DotW: EP as the new RE?

[pecelot]

Discussion of the Week #5:

If you could, would you implement the ESOC Patch as the official patch?

Benefits are — hopefully — well and widely known for all of us. On the other hand, though, there's a a large part of ESO population that doesn't even known of our existence, not to mention the fan-made patch. From their point of view, such a change could drastically change the balance, making the current RE OP strategies no longer that strong, would make it obligatory for them to familiarise themselves with all patch notes and bug fixes, and — on top of that — they would have to learn new maps that would be playable in Quick Search. Some of the players would most likely not want to do that and would quit entirely, unfortunately. Moreover, with MS being lazy with keeping up with the community, we wouldn't really be able to expect frequent balance updates at the current rate.

The question, in other words, translates to: what do you value in the Age-of-Empires-3 community more — players' number or the quality of gameplay. With the population of ESO consisting of many non-ESOC players, like I said above, the decrease in activity could be pretty significant.

Discuss!

[_RDX_]

PR 30+: This is really nice, I can try out new things, new metas, new builds. I always wanted to play an aoe 3 that's fairly better and balanced than the RE
PR 22 - PR 29: Ah, My favourite civ has been nerfed/buffed. Now it is so bad/good. It's not a problem though.
PR > 22: Aw crap, wtf is this? I can't lame anymore. I'm getting outta this shitty thing.

[pecelot]

That's what could happen, hence the question. On the first glance, EP offers a lot in terms of quality of gameplay and it's undeniable. However, there's this other part of the community. If we could, should we care?

[Gendarme]

Some changes are just too drastic to be accepted by everyone unless it's an official Microsoft patch: mameluke shipment nerf, wall nerf, Portuguese settler cost buff, teepee revamp, Dutch bank limit buff. ESOC maps are very biased towards balance too, sacrificing variation.

It is still way too early to replace the official patch with our EP. EP is still in the beta stage as I see it.

[gamevideo113]

It is veery difficult to have a non-official patch spread to the whole playerbase. In AoE2 (voobly) there have been a lot of attempts to fix the broken balance, but what happens is:
-Patch comes out and gets launched with a tournament to involve as many people as possible -> Those who play in the tournament learn as little as possible of the patch notes in order to be able to play -> Tournament ends and everyone goes back to playing the 17 year old unbalanced version.
While i think that many of the AoE2 balance patches are not very good patches (they either change too much or too little), the problem that i think that prevents patches to be succesful is that the average player is unaware of the rest of the community/quite lazy/simply enjoys the broken balance and doesn't want anyone to touch his beloved OP civ. There are also some players willing to change but finding games on balance patches is so hard that they give up after a couple of days. Unfortunately balance in a RTS is a somewhat subjective thing, so even if you get as close to the perfect balance as you possibly can, there will still be people who don't like your balance changes and who complain about the patch notes.

On the other hand though the HD edition has brought new balance changes and most people seem to be ok with them (there is always a bunch of people that argues that HD is even more unbalanced than the original AoC but usually that is not the case, with a few exceptions) and it has shown that enforcing balance changes can be quite successful. Enforcing the ESOC Patch would surely annoy some people but i think that overall the result would be decent. Even if some changes might seem absurd to the majority of people, some times they just need to settle down and the community will simply figure out the new balance in a while.

The best thing that could be done in my opinon would be setting EP as the standard data set for everyone, and those who don't want to play it can just revert it to the RE balance with a toggle option or something like that. Also the patch notes should be very clear and easily accessible.

There is still one major problem with this, MS support is totally absent.

[momuuu]

Yes. EP is far more balanced. Could the EP also be updated after becoming the official patch?

[_RDX_]

As for our knowledge, There are only few players in EP, and there are things that still have to be fixed. Such as this:

a patch no nerf japan=noob patch 3.1.1

I'll list some of the issues that regrets people when the EP is suddenly announced as the official patch:
1. Popularity: Most of the aoe 3 players think that the support for this game is dead. I've even seen you having a room hosted in the custom browser titled 'eso-community.net' and going afk. That's a good thing but it's not so effective. You'll have to publish about this on places like Steam Community, where the game is purchased at this time. There has to be an information about this at ESO's home page.

