This NEW PATCH Will Fix Age of Empires 2 transcript

Uh, so hello everyone. Uh, there's been a new DLC or there is a new DLC coming out in about a week now. And alongside this DLC, there's going to be a whole host of balance changes, not just for the new civilizations, but also for all of the civilizations in the game, as well as some generic changes. So, here it is. Today, we're going to hop right in and check it out. I've got five pictures up here. So, there's a lot of changes.

Let's go ahead and take a look at them one by one, so you guys have all the information ahead of this patch. So when it drops, you are ready to play. You're ready to just hop in that rank ladder and get some free ELO before everyone catches up. So this is posted by the Forgotten Empire developer. Uh balance changes. So the general balance changes are that infantry uh or in the infantry category. Men arms bonus damage with shock infantry plus two that becomes plus three.

Long sword goes from plus 8 to plus 9. Tunersman and champion get one extra. So from plus 8 to plus 9. And then eagle scout train time from 50 seconds to 46 seconds. So what does this mean? Uh meta arms the champions get extra damage with shock infantry. Shock infantry is like uh the Vangian guard which is the new unit. Eagle warriors uh fire lancers. All of those are considered shock infantry. So they're essentially non-heavy infantry and not spearmen.

They're like the middle uh infantry uh class, let's say. And so the swordsman line is supposed to be a direct counter to those. However, in practice, the swordsman line was not good enough against the shock infantry, and so the developers are actually buffing the infantry line to be better against those new units. The thing is though is that the shock infantry is a very good uh unit class, and so by buffing the the infantry line against it instead of nerfing this class, what you end up end up doing is like now everything is just stronger.

It's like this is a really strong class and so therefore you have to go into this uh infantry line which is also now a stronger class because it gets extra damage and so the power level of everything is going up which is interesting to note. Eagle scouts are also being made a few seconds faster. This only helps asex and mines the only two meos left and it gives them only a small boost in feudal age. Nothing too crazy.

Uh siege battering ram line of sight increased from three to five. That's pretty good. Battery rams were very blind before. Getting a little bit of extra vision helps when making pushes. Same thing for the armored elephant. You get plus two line of sight. Siege tower though in exchange of the rams getting a buff. The siege tower actually get a nerf on it line of sight from eight to six. That's a good change. I think the siege tower in general has just been having too many stats pumped into it.

Uh because the devs wanted the siege tower to see more play, so they just they just spammed all kinds of stats into the siege tower. Uh but really the siege to shower is meant to be like a niche siege weapon to hop over walls. Uh it was never being used for that. It was being used for all the other things uh like tanking like uh taxing units like a scout. And so they're kind of uh nerfing the siege tower a little bit, making room for the other siege weapons to actually shine.

Uh honager attack from 50 to 55 and pierce armor 7 to eight. This is an insane change. This is going to make the h oner an actual respectable option now. So before if you had only onager, you almost never went for it unless it was specifically good for a matchup. Uh even in 1 v one, like you just never really consider it. Same same goes for team games. You'd only go for honer if you had siege honagger available uh because it was just much better.

With this buff, it makes hager very respectable. So think of sibs like Vikings, uh you know, Chinese. These civilizations or Chinese get rocket cards now, but like let's say Vikings, uh what's another example? Something like the Franks, you can actually go honor now with those cives because oner gets a huge buff here. Pierce armor getting an extra um or getting an extra one pierce armor is the biggest change here. It makes it so arbless don't completely counter you even though you're supposed to kill arbless.

So this is a really nice change. Overall, I think honor becomes a lot better because of this. Dealing five extra damage is also very relevant uh because you get more kills when you hit archers and caves. Basically naval and buildings. So, demolition ship upgrade went from 50 wood, 100 gold, and 50 seconds to 25 wood, 75 gold, and 20 seconds. So, huge, huge change on the demo upgrade. It's now a lot more affordable. I think that's good.

Demos were very out of the meta on water. Uh, Hulk line mele armor reduced from four, five, and six to three, four, and five. Hulk HP from 90 to 85. Uh, this melee change was basically just so other Hulks when they get forging can deal one extra damage against other Hulk ships. That's the main idea behind this armor change and it's a very good one. A Hulk getting some less HP. I kind of disagree with that, but it's fine.

Luchan bonus damage buildings has been reduced. That's good. Luchan is very overpowered. I think this is not enough of a change actually. I think the Luchan is still completely overpowered. Uh, fire galley bonus damage buildings went from one to zero. Very good. Fire galley was completely melting buildings. It was absurd. Uh they should still be good against buildings, but I think toning it down a little bit is nice.

