Introduction: This is an explanation topic for the changes in the AOC Balance Patch developed by me and John Mendl. The current version of the patch is version 6.6 which is an improvement over the version 3.2 used in the Balance of Power Tournament. The BOP tourney gave a refreshing variety of civs as the STATISTICS demonstrate. With absolutely no restrictions on civ picks, only 12.5% of the games in the final stage were mirror games compared with 80% or more mirror games that we observe in normal free civ pick tourneys. With a new balance patch tourney planned soon, here is an explanation for the changes in the patch.
Improving strategic variety in land: Of all the problems AOC faces, the lack of strategic variety is at the top of the list along with civ balance. Almost every expert game you can observe involves a race on who gets the crossbow upgrade the fastest and can score the most early damage with them, be it as drush followed by FC or a drush/straight feudal followed by castling in the early 20 mins. The crossbow upgrade being so cheap is the number one killer of strategic variety in the land game. Tackling this problem helps to shift the game more towards feudal play or using knights/eagles instead of crossbows. Cavalry archers are useless units for ordinary civs, a somewhat overpowered unit for huns (the hun CA bonus nerf tackles this) and a rarely useful unit for mongols and maybe post-imp saracens or turks. 10 less gold gives more reason to use these units for non-hun civs. Swordsmen have been boosted to encourage their usage more, while making sure miltia don't get their share here. Militia given -1 pierce armor helps archers/skirms deal with them easier vs a drusher. The eagle warrior changes help improve their usage as an alternative strategy to crossbows for aztecs/mayans, while the raiding power of elite eagles is checked a bit. Monks are nerfed a bit which can encourage people to go knights and reduce the power of a monk/mangonel combo. Monk push as such is somewhat overpowered on arena and other maps in many cases. This is especially important given the nerf for crossbow upgrade as crossbows are a practical counter to monk rush before mangonels come in numbers. Scorpions are boosted to increase their usage possibilities being underpowered in castle age.
- Crossbow upgrade costs 175F 125G (instead of 125F 75G).
- Cavalry archers base cost = 40W 60G (instead of 40W 70G).
- Sword-line (except militia) speed increased from 0.90 to 0.94 tiles per second.
- Militia -1 pierce armor, Longswords have 60 HP (instead of 55), Two-Handed Swords have 12 attack (was 11).
- Non-elite Eagles attack bonus vs cavs increased from +2 to +3, creation time decreased to 30 sec (was 35 sec).
- Elite Eagle Warriors speed reduced from 1.3 to 1.27 tiles per second.
- Monks (and missionaries) average conversion time increased from 8 to 9 sec, conversion randomness reduced.
- Scorpion attack increased to 14 from 12. Scorpions and heavy scorpions move 10% faster.
Improving strategic variety in water: These simple changes help improve the water map balance between galleys/fire ships/demolition ships which is normally dominated by galleys. Korean turtle ships are clearly improved and viking longboats are somewhat improved.
- Fireship-line move 10% faster. Fast fire ships +10 HP.
- Turtle ships +1 pierce armor, cost 160W 160G (instead of 200W 200G).
- Longboats base cost 90W 40G (instead of 100W 50G).
Improving strategic variety in team games: Changes that are specific to improving the balance in team games - to nerf slinging, make allied vision easier to obtain, improve trade cogs, reduction of spanish trade bonus.
- Base tribute fee increased to 35% (from 30%). Coinage costs +100F +50G, banking +50F +50G.
- Cartography costs 50F 50G (instead of 100F 100G), research time 30 sec (instead of 60 sec).
- Trade Cogs carry 30% more.
- Spanish team (trade) bonus reduced from 33% to 25%.
