Beta V3

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After additional input, I've decided to make some changes to the draft. Please refer to the OP for complete, current notes.

The following changes are being added to the update:

General
– Any time a Trading Post has been built on a minor native settlement, the player that built it now receives 100xp – Eaglemut (we love you!) has discovered that this change is currently implementable. It is most significant in the early game, where minor natives are generally the least viable. It should encourage allying with them, increasing options without being overpowering.

Aztecs
– Arrow Knight speed increased from 3.75 to 4 – By command of Garja himself. Although I lack his spirit, I think it's a positive change, without significant risk.
– Temple of Xipe Totec shipment now also increases Coyote Runner ranged resistance from 10% to 20% – This will help the unit's viability in the late game—especially when it comes to countering ranged infantry.
– Temple of Centeotl shipment now also adds 1 to Macehualtin splash radius – This will help the unit's viability in the late game—especially when it comes to countering light cavalry and ranged infantry. Please note that it may be substituted with a safer one, unless testing instills confidence.
– Great Temple of Huitzilopochtli shipment cost reduced from 2000c to 1500c (Religious Unity shipment adjusted accordingly)
– Great Temple of Quetzalcoatl Support shipment cost reduced from 2000c to 1500c (Religious Unity shipment adjusted accordingly)

Chinese
– Iron Flail hand attack decreased from 20 to 19 (damage cap decreased from 40 to 38); hitpoints decreased from 320 to 292 [revert]
– Meteor Hammer attack increased from 25 to 29 [revert]

Indians
– Ottoman Allies line of sight bonus no longer applies to buildings – The current effect is arguably an issue with at least Agra Fort, and definitively one with walls.

The following changes are being stricken from the update:

General
– 100c dynamic (“random”) starting crate spawn removed – Among other things, I will be polling this, in the coming days, to decide whether to include it with EP7. More deciding polls are forthcoming, before the conclusion of the beta.
– Unique minor native alliances now grant a trickle of 0.6xp per second, while they last – It is currently unclear whether this change is technically possible.
– Stagecoach line of sight increased from 0 to 15 for all six expansion civilizations – Thanks to Eaglemut's revelations, this change is now correctly classified as a bug fix.
– Iron Horse line of sight increased from 0 to 15 for all six expansion civilizations – Thanks to Eaglemut's revelations, this change is now correctly classified as a bug fix.

Aztecs
– "Heal Dance" no longer affects the dead War Chief – It is currently unclear whether this change is technically possible.
– Puma Spearman "Siege Trooper" unit-tag removed – Feedback is divisive, and the change risky and non-essential; if further Aztecs buffs are desirable, in the future, it should be considered, then.

Germans
– Doppelsoldner hitpoints decreased from 240 to 230 – Among other things, I will be polling this, in the coming days, to decide whether to include it with EP7. More deciding polls are forthcoming, before the conclusion of the beta.

OP has been updated accordingly. Once the release is out, I will update the respective threads, too. Please expect the update's release in the coming few days, and note that there will be at least one more update, before the conclusion of the beta.

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Added Chinese changes to above post and OP.

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Added general and Aztecs changes to the above post and OP. Please note that changes to other Aztec temple shipments may be added in a future update.

[n0el]

Is there somewhere that has the changes compared to current in one place?

[Garja]

General
– Any time a Trading Post has been built on a minor native settlement, the player that built it now receives 100xp – Eaglemut (we love you!) has discovered that this change is currently implementable. It is most significant in the early game, where minor natives are generally the least viable. It should encourage allying with them, increasing options without being overpowering.

Well this change has the same conceptual flaw of the xp trickle and possibly is even worse because it incentives taking nat posts but not holding them.
Also 100xp is objectively a lot early on (2 arkasans passes). Nat rushes are insanely boosted from this change.

Aztecs
– Arrow Knight speed increased from 3.75 to 4 – By command of Garja himself. Although I lack his spirit, I think it's a positive change, without significant risk.
– Temple of Xipe Totec shipment now also increases Coyote Runner ranged resistance from 10% to 20% – This will help the unit's viability in the late game—especially when it comes to countering ranged infantry.
– Temple of Centeotl shipment now also adds 1 to Macehualtin splash radius – This will help the unit's viability in the late game—especially when it comes to countering light cavalry and ranged infantry. Please note that it may be substituted with a safer one, unless testing instills confidence.
– Great Temple of Huitzilopochtli shipment cost reduced from 2000c to 1500c (Religious Unity shipment adjusted accordingly)
– Great Temple of Quetzalcoatl Support shipment cost reduced from 2000c to 1500c (Religious Unity shipment adjusted accordingly)

I think I have pointed it out already but 20% for coyotemen is potentially problematic. The unit is already hard to counter when massed and pretty deadly with the attack dance. As discussed that card should just provide few more units to be in line with the other temple cards.
Also, 1.5k gold is still a lot for those card to be any viable. 1k gold with half the units would be a better change.