And then fortified church build time went from 40 seconds to uh to 50 seconds. So, a small nerf to the fortified church. All of this has been very good so far. Uh I don't hate on any of this. I think Luchans could use a bit more of a nerf. Uh the Hulk HP change I don't think is necessary, but like overall I'm not unhappy with anything here. Uh very very good changes from the dev so far. Let's go to the civilization specific ones.

So I have A to B here. Let's go through it one by one. So Armenians just going to make my camera a little bit smaller. This is not about me. This is about the balance changes. I want to make sure all of them appear on the screen. Uh so civilizations, Armenians, we gain treadmill crane. This is almost guaranteed just for a deathmatch. This upgrade does not matter for random map that much. This is a deathmatch specific upgrade.

Um so if you don't know what that is, don't even worry about it. It's not that relevant. Uh then we move to the Bengali. So the Ratha the train time 20 seconds to 24 seconds. Elite is unchanged. Uh this is trying to nerf the phosphor rush for the Bengali. Trying to make the Ratha take a little bit longer to hit the field. I think that's pretty good. 4 seconds I always feel like is not going to make that much of a difference, but I think it's okay.

It definitely helps a little bit. Uh gives you a little bit more time as a defending player. So I would say it's it's substantial. So you're losing a decent amount of your production speed there on the wrath around 20%. So yeah, I think that's a reasonable change uh for the Bengalis. And you also lose treadmill crane, which like I said is mainly a deathmatch nerf. Uh matters a little for random map, but not much. Uh Bohemian so elite and regular hisite wagon costs from 110 wood and 70 gold to 110 uh wood and 80 gold.

So 10 extra gold cost for the hisite wagons. This is once again to nerf the phosphor rush. Uh then the Wagenberg tactics uh movement speed for gunpowder went from 15% to 10%. This is to nerf the late game uh Bohemians. They want to nerf the late game Bohemians uh because the hu or the the Hoffnes as someone in the chat's you know telling me to say the Hoffn um it's way too strong in imper just have no counter to it. So they're trying to make it move a little bit slower.

I I think these are nice changes. I don't know if I like increasing the cost of the site wagon. It already feels like a unit that was quite expensive. Anyways, I would have actually liked to hide some more of the stats behind the elite version if anything. Uh or even like hide more of its movement speed behind wagenberg tactics or something like that. But increasing the cost is kind of like a lazy fix to like the fossil rush.

Uh by the way, this fossil rush will always still be possible. Like no phosphor rush so far has been completely killed off. Uh these are minor nerfs. Uh the fossil rush will be less abusable but still good if the situation calls for it. Uh they gain the mounted crossbowman which is a new unit that replaces the cavalry archer. So whenever you see this I just think it's a cavalry archer that is a little bit different. And then we lose treadmill crane which is once again a deathmatch thing.

Uh Britain's we gain heavy mounted crossbowmen and cranoquins. Uh cranoquins is basically the replacement of parthean tactics. It does something very similar for the mounted crossbow. Um and uh it's very interesting actually because Britains will lose heavy uh heavy and regular cav archers, right? And then they gain heavy mounted crossbow men. So this looks like an even trade, but Britain before did not have access to parathon tactics, but now they actually get cranquins.

So the mounted crossbow for the Britain will actually be a very legitimate option. So in my opinion, Britain get a very big buff from getting access to the mounted crossbowmen uh and the chronicquins technology. So very cool. Uh, Burgundian's Flemish militia went from 30 food and 25 gold to 35 food and 25 gold and futile train time is from 14 seconds to 16 seconds. Uh, pretty good change. Uh, I like it's a double nerf, but it's a small double nerf.

I think this is good. I think this is good. Uh, so Britain's don't get bloodlines, but they do get husbandry. So their mounted crossbow is not going to be meta, but it's going to be a decent option to go into. Like it's an extra option that is very usable, but not like their main thing. Uh, but yeah, Burgundians, pretty big nerf on the Flemish militia. Um, two small ones ends up being a pretty big nerf, but I think the unit should still be very workable.

Uh, the fact that it only costs 25 gold means you can make two of it right away. Uh, the devs insist on keeping it 25 gold. They don't like the fact that you have to mine gold to make more of this. They like that you can just make two one shot. And, uh, losing two seconds on it is going to hurt the spam, but it's nothing too crazy. Uh, we gain mounted crossbow moment and we lose cavalry archers, but we don't get cranoquins, so it's not that exciting.