2. Copyright risks: The game servers belongs to Ensemble studios/Microsoft games. ESOC can't just say, "Hey, here's a new patch, it's free" without their authorization.

3. Language: English might be the most popular language. There are some who prefer their language than English, Sometimes they can understand only from their preferred language, there has to be more than one language version of the ESO Community website, This keeps most of them connected.

4. A Permanent Patch: If the current version of the patch is announced as the official patch, then it has to be permanent. If you keep giving updates, there are lot of problems that will occur. Some people might not know that the updates were given and they'll be playing in the older version. So, I recommend giving a permanent solution and then announce it as the official patch.

[pecelot]

The best thing that could be done in my opinon would be setting EP as the standard data set for everyone, and those who don't want to play it can just revert it to the RE balance with a toggle option or something like that. Also the patch notes should be very clear and easily accessible.

For me it's quite clear then that it wouldn't change a thing. People would be a bit confused, but eventually the vast majority would come back to the original version, I'm afraid. Sure, some players would switch to the more balanced iteration, but eventually that would be the inevitable outcome, I'm afraid.

Yes. EP is far more balanced. Could the EP also be updated after becoming the official patch?

Like I said in the OP, I don't think so. It's all a matter of guessing, but even a miracle occurs and Microsoft finally decides that the game needs to be a bit reworked, then I highly doubt it will keep any regularity in terms of further updates.

I'll list some of the issues that regrets people when the EP is suddenly announced as the official patch:
1. Popularity: Most of the aoe 3 players think that the support for this game is dead. I've even seen you having a room hosted in the custom browser titled 'eso-community.net' and going afk. That's a good thing but it's not so effective. You'll have to publish about this on places like Steam Community, where the game is purchased at this time. There has to be an information about this at ESO's home page.

I'm not entirely sure what that has to do with the topic. It's not like people would be disappointed if they found out that there still is some support for the game.

2. Copyright risks: The game servers belongs to Ensemble studios/Microsoft games. ESOC can't just say, "Hey, here's a new patch, it's free" without their authorization.

Naturally, it would be solved in an agreement, I assume it would be dealt with.

3. Language: English might be the most popular language. There are some who prefer their language than English, Sometimes they can understand only from their preferred language, there has to be more than one language version of the ESO Community website, This keeps most of them connected.

That's a legitimate concern, but surely we could work on translation easily — in the end, the changes would consist of description updates, patch notes and perhaps maps' descriptions, although not obligatory.

4. A Permanent Patch: If the current version of the patch is announced as the official patch, then it has to be permanent. If you keep giving updates, there are lot of problems that will occur. Some people might not know that the updates were given and they'll be playing in the older version. So, I recommend giving a permanent solution and then announce it as the official patch.

That was just my expectation what MS would do. In fact, it's an exception from norm, as I think every game nowadays is patched online — heck, even ours, back up until 2010.

[JakeyBoyTH]

TR broken then?

[pecelot]

IMO we could merge some of the NR changes into the EP, if that's the case --- alternatively, I would see the Treaty Patch functioning separately -- prioritiesh, man!

[fei123456]

is this worth discussion? of course EP is 10 times better than RE now, but we just have no one working in microsoft.

[pecelot]

There were some concerns raised in the posts above!

[_RDX_]

I never knew why would you release a separate patch for treaty if it's balanced in EP. Or release a patch that balances both supremacy and NR games.

[pecelot]

The Treaty Patch opted for much more drastic changes than EP, affecting areas relevant to supremacy without treaty, too. I'm sure, though, that if the duty called, we would be able to form one patch for both game modes. For now, it's not a big deal, as you can just turn them on from one EP launcher

[momuuu]

EP is honestly miles better balance wise and mapwise. Theres room for improvement but denying this seems foolish. If I could Id force this on eso asap, even if thatd mean some people decided to stop playing.