[Kaiserklein]

Yea, typically inca rush on pampas could be too good in some mus. And the useless nats would still be useless cause 200w for just 100 xp and nothing else is not worth it.

[EAGLEMUT]

@zoom does this change list include all of the changes that will be included in V3, or will other changes in V2 be added onto this list when the list is updated?

This is a balance changelist from current V2 Beta. Combined changelog will be released when V3 is actually released, along with bugfixes and such.

– Starting Town Center building placement minimum range no longer applies to Trading Posts

Not sure how I feel about this. I would say this is a mostly unnecessary change, and I'm not convinced it's even preferable to the current system.

Seems like a great change to me; it ensures players don't get screwed just because some TP socket spawned a bit off and is now unusable. It was historically a real pain to spawn TP sockets both randomly and fairly 100% of the time, due to the building restriction.

– Unique minor native alliances now grant a trickle of 0.6xp per second, while they last

I don't know how I feel about this either. I'll take it just because non-TP maps really need some kind of xp income at this point, I guess.

Yeah, seems like some kind of change is quite urgent, judging by the current plans of removing non-TP maps from tournament play completely. Although this particular one won't make it in, for now.

– Musketeer batch cost increased from 270f, 90c to 285f, 95c [from -4% cost to +1% cost]

Just let it have the decimal, it's not a big deal, really.

Smaller deal than +1% cost to fix it?

Can we please include the Japanese deck "bug fix" as a balance change? It's arguably the largest balance change in this whole list at a competitive level--not to mention that it's debatable whether or not it even is a "bug." If anything it should probably be reverted, to be honest.

I am appalled by this suggestion. It's on the level of buffing Aztecs by giving them cover mode exploit back.

[Kaiserklein]

Regardless of whether we want to revert the deck x2 thing or not, it's definitely not just a "bug fix". It's a huge buff to japan, definitely needs to be called a balance change.

[EAGLEMUT]

Regardless of whether we want to revert the deck x2 thing or not, it's definitely not just a "bug fix". It's a huge buff to japan, definitely needs to be called a balance change.

Whether a bug is causing something to be hugely buffed or nerfed should really not be a reason to call it a balance change. It's still just a bug that was fixed with the intent to make the game less bugged, not to balance it.

I realize this is a hot topic due to the large number of bugfixes introduced by EP, but the way I see it, mixing seemingly random bugfixes into the balance change list would only serve to increase confusion and of course make the balance changelist harder to get through, as it will become more crowded (which some argue is already a problem). A possible solution could be to split the bugfixes into more sections such as "Major" / "Minor" to distinguish the more important ones, though it might still be tough to decide what goes where.

[Garja]

So, sending and canceling a shipment restores the x2 currently? I thought it would still remove the x2 from the canceled card.

[Kaiserklein]

Whether a bug is causing something to be hugely buffed or nerfed should really not be a reason to call it a balance change. It's still just a bug that was fixed with the intent to make the game less bugged, not to balance it.

Nah, the point of this change is to buff japan. So to me it's a balance change.

It's in fact such a big balance change that most likely no others are needed to buff japan, in fact mitoe or hazza (or me ofc) even think it's too much of a buff already.

[Mitoe]

Regardless of whether we want to revert the deck x2 thing or not, it's definitely not just a "bug fix". It's a huge buff to japan, definitely needs to be called a balance change.

Whether a bug is causing something to be hugely buffed or nerfed should really not be a reason to call it a balance change. It's still just a bug that was fixed with the intent to make the game less bugged, not to balance it.

I realize this is a hot topic due to the large number of bugfixes introduced by EP, but the way I see it, mixing seemingly random bugfixes into the balance change list would only serve to increase confusion and of course make the balance changelist harder to get through, as it will become more crowded (which some argue is already a problem). A possible solution could be to split the bugfixes into more sections such as "Major" / "Minor" to distinguish the more important ones, though it might still be tough to decide what goes where.