And we also don't have bloodlines. So again, usable unit, but not going to be anything too crazy. Uh, Byzantines, so elite catifact. Also, we don't even get to heavy mounted crossbowmen. So, it's going to be very uh very niche for the Bundians. Uh, Byzantines, elite catact and regular catifact. Bonus damage versus infantry goes from 9 to 13 and the elite version goes from 12 to 18. So, big buffs for the catifact. What?

Oh, okay. Okay. Okay. I understand why. Uh, logistica now grants trample damage to both catifacts and verangen guards. Uh, but we remove the plus six versus infantry that it also gave before for the catifact. So now that plus six versus infantry is built into the elite upgrade basically. So now they're just buffing the castage version of the catifact. The elite will kind of remain unchanged. Um, it's equivalent to before when you had elite plus uh plus logistica.

So pretty interesting. And now Logistica gives trample damage to the Vangian guards as well. And Byzantines also gain the Verangian guards. And they get the elite upgrade. So, okay, this is crazy. Byzantines got a huge buff, by the way. This is like literally ridiculous. This is going to help my fortress strategy with the Byzantine a lot. Getting access to a whole new unit and also getting an upgrade on that unit from your unique tech that's already upgrading your main option in late game, which is the catifact, is insane.

Byzantines can generally can genuinely be a top tier civ now depending on how good the Vangian guard is because like oh my god we can have cheap skirmishers in castle age with verangian guards as the front line cuz like before Byzantine was missing a front line. You had camels that were like okay and pikeman okay sure both of them on a discount but pikeman and camels are not offensive units they're like defensive units.

So, Byzantine lacked offensive firepower, but with ran guards, which has really strong attack and gets gold as it fights, now you have a really reasonable front line for castle. Byzantines is the biggest winner of this patch so far by far. By far. That that's insane actually. Um, and they didn't nerf the Byzantine in any any other capacity. Like, Byzantines can generally genuinely be an S tier civ in this next patch.

But again, it depends on how good the Vanguard actually is. Super super nice for the Byzantine. Big wins for them. Moving on to the Kelts here. They just gain the heavy mounted crossbowman and then they lose heavy cavar and treadmill crane. So pretty even trade there. They also lose treadmill crane for deathmatch. But uh yeah, pretty even trade. Chinese lose heavy cavure upgrade. That's good. Oh, that's so good. That was a suggestion I gave to the Chinese a long time ago.

The Chinese was like the best in the game forever and nobody knew how to nerf them. And so I suggested they should nerf uh nerf them by taking away one option that is only a high elo option because Chinese is really strong in low yolos. Uh sorry, it's really weak in low elo and it's really strong in high yolo. So if you take away heavy cavar upgrade, you're taking away one of the Chinese options in late game that is only really played in high yolo, but you're leaving the civ untouched for low yolo.

Uh so I think it's a very very good change for the Chinese. Let's see how it plays out. Uh, if it's a bad change, I had nothing to do with it. Uh, but I'm happy to see my suggestion implemented. I think it's a good one. Uh, next we have the Franks. So, small nerf for the Chinese. It's not going to change much, but you know, it's it's a little bit of a nerf. Uh, next we have the Franks. So, elite and regulars throwing axemen range from three to five.

Elite four to six. Good. Honestly, good. The whole bearded axe thing is so annoying. That's so good. That's exactly what the civ needed to be honest because getting an upgrade to buff the throwing axeman from a unit to a decent unit feels horrible. Now it's just a decent unit from the start which is amazing. Five range, six range, no upgrade needed. Amazing. Beautiful. That's a good change for the throwing axeman. With five range is actually very usable in castle age.

Wow. Huge buffs to the Franks. Uh new tech to replace bearded. So salutes in the chat for beardax. Beardax is done. It's gone. Um, we've lost another fallen warrior. I think the last fallen warrior was obsidian arrows for the Mayans, but that's not a classic tech. This is a classic Age of Kings technology, by the way. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Yeah, it's an Age of Kings technology. This was an Age of Kings technology fallen.

I think cuz uh Yeah, I think it was. Yeah. Or Age of Conquerors, maybe. Age of Conquerors. Damn, that's crazy. That's a That's a fallen warrior. It's a legend that just fell in battle. Anyway, new tech ordinance companies, it's a castle. Unique tech makes mounted crossbow cost minus 40% gold. Ooh, okay. Let's do some math on that. So, the mounted crossbow costs 65 gold. Half of 65 is 32.5. We're just going to add 10% to that.

