AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

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Nauru Dolan
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by Dolan »

Being imba never stopped a game from being popular or selling skins. People will just buy skins for the broken civs and lame them.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by duckzilla »

I think that there is a lot that we did not see yet such as a number of core units that all civs have access to, e.g. swordmen, bowbois, pikes, catapults, horse bowbois, etc. There is still a lot that can look like aoe2.

A civ like Mongols, which packs up its base and leaves for another location, might be very strong in the hands of a good player (apm) and comparably weak otherwise.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by Goodspeed »

RefluxSemantic wrote:
n0el wrote:
Goodspeed wrote:And AoE3 was live tested and balanced over more than a decade and we're still not close. What I mean by inherently unbalanced is that it's virtually impossible to balance every match up. Making sure each civ wins an equal number of match ups may be possible, but is a different, much less than ideal type of balance.
AoE3 has cards and unique civilizations, its not like AoE2 where the civs have the same core units and there are some unique units and techs.
That is goodspeeds point? Unique civilizations like in aoe3 (and as they seemingly advertise for aoe4) make balancing harder. 8+ civs makes balancing individual match ups impossible.

And then Mart thinks this means the game wont succeed because a large portion of players wont even consider a game that doesnt have perfect balance.
I'm not saying the game won't succeed, just that from this alone we can safely say it won't be a Starcraft competitor, and that many of the more purist RTS fans will drop it.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by Goodspeed »

Dolan wrote:Being imba never stopped a game from being popular or selling skins. People will just buy skins for the broken civs and lame them.
It has historically been pretty important for RTS in particular, though.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by RefluxSemantic »

Goodspeed wrote:
RefluxSemantic wrote:
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That is goodspeeds point? Unique civilizations like in aoe3 (and as they seemingly advertise for aoe4) make balancing harder. 8+ civs makes balancing individual match ups impossible.

And then Mart thinks this means the game wont succeed because a large portion of players wont even consider a game that doesnt have perfect balance.
I'm not saying the game won't succeed, just that from this alone we can safely say it won't be a Starcraft competitor, and that many of the more purist RTS fans will drop it.
I suppose. I just dont think there are that many real purist fans out there. Over the years I have started to realize that a competitive scene is simply the result of a multiplayer game with a lot of players. Even games that really dont fit the idea of a competitive scene and look to me like they're intended to simply be fun end up having competitive scenes because people are just playing the game. Think of rocket league, overwatch, even stuff like hearthstone battlegrounds (slot machine simulator) had some tournaments. Hell, there are even battle royale tournaments. If the game is good, people will play it, and with people playing it there will be a competitive scene. Unless the high level gameplay is really shit, people will simply play the game because its fun. We'll have maybe a handful of purist mocking in the corner, but it wont kill the competitive scene or anything.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by Goodspeed »

It just won't be as big as Starcraft. My point is that it can't be, with this kind of fundamental problem.
And also that I personally dislike the decision because I enjoy playing a well-balanced game.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by RefluxSemantic »

Goodspeed wrote:
Dolan wrote:Being imba never stopped a game from being popular or selling skins. People will just buy skins for the broken civs and lame them.
It has historically been pretty important for RTS in particular, though.
Can we even use the word 'historically' when that means you're talking about ~10 games in the past 15 years? I mostly recall sc2 and that game is a succes despite big balance issues. Lets not pretend its balance was fine, it had enormous balance issues at release and throughout its history, with two notably long stretches of utter zerg dominance.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by Goodspeed »

RefluxSemantic wrote:
Goodspeed wrote:
Dolan wrote:Being imba never stopped a game from being popular or selling skins. People will just buy skins for the broken civs and lame them.
It has historically been pretty important for RTS in particular, though.
Can we even use the word 'historically' when that means you're talking about ~10 games in the past 15 years?
Why not?
I mostly recall sc2 and that game is a succes despite big balance issues. Lets not pretend its balance was fine, it had enormous balance issues at release and throughout its history, with two notably long stretches of utter zerg dominance.
SC2 has had periods where some races were dominant, yet its balance was and is leagues above where AoE3 ever was or could've been, simply because the amount of races they had allowed them to strive for (and often achieve, to a reasonable degree) balance in every single match up. This enables players to specialize and assume that, even if not at every point in time, at least throughout the years their race would be, on average, competitive in every MU.