Gameplay enhancers: Making houses weaker helps people break through house walling easier. House walling is almost always used in expert games atleast in parts of the town. A wall is only as strong as its weakest link, even if the player covered the remaining parts with stonewalls. Houses being cheaper helps to nerf the huns as a civ too. Palisades and stonewalls are also costlier, increasing the price of full walling a town somewhat well. Petards being cheaper helps people break through stonewalls at a reduced price. Outposts costing only wood means that you can now use them for strategic purposes much more than before without the fear of losing stone for town centers. This can be a refreshing alternative to walling in certain cases. Guard tower upgrade is rarely used and keep upgrade almost never used in games, and the changes increase the prospects of using them. Hand cart being cheaper helps to shift the balance of AOC somewhat from the typical ranged units costing only wood and gold to units like knights/lcav/infantry/skirms that cost food as well (the reason being handcart improves farming much more than wood/gold/stone collection). Same applies to squires/tracking/husbandry being cheaper. All these clearly improve the prospects of going knights/eagles in castle age for example and makes games more exciting than pure xbow/CA/mangonel warfare.
- Houses cost only 25W, get -150HP.
- Palisade walls cost 3W instead of 2W.
- Stonewalls cost 6S instead of 5S, take +2 seconds to build (8s changes to 10s).
- Hand Cart costs 250F 150W (instead of 300F 200W).
- Squires costs 100F (instead of 200F), Husbandry 150F (instead of 250F), Tracking 50F (instead of 75F).
- Petards cost 60F 20G (instead of 80F 20G).
- Guard towers +1 attack, Keeps +2 attack.
- Outposts stone cost removed, costs 30W.
Reduction of luck factor: There is a certain luck factor in the game that is distinct from what can be called randomness. This luck factor comes mainly through dark age "laming" or using your exploring scout or eagle to dramatically change the course of the game in your favour through simple and neat tricks along with some luck. Exploring the enemy early to steal his sheep/boar/kill his unloomed villager (especially when you have eagle as the explorer) can be a major game changer in the expert level. These changes reduce the problem, reducing the exploring advantage of the eagles (and mongol scouts too, check the mongol changes) and making stealing of boars much more challenging task.
- Wild Boars +6 attack vs scouts, +7 attack vs eagles.
- Eagle -1 LOS before castle age.
Bugs fixes and minor enhancements: These are either small additional changes to improve the game balance or bug fixes.
- Fervor now works properly. Monks carrying relics also incur anti-monk damage.
- Two-Handed Swordsman, Cavalier, Heavy Camel upgrade time -25 sec.
Due to the limit in the length of the topic, I'm separating the list of civ changes to the next post.
Improving strategic variety in land: Of all the problems AOC faces, the lack of strategic variety is at the top of the list along with civ balance. Almost every expert game you can observe involves a race on who gets the crossbow upgrade the fastest and can score the most early damage with them, be it as drush followed by FC or a drush/straight feudal followed by castling in the early 20 mins. The crossbow upgrade being so cheap is the number one killer of strategic variety in the land game. Tackling this problem helps to shift the game more towards feudal play or using knights/eagles instead of crossbows. Cavalry archers are useless units for ordinary civs, a somewhat overpowered unit for huns (the hun CA bonus nerf tackles this) and a rarely useful unit for mongols and maybe post-imp saracens or turks. 10 less gold gives more reason to use these units for non-hun civs. Swordsmen have been boosted to encourage their usage more, while making sure miltia don't get their share here. Militia given -1 pierce armor helps archers/skirms deal with them easier vs a drusher. The eagle warrior changes help improve their usage as an alternative strategy to crossbows for aztecs/mayans, while the raiding power of elite eagles is checked a bit. Monks are nerfed a bit which can encourage people to go knights and reduce the power of a monk/mangonel combo. Monk push as such is somewhat overpowered on arena and other maps in many cases. This is especially important given the nerf for crossbow upgrade as crossbows are a practical counter to monk rush before mangonels come in numbers. Scorpions are boosted to increase their usage possibilities being underpowered in castle age.
- Crossbow upgrade costs 175F 125G (instead of 125F 75G).
- Cavalry archers base cost = 40W 60G (instead of 40W 70G).
- Sword-line (except militia) speed increased from 0.90 to 0.94 tiles per second.
- Militia -1 pierce armor, Longswords have 60 HP (instead of 55), Two-Handed Swords have 12 attack (was 11).