What is that? Like a It's going to cost us like 38 gold. 38 gold on a 40% discount. That's pretty good. Uh, chat, check my math on that. Maybe like 37. I don't know. Um, that's pretty good though. That's a good discount on the mounted crossbowman. Yeah, it's super solid. We gain heavy uh we gain treadmill crane and we also gain heavy mounted crossbow and cranquins and cranins. Oh my god. Wait, I have to see something actually.

I think the Frank bonus the Frank bonus. Just excuse me for two seconds here. Is it applying to all mounted units? Yeah, all mounted units plus 20% HP. That's unchanged. So, your heavy uh heavy mounted crossbow will get plus 20% HP, which is not as good as bloodlines compared to other sips. That's not as good, but you don't have to pay for it. So, Frank's actually got a huge buff and it's 39 gold. So, my math is pretty good.

So, it's going to cost you 39 gold in the late game and it's 40 wood. It's like 40 wood, I believe it costs. Let's just double check this. Yeah, 40 wood. Damn. I'm not to pat myself on the back, but I was spot on with that. It's going to cost you 40 wood, 40 gold basically in the late game essentially with this 40% discount. It's a very cheap unit for what it is. And you also get heavy and cranquins. You're only missing bracer and the last armor upgrade, I guess, on uh yeah, you're missing bracer and the last armor upgrade on your mounted crossbow.

So, I would say it's a very good unit in Castle Age and a decent unit in in Imperial Age, the mounted crossbowman for the Franks, and then you lose the heavy cowers. But dude, overall, I love this change. I think it's a big buff to the Franks, but not in an overpowered way. Like, Franks are not going to be annoying now. They're just going to feel a lot more playable. I really like this. I really, really like this. Like, I I'm actually shocked at how good this change is.

Give me something to hate. The devs. The devs are killing it. The the changes so far have been insane. Um, got gain treadmill crane. Oh my god, the guts will be broken now. I hate the devs. I finally latched on to something. No, of course this is just a deathmatch change. Just does nothing. For those wondering, by the way, treadmill crane just makes you build stuff faster. And it's only 20%. It only matters for deathmatch because they just spam buildings right away, like military production buildings to spend like the thousands of resources they have.

Um, but for random map, it's kind of like a win more upgrade or like a it's nice upgrade, but it's not going to be like metading ever. Uh, it only matters for like tower rushing civilizations if anything uh in late game. But any anyway, uh, no, so far so good, guys. Really, really impressed with this balance change uh, list so far. Uh, Gajara civ bonus removed. Docks plus five garrison capacity. Uh, this is good. I'm surprised they didn't replace it with anything.

It's like they just they stole a dollar from the Gjaras. They stole like 10 rupees from the Gjaris. That's what happened. Like the bonus wasn't that good. You didn't need it, but like you didn't give them anything else in exchange. Everything else is getting some cool stuff. Gajjar just lost 10 rupees. Okay. So, I mean, I like that they removed this bonus cuz you really just don't need it. It's a terrible bonus and it's it's kind of nonsensical.

Like, everyone can garrison five units into their docks. Gajara can garrison 10. Okay, it's not doing much. So, I'm kind of happy they removed this, but I think it would have been nice if they replaced it with something like Gerjara's heal faster or something. Or like Gjara ships heal when you garrison them. I think that would be kind of cool actually for the Gjaras. Um cuz that would only apply to their fishing ships anyway.

So, I think that would be a nice bonus. Uh but anyway, fair enough. Huns Atheism wonder and relic victory timer increase now applies only to enemy/neutral players. effect can now stack. Relic income reduction now also applies to neutral players. I have no idea what this is supposed to target. I understand what it means kind of, but I don't know. I think this is more like for like free-for-all stuff. Let me know in the comments what this is supposed to affect.

I think it's for like diplomacy or something. And if you have like multiple Huns players, you can now like hit the same guy with multiple atheisms. Um, yeah. Uh, can any god-fearing uh, humans let me know what atheism is doing here in the comments below? Would love to understand what's going on here. Uh, but Italians gain mounted crossbowmen and lose cavalry archers. We don't get cranacons and we don't get heavy, so it's just an okay option in castle, but nothing crazy.

