ESOC Patch 7.0.0.0 released!

[Hazza54321]

. . . yet theyre randomly implemented as though saying “prove us wrong” rather than explaining why these changes are good and evidence to back it up.

from the OP

P.S. Please refer to my comments for insight on some notable changes
~ @zoom

comments on some notable changes

Comments by @zoom, in italic:

General

– Improvements that deliver "approximately 1 unit for every x minutes of game length, up to 30 minutes" now actually deliver 1 unit for every x minutes of game length, up to 30 minutes", resulting in intuitive and proportionate scaling (affects certain Aztec, Iroquois and Sioux 'big buttons', as well as several minor native improvements; descriptions updated accordingly)
Notably, this change is a slight nerf to the Iroquois and Sioux 'big button' improvements. For more information, please see this post.

– 100c dynamic ("random") starting crate spawn removed (does not impact the 100f+100c spawn)
A divisive and fundamental change to the game, fixing crate starts would – beyond alienating many in the community – cause major balance issues for the foreseeable future, by drastically altering the strength of 14 civilizations in largely unpredictable ways, instead of altering one civilization in such a way that directly improves balance. Simply put, I will not be responsible for such an irresponsible change. Ultimately, this alternative is a more than sufficient compromise to balance the game.

Combined with giving Chinese "random crates", the removal of this outlier will eliminate the vast majority of balance issues arising from crate starts. For more information on how things work, please see this post

– Fortress Age councils and politicians (not wonders), except for "The Exiled Prince" and "The Messenger" research points decreased from 110 to 105
This change will help balance the fast-age options, while avoiding the risks of directly nerfing them further.

– Plantation cost reduced from 800w to 600w (bounties adjusted accordingly)
This change is intended to make transitioning away from natural resources slightly less punitive.

– Trading Posts at minor native settlements now grant a trickle of 0.7xp each;
This change will improve minor native viability, as well as the viability of TP-dependent civilizations, on 0TP maps.

– Starting Town Center building placement minimum range no longer applies to Trading Posts
This change will eliminate the problem of certain Trading Posts being inconsistently possible to take, and reward players with total map control.

– British Allies hitpoints bonus decreased from 10% to 5%
This is a significant nerf to Chinese, a less significant nerf to Indians, and will help the viability of Consulate options for both of these civilizations.

– Crossbowman inaccuracy removed
This change corresponds to approximately a 7% damage increase, on average.

Aztecs

– Temple of Xipe Totec shipment now also increases Coyote Runner ranged resistance from 10% to 20%
Especially in light of the Eagle Runner Knight nerf, this change (like the one below it) is aimed at helping Aztecs counter ranged infantry, in the late-game.

Chinese

– 100w removed from starting crates; dynamic ("random") starting crates added
Currently, depending entirely on the crate start, Chinese can be up (or down) 100 resources—a 200 resource swing. Necessarily, this is a major balance issue for the civilization, making it impossible to balance. Now, that won't be the case anymore, which will automatically make the civilization more balanced – and allow it to be balanced, in the first place.

Other changes are all geared towards increasing viable options.

Germans

– Per-shipment xp required increased from 110% to 112%
Combined with the buff to minor native Trading Posts, this nerf – along with the Jäger nerf – will help balance the civilization.

– Settler Wagon ranged attack huntable multiplier increased from 4 to 5.75
This change will avoid punitively poor starts on some maps.

Indians

– Brahmin Monk Stomp passive ability moved from Discovery to Colonial Age
This change will drastically reduce balance issues arising from the ability.

– Taj Mahal "Cease Fire" ability duration decreased from 20 to 15 seconds; now also halves all military unit speed
This change will promote the intended, defensive usage of the ability.

Ottomans

– Abus Gun artillery multipliers decreased from 0.75 to 0.5"Veteran Abus Guns" improvement +2 line of sight and range reduced to +1 line of sight and range; "Guard Abus Guns" improvement now also grants +1 line of sight and range
These changes will help balance the unit against artillery, as well as help the viability of the Culverin as an option, while reducing perceived overperformance—particularly in team games, where it is most viable.