The difference is best illustrated looking at whether the best players were ever "forced" to switch civs in order to be competitive. While this often happened in AoE3, by my knowledge it was never widespread in SC2, if it ever happened at all.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by RefluxSemantic »

Goodspeed wrote:It just won't be as big as Starcraft. My point is that it can't be, with this kind of fundamental problem.
And also that I personally dislike the decision because I enjoy playing a well-balanced game.
There isnt really evidence for this statement, there isnt even anything that implies this would be true. Esports are built upon inherently imbalanced games. Maybe you are right, but I dont really see the case you're making here. You keep bringing up sc2 but sc2 has had atrocious balance issues throughout its history. All good competitive games that come to mind have balance issues really. Im thinking hearthstone, overwatch, dota, LoL, mtg, sc2, smash, all big balance issues throughout their history. I see where you are coming from, but I just dont see anything backing up your case.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by Goodspeed »

RefluxSemantic wrote:
Goodspeed wrote:It just won't be as big as Starcraft. My point is that it can't be, with this kind of fundamental problem.
And also that I personally dislike the decision because I enjoy playing a well-balanced game.
There isnt really evidence for this statement, there isnt even anything that implies this would be true.
Correct, it's just my prediction.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by supernapoleon »

Does anyone know if the homecity mechanic will be part of the game? I feel like it would be important for the game to feel dynamic and fast especially in the beginning.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by Garja »

supernapoleon wrote:Does anyone know if the homecity mechanic will be part of the game? I feel like it would be important for the game to feel dynamic and fast especially in the beginning.
In the resource UI panel there are two icons above the resources. Not sure if they might be number of relics or what but they could also be a meta resource like cards.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by duckzilla »

Would be nice to see the shipment mechanic be part of the game, e.g. as a kind of policies that can be adopted from time to time to flesh out the style of government.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by Dolan »

I doubt it tbh, since the card system was one of the reasons AOE3 didn't become a popular game in mainstream gaming.
Most people found it confusing or difficult or were just put off by the HC unlocking system.
Since Microsoft stated they are trying to capture mostly the AOE2 audience with AOE4, I think they'll try to stick to the AOE2 mechanics as much as possible and only add a few minor elements from other installments of the game.
I mean, this is 2021, nobody's taking any risks in gamedev, everyone's going with the surest way to make a buck.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by ǝɯɐuɹǝsn »

finnally something worst than the DE so i can sotp complainning about the DE
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by Jerimuno »

there's no way the card system has made it into aoe4. absolutely no chance
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by howlingwolfpaw »

Cards may not make it, but I have seen some icons in the UI that seem different for each civ which may have to do with civ bonuses and how they earn them.

For instance Delhi gets free tech upgrades and uses scholars to research them. In their UI above the resources have a feather quill, and a scroll. I have not seen those with the English, and China had its own icon.
So perhaps the researches are free, but have to be earned somehow.

AOE 3 balance was so tough because civs were lacking certain unit type. Dutch and German for instance no musketeer, yet having over developed other units. While the devs say it will have some asymmetrical balances, (which makes it interesting) so far what we have seen is each civ still has pretty much the same unit types. Archers, foot soilders (sword n shield, pikemen), lancer cav/ cav with sowrds, siege, etc... So some may have certain bonuses in some areas and deficits in others. Also Cards add a lot to unbalance the matchups because of how fast civs can earn them (or with trade post), and how differently they can be applied. If that system were taken out entirely and the techs made re searchable AOE3 may have some decent balance entirely. We can see this in evidence of staying in base and leveling up just to get better age cards, while kind of skipping the value of early ages, putting those who invested early far behind someone just for use of cards.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by RefluxSemantic »

howlingwolfpaw wrote:Cards may not make it, but I have seen some icons in the UI that seem different for each civ which may have to do with civ bonuses and how they earn them.

