and develop quickly enough to turn an early advantage into a game-winning lead.
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Apr 27, 2023 13:11
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Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Vikings Unique Unit: Berserk - fast infantry that regenerates Unique Unit: Longboat - fast warship that fires multiple arrows Unique Techs: Chieftains: infantry +5 attack against cavalry and +4 attack against camels; infantry generate gold when killing villagers, trade units and monks Bogsveigar: archers and Longboats +1 Attack Civ Bonuses: Wheelbarrow, Hand Cart upgrades free. Warships cost -15%/-15%/-20% in the Feudal/Castle/Imperial Age. Infantry have +20% HP starting from the Feudal Age. Docks are 15% cheaper. Competitive Rating: Above Average The Vikings are a supremely flexible and well-rounded civilization that are a common sight in the high-end competitive circuit, even if they're not as reliable as some. Free wheelbarrow and hand cart are deceptively powerful upgrades, they make villages move faster and carry more resources. Vikings get these instantly and free, and also have available most of the game's economic upgrades. I've commented before that competitive AoE2 is all about gaining small advantages that snowball into big advantages as the game goes on, and the Vikings excel at this aspect of the game. Adding to this, the Vikings have access to the majority of the game's military upgrades, and solid access to most unit types across infantry, cavalry, archers, siege, and navy. Few civs can pull off tech switches as naturally as the Vikings, and good Viking play often incorporates more than one tech switch over the course of the game. The Vikings also, as you might expect, are well known as a naval civilization, and on water-heavy maps jump straight into the top tier of competitive prowess. Even in pure land maps, though, the Vikings' flexibility and economic advantages keep them in the conversation. The Vikings' drawback is that they tend to lack a decisive knockout weapon. They're flexible, but they do lack paladins, gunpowder units, hussars, and halberdiers. Berserks are not bad, but they're not the kind of competitive unit that typically decides games. If both the Vikings and their opponent make it into the late game and are still evenly matched, the Vikings will typically struggle. Given how close a lot of high-end competitive games are in terms of player skill, this does hurt the Vikings particularly badly despite all their advantages.
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Apr 29, 2023 17:21
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Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Turks Unique Unit: Janissary - more powerful hand cannoneer Unique Techs: Sipahi: mounted archers +20 hit points Artillery: +2 range for bombard towers, bombard cannons, cannon galleons Civ Bonuses: Gunpowder units have +25% HP. Gunpowder technologies are 50% cheaper; Chemistry is free. Gold Miners work 20% faster. Light Cavalry and Hussar upgrades are free Scout Cavalry line gain +1 pierce armor Gunpowder units are created 25% faster Competitive Rating: Average The Turks have two big advantages married to one big drawback. Janissaries are an excellent unit, and Turks have among the best light cavalry and mounted archers in the game. Janissaries, hussars, elite cavalry archers, and bombard cannons are a game-winning composition, and a typical successful Turk game uses hussars to flood the map, cavalry archers to gain map control and raid the enemy, then janissaries and bombard cannons to break the enemy's teeth. Everything in the Turkish bonuses feeds into this strategy, but one should never forget that the Turks also get cavaliers, heavy camels, and siege rams with an expansive suite of research upgrades to support a game-winning tech switch. And yet, you often won't see a tech switch from the Turks because their drawback puts them on a ticking clock. Gold is, on almost every map ever seen in the competitive circuit, the most sharply limited resource in the game, and every power unit and advantage in the Turk lineup requires gold and lots of it. Their gold miners may work faster, but that merely means you'll exhaust the map's gold that much faster. Without gold, the Turks' only good trash unit is the hussar, and while the Turks have very good hussars, hussars alone won't win you the game. Unless your screen name in AoE2 is Hera. Turkish victories tend to be short games because Turkish power is based on their gold supply. If the enemy can deny the Turks access to gold, or if the game drags on long enough to exhaust the map's gold, the Turks will almost always lose. They have a powerful game plan with a major weakness, and so tend to be around the middle of the pack in terms of overall success in the competitive scene.