Portuguese

– Berry and hunting gather-rates increased by 5%
Cheaper Settlers alters starting crates, eliminates the 10/10 age-up option, counteracts the designed inherent weakness of the civilization, infringes on another's basic feature, disproportionately buffs fishing and turtling builds, as well as advancing to the next age. This change does not.

– Cassador ranged attack "rate-of-fire" increased (nerfed) from 3.0 to 4.5; ranged attack increased from 17 to 25
This change will make the unit more unique, according to its original design, while helping its viability and the performance of the civilization.

– Organ Gun train-points decreased from 45 to 40; unpacked (“limber)” mode speed increased from 1.6 to 2.4; unpacking time decreased from 2 to 1 seconds
These changes should make the unit more appealing (especially to train), and more fun to use. They should also make it less punitively weak to some other Fortress Age artillery units.

Russians

– Musketeer batch cost increased from 270f, 90c to 285f, 95c
Corresponding to a revert and a subsequent marginal cost increase of 1%, this change slightly nerfs the civilization, while keeping resolved the problematic decimal cost, that causes the player to be unable to train a batch of Musketeers, despite (seemingly) having the resources.

Sioux

– Teepee gather-rate aura increased from 3% to 5%; no longer stacks; range decreased from 24 to 18
This change will disincentivize the currently incentivized stacking of the maximum number of Teepees, by not necessarily rewarding it—instead directly rewarding doing the opposite.

– War Chief ranged resistance increase from 10% to 30% moved from Fortress to Colonial Age
This change is correcting an original mistake, and should pose no balance issue, with the changes to the Teepee.

Spanish

– "Caballeros" shipment changed from +1 hand attack infantry multiplier to +1 hand attack infantry multiplier and +2 hand attack range for Lancers
This change is intended to make the shipment more appealing, and allows the Lancer to attack from behind a single infantry unit, with the shipment.

So the reasoning for china crate start change was because of 200res swing and “allow china to be balanced in the first place”.

Many civs have a different number of crates compared to others look at russia or jap compared to port for example, 300f 300w just gives china so many options which they wouldnt have with a 200w start (cant even 2nd village). Now with the the random crates theyre either going to be really overpowered with the added buffs on a wood start, or be complete shite on a coin start, so tell me how thats more balanced than before.

The rusket nerf like wtf is that, they were never a problem on re infact on a balanced map russia are barely average on RE, we’ve seen the snowball effect many times with russia whether it was cheaper settlers or cheaper ruskets, now you wanna make it even worse than RE for the sake of a fucking decimal point.

[Cometk]

+100c start was eliminated on this iteration of the patch. it no longer exists. only the +100f +100c crate start exists in regards to crate starts incl. coin crates. obv there is still the +100f, +100w, and +100f +100w starts

[Mr_Bramboy]

I'm fully in agreement with diarouga and Hazza. I do feel like Zoi listens to what I have to say regarding both patch balance and patch development, but it's clearly not enough.

[Goodspeed]

Hazza's post seems to sum up the complaints about the crate change, so I'm replying to him, but also @Lukas_L99 @deleted_user5 @Riotcoke @Kawapasaka @n0el

Many civs have a different number of crates compared to others look at russia or jap compared to port for example

The important difference here is that a civ like Russia gets, compared to their opponent, the same number of extra crates every game. With current China, the difference between their crate start and the opponent's crate start is not the same every game. Current China is much stronger when they are facing a German with a coin start than when they face a German with a wood+food start. The difference between these scenarios is hard to overstate, and should've been a major balance complaint ever since China's crate start was fixed. Somehow people never cared. Finally it's being fixed.

300f 300w just gives china so many options which they wouldnt have with a 200w start (cant even 2nd village). Now with the the random crates theyre either going to be really overpowered with the added buffs on a wood start, or be complete shite on a coin start, so tell me how thats more balanced than before.