And then Georgian's grenadier cost from 35 food, 65 gold to 55 food, and 50 gold. That's a great change. This will make grenaders almost unplayable in early castle age, which is good because the fast castle grenadier that was a very solid and very annoying strategy to deal with is now very hard to do. It's not dead. You can still do it sometimes, but it's a lot harder to do. The way this works, guys, for those curious, is that a food cost is always harder to afford early game and easier to afford late game.

So, this will actually buff the G in late game in terms of their grenadier, which I think is good because the GE in late game was really good, but it was like played heavy cavar. No one really touched Grenaders even though it's a fun unit. This will make Grenaders a lot more touchable in late game. Um but uh a lot worse in the early game which I think is good. Like Gians don't need early game cheese options. They have already enough uh you know enough options that are quite legit.

So I think that's a good one for the Jens. Uh moving on here we have the Koreans. So turtle ship gets 15 less HP. Um okay. This is like saying that a 7 foot5 basketball player lost a quarter of an inch off his vertical. It doesn't matter. It's like the turnership is already massive and it lost 15 HP. Like I I don't even care. What does this number mean? You can add 15 HP. I don't think I'd care to be honest. So I I don't think this actually matters.

This is whatever. Uh but maybe some stats nerds would be like actually that's two less hits from a gallion. This is actually huge. No idea. Maybe. But uh [laughter] I don't see it myself. And they lose Gambison. Oh, that's big. What? That's big. Okay, you might be thinking, "Oh, Hera, they lost Gambison." But Koreans were not much of a champion line, you know, civilization. Anyways, Hera, you might need to be schooled on how to play the Koreans.

This does not matter for the champion line whatsoever for the Koreans. This matters for the Firelancer. The Firelancer loses the Pierce armor now that they lose Gambison. So, you have those really cheap fire lancers. Now you're gonna be having weaker fire lancers. Now personally personally I would have removed the elite fire lancer upgrade from them instead of gambisonens because I like the idea of Koreans having champions fully upgraded in late game.

I like that idea. I think that's a good that's a good idea. Uh but Gambison's not being there for the fire lancer is a pretty big nerf. I would say it's a pretty big nerf for the Koreans, but a fair one. It's a fair one. Um, I don't really like it 100%. Like I said, I would have liked to see them lose elite fire lancer because it was really their late game that was annoying with the fire lancer. It was not really like the castle age.

I think the castle age was fine. Um, but yeah, that's that's a pretty big nerf. It's going to make their fire lancers a lot more susceptible to ranged fire. Now, Magars, the Magar train time went from 12 seconds to 18 seconds. This is not nearly enough of a nerf on the Magahar. The Magnar will remain to be one of the best units in the game. Not just for the phosphor rush, but also just in general. Uh, this nerfs the phosphor rush a little bit.

It's going to make the foster rush a little worse, but it's probably still playable because you're not changing the cost. You just you just get less of them, but that doesn't really matter that much. Such a mobile unit that the 12 seconds per unit doesn't matter too much in my opinion. So, I think if it was 12 seconds to 20 seconds, it would matter a lot more. But 6 seconds only, I'm not really uh I'm not really too worried about that.

Yeah, it's an okay nerf, but yeah. Yeah, it's 50% slower trading, but the thing is 50% sounds like it's a lot, but like 50% is only a lot over like over like 20 30 units. when it's only like five units with the phosphor rush. It's like five units that really matter for like the first initial rush. I mean, what you're losing like 30 seconds, I guess. I mean, I guess it matters. It is nice. It is nice. 30 more seconds.

Sometimes that's the difference between surviving a rush and dying. So, yeah, I guess it's a pretty big change. Um, but I don't think it's going to kill the rush. Um, time time will tell if I'm right or wrong on that. Moving on to the Mupuche. Uh, for the record, this unit is still really good in late game, by the way, since the elite is unchanged, but that makes sense. Uh, Mufuche elite bolis riders and regular bullish riders cost 45 wood, 50 gold has been turned into 50 wood, 55 gold.

Uh, that's a good change. They're going to be five and five more expensive. Uh, they're still going to be a good unit, but I like that they're made more expensive. Like, the bolis rider is way better than a cavalry archer, and before it was actually five resources cheaper than a cav archer, which is ridiculous. Like the fact that it's better than a cowarter uh when it first comes out and it was actually cheaper. Like that didn't make sense.

So now it's going to be five resources more than the cow archer. That's a good nerf. That's probably enough of a nerf to make the bullish riders a little bit weaker but still playable. I think that's a good nerf. My think is I think the Mapuche Bullish Riders will still be strong. You'd still go for them if you want them. The nerf's not going to stop that. Uh Musa Temple Guard attack went from 12 to 11. Elite unchanged.

