Fixed crate spawns for all civs?

[Atomiswave]

Maybe ep team should try fixed crates for all civs. One advantage of this workaround is removal of randomness factor. Lets face it, sometimes bad crate spawn could be big disadvantage, especially if treasure hunting goes poorly.

[pecelot]

Still, fixed crates favour some civs more than the others, so I guess it won't even them up. Of course wood is always valuable, but the French or the Germans it means a free TP, whereas for Dutch not really (of course the builds are shifting towards it, but you get the idea).

[Atomiswave]

Still, fixed crates favour some civs more than the others, so I guess it won't even them up. Of course wood is always valuable, but the French or the Germans it means a free TP, whereas for Dutch not really (of course the builds are shifting towards it, but you get the idea).

Not if you set them "right". I think we can find balanced crate amount for every civ.

[lemmings121]

the downside is getting even further from the original objective of "similar to re meta, but balanced", and removing variety/adaptation value....

but that said, I still suport it. The random factor would be good if it afected both players the same, while there are MUs that this is the case, there are mus that have a big shift in balance depending on start.

[pecelot]

So again, we're coming to the point in which he have to decide between randomness and competitiveness... And I honestly don't know. I'm satisfied with the current state, the former enforce some adaptation, on the other hand sometimes it can be too game-breaking. Nevertheless, I don't think I'm a huge fan of this concept.

[momuuu]

Itd solve early tp, china, and make some civs that struggle with certain crate starts stronger. Its just weird this way, dutch loves a coin start while india cries when that happens to just name two civs.

[Atomiswave]

the downside is getting even further from the original objective of "similar to re meta, but balanced", and removing variety/adaptation value....

but that said, I still suport it. The random factor would be good if it afected both players the same, while there are MUs that this is the case, there are mus that have a big shift in balance depending on start.

Crucial argument.....

[Garja]

Both players get the same crates.Then ofc one civ may benefit more from one crate and viceversa but that balances it out on the long term.
In general the random crate moves in the same direction for all civs. Gold crate is an exception for Dutch only. For India and Jap the gold crate has the lowest value probably.

[Diarouga]

I totally agree with you and I've kept repeating this for months now, some crates favour some civs more and it can totally change the balance of a match up.

For example, when I was preparing my serie vs mankle in the winter tourney, I practiced the aztec vs ger MU a lot with Raphael and nagayumi, and actually I won every game when it was a no wood start (2 vs raph and around 10 vs nagayumi), and lost every game where it was a wood start (2 vs rapha and 4 vs nagayumi). Honestly, it's just too much to not be considered.
I unfortunately can not prove it since it is only from my experience (and as it was tournament practice, it's obvious that the games weren't recorded or streamed), but if you think about it, it's actually obvious, why?
Well, because in the aztec vs ger MU, it's about whether or not germany can age and have a shipment when they reach the 3rd age, and here the early TP. If they stay colonial and aztec just contains, they should be able to hold the timing if they play it well, but if the german player can get to the third age and hold the aztec timing, it's just game. And the early TP means that he can age sooner (the ger player will send 3sw/700w/700g and thus have his 700g sooner, and a shipment when he reaches the 3rd age).
In my game vs H2O, I could have won because he didn't have a shipment in age 3 (he probably missed a TP pass idk), but in my practice games, my opponent did have a shipment so I didn't try to commit and lost.

I know many don't like this change, because it changes the game and removes variety, but at some point if you want to balance the game, you have to make unpopular changes.

On top of that, many players don't like the fre and the ger change because it is "awkward", fine, just change it:

Give a fixed food+gold start to France and Germany, unnerf them, and the balance is better than it currently is without having to nerf them.
Russia 255f vills is broken? Same, just give them a food+wood start, that way they can go early market with gold start (just like what they can do currently), without the vill cost issue.
Want to buff Iro? Okay, then give them a food+wood start, they just have to chop 100w to take a TP which means that ff and rush builds are viable again while Iro is totally balance.