Because every civ has this issue. Yes, China will be weaker on a coin start. So is every other civ. This is why people saying China will be unplayable on coin starts are vastly overstating things. Every other civ except Dutch is also much worse on coin starts, so it evens out. For most other civs, a non-wood start means no early TP. It will be the same for China after this. The civ is more balanced because it gets the same bonuses from the random crate start as their opponent.

The difference to balance over many games will be minimal. The point is to balance China in individual games, as opposed to currently where they are extremely reliant on the opponent's crate start.

From an earlier thread:

The problem is in the difference in strength of the civs purely based on a dice roll. I gave the example of China because it illustrates it perfectly. You say China is always "down" one crate, but that's not true. Ignoring the detail that actually they would be down an extra (food) crate in 2/5 cases, you can just as easily argue they are always up a crate. The problem isn't in whether they are up or down a crate, the problem is the difference between their crate start and the opponent's.

It's especially apparent when you consider a game between Germans and China. If Germans get a wood start, they get an early TP. If they get a coin start, they're unhappy. China gets the same crates either way. This severely impacts the result of the game. It can be argued that it is actually the difference between Germans winning the match up and losing it, and it's purely based on chance. That is poor game design.

Getting a wood start on a TP map is similar to almost +1 vill for most civs. And it's (relatively) okay if both civs get it, but because we have a civ like China with their static crates, we have this problem. That is why you either give every civ fixed crates, or none of them.

And stopping to think about that extra food crate for a sec: The difference between only a coin start and a wood+food start is 152 villager seconds. Even without the potential TP start, that's like having +1 vill for most of discovery age.

Frankly, I think China's crate start issue is one of the biggest things currently lowering AoE3's skill cap because it introduces a good bit of randomness. It's a good thing not every game has China in it.

[[Armag] diarouga]

The difference is that China NEEDS a TP or a 2nd village in age 1.
With most nilla civs, you get a TP or a market depending on the crate start.
With China however you get a TP or nothing depending on the crate start.

The conclusion is that China is much more affected by a crate start because a nilla civ will go TP age 1 then market on wood start and market in age 1 and TP in transition while China will either get a TP or no TP.

Do you realise that you can't even ship a military shipment in age 2 because you have no 700w shipment then ? China probably can't win against a rush or a musk/huss timing on food start lol.

[Goodspeed]

The difference is that China NEEDS a TP or a 2nd village in age 1.

Then Germans NEED a TP in age1. Yes, the difference in strength is big, but this is the case for most civs. Besides, I won't speak for Zoi but it seems that this is being treated as a small nerf to the civ overall, and other changes have been made to compensate.

With most nilla civs, you get a TP or a market depending on the crate start.
With China however you get a TP or nothing depending on the crate start.

Not necessarily the case. For example on a coin+food start, China could mine and chop for market + sell coin for the food upgrade and a village.

[n0el]

You could chop and gather to age slower and get a nice 5% bonus. Whereas euro civs can age the same and get 10%

[Le Hussard sur le toit]

The difference is that China NEEDS a TP or a 2nd village in age 1.

Then Germans NEED a TP in age1. Yes, the difference in strength is big, but this is the case for most civs. Besides, I won't speak for Zoi but it seems that this is being treated as a small nerf to the civ overall, and other changes have been made to compensate.

The main difference is that China get a double nerf on a gold crate : no TP and a weaker first shipment, while Germany still gets its op 2SW shipment. I suck at this game but even I can see why this may be a problem. And with the slight overall buf they will be even better on wood starts the effect on balance does not seem so good.

(On the other hand zoi's argument that it's easier to make the crates floating for China than to fix them for everybody is difficult to argue against).

[Goodspeed]

The difference is that China NEEDS a TP or a 2nd village in age 1.

Then Germans NEED a TP in age1. Yes, the difference in strength is big, but this is the case for most civs. Besides, I won't speak for Zoi but it seems that this is being treated as a small nerf to the civ overall, and other changes have been made to compensate.

The main difference is that China get a double nerf on a gold crate : no TP and a weaker first shipment,

How does China currently get both the TP and a 3v shipment?