Do we know that it’s even a bug, and can’t possibly have been intended? And even if that’s the case, it should still be listed as a balance change. I don’t really care if it’s a bug or not—if it completely changes the way every single one of Japan’s matchups play out (and it almost does) then it’s a balance change, and a pretty massive one at that, and should absolutely be listed as a balance change.

[n0el]

I really think people are overrating the affect of removing the 2x. We scout every other civ's shipment progression when it matters, why would it be different for Japan.

[Goodspeed]

I really think people are overrating the affect of removing the 2x.

Seems so

[Kaiserklein]

No, you guys underrate its effect. It's in fact impossible to scout shipments of regular civs in many situations, because you'd just lose your scout. And on top of that, japan is one of the civs that can go for a ton of different build orders, so being able to automatically scout their shipments is even bigger.

[Garja]

Eh, just list in both or put an asterisk or w/e

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Is there somewhere that has the changes compared to current in one place?

As the update has not been released, Eaglemut has not yet updated the release post. However, using the OP of this thread (which contains the current V3 build) and the release post it links to (which contains the current beta changes, from EP6), grasping things should be a small task.

[n0el]

But it has revert's from V2 and V1, which makes it very confusing to read.

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@zoom does this change list include all of the changes that will be included in V3, or will other changes in V2 be added onto this list when the list is updated?

Also why remove the 100g crates. It's just a crate like the others and it's actually cool because it makes things more colonial oriented. It's not an improvement in terms of balance really. It is going to increase the number of times TP civs get a TP in age1 (which apparently most consider problematic). It is also going to increase the number of times Russia gets the food start vs Japan or Germans or Dutch or w/e civ might struggle vs Russia. Brits will more often get 1 extra house and the 4.10 age up. I mean all those cases are ok but I don't see them being preferable to the point that 100g has to be removed. Asian civ vs FF civ with gold start is arguably better for the asian civ (no TP and in Jap vs Brits it often means 4.30 vs 4.30 age up). I'm sure there are plenty of other situations but you got the point. It's just an arbitrary decision with ass logic.

To be perfectly honest everything you said here makes fixed crates sound really appealing. Why are you against that again?

– Starting Town Center building placement minimum range no longer applies to Trading Posts

Not sure how I feel about this. I would say this is a mostly unnecessary change, and I'm not convinced it's even preferable to the current system.

– Unique minor native alliances now grant a trickle of 0.6xp per second, while they last

I don't know how I feel about this either. I'll take it just because non-TP maps really need some kind of xp income at this point, I guess.

– 100w removed from starting crates; dynamic (“random”) starting crates added
– Village cost reduced from 200w to 180w (bounties adjusted accordingly)

Meh...

– Envoy train points decreased from 30 to 10

Seems unecessary, IMO. If anything make the change smaller. Perhaps 30 to 25 or 20?

– Musketeer batch cost increased from 270f, 90c to 285f, 95c [from -4% cost to +1% cost]

Just let it have the decimal, it's not a big deal, really.

Sioux
– “4 Villagers” shipment added [revert]
– Brand new “5 Villagers” shipment added to Colonial Age removed [revert]
– “Mustangs” shipment increased from 10% to 15%

Does this mean teepees are remaining the same?

– Berry and hunting gather-rates increased by 5%

Must we? Surely there's better ways of balancing the civ.

Whether to further nerf Germans, and if so: How.

Is the 13 Jaeger > 12 Jaeger change listed in V2 still going through? That should probably be included. This plus the additional 5 seconds on fast age seems like a reasonable starting point.

Whether to further buff the Sioux.

I'm confused. If teepees are not being changed than they're OP. I will wait to hear confirmation of whether or not the V3 change list is missing changes from the V2 change list.


Other notes:
Can we please include the Japanese deck "bug fix" as a balance change? It's arguably the largest balance change in this whole list at a competitive level--not to mention that it's debatable whether or not it even is a "bug." If anything it should probably be reverted, to be honest.

The list in the OP contains all changes from V2 currently planned for V3. Please see my above post for further clarification.

For the fifteenth time: The definition of a bug has nothing to do with whether it affects balance. I cannot condone classifying what is most likely a bug as anything other than a bug. According to the poll I made on the subject, some time ago, I absolutely intend to highlight it, and certain other bug fixes, as particularly relevant to balance, in the patch notes, though.