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May 2, 2023 00:50
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Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Britons Unique Unit: Longbowman - archer with extended range Unique Techs: Yeomen: foot archers +1 range and towers +2 attack Warwolf: trebuchets deal blast damage and 100% accuracy against units Civ Bonuses: Town Centers cost -50% wood starting in the Castle Age. Foot archers (except skirmishers) have +1/+2 range in the Castle/Imperial Age. Shepherds work 25% faster Archery Ranges work 10% faster Competitive Rating: High I think this is the shortest list of bonuses we've seen yet, but it tells you very effectively what the Britons are about. Archers are a critical unit in the competitive multiplayer scene, and the Britons have few rivals for the strength of their archers. Adding to this, the Britons have powerful economic bonuses to help them develop and expand. Early economic advantages and powerful military advantages are a recipe for a high-tier civilization and the Britons don't disappoint. Warwolf also deserves special mention, trebuchets are the dominant siege weapon of the late game in AoE2, and Warwolf radically changes the calculus of how to use them because now they're snipers that deal area effect damage. The Britons also have a well-rounded tech tree that includes very good monks, an excellent navy, a full set of infantry upgrades, and cavaliers. Britons are at their best in closed maps like Arena, or mixed maps where they can bring their other advantages to bear, but they're also famous for their tech switches in high-end play. The Britons are so famously specialized as archers that you occasionally but regularly see Britons winning games by switching into cavalry. The Britons may lack hussars and paladins, but if your enemy is prepared for archers and trebuchets, they won't be prepared for knights and the Britons get a full suite of secondary research upgrades for their cavalry. What keeps the Britons from the highest tiers of competitive play is their lack of a power unit to drive pushes like hand cannons, siege rams, bombard cannons, or paladins. Britons are often described as 'hard to push and hard to push with.' They're a consummate defensive civilization, but Briton advances are typically slow, grindy affairs based on archers and trebuchets. Killing a proper Briton base is rarely an easy ask, but contrariwise the Britons will often struggle to contest map control against aggressive opponents. Britons are a perennial second-tier threat in the competitive scene, but lack that certain something to propel them to the 'what's the most powerful civ in the game' discussion.
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May 3, 2023 02:17
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Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Spanish Unique Unit: Conquistador - mounted gunpowder unit Unique Unit: Missionary - mounted monk that cannot collect relics Unique Techs: Inquisition: increases conversion speed for Monks and Missionaries. Missionaries +1 range. Supremacy: Gives Villagers +6 attack, +2/+2 armor, and +40 HP. Civ Bonuses: Builders work 30% faster (20% for Wonders). Blacksmith upgrades don't cost gold. Cannon Galleon projectiles have Ballistics-like accuracy and move faster. Gunpowder units fire 18% faster. Receive 20 gold for each technology researched. Trade units generate +25% gold. Competitive Rating: Below Average The Spanish are an odd duck of a civ that's risen and fallen in the metagame and risen again (currently, fallen). They are an exceptional late game civilization: conquistadores are very powerful units, they can creep towers and castles like nobody's business, they have paladins and hussars with a full suite of upgrades, and they have every naval and monk tech in the game. The Spanish are oppressive and everywhere in the lower end of the multiplayer scene, but fall off significantly as you creep into the upper tiers. The reason is similar to the Turks: the Spanish are extremely reliant on gold to fuel their power. They get some advantages to economize their gold, like the Turks, but this cardinal weakness remains. Further, the Spanish do not upgrade their archers. Ever. The Spanish get a full set of blacksmith upgrades, but are one of only two civilizations to not get the crossbow and this is a painful blow to the Spanish early game. Like the Turks, late-game Spanish operating at full power are devastating, if in a subtly different way. Conquistadores are the first unique unit I've talked about since the mangudai that can dominate a game by themselves, Spanish monks make a credible argument for being the best in the game, and nobody drops castles on your porch like the Spanish. Their navy is also very formidable, if again they don't get any actual bonuses until the late game. The Spanish are most famous these days for being kings of the Nomad game type, a format where you start with villagers but no town center. No one builds a base faster than the Spanish, and that sheer speed is enough to make the Spanish top tier in this game format. I rate the Spanish below their Turkish cousins, though, because the Spanish have an even more narrowly defined game plan. The Turks have janissaries, bombards, hussars, and cavalry archers all enriched with bonuses. The Spanish have conquistadores and monks. While these are both good, everywhere else the Spanish are forced to rely on merely average units and lack crossbows. Nomad aside, the Spanish early game is painful and it's all too common for the Spanish to be corralled and boxed in, or simply obliterated, inside the first fifteen minutes of the game.