Honestly, I could just write the same about the other civs: India, Japan, Dutch etc.

I know ESOC doesn't care about my opinion, and that this change won't happen, but just don't listen to garja guys, he has no clue about this game.

[Atomiswave]

Well, I got banned from ESOC for that suggestion

I totally agree with you and I've kept repeating this for months now, some crates favour some civ more and it can totally change the balance of a match up.

For example, when I was preparing my serie vs mankle in the winter tourney, I practiced the aztec vs ger MU a lot with Raphael and nagayumi, and actually I won every game when it was a no wood start (2 vs raph and around 10 vs nagayumi), and lost every game where it was a wood start (2 vs rapha and 4 vs nagayumi). Honestly, it's just too much to not be considered.
I unfortunately can not prove it since it is only from my experience (and as it was tournament practice, it's obvious that the games weren't recorded or streamed), but if you think about it, it's actually obvious, why?
Well, because in the aztec vs ger MU, it's about wether or not germany can age and have a shipment when they reach the 3rd age, and here the early TP. If they stay colonial and aztec just contains, they should be able to hold the timing if they play it well, but if the german player can get to the third age and hold the aztec timing, it's just game. And the early TP means that he can age sooner (the ger player will send 3sw/700w/700g and thus have his 700g sooner, and a shipment when he reaches the 3rd age).
In my game vs H2O, I could have won because he didn't have a shipment in age 3 (he probably missed a TP pass idk), but in my practice games, my opponent did have a shipment so I didn't try to commit and lost.

I know many don't like this change, because it changes the game and removes variety, but at some point if you want to balance the game, you have to make unpopular changes.

On top of that, many players don't like the fre and the ger change because it is "awkward", fine, just change it:

Give a fixed food+gold start to France and Germany, unnerf them, and the balance is better than it currently is without having to nerf them.
Russia 255f vills is broken? Same, just give them a food+wood start, that way they can go early market with gold start (just like what they can do currently), without the vill cost issue.
Want to buff Iro? Okay, then give them a food+wood start, they just have to chop 100w to take a TP which means that ff and rush builds are viable again while Iro is totally balance.

Honestly, I could just write the same about the other civs: India, Japan, Dutch etc.

I know ESOC doesn't care about my opinion, and that this change won't happen, but just don't listen to garja guys, he has no clue about this game.

Maybe you should write suggestions for all civs, because it could prove hard to find balanced amount for some of them.

[iNcog]

Russia 255f vills is broken?

Is it?

[Diarouga]

Well, I got banned from ESOC for that suggestion

I totally agree with you and I've kept repeating this for months now, some crates favour some civ more and it can totally change the balance of a match up.

For example, when I was preparing my serie vs mankle in the winter tourney, I practiced the aztec vs ger MU a lot with Raphael and nagayumi, and actually I won every game when it was a no wood start (2 vs raph and around 10 vs nagayumi), and lost every game where it was a wood start (2 vs rapha and 4 vs nagayumi). Honestly, it's just too much to not be considered.
I unfortunately can not prove it since it is only from my experience (and as it was tournament practice, it's obvious that the games weren't recorded or streamed), but if you think about it, it's actually obvious, why?
Well, because in the aztec vs ger MU, it's about wether or not germany can age and have a shipment when they reach the 3rd age, and here the early TP. If they stay colonial and aztec just contains, they should be able to hold the timing if they play it well, but if the german player can get to the third age and hold the aztec timing, it's just game. And the early TP means that he can age sooner (the ger player will send 3sw/700w/700g and thus have his 700g sooner, and a shipment when he reaches the 3rd age).
In my game vs H2O, I could have won because he didn't have a shipment in age 3 (he probably missed a TP pass idk), but in my practice games, my opponent did have a shipment so I didn't try to commit and lost.

I know many don't like this change, because it changes the game and removes variety, but at some point if you want to balance the game, you have to make unpopular changes.