(On the other hand zoi's argument that it's easier to make the crates floating for China than to fix them for everybody is difficult to argue against).

Right. We shouldn't forget the current problem, which somehow keeps getting understated (I really, for the life of me, don't understand why). Yes, the solution may not be ideal, and yes, China may be slightly more reliant on their wood crate than most if not all other civs but the other option is the current, much bigger power swing based on the crate start.
(And like you mentioned the third option is fixed crates for all civs, which was discarded for good reasons).

[dansil92]

Lets just imagine for a moment if every civ got a 300 wood atart every time. Spain would get a tp guaranteed and plough up to fortress with the option to ship CM with no trouble or slowing to their shipments, making their timing virtually unstoppable. Germany would just be obscene. Japan would unquestionably be top tier. India.... *shudders*

But when china gets 300 wood guarantee then its "necessary." Can we come to terms that this may be too much? The real strength of the china ff is that they get like 7 shadowtech units and that they can guarantee a tp start. On ep6 china was just too... safe? Too... guaranteed to be strong? I like the crate float. Yeah 300/300 is gonna be nuts but its not like india, japan, or germany arent just stupid on those starts too

[dicktator_]

Zoi definitely does listen to player feedback. I think what he does is he tries to find a compromise between his vision for aoe3 and what top players want. Which is why the China banner armies stayed but for example the 10 mace -> 9 mace and 9 mace -> infinite 8 mace (which he tried to push on ep6 as well) was scrapped. That said if EVERY top player disagreed with the China banner army changes it probably should have been scrapped. I think the biggest problem with the set of changes is how big it is, at least for me personally none of the changes made me think "this is horrible" (at worst they made me think "seems kinda weird", though maybe the reason I'm not too concerned either way is because I'm not as invested in aoe3 as I used to be) but with all of them combined it's kinda overwhelming and I understand why some people are upset. Also not sure what Zoi's vision is or why the patch is getting so ambitious (ep6 also wanted to be ambitious but was curbed because of the LAN I think) when we were already so close to good balance and could get there with some small tweaks. I thought that maybe it was because DE is on the way but n0el said in a twitch chat that Microsoft will be in charge of balance again for DE, and if they were planning on collaborating with EP in any way he would know about it.

[Le Hussard sur le toit]

Show hidden quotes

The difference is that China NEEDS a TP or a 2nd village in age 1.

Then Germans NEED a TP in age1. Yes, the difference in strength is big, but this is the case for most civs. Besides, I won't speak for Zoi but it seems that this is being treated as a small nerf to the civ overall, and other changes have been made to compensate.

The main difference is that China get a double nerf on a gold crate : no TP and a weaker first shipment,

How does China currently get both the TP and a 3v shipment?

In a 300 wood start they get either a TP or a 3 vill shipment. The contrary of "p or q" is "no p and no q", so "no TP and no 3 vills shipment". Anyway I won't argue more because I'm out of my league here and I have a maths problem that will satisfy my urge to think about things I don't understand. (Unless there is someone here who is an expert on the Calderon problem for Maxwell's equations ?)

[Goodspeed]

Show hidden quotes

The difference is that China NEEDS a TP or a 2nd village in age 1.

Then Germans NEED a TP in age1. Yes, the difference in strength is big, but this is the case for most civs. Besides, I won't speak for Zoi but it seems that this is being treated as a small nerf to the civ overall, and other changes have been made to compensate.

The main difference is that China get a double nerf on a gold crate : no TP and a weaker first shipment,

How does China currently get both the TP and a 3v shipment?

In a 300 wood start they get either a TP or a 3 vill shipment. The contrary of "p or q" is "no p and no q", so "no TP and no 3 vills shipment".

Yes but that's not a double nerf. It's not like they're losing both.

[Sargsyan]

Show hidden quotes

The difference is that China NEEDS a TP or a 2nd village in age 1.

Then Germans NEED a TP in age1. Yes, the difference in strength is big, but this is the case for most civs. Besides, I won't speak for Zoi but it seems that this is being treated as a small nerf to the civ overall, and other changes have been made to compensate.