Now, technicalities aside, I think it's stupid and undesirable that discerning precisely whether a given shipment has been sent by an enemy, is ever possible without scouting – let alone through deck inspection! I'd rather nerf Japanese otherwise, should said change should be determined to be undesirable to balance. Although I realize many players change their mind on balance, on a whim, I will remind everyone that Japanese was very recently considered one of the weakest civilizations (especially by you, incidentally). For this reason, as well as the actual properties of the change, I consider it unlikely that it will prove particularly problematic to balance, while ackowledging that it's hardly insignificant, either.

On another note, I'm considering halving the Yabusame buff from +2 ranged attack to +1, during the beta, seeing as it is one of the few viability changes that are actually risky to inter-civilization balance.

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But it has revert's from V2 and V1, which makes it very confusing to read.

I wonder if you misunderstand: The release post by Eaglemut always features the combined changes from the previous version of the patch (EP6, in this case), to the current beta version (V2, in this case). Only add the list of changes in the OP, to the release post by Eaglemut, and you will have current (projected) changes, from EP6 through V3 of the beta.

If it remains an issue to you, I'm happy to do the merging, ITT, prematurely – as soon as I finish the treasure change notes.

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Added the following change (OP updated accordingly):

– Before Colonial Age, rescued warriors (treasure rewards) now do 1/4 damage to heroes and villagers

Removed the following change (OP updated accordingly):

– Monastery cost reduced from 225w to 200w

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But it has revert's from V2 and V1, which makes it very confusing to read.

I wonder if you misunderstand: The release post by Eaglemut always features the combined changes from the previous version of the patch (EP6, in this case), to the current beta version (V2, in this case). Only add the list of changes in the OP, to the release post by Eaglemut, and you will have current (projected) changes, from EP6 through V3 of the beta.

If it remains an issue to you, I'm happy to do the merging, ITT, prematurely – as soon as I finish the treasure change notes.

For practical reasons, I decided to reverse my priorities. Please refer to OP's spoiler, to see the currently projected Beta change-list.

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Some of those changes are very flawed in the underlying logic.
I mean why would you need some sort of xp mechanic at all costs (nat TPs). Also let's say you take 4 nat posts which equals to 2 TPs. Is that balanced and desired? To me it sounds both unbalanced (too much xp and in trickle form) and also kinda shit design (competes with TPs when they're supposed to be 2 completely different things).
Also why remove the 100g crates. It's just a crate like the others and it's actually cool because it makes things more colonial oriented. It's not an improvement in terms of balance really. It is going to increase the number of times TP civs get a TP in age1 (which apparently most consider problematic). It is also going to increase the number of times Russia gets the food start vs Japan or Germans or Dutch or w/e civ might struggle vs Russia. Brits will more often get 1 extra house and the 4.10 age up. I mean all those cases are ok but I don't see them being preferable to the point that 100g has to be removed. Asian civ vs FF civ with gold start is arguably better for the asian civ (no TP and in Jap vs Brits it often means 4.30 vs 4.30 age up). I'm sure there are plenty of other situations but you got the point. It's just an arbitrary decision with ass logic.

You wouldn't; I just think it would help inter-civilization balance on 0tp maps, and incentivize minor native use, without significant drawbacks. It seems worthwhile to try.

The reasons I am suggesting to remove the 100c start, is that it's the greatest outlier, in terms of inter-civilization balance, and that it doesn't seem to add meaningful variety (that 100f or 100f+100c) already doesn't offer. I think it's a sound compromise between fixed and random crate starts. Athough balance would suffer (particularly for Dutch), I'm happy to keep the 100c start, if players prefer. Compromise is such a dirty word! The essential thing is that Chinese is no longer necessarily unbalanced.

Both those assesments are wrong tho.

I do not understand what relevant variety 100c offers, that 100f+100c does not. I have created a poll to determine the decision.

[Garja]

Well I admit I didn't notice it was only the bare 100g variation. Rush civs may be better with that, or on the opposite it provides the gold for the mm. Also it changes certain age up times. Regardless of which civs benefit the most from that, it's still one more combination so it does add variety.
The change is just another example of urge to change stuff without a clear effect.

[Mitoe]

I really think people are overrating the affect of removing the 2x.

Seems so

We’re not overrating it. I think over half of my losses to Japan are a result of not checking which shipments they are sending in Colonial and getting caught off guard by what is otherwise a nearly unscoutable (or at least unscoutable in time to react) ashigaru rush for example.

Japan is currently ONLY balanced because of how effectively the opponent can react to / counter whatever Japan does. Once we make it significantly harder to scout on top of limiting how early you can scout it I’m certain Japan is going to be very very strong.