[musketeer925]

EP is honestly miles better balance wise and mapwise. Theres room for improvement but denying this seems foolish. If I could Id force this on eso asap, even if thatd mean some people decided to stop playing.

I think the idea that the game is still supported would offset the effect of players quitting. I would also think that if microsoft was releasing a patch today, they could push it out on Steam update as well the internal update system. This would mean any Steam player who owns the game and has it installed -- even if they haven't played it in awhile -- would see the game being updated and might give it a try again.

[Darwin_]

EP is fine, and I like to play on it more than RE. However, team balance is essentially the same (when played on the same maps) as RE, a bit worse if anything. Also, while I think balance is better for 1v1 and the changes that have been made have been mostly effectual, I am not alone in thinking that some civs (dutch and ports) feel "fake", however it is better than the last patch version I feel.

[lordraphael]

The Treaty Patch opted for much more drastic changes than EP, affecting areas relevant to supremacy without treaty, too. I'm sure, though, that if the duty called, we would be able to form one patch for both game modes. For now, it's not a big deal, as you can just turn them on from one EP launcher

i think every change the tr patch made could be implemented into the EP. Simply enable it once you hit imperial age. Assuming that less than 1 % of all Sup games go into imperial i dont think it would matter.It would probably improve late game supr experience as the whole purpose of the tr patch is to make super lategame unit spam balanced.

[fei123456]

If I could Id force this on eso asap

but you can't. i can't either. no one can atm. LOLOL

[pecelot]

The Treaty Patch opted for much more drastic changes than EP, affecting areas relevant to supremacy without treaty, too. I'm sure, though, that if the duty called, we would be able to form one patch for both game modes. For now, it's not a big deal, as you can just turn them on from one EP launcher

i think every change the tr patch made could be implemented into the EP. Simply enable it once you hit imperial age. Assuming that less than 1 % of all Sup games go into imperial i dont think it would matter.It would probably improve late game supr experience as the whole purpose of the tr patch is to make super lategame unit spam balanced.

I wasn't sure it it could be done technically so didn't even think about it nor mention it.
Also, are you sure you're familiar with the Patch Notes?

Yeoman card now only gives +2 range/los to Longbows (down from +4)

Macehualtin now have 90HP, 9 dmg, 2.5x vs HI, and 18 range. (from 80HP, 8 dmg, 2x vs HI, 16 range). Costs changed to 40f/30g (from 40f/30w).

Coyote Runner now have 165 HP and 20% rr (from 150 HP and 10% rr)

And many, many more, drastically affecting early stages of the game. Plus this one:

French can no longer train the Hussar

XD

If I could Id force this on eso asap

but you can't. i can't either. no one can atm. LOLOL

[_NiceKING_]

The Treaty Patch opted for much more drastic changes than EP, affecting areas relevant to supremacy without treaty, too. I'm sure, though, that if the duty called, we would be able to form one patch for both game modes. For now, it's not a big deal, as you can just turn them on from one EP launcher

i think every change the tr patch made could be implemented into the EP. Simply enable it once you hit imperial age. Assuming that less than 1 % of all Sup games go into imperial i dont think it would matter.It would probably improve late game supr experience as the whole purpose of the tr patch is to make super lategame unit spam balanced.

I wasn't sure it it could be done technically so didn't even think about it nor mention it.
Also, are you sure you're familiar with the Patch Notes?

Yeoman card now only gives +2 range/los to Longbows (down from +4)

Macehualtin now have 90HP, 9 dmg, 2.5x vs HI, and 18 range. (from 80HP, 8 dmg, 2x vs HI, 16 range). Costs changed to 40f/30g (from 40f/30w).

Coyote Runner now have 165 HP and 20% rr (from 150 HP and 10% rr)

And many, many more, drastically affecting early stages of the game.
XD

Ye it's possible to move these changes to imperial unit upgrades

[pecelot]

Nice, but would feel very weird to upgrade, let's say, a longbowman