The main difference is that China get a double nerf on a gold crate : no TP and a weaker first shipment,

How does China currently get both the TP and a 3v shipment?

In a 300 wood start they get either a TP or a 3 vill shipment. The contrary of "p or q" is "no p and no q", so "no TP and no 3 vills shipment".

Yes but that's not a double nerf. It's not like they're losing both.

the point is not they're losing a tp and a village at the same time, the point is they will get neither a tp nor an extra village with 200w start

[Goodspeed]

Which is not a double nerf. He said "no TP and a weaker first shipment", when they would already never have both as is. If you're doing a TP build your first shipment isn't weaker than currently, it's the same. And if you're doing the 2 village build, you're not missing a TP that you otherwise would have.

[Cometk]

Show hidden quotes

The difference is that China NEEDS a TP or a 2nd village in age 1.

Then Germans NEED a TP in age1. Yes, the difference in strength is big, but this is the case for most civs. Besides, I won't speak for Zoi but it seems that this is being treated as a small nerf to the civ overall, and other changes have been made to compensate.

The main difference is that China get a double nerf on a gold crate : no TP and a weaker first shipment,

How does China currently get both the TP and a 3v shipment?

In a 300 wood start they get either a TP or a 3 vill shipment. The contrary of "p or q" is "no p and no q", so "no TP and no 3 vills shipment".

Yes but that's not a double nerf. It's not like they're losing both.

the point is not they're losing a tp and a village at the same time, the point is they will get neither a tp nor an extra village with 200w start

instead, they get +100f (much expedited colonial age time) or +100f +100c (same thing), same as any other civ

[RefluxSemantic]

In my opinion the patch is split between disputable design changes, good balance changes and just random number tweaks that sometimes worry me.
The design changes are things that I sometimes strongly dislike. The RE patch has a pretty good civ identity. There are all sorts of different civs that do all sorts of things. There is basically a civ for everyone. The ESOC patch has often mistaken design changes for balance changes and this patch really increases those design changes. I don’t really think it’s for the better though. Some things seem poorly thought out, some things just straight up remove defining characteristics of civilizations and some just seem really random. I have always disliked these changes; Like I said, RE has a really nice mix of civs. There is almost the perfect mix of things. Some civs are a bit one dimensional, but that’s fine imo. There are 14 civs, you don’t have to like every single civs. If some civs are more catered towards a specific playstyle (“one dimensional”) then that is fine; after all, if you want to play a very flexible civ then you are free to play for example France. Some people enjoy playing a very limited civ, and try to get around those limitations and use their strengths. I believe RE should offer something for everyone. Of course, some people are going to strongly dislike some civs. However, I believe that you shouldn’t try to avoid people disliking civs, you should design so that people will have something they love. So let the civs be diverse, and sometimes one dimensional; there will always be that one civ somebody loves within the 14 extremely diverse civs of RE.
Now in this patch there are a few design changes that bother me:

1) The banner army changes to China. One of the integral parts of China’s civ identity is that your armies train in the banner armies. This isn’t just a ‘gimmick’ similar to Russia’s batches, this is something that deeply affects all decision making with regards to China. That is because not all unit combination banner armies are available. China is actually limited in the army compositions they can make. It’s often said that China is weak to cavalry for example, because they can’t make a good anti cavalry banner army. And that’s fine! It leads to strategy. For example this leads to China players often electing to go for the Intervention shipment first, because that gives them something to balance out their army composition. This also leads to other players going for specialized cavalry strats against china. I recall a game where LordRaphael went for almost full cuirassier with very early cav combat cards against China. This was a really awesome strategy that abused this part of China civ design.

The proposed banner army changes take away this entire dimension of China, and replaces it with nothing. There is this defining and extremely unique aspect of China and it’s just removed from the game. I hate it. I loved how China made you play differently than normal civs because your army composition was so limited. I loved how you could (and almost had to) abuse China’s inflexibility in army composition to succeed against them. I loved how I would try to play around the fact that China can’t just mass skirms without producing Chandaos. I am extremely sad that for some reason this very cool, defining and integral part of China has just been removed.