For instance Delhi gets free tech upgrades and uses scholars to research them. In their UI above the resources have a feather quill, and a scroll. I have not seen those with the English, and China had its own icon.
So perhaps the researches are free, but have to be earned somehow.

AOE 3 balance was so tough because civs were lacking certain unit type. Dutch and German for instance no musketeer, yet having over developed other units. While the devs say it will have some asymmetrical balances, (which makes it interesting) so far what we have seen is each civ still has pretty much the same unit types. Archers, foot soilders (sword n shield, pikemen), lancer cav/ cav with sowrds, siege, etc... So some may have certain bonuses in some areas and deficits in others. Also Cards add a lot to unbalance the matchups because of how fast civs can earn them (or with trade post), and how differently they can be applied. If that system were taken out entirely and the techs made re searchable AOE3 may have some decent balance entirely. We can see this in evidence of staying in base and leveling up just to get better age cards, while kind of skipping the value of early ages, putting those who invested early far behind someone just for use of cards.
From the wording on the Delhi research, I speculated earlier in this topic that a research system might play a similar role to a home city system, with 'research' instead of experience and 'technologies' instead of shipments. The UI elements could be another indication that this theory makes sense.

Its probably wishful thinking. I do think that there is a place for such systems in RTS games. Tech trees or more generally mutually exclusive bonuses work well in strategic video games. Its simply interesting and encourages strategic thinking, even if its a rather bland design.

Again, this is partially wishful thinking.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by supernapoleon »

I agree, tech is not the issue. But 3 vills in age 1 or 700 wood/coin in age 2 gives aoe 3, compared to other game (except maybe for sc2), a very fast and dynamic start. Other RTS games feel for me always very slow. Aoe2 feels more like base building and farming for me in the early game. It seems like they might be doing this to aoe 4 as well (big focus on the base building so far) to please aoe2 players. It would be really sad not to have this mechanic.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by howlingwolfpaw »

I'm all for losing the deck system for a slower paced game, I think it will help balance. That high lights and makes good use of later ages. So many games are won in age 2 all in rushes or stopping at age 3 play, DE has done a little more to curb that, but AOE 4 definitely wants to see castles and sieges as part of everyday gaming.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by RefluxSemantic »

howlingwolfpaw wrote:I'm all for losing the deck system for a slower paced game, I think it will help balance. That high lights and makes good use of later ages. So many games are won in age 2 all in rushes or stopping at age 3 play, DE has done a little more to curb that, but AOE 4 definitely wants to see castles and sieges as part of everyday gaming.
If you like that sort of stuff you should try aoe2
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by howlingwolfpaw »

I have but that is not what makes AOE 3 far superior. Its cool, but its not needed, and certainly does not help to make balance easier. There is a lot I would like incorporated into a new AOE title in the medieval age, but decks are not necessary. I do like longer games which is why in part I am drawn to FFA, I like full tech armies and to force people to use cannons or lose. 1v1 so many just get by with the cannon shipment and spamming more units. I hope castle walls and keeps require siege engines to take down, using torches is quite silly for such a thing. AOE 3 needs units to take down walls though, because they are so cheap and cost wood. At least in a stone resource game walls will be a trade off between using castles which have a lot of utility and are needed or trading surpluses away at the market so I do not think will be able to abuse them.
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

Post by Goodspeed »

n0el wrote:
Goodspeed wrote:time will tell
I mean, I guess, but the game has been play tested for the last 3 years by a group of 30-40 players, and there are multiple teams affiliated with MS that are testing it all the time.
You sound bought btw. I know you know better than this
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

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"you sound bought" :lol:
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Re: AOE4 All We Know From April 10th

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Post by n0el »

Goodspeed wrote:
n0el wrote:
Goodspeed wrote:time will tell
I mean, I guess, but the game has been play tested for the last 3 years by a group of 30-40 players, and there are multiple teams affiliated with MS that are testing it all the time.
You sound bought btw. I know you know better than this
well i was part of the process, and ive been part of past processes. this one has a lot more focus. im not saying its going to be perfect, but it will surely be better than past attempts.
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