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May 4, 2023 22:48
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Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Japanese Unique Unit: Samurai - fast-attacking infantry with an attack bonus against unique units Unique Techs: Yasama: towers fire extra arrows Kataparuto: trebuchets pack, unpack, and fire faster Civ Bonuses: Fishing Ships have double HP, +2 pierce armor, and work 5%/10%/15%/20% faster in the Dark/Feudal/Castle/Imperial Age Mills, Lumber Camps and Mining Camps are 50% cheaper. Infantry attack 33% faster starting in the Feudal Age. Galleys have a +50% longer Line of Sight. Competitive Rating: Below Average If the Spanish could be summed up as store brand Turks, the Japanese are the generic off-brand of the Britons. They have a comparable package of bonuses to early food gathering speed (fishing vs sheep), discounts to important buildings for expansion, and better trebuchets, rounded out with a similar tech tree featuring good infantry, archers, navy, and monks, access to cavaliers but no other notable cavalry, and limited siege. The Britons, however, are a consistently high tier civ because they also get bonuses to a very important unit line in archers, and the Japanese are saddled with bonuses to infantry and galleys. The result is a civilization that plays very similarly, just significantly worse for the most part. It should also probably tell you something about the competitive scene that the Japanese can be thought of as dime store Britons primarily on the basis of their economic bonuses, much more than their military. There are perks to the Japanese. Their famously durable fishing ships are a big advantage in mixed maps and makes them very resistant to contested waters, samurai are very powerful units if the Japanese get the chance (and of course are facing something they want to use samurai against, don't try it against, say, Mayans or Chinese), and the Japanese do get hand cannoneers and cannon galleons (but not bombard cannons). Hand cannons and samurai can give the Japanese the killing punch that the Britons often struggle with, but this advantage comes with a corresponding lack of the Britons' civ-defining unit support. The Japanese do see regular play in the tournament circuit, but in a manner similar to the Huns. You want to play Britons, but either your opponent picked them or banned them, so you pick Japanese and hope for the best, and sometimes you do succeed. They are rarely anyone's first choice. Cythereal fucked around with this message at 01:03 on May 6, 2023 |
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May 6, 2023 00:52
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F. Pachacuti
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May 6, 2023 18:43
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Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Koreans Unique Unit: War Wagon - heavily armored cavalry archer Unique Unit: Turtle Ship - heavily armored ship that fires cannonballs Unique Techs: Eupseong: Towers (except Bombard Towers) have +2 range. Shinkichon: Mangonel line +1 range. Civ Bonuses: Villagers have +3 Line of Sight. Stone Miners work 20% faster. Tower upgrades are free (Bombard Tower requires Chemistry). Archer Armor upgrades are free. Military units cost –20% wood (except siege weapons). Mangonel line minimum range reduced to 1. Competitive Rating: Low The Koreans have similar problems to the Teutons in that they're a very defense-focused civilization that, while they have decent unit and technology access, just don't have much pulling them in a positive direction with the kind of economic and military advantages that make a winning civilization in the current metagame. Mining stone faster and military units costing less wood sounds good, but those are the less useful of the game's resources and on land maps nothing costs much wood except the unit type that's specifically exempt from that bonus. While the Koreans are also billed as a naval power, they have one critical weakness in that regard: they completely lack the demolition ship line, the only civ in the game at present (Romans will also lack them) to not have these extremely valuable sources of area-effect burst damage to break lines and generally make a mess of things. Just the threat of a well placed demo ship can make a difference in a competitive game with water, and turtle ships don't make up for this absence. Turtle ships and war wagons are not bad, but they also don't synergize with the rest of the faction. Koreans in high-end multiplayer are almost exclusively a team game phenomenon where they're used to run interference and protect allies with weaker early games, trading the Koreans' offensive impotence for the promise of a late-game juggernaut that would struggle to survive the early game otherwise. This kind of strategy does pay dividends now and then, but most team game compositions rely on everyone pulling their own weight instead.