I I hate that. I I hate what they've done to the temple guard. They made the tempo guard have an attack bonus against knights. Why does that make any sense? I would have liked them to remove the attack bonus versus knights. Just take that completely away. You don't need that for the Muska. We already have options versus knights and cavalry and just make the temple guard an all round really good unit. Like do musk get haders is what I want to know.

Ah, we don't get h. So they want the temple guard to be the hob. I guess that's why the temple guard has to keep the attack bonus for cavalry. Okay. Okay, so Temple Guard gets a nerf in Castle. Small nerf. It's not going to matter too much, but it is there. Um, poles, they gain heavy mounted crossbow movement and they lose the heavy cow archers. That's not going to change too much. You don't get cranicquins, so it's not a crazy unit, but still a pretty solid option.

Portuguese organ gun train time, uh, 25 seconds to 28 seconds, a 3se secondond nerf. Uh, not not crazy, but decent to stop those foster rushes a little bit more. uh gain mounted crossbow, lose redemption and cav archers. Okay, so let's let's break this down. Mounted crossbow and cav archers, that's an equal trade. Assuming this unit performs okay or performs decently, then it's an equal trade. Redemption loss is huge.

Let's break this down. This is a big big loss. So number one, the foster rush with organ guns plus redemption monks to counter enemy mangels is completely dead. So generally so far all of the fossil rushes have been nerfed but the fossil rush for the Portuguese might actually be killed completely. It might have actually gotten completely killed. Uh losing redemption is so huge. So I would say this is a big big loss. Uh losing redemption matters a lot.

Uh the coucher versus heavy CA that doesn't matter too much. So overall I would say this is a massive nerf for the Portuguese. But some implications here. By the way, redemption is also being taken away from any monk rushes. So, the Portuguese monk rush and arena significantly worse. Uh, late game, you have one less option to go into. I I don't think it matters too much if you're playing an honest Portuguese game because you don't go into redemption every game, but it certainly hurts a few Portuguese strategies and it especially hurts the foster rush.

That being said, I honestly think it's a good change honestly because Portuguese having 80 gold costing monks, spamming them in a redemption like situation kind of annoying. Like you siege push a Portuguese player, he just spams 80 gold monks and gets redemption and then you you just can't do anything about it. So I think it's a good nerf honestly. Uh I I like it, but it is a massive nerf. Uh Sarson's loose treadmill crane deathmatch change.

The shoe, the war chariots goes from 65 food and 90 gold to 75 food and 90 gold. And the trading time is also made longer. So they're nerfing the shoe all in rush by making the chariot 10 food more expensive and also take 4 seconds longer to make. I like this double nerf. I think it's good for the war chariot. But I don't think the war chariot is actually a good unit besides the all-in rush. So, like now with the war chariots, it's not really that usable for an all-in rush because of the nerf.

Like, this is going to be a hard nerf to kind of like bridge in my opinion. It's going to be hard to afford them in in early castle age. But when are you ever making war chariots now? So, I think they've completely killed this unit. My opinion on war chariot, by the way, is that they should give it an elite upgrade to make it better in imp. Like instead of making it more expensive, you should have kept it the same cost. you should just make it weaker in castle age so it's not like obnoxious to deal with.

Make it weaker and then give it an elite upgrade that makes it much stronger. Uh that's what I think they should do with the war chariots because now you're not going to make them early and you're basically never making the unit. So it's like it's a terrible unit. Uh you can also uh suggest in the chat you can also make it only available in Imperial Age. So like make it more expensive but make it better and then make it only available in Imperial Age.

That's another solution. The problem with that one though is that then the shoe doesn't have scorpion and doesn't have anything in castle besides the manganels to defend itself. So that's why they want it to be a castle unit. But I think giving it an elite upgrade makes a lot of sense. And then they gain treadmill crane a theory um a theme rather from this uh this balance change so far. Sicilians we gain heavy-mounted crossbowmen and cranoquins and we lose only cow archers.

What the huge buff for Sicilians? Finally the civ really needs this. This this is huge. So heavy mounted crossbowmen. So that's a pretty big buff compared to just losing regular calav archers. And we also get granquins on top of that. And remember, Sicilians get bracer and all archer armor upgrades. So they get fully upgraded mounted mounted crossbowmen. This is huge. Sicilians will actually feel playable now. Oh, that's such a good change.

