Jerom wrote:Xp is a step function. Tps sometimes vastly alter the way a build goes, for example in the german semi ff, which went from a 2 shipment colonial into not really having a shipment in age 3 to a smooth 3 shipment colonial with a shipment ready once you age if you get an age 1 TP.
That's a big if though. With a transition tp, you barely have your 3rd shipment ready in age 3 never mind 4th with a 9 uhlan semi.
Even the transition TP compares very favourably to not building one at all. Iirc, without a TP when gonig 2sw 3sw 700g you are aging around 9:00 whereas with TP you are aging before 8:00. Both builds have a shipment ready when hitting fortress, or maybe the non-TP one barely doesn't I don't remember, no one's used that build for ages.
But we digress. I think India is not very good right now, mainly because they don't fit very well into the semi-FF meta. I think changing them now would be a mistake though, because it seems to me that they still have some options that need to be explored. If we do buff them eventually I think a change to elephants (or elephant shipment costs) could be a good start but obviously there are a ton of options.
Goodspeed wrote:Even the transition TP compares very favourably to not building one at all. Iirc, without a TP when gonig 2sw 3sw 700g you are aging around 9:00 whereas with TP you are aging before 8:00. Both builds have a shipment ready when hitting fortress, or maybe the non-TP one barely doesn't I don't remember, no one's used that build for ages.
But we digress. I think India is not very good right now, mainly because they don't fit very well into the semi-FF meta. I think changing them now would be a mistake though, because it seems to me that they still have some options that need to be explored. If we do buff them eventually I think a change to elephants (or elephant shipment costs) could be a good start but obviously there are a ton of options.
The transition tp is good for sure, just not quite as good as jerom seems to think
Jerom wrote:I think you should read my posts more carefully which do not adress the transition TP other than as a tool to make TPs and TP boom.
basing it off posts like the following:
Jerom wrote:The build order for a French semi FF for example used to be 4 CDB 700g, and then people would age up with 6 skirms sometimes because you wouldn't have your shipment in age 3 ready yet without the TP. With a TP you make the colonial part smooth, adding a very crucial shipment (700w) and have your shipment ready right when you hit age 3.
unless you assume early tp which seems a little silly to me since you get that 1/3 of the time?
I dont think that India needs to fit into the semi-ff meta by having better age 3 options. It was clearly laid out by the designers that India shouldn't have to age (good eco, full 3 unit composition), and I think that they should be changed to make that age 2 style better, whilst making sure that the power of their more aggressive styles are kept in check.
somppukunkku wrote:This is not a fucking discogame.
their problem still is that they are good at turtling which is really weak in a boomy meta. The balance of this game is close enough now where slight map changes will stir up the meta. It just takes playing them on some of the maps like cascade or tibet where you can use the agra to get early control then fall back on your strong defense for them to be good again. I am not sure it warrants any changes actually.
This the very reason I feel a different approach to balancing is needed. Trying to first balance all Strats within a Civ might be more cumbersome but will achieve overall and proper balance faster. If small changes to maps can fluctuate it, then its Pseudo balance not true one. Having Civ's being hard counters for each other is not good for competitive matches. While keeping true to what each Civ is inclined to do(rush, boom, turtle). Trying to keep the efficiency(VillSec) of a rush civ while doing rush balanced with a boom civ while booming. And also making the boom and ff/semi strat's only slightly less efficient than rush for that civ.
How that helps? the variables like map, tp, different game modes, team games all get balanced at once. eg in a match between 2 boom civ, where one is better boomer. the other civ should have (viable)option to use rush which even though slightly less efficient than its boom will make the match interesting and unpredictable. what if the other civ started with turtle anticipating this and switched to boom after first raid.
If India is good on Maps like Tibet what does it tell you. their Rush Strat is good. Maps always favour a certain strat. On Maps with defensible starting hunts and TP(read- all ESOC maps) a rush strat is always inferior to Semi-ff/boom. If you want to balance india for such maps, boost their other strats in a way their rush is unaffected. Or you could simply stop playing india on such maps, easier alternative which is being followed.
If down the line the meta changes again to rush, or becomes even more boom favoured. You wont have to put too much effort to start balancing all races again. It would require veterans to drop their preconceptions about civ like only for rush, only for ff, and only for colonial warfare etc. Will help TAD competitive scene better if more options are opened. Compared to other time tested RTS TAD loses many of its good players over time. Restrictive play style could be one cause of that. we might see more variety of civ match ups in tournaments and more variety of gameplay in single matchup.
Having said that the kind developers of the patch might not have enough time for more ambitious projects. I only feel that if a different approach(indirect but efficient) is taken they might end up saving their time.
The problem with that approach is that you'll end up standardizing, and we want to keep the civs unique. True balance is not achievable with 14 unique civs, that's just something we have to live with. The best we can do is tweak the civs that are too dominant or too weak.