2) The Portuguese changes. The Portuguese have always been a very turtly civ. You get lots of Town Centers, but otherwise have very little going for you, and you have to turtle a bit to make use of it. The Portuguese are one of the few turtle civilizations in the game and are thus one of the few civs that can really give a player the joy of playing a turtly style. Although maybe the old changes weren’t the greatest, they at least tried to keep Ports true to what they have always been like; an FF civ that makes a lot of villagers.

While these new changes aren’t that impactful, I really dislike them. Moving the upgrades around seems to once again fundamentally alter the design of civs. Ports have never been a civ that would win by very effective, strong units. Ports are a civ that wins by turtling and dragging the game into a point where their economy is much better. I dislike that it might turn into a civ that can play colonial musks similarly to how Brits can. Getting strong upgrade cards is almost a specific civ bonus in itself, so you’re really changing the civ design a lot by moving these cards around. I also think the hunting/berries gather rate change is somewhat random. It doesn’t really fit the design of a turtle civ at all.

3) To a lesser extent, the 6 coyote shipment for Aztec bothers me. If this change is impactful, it will really change the Aztec build order from the ground up, whereas otherwise it’s a bit of a useless change. I think it might have been better to look at other aspects of the standard Aztec build order, and to try to make what they were already doing a bit stronger. One more elegant change would be to slightly buff some aspect of the firepit; for example slightly reduce the time it takes to build a warrior priest. I'm also a bit said that the Aztec hero can't be revived with the healing dance anymore. I always thought the Aztec explorer stuff was really cool and unique (ofc, it was a bit overpowered with the covered mode bug). I hope it can be viable without healing dance. I must admit I don’t really understand the core of the Aztec balance problems, but I hope a solution can be found to the balance problems without trying to turn something unused into the solution to the balance problems.

4) Sioux is still in a terrible state in my opinion. I love their RE design. Sometimes I just really get that itch to play a super mobile, raiding oriented civ like Sioux. I just love running around with Bow riders, catching villagers left and right and just being all over the map. I really do feel like EP has taken a lot of this away and I think that what is left of Sioux is a bit bland. The war club change for example seems to not fit Sioux at all. Isn’t it supposed to be a very mobile, cavalry oriented civ?

5) The same is true for Spain. I get that Spain can be a bit one dimensional, but it’s one dimension that is at least very unique. I’d much rather see the patch make sure that their FF is competitive and strong, than to see the patch try to just give them a better option than to FF. In that light, I still don’t really understand the Spanish gold change and I still don’t know why unction keeps getting buffs. The lancer change is at least a bit flavorful and sort of fits their playstyle.

6) There are many more smaller changes with design effects that I dislike. Why give settler wagons a higher herdable multiplier? I loved the challenge of trying to get around this small handicap and German age 1 is already pretty smooth. You’re just taking away a unique quirk that can be played around with skill. I dislike how abus guns suddenly have to be worse against artillery, I really loved that unique aspect of them. Did we really have to take away the cool cease fire india strats (which can totally be countered by just running away in time.. it’s usually successful because aoe3 players have a bad reaction time) instead of just nerfing the civ in general? You take out something cool under the flag of balance.

Now there are a lot of number tweaks to units. For many of these buffs, I’m praying that it doesn’t actually end up making the units viable. It’s sometimes assumed that adding more options makes the game more interesting, but I don’t think that’s necessarily true. Adding more things can also distort what was once carefully balanced game design. For example Halberdiers are a scary thing to buff. One has to wonder what the game would actually look like if Halberdiers were viable. If instead of making just goons against cav, you could make a combination of a Halberdier meatshield (which is now actually strong) and a ranged cav backline. Hand cav is hardly viable as if. If you end up buffing the anti cav in age 3, I honestly doubt that we would ever see hand cav again. It also has the dangerous side effect of being an unforeseen buff to civs that actually can make halbs, which could ruin the balance that has been so carefully iterated upon. Of course just this one change isn’t terrible, and I’m sure with this change halbs will still be terrible. However, this EP makes dozens of these changes and I’m sure a bunch of them will have undesired effects, for what’s otherwise very little gain (you’re just tuning something irrelevant that stays irrelevant).