That's such a good change. Thank you, devs. Okay, the mounted crossbone will still not have thumb ring, though. So, it's not fully upgraded, but still it's going to be very, very nice upgrades on the mounted crossbowmen. And on top of that, you take less bonus damage from enemy skirmishers because of the Sicilian bonus. And they're also resisting conversion if you get the unique tech. So, I can imagine some compositions like uh dungeon plus sergeants, like the towers plus some infantry, and then you combine that with mounted crossbow and running in and out.

And then all you need to do is like go like siege oners or something behind that. Maybe some trebushets to like really finish the comp. More maybe more of like a team game play style, but super super cool, dude. Age of Empires got completely fixed with this patch. Literally, they solved everything. Uh, Spanish, the elite and regular concis went from 70 food and 60 gold to 75 food, 60 gold. Train time was a little bit longer as well.

Two more seconds on it. Elite unchanged. I think that's a good change. Uh, this concis has been the best unit in the game basically for or like the best unique unit in the game for the longest time. So, giving it the small like two small nerfs are pretty good. I don't think it's going to change much. If you want to go Kongs, you still go for them, but it's going to make them feel a little less oppressive. Pretty solid.

Missionary went from 100 gold to 30 food 100 gold. Excellent change. The missionary was complete cancer to deal with, by the way. It was so over so overpowered. Not because it's an overpowered unit, but just because of how cheap it was for what you get. It wasn't just a regular monk. It was a monk that had mobility, that picked up relics really fast, that converted units and ran away from tricky situations, that never got caught out of position.

It was such an insanely valuable unit. Giving it 30 food cost now makes you have a decision to make as the Spanish player. Do you want to make the stronger, more versatile missionary or do you want to make the classic monk, which only cost you 100 gold? I think missionary going to 30 food is a very, very, very good change. I like that a lot. Uh they gain heavy-mounted crossbowmen and lose heavy cav archers. Uh that's going to be an equal trade I would say.

Uh no cranicquins coming in. So equal trade there. Um pretty good changes for the for the Spanish. It it is a bit weird that the Spanish suffers a double nerf without getting buffed though because Spanish were already not the top tier civ. So like now you're I guess they were kind of top tier in team games and like nomad and stuff. But I don't know. We're like nerfing. We're like triple nerfing Spanish or let's say double nerf if you count these two as one nerf.

Like we're double nerfing Spanish, but we're not giving them anything in exchange unless the heavy-mounted crossbow moment actually outperforms the cow archer then. Okay, sure. Um but fair enough. Uh Tutins uh civ bonus changed infantry and mounted units plus one plus two mele armor and castage and purge um previously stable/ bareric units. Oh, okay. Okay. So it's all infantry and all mounted units. So that just includes the cav archer.

All of this to say all of this to say that the cav archer or the mounted crossbow will now get extra armor and then elite tutonic knight will lose the two armor. So it's going to be unchanged with the civ bonus. That's the whole idea. The elite tutonic knight will not get extra armor. But the regular tutonic knight will get plus two. No, cuz this only changed the the elite tutonic knight. The regular Tutonic Knight will still get the plus two armor.

So if we go to twoins here, hold on, let me do some digging. The Tutonic Knight regular has seven armor. This will be plus one. This will be eight armor in Castelage. So actually the Tutonic Knight gets a pretty big buff by that because it gets an extra armor and elite Tutonic Knights will be unchanged. Yeah. And the regular Tutonic Knights will also be nine armor in imp if you don't get the elite upgrade. So that's a pretty good buff, I would say.

Yeah, it's it's a pretty good it's a pretty good buff. And we also get access to heavy-mounted crossbowmen. So we lose caves and get heavy mounted crossbow, which is a good shade. Uh it's a good change. So overall, two pretty reasonable buffs for two ins. Not nothing game-breaking, but still you're going to have mounted crossbowmen that are quite tanky. You are missing bracer though and husbandry. So they're not going to be that good, but um they would be good against melee units. uh 2P elite and regular Blackwood archer cost 35 wood, 45 gold to 40 wood, 45 gold.

H I think the unit's still going to be so cancerous to be honest. I think the unit is still really way too strong. In my opinion, what they should do with the Blackwood Archer is make the cost much higher. 45 wood, 45 gold is the minimum, but then also make it stronger in imp. Give the elite upgrade more stats. My problem with the Blackwood Archer is that it's way too strong in early castle and way too weak in late game in imp.

