AOE-II DE Does Hera start his era of domination tomorrow?

[otw_Da]

I barely enjoy 1on1 and this sir plays so strong I can't enjoy him. Who gonna stop him when he continue his journey from here?
Young, hungry and ready. He ate NAC4 already for breakfast. Is it just the beginning?

 

[mmXy0]

Nope, there will never be a dynasty as the viper had one. Since two or three years it's 4-8 players constantly competing for the top alternately winning the tournaments and will stay like this.

My prediction is even that theviper will still win more s-tier tourneys in the future than the others. But just with a slide edge.

 

[_Andrew]

I’d favor him to win tomorrow but just slightly. Every S tier event final between him and Lierey seems to come down to a final game one way or the other. And viper at his best is still right there with them.

 

[Barbapapa]

Depends on how hard Liereyy works on aoe2. In my opinion Liereyy has more talents than Hera, but Hera is more diligent in improving his gameplay.

 

[AlBundy95]

Good, now after decider game we can stop this discussion until KOTD V

 

[kshotts1]

Maybe it’s being a prisoner of the moment, but seems likely Hera will end up widely viewed as the top player in aoe2 after a few more S tier tourneys are complete. He’ll never be as dominant as Viper was though. The level of competition is simply too high nowadays.

It’s also completely possible Viper retains his title of best player if he is able to be more consistent. His peak level still surpasses anyone else’s IMO.

 

[kalpit00]

Maybe it’s being a prisoner of the moment, but seems likely Hera will end up widely viewed as the top player in aoe2 after a few more S tier tourneys are complete. He’ll never be as dominant as Viper was though. The level of competition is simply too high nowadays.

It’s also completely possible Viper retains his title of best player if he is able to be more consistent. His peak level still surpasses anyone else’s IMO.

Here's the thing though, age of empires 2 has evolved throughout the years and the level has only gone up. There's no telling if the peak Viper from 2018-19 who destroyed everyone (only Liereyy came close to being #2) would be able to beat the current level of Hera and Liereyy simply because the players have improved so much

Its true there is an entire new game now with constantly changing balance (a lot of Viper's most dominant success was in userpatch before DE came out)

If we recall some changes, zero lag and abysmal knight pathing in DE really help players like Liereyy because its a direct buff to xbows. And on the other hand, Viper's always been a greedy boy stylistically, he loves defense and macro (just like Hera) and back in the day, the mango delete trick and lag made it impossible for someone to push.

It's hard to tell if Viper's peak can be comparable to the level we have currently. Because back in the day, Viper would lose some games here and there but in the end somehow come back in games because people weren't as good at closing games out. They don't let that happen anymore. Everyone is aware of their win conditions, and everyone is preparing based on the maps.

Before, players had their own map specialties (Liereyy/Hera on Arabia clones, Yo on Nomad, Nicov/Tatoh on water, Daut on Regicide Fortress, Vinchester on Arena, etc). And Viper? #1 on all map types. But currently, everyone is much much more complete. Anyone can take games from anyone on any map as everyone's preparation and civ drafts comes into play.

 

[_Andrew]

I'm old enough to remember when the narrative was Hera could never get past Lierey in tournaments, now the roles have reversed a bit over the last couple of years. I think the most likely explanation is they're extremely close in skill level and when every final between them seemingly ends 5-4, 4-3, etc there probably isn't much gap one way or the other. The ball has bounced Hera's way in the decisive games lately just as it used to bounce Lierey's way. Will it swing back to Lierey? Probably as long as the two players are this close in skill.

 

[Hunyadi_]

I'm super happy for Hera. He's put in the work and it's paying off.