Some examples are the TC no build area for TPs. I don’t know if this has been given proper thought, because it just straight up sounds game breaking. Imagine being a civ that can’t easily grab a TP early (eg. Dutch, Japan, 200w start China, Russia). Now imagine being up against an ATP civ on Florida. You should realize that this will mean you’ll be playing the game with two 30 attack extremely strong outposts around your town center, possibly denying you multiple hunts. That would just be beyond ridiculous. This is probably something that the patch team didn’t consider yet (because I cannot imagine how anyone would think such a scenario is okay…) and that just goes to show how risky these seemingly irrelevant tweaks can be.

The native TP xp trickle is another one of these examples. Do we really want natives to be viable? First of all, viable natives pose a serious balance issue: Natives vary a lot in strength and in unit types. So naturally, match ups are going to be wildly different based on how strong the natives of a map are for that match up. The natives also have upgrades that really favor different civs, which will give more balance problems. It’s going to be really messy. Secondly, if this is actually strong, it kind of takes away the uniqueness of the civs. Instead of civs doing their strong strategy, they will be doing their variant of the generic native strat. Instead of civs being limited by what units they can actually make, they might just get natives that completely nullify their weakness. Just imagine Dutch actually having a strong anti cav alongside their skirms.. It would completely ruin their design for me, because I love having to play around the the handicap of not having good age 2 anti cav.

There are so many more of these. Do we really want spies to be viable? Do we really want Dutch to be spamming envoys into every fight? At some point Otto’s church upgrades will be buffed to the point that an otto turtle boom is the main playstyle, I don’t think that would be desirable. Do we really want India to be incorporating Flail elephants to their playstyle? Should Japan’s weakness to artillery be taken away by buffing Yabusame? Is it really fun for Samurais to be viable? These are all things I am scared about. I hope many of these will turn out to be insignificant (it does seem like they are intended to turn out that way).

But then still, even if most changes are insignificant, I see another problem. This entire patch is filled with so many insignificant tiny changes. Why are Beisteros 400w cheaper? Why do great bombards train 15 seconds slower? Why is 200f, 100w 100c infinite shipment changed? Why is the building line of sight for Ottoman consulate removed? Did we really need this buff for Steppe riders? Did rocket train time really need to be reduced by 8 seconds? Did priests really need to be 50 gold cheaper? The effect of this is that it’s really bothersome for players that haven’t been following the scene, or are new to (competitive) aoe to get into ep. I really dislike that aspect of it too. It always used to be an EP philosophy to stay true to RE, because the game design of RE is what everybody liked and because that made the patch more attractive to people not already playing it. I’m very sad this philosophy is dead. I do like the follow the game from time to time, but all these random changes make that a lot less fun. I also really think the current philosohpy is too ambitious. You can blame other people for not testing the beta, but the bitter truth is that currently testing these huge scale changes is just not possible for our community. I remember testing an iteration of EP at one point, and by accident discovering that walls were literally broken (units could just walk through them). However great the developers are (and trust me, they are pretty damned great), there might always be gamebreaking bugs too and obviously many of these changes could be gamebreaking as well. The previous scale of EP seemed much more realistic and suitable to the state of the game/community.

At least hopefully the balance will improve. I hope some of this criticism will be taken into account. I really believe the new design philosophy is harmful for the success of this patch. There are always some good things though; I do like the treasure changes (although, once again a long list of changes that makes it harder to get into EP, in principle it’s good). I also can appreciate the plantation change and the reverts of some older changes. At least you didn’t nerf Dutch so I should be happy right!? (/s)

ESOC Patch bug fixes
- Changdao cover mode attack standardized to deal half the damage of regular attack.
- Indian Monks now have the previously missing AbstractElephant tag.
- The Aztec Heal Dance no longer affects "knocked out" War Chiefs.
- Other players can no longer see if "2x" shipments have been sent, via deck inspection.