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May 6, 2023 20:17
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B. Alaric
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May 13, 2023 03:20
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Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Romans Unique Unit: Legionary - heavy infantry unit that replaces two-handed swordsmen and champions Unique Unit: Centurion - heavy cavalry unit that increases the power of nearby infantry Unique Techs: Ballistas: scorpions and galleys fire 33% faster Comitatenses: infantry, knights, and centurions train 50% faster and receive a charge attack Civ Bonuses: Villagers gather, build, and repair 5% faster Galleys +1 attack War Galleys +1/+1 armor, Galleons and Dromons +2/+2 armor Infantry receives double the effect from Blacksmith armor upgrades Scorpions cost -60% gold and benefit from Ballistics Scorpion-line minimum range reduced to 1 Estimated Competitive Rating: Average As the newest oldest kids on the block, it's going to take some time to figure out where the Romans fit into AoE2's meta, but I was bored at work today and watched a series of games by top-fifty players where they chewed on how they think the Romans will shake out, and the preliminary consensus is that the Romans are probably going to be an extremely map dependent faction. The Romans are very unusual in that their bonuses are quite narrowly focused on just a few types of units: infantry, scorpions, and galleys, with a few small benefits to knights and their unique units. And, well, infantry and scorpions are generally bad and it's extremely unlikely that the Roman bonuses will change that. None of the Roman bonuses address why those units are bad in competitive multiplayer, and thus are unlikely to be meaningful. The Romans also have a sharply limited tech tree, losing a lot of valuable upgrades in the Castle and Imperial Ages, and they notably join the Britons in entirely lacking gunpowder units of any kind. Strangely, what this leaves the Romans with is what may very well be an oppressively strong naval civ. The Romans completely lack the demolition ship and cannon galleon lines, but get the brand new dromon for the Imperial Age that serve the same role as cannon galleons. The Romans then get bonuses to both attack and armor on their galleys, with the armor improving as the Romans tech up their navy, and the Romans also get fast fire ships. The Romans may very well be the strongest naval civilization in the entire game, likely to be a certified nightmare (or more likely, just plain banned) on water heavy maps and likely giving them some serious play in mixed maps. The big question mark with the Romans, then, is their villager bonus. While it's a much smaller bonus to gather speed than any similar bonus previously seen in the game, it also applies to pretty much everything. In the opinions of the top-end competitive players, they're curious and uncertain whether this flexibility and broad applicability is likely to actually outweigh a more limited but more powerful bonus that gets you what you need when you really need it. It's quite likely that this will be dependent on map and civilization matchup. Taken together, the forecast for the Romans in their current state is that this is a civ likely to veer between a below-average-to-low position to an oppressively powerful civilization depending on how much water play matters on a map. It is very likely that they'll be habitually banned in competitive tournaments by most players due to the specter of facing Roman naval power.
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May 19, 2023 02:44
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A. Attila the Hun
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May 20, 2023 19:22
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It's the voice actor who sells the twist at the end, I think. Adds a little more spice and emotion to the narration. C. Vlad Dracula
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May 26, 2023 17:12
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Competitive Multiplayer Overview: The Aztecs Unique Unit: Jaguar Warrior - infantry with bonuses against infantry Unique Techs: Atlatl: Skirmishers +1 attack and range Garland Wars: Infantry +4 attack. Civ Bonuses: Start the game with an Eagle Scout. Villagers carry +3 extra resources. All military units are created 11% faster. Monks gain 5 HP for every researched Monastery technology. Start with +50 gold. Relics generate +33% gold. Competitive Rating: Above Average Forget the infantry, the calling cards of the Aztecs in competitive multiplayer are their monks, skirmishers, and archers. Aztec monks are bar none the toughest in the game, get a full suite of upgrades, and give the Aztecs a credible claim on being the best monk civilization in the game, period. Backing these monks up are archers and skirmishers with an almost complete range of upgrades that are created 11% faster, Atlatl for the skirmishers, and access to siege rams and siege onagers. The relic gold generation keeps the Aztecs in the game where other civs might run out of gold faster, and if it comes down to it, Garland Wars pikemen are surprisingly dangerous and the Aztecs do have an infamously nasty tech switch into infantry if they can catch their opponent off guard (they probably won't). What holds the Aztecs back in the competitive scene is, in general, a lack of speed. All Mesoamerican civs lack cavalry, yes, but Aztec eagle warriors are also nothing particularly special pre-Garland Wars. The Aztecs struggle at the map control aspect of the game, and they're something of a late bloomer civ with their most iconic advantages only coming online in the Castle Age for a hefty investment of gold. These advantages are workable on some maps, and Aztecs are rightly feared on closed maps like Arena. The more open a map is, the more the Aztecs tend to falter. Monks and skirmishers are great, but they're not really game-winners in and of themselves so much as they strangle the enemy's ability to win the game. Aztecs likewise struggle on mixed and water maps, none of the Mesoamerican civs are naval powerhouses and the Aztecs are no exception, missing a number of important unit upgrades and techs. I rate the Aztecs as above average due to a combination of their closed map dominance and that there are some players in the competitive scene who are renowned for their monk micro skills. Aztecs can deliver some powerful hammer blows if given the chance, the question is just whether the game will still be competitively viable by that time.
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May 28, 2023 13:14
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| # ¿ May 17, 2024 01:05 |
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B. Vlad Dracula
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Jun 2, 2023 02:29
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