- Non-elite Eagles attack bonus vs cavs increased from +2 to +3, creation time decreased to 30 sec (was 35 sec).
- Elite Eagle Warriors speed reduced from 1.3 to 1.27 tiles per second.
- Monks (and missionaries) average conversion time increased from 8 to 9 sec, conversion randomness reduced.
- Scorpion attack increased to 14 from 12. Scorpions and heavy scorpions move 10% faster.
Improving strategic variety in water: These simple changes help improve the water map balance between galleys/fire ships/demolition ships which is normally dominated by galleys. Korean turtle ships are clearly improved and viking longboats are somewhat improved.
- Fireship-line move 10% faster. Fast fire ships +10 HP.
- Turtle ships +1 pierce armor, cost 160W 160G (instead of 200W 200G).
- Longboats base cost 90W 40G (instead of 100W 50G).
Improving strategic variety in team games: Changes that are specific to improving the balance in team games - to nerf slinging, make allied vision easier to obtain, improve trade cogs, reduction of spanish trade bonus.
- Base tribute fee increased to 35% (from 30%). Coinage costs +100F +50G, banking +50F +50G.
- Cartography costs 50F 50G (instead of 100F 100G), research time 30 sec (instead of 60 sec).
- Trade Cogs carry 30% more.
- Spanish team (trade) bonus reduced from 33% to 25%.
Gameplay enhancers: Making houses weaker helps people break through house walling easier. House walling is almost always used in expert games atleast in parts of the town. A wall is only as strong as its weakest link, even if the player covered the remaining parts with stonewalls. Houses being cheaper helps to nerf the huns as a civ too. Palisades and stonewalls are also costlier, increasing the price of full walling a town somewhat well. Petards being cheaper helps people break through stonewalls at a reduced price. Outposts costing only wood means that you can now use them for strategic purposes much more than before without the fear of losing stone for town centers. This can be a refreshing alternative to walling in certain cases. Guard tower upgrade is rarely used and keep upgrade almost never used in games, and the changes increase the prospects of using them. Hand cart being cheaper helps to shift the balance of AOC somewhat from the typical ranged units costing only wood and gold to units like knights/lcav/infantry/skirms that cost food as well (the reason being handcart improves farming much more than wood/gold/stone collection). Same applies to squires/tracking/husbandry being cheaper. All these clearly improve the prospects of going knights/eagles in castle age for example and makes games more exciting than pure xbow/CA/mangonel warfare.
- Houses cost only 25W, get -150HP.
- Palisade walls cost 3W instead of 2W.
- Stonewalls cost 6S instead of 5S, take +2 seconds to build (8s changes to 10s).
- Hand Cart costs 250F 150W (instead of 300F 200W).
- Squires costs 100F (instead of 200F), Husbandry 150F (instead of 250F), Tracking 50F (instead of 75F).
- Petards cost 60F 20G (instead of 80F 20G).
- Guard towers +1 attack, Keeps +2 attack.
- Outposts stone cost removed, costs 30W.
Reduction of luck factor: There is a certain luck factor in the game that is distinct from what can be called randomness. This luck factor comes mainly through dark age "laming" or using your exploring scout or eagle to dramatically change the course of the game in your favour through simple and neat tricks along with some luck. Exploring the enemy early to steal his sheep/boar/kill his unloomed villager (especially when you have eagle as the explorer) can be a major game changer in the expert level. These changes reduce the problem, reducing the exploring advantage of the eagles (and mongol scouts too, check the mongol changes) and making stealing of boars much more challenging task.
- Wild Boars +6 attack vs scouts, +7 attack vs eagles.
- Eagle -1 LOS before castle age.
Bugs fixes and minor enhancements: These are either small additional changes to improve the game balance or bug fixes.
- Fervor now works properly. Monks carrying relics also incur anti-monk damage.
- Two-Handed Swordsman, Cavalier, Heavy Camel upgrade time -25 sec.
Due to the limit in the length of the topic, I'm separating the list of civ changes to the next post.