Tiny nitpick: These should probably be listed under balance changes. They are pretty impactful. I think it's a more transparent format to have gameplay affecting bug fixes under the balance changes. This way it kind of seems like you're trying to get away with some nerfs by calling them bug fixes.

That being said, and maybe I should have started by saying this: I am really grateful for the work the developers have put into this patch. This patch is beautiful from a technical perspective, and the functionality is so much more than I could have ever imagined. It’s just amazing!

[RefluxSemantic]

Lets just imagine for a moment if every civ got a 300 wood atart every time. Spain would get a tp guaranteed and plough up to fortress with the option to ship CM with no trouble or slowing to their shipments, making their timing virtually unstoppable. Germany would just be obscene. Japan would unquestionably be top tier. India.... *shudders*

But when china gets 300 wood guarantee then its "necessary." Can we come to terms that this may be too much? The real strength of the china ff is that they get like 7 shadowtech units and that they can guarantee a tp start. On ep6 china was just too... safe? Too... guaranteed to be strong? I like the crate float. Yeah 300/300 is gonna be nuts but its not like india, japan, or germany arent just stupid on those starts too

Let's not forget that China's house costs them 200w and not 100w.. A China 300w start is like a 200w start for other civs. The problem is that on 200w China can't get a market like other civs can, on top of their first shipment being very weak (2 vills) and their early game being really poor anyways. It's almost like a civ would spawn with 300f 100w, without having good age 1 shipments. I think it actually qualifies for the worst crate start in the game.

And although the fixed crates were really ugly, I honestly believe this change is even worse. I think the disparity between a wood start and any other start is bigger than the previous crate start disparity. Obviously ideally we just fix the crates for all civs - it sucks when RNG is such a dominant factor in the outcome of a game, but for some reason people think that would ruin the game.

[Goodspeed]

Jerom confirmed

[Sargsyan]

one does not simply read jermon posts without calling him fackfase for writing such long posts

[RefluxSemantic]

Which is not a double nerf. He said "no TP and a weaker first shipment", when they would already never have both as is. If you're doing a TP build your first shipment isn't weaker than currently, it's the same. And if you're doing the 2 village build, you're not missing a TP that you otherwise would have.

Although I generally agree, I think it's important to realize that China actually sacrifises a villager to get that TP. Maybe getting a TP 100% of the time is a bit strong, but that wouldn't mean getting 2 villages and a villager shipment would be too strong. However, that is now also impossible on most crate starts.

[Garja]

The difference is that China NEEDS a TP or a 2nd village in age 1.
With most nilla civs, you get a TP or a market depending on the crate start.
With China however you get a TP or nothing depending on the crate start.

The conclusion is that China is much more affected by a crate start because a nilla civ will go TP age 1 then market on wood start and market in age 1 and TP in transition while China will either get a TP or no TP.

Do you realise that you can't even ship a military shipment in age 2 because you have no 700w shipment then ? China probably can't win against a rush or a musk/huss timing on food start lol.

Nah the civ doesnt need it. And anyway can always get it with the two wood starts and can get a market with the 100g start. On the food start you age a bit earlier so you net about 50w and build the TP in transition to colo, if you chose so. It's the same as other civs.


It's funny how among all the changes the China crate one actually makes some sense, despite being of course game changing.

I am baffled at how the building restriction thing for TPs made through the change list and how it did so quickly. It's such a 1) nonsense change 2) bad for balance 3) basically none advocates for it

[SoldieR]

This is when people start to realize China can skip 700w shipment, especially with tower age up...

[Kawapasaka]

This is when people start to realize China can skip 700w shipment, especially with tower age up...

There are already situations against hard rushes where you'd skip 700w, but now you don't get another unit shipment or 20 extra pop space to hold it.

[Lukas_L99]

This is when people start to realize China can skip 700w shipment, especially with tower age up...

And then you're age 3 without a rax, a consulate and popped.