I wont say go for complete standardisation. just decrease the specialisation part a little. All the civ will still be best at one specific thing, but not much worse at other things. Some matchups which are impossible right now will become less difficult and possible to overcome with skill.
The uniqueness doesn't get affected since each civ has its own way to boom or rush etc. Are Spain and China both not unique. Or Brit and Japan.
the way i see it. there are like 4-5 unique civ right now. Others dont get played on most maps. Just an example- If u try to balance India on esoc maps by re-inforcing its rush. Like vet upgrades at agra fort, or auto vet upgrade for gurkha. They will become unbalanced for other maps or game modes. Even after long trial and error this can achieve a fragile balance only if u decide to have different patches for 1vs1, team games, treaty.
Imo standardising all maps was a much dangerous idea causing predictable and monotonous gameplay. I got interested in Esoc patch recently only for new maps.
Edit- Also if u feel that playing strategy is what makes a civ unique, then there are not 14 unique civ but 3 or 4(like rush civ's, boom civ's, ff civ's etc). which are hard counters for each other resulting in players either clearly knowing they will win or lose the game, or simply avoid most of the macthups. Decreasing the civ specialization so that they are only soft counters, will infact result in 14 unique civ and 196 interesting matchups. Instead of the 4 civ and 16 matchups we see now. True balance will also allow for unique maps with different play styles to be used in competitive setting. compare that to the standardised maps we have now. Trading rush civ like iro for semi-ff civ like france/germany. we are not far from where we started.
Jerom wrote:India is probably not even weak. Theres a habit of comparing civs to france in which case almost every civ compares unfavorably.
Compare them to dutch then they still suck
Dutch already does well vs india on RE patch so your comparision is a bit off.
breeze wrote:
they cant even guess how much f***ing piece of stupid retarded they look they are trying to give lesson to people who are over pr35 and know the best mu. im pretty sure that we need a page that only pr30+ post and then we could have a nice discussins.
Sioux, spain imo, bart beats dutch, brits, do well or close against china, germany is close on many maps, russia, iro. Thats quite a list of close/good match ups.
Dont beat otto supposedly, aztec france and ports (probably, but my TP build seems good against them tbh) are rough but not even terrible.
If you see this list you'd wonder why you're suppossed to change anything about india.. A balanced civ loses match ups too, as little as possible, and wins as little as possible. If a civ loses a few match ups, and not even hard, its not a bad thing but more a pointer at that the civ is balanced.
Jerom wrote:Sioux, spain imo, bart beats dutch, brits, do well or close against china, germany is close on many maps, russia, iro. Thats quite a list of close/good match ups.
Dont beat otto supposedly, aztec france and ports (probably, but my TP build seems good against them tbh) are rough but not even terrible.
If you see this list you'd wonder why you're suppossed to change anything about india.. A balanced civ loses match ups too, as little as possible, and wins as little as possible. If a civ loses a few match ups, and not even hard, its not a bad thing but more a pointer at that the civ is balanced.
MAYBE EP sioux def not on RE, Spain wins imo, bart only beat u because u werent dirty wall lamer vs him like u were vs me, I don't think it beats brit at all unless youre at a super high level, according to my own experience and h2o
Jerom wrote:Bart just 10/10s which I guess you could wall up against, but even then its closer than whatever the fuck you were trying when playing vs me.
Also, I honestly think india would beat dutch by stagecoaching. Maybe they can also beat ports like that.
Ok I make sepoy rush. I see a wall and 5 skirms. What do I do? Siege the wall and win the game? No, you make 4 banks and ff
Right Ovi, India don't win a single match-up easily.
Spain beat India on TP map. On no TP map its still uneasy (for both civs) Dutch vs India is hard for India, those skirms shooting out of nowhere from 20 range makes sepoys die like flies.
In most match ups, India goes in with 12 sepoys, and they dont return with a single shit lol. And your mass is sooooo sloowwwww and your enemy reaches age 3 wtf you can do nothing. -_-
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Jerom wrote:Sioux, spain imo, bart beats dutch, brits, do well or close against china, germany is close on many maps, russia, iro. Thats quite a list of close/good match ups.
Dont beat otto supposedly, aztec france and ports (probably, but my TP build seems good against them tbh) are rough but not even terrible.
If you see this list you'd wonder why you're suppossed to change anything about india.. A balanced civ loses match ups too, as little as possible, and wins as little as possible. If a civ loses a few match ups, and not even hard, its not a bad thing but more a pointer at that the civ is balanced.
MAYBE EP sioux def not on RE, Spain wins imo, bart only beat u because u werent dirty wall lamer vs him like u were vs me, I don't think it beats brit at all unless youre at a super high level, according to my own experience and h2o
Jerom wrote:Bart just 10/10s which I guess you could wall up against, but even then its closer than whatever the fuck you were trying when playing vs me.
Also, I honestly think india would beat dutch by stagecoaching. Maybe they can also beat ports like that.
Obviously. I mean any civilization would beat Dutch by doing anything.
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