On top of that, many players don't like the fre and the ger change because it is "awkward", fine, just change it:

Give a fixed food+gold start to France and Germany, unnerf them, and the balance is better than it currently is without having to nerf them.
Russia 255f vills is broken? Same, just give them a food+wood start, that way they can go early market with gold start (just like what they can do currently), without the vill cost issue.
Want to buff Iro? Okay, then give them a food+wood start, they just have to chop 100w to take a TP which means that ff and rush builds are viable again while Iro is totally balance.

Honestly, I could just write the same about the other civs: India, Japan, Dutch etc.

I know ESOC doesn't care about my opinion, and that this change won't happen, but just don't listen to garja guys, he has no clue about this game.

Maybe you should write suggestions for all civs, because it could prove hard to find balanced amount for some of them.

It's done somewhere in the EP forums, and some were EP members were interested by that, but because of that, garja went crazy and banned me from ESOC and thus they forgot about it
It's disappointing but understand that this change isn't going to happen because unfortunately the ESOC team does not care...

[Diarouga]

Russia 255f vills is broken?

Is it?

I think it is, and even if it is not I heard that they're planning to remove it, so to them it is

[iNcog]

I thought Russia was in a good spot right now in terms of balance.

[momuuu]

Sometimes I feel like the psychological factor is larger than the balance changes themselves.

[Diarouga]

Anyway, back to the topic (unless you're more interested by Riki showing that garja banned me without putting a reason), I just recorded a game where I play iro with a wood start on the EP, and you can clearly see that Iro feels so much stronger. I went for the ff (yep 6:40 ff with a stable, a wh, a market,22vills and a shipment ready is pretty strong), but you can of course rush and have 4 kanyas at 4:30, build a TP while aging, and then send the 600w shipment to take the TP line.

With a food+wood start, I would play in a tournament as Iro, and I would be fine to face an Iro player, what's balance if it's not that?
(and doing this is simply not possible without fixed crate because if you try to add a wood crate instead, with a random wood crate they will have a 200w start and thus it will just be RE iro, I just told how to balance half of the civs in the EP, but yes it won't happen )

[lemmings121]

can some mod please clean up this thread? the original discussion that was happening here was very good imo...

[deleted_user]

Is there a way I can toggle fixed wood crate spawns for myself and coin starts for my opponent?

Pls thanks ep team my eso is sircallen just go ahead and add it on there

[gibson]

How is it even a question about whether or not fixed crate start would improve balance? Its obvious that it would lol

[Diarouga]

How is it even a question about whether or not fixed crate start would improve balance? Its obvious that it would lol

Yes it is lol.

[Dankl]

Not sure if its been mentioned but maybe crate spawns should be fixed but map specific. So TP starts will be possible on certain maps but not others.

[Diarouga]

Not sure if its been mentioned but maybe crate spawns should be map specific. So TP starts will be possible on certain maps but not others.

Why?

[britishmusketeer]

Imo fixed crates would be a hardly noticeable change that would improve balance drastically. Ultimately people are more likely to wait 5 mins to get a game on EP compared to going into RE qs if they think that they will get a game that is significantly more balanced. Obviously it wouldn't be without disadvantages since it would mean that you no longer have to macro your early market with different crate starts and there would be slightly less variety early on but in this case i think the advantages significantly outweigh the disadvantages. Currently civs like german and iro are impossible to balance since they are totally different civs with different crate starts but with static crates they could be balanced.

[Diarouga]

Imo fixed crates would be a hardly noticeable change that would improve balance drastically. Ultimately people are more likely to wait 5 mins to get a game on EP compared to going into RE qs if they think that they will get a game that is significantly more balanced. Obviously it wouldn't be without disadvantages since it would mean that you no longer have to macro your early market with different crate starts and there would be slightly less variety early on but in this case i think the advantages significantly outweigh the disadvantages. Currently civs like german and iro are impossible to balance since they are totally different civs with different crate starts but with static crates they could be balanced.

[Mitoe]

Cleaned up the thread a bit. Stay on topic guys