So, in my opinion, they should make the cost higher, but then also make the elite version better. So, you make it worse in the early game, but much stronger in late game. That's kind of what I think. Uh, this this won't change too much. Uh, they didn't change the production time. So, the fast castle 2P strategy is still going to be just as strong. I don't think that's changed much to be honest. Uh, Vietnamese civ bonus changed from foot archers and skirmishers plus 20% HP.

Previously, archery range units plus fire lancers. Now, it's foot archers and skirmishers only. [sighs] Oh, cav archers don't get extra HP. Fire lancers don't get extra HP. Huge nerf for the Vietnamese. Massive nerf for the Vietnamese. Oh, they made this so bad. I don't like this change at all. It's a needed change. Let me process this information before I say something I might regret. Vietnamese needed a nerf for sure, but I think this change makes them way too boring of a civ.

Like now you only get benefit on your foot archers and skirmishers. You you have way less options. You lost a good option in the fire archer, sorry, fire lancer and in the cav archer. Um you lost two very playable options. I mean you can still make those options but missing out on that 20% HP makes those options generic options which doesn't feel good. Uh they are buffing the wrath and archer in exchange though. So elite and regular ratan archer base HP goes from 40 to 35.

No, they nerfed it. What? They nerfed it. Oh, no, no, no, no. Okay, okay, okay. Hold on, hold on. So, they're lowering the the HP of the Wrath and Archer, but you also get the plus 20% HP. So, what's 20% of 35? I imagine 20% of 35 is what? Uh 7 HP. So, it's going to be 42 HP. 42 HP for the regular. And then the elite would be 40. 40% uh 20% of of 40 is what? That's eight. So, it's going be 48 HP. So, a small buff to the Ratn Archer.

You're going to have 42 HP in castle age instead of 40. And you're going to have 48 HP in imp um for the elite one instead of 45. So, small buff to the rat archer, but we're also making the elite rat archer upgrade 200 food cheaper as well. So, the unit will get slightly better and the upgrade slightly cheaper. So, two buffs ends up being one pretty big buff for the rat archer. You also gain masonry. Uh I don't know.

It's taking Vietnamese and making them a unique unit based civ when in my opinion they were very fun being a flexible civilization. In my opinion, it would be much better to take away elite fire lancer or heavy cow archer from the Vietnamese. Take away some of those Imperial age options, but still give them a very flexible castle age. I think that would have been more fun. But um I don't know. It's fine. Now they're going to be very boring.

All right, take a look at the Vikings. So chieftains no longer generates gold when infantry defeats villagers trade units or monks. So nerf to the chieftains. They gain varian guards and mounted crossbowmen and they lose gambison and cavalry archers. What? We lose gambison. Why? Huh? That doesn't make any sense. Why would we lose gambison for Vikings? That's terrible. That's ch am I am I missing something here? That completely kills the champion play for the Vikings.

Why would they do that? [laughter] You have to buy the new DLC. Oh, I understand. I understand. Oh. Oh, it's a money play. It's a money move. They didn't want you to. You freaking pores out there. You listen up. All right. You You guys probably have some ads, so you probably can't even listen to me because you guys are poor. Listen to me. Big old Microsoft is calling out all the poor people. Oh, you like the new DLC content?

Oh, you're in the Viking spirit. Pay up. Pay up. Give me your money. Give me a multi-billion dollar corporation, your $9.5 an hour salary, your minimum wage slave. If you want to play Vikings, you got to give me your money. All right. Give me your money because we're nerfing Vikings. Vikings are losing Gambison. We're taking your money and you have to pay money to play with the new Viking sips. That's what we're doing here.

I understand. Okay. Everything, the devs, everything has been really good, but you guys just couldn't resist being money hungry near the end. I caught your ass. I mean, listen, obviously I'm exaggerating it, right? Obviously, I'm exaggerating it, but I genuinely think that's a very, very unfair change to the Vikings. Like, the Vikings who really rely on Gambison for their late game. Without Gambison, they have no late game.

So, now the unit is like, you have to win early game or midame. You cannot play late game under any circumstances. That's a terrible change. They should 100% revert that revert this. I don't understand it whatsoever. The only way this makes sense is if Rangen Guard just so overpowered that they replace the champions. But even then, I don't want the champions to be replaced. I like the champions to be good. It's a classic infantry line.

I don't want it to be bad. I want it to be playable. So, I don't know. Uh, that's a pretty big rant, but let me know what you guys think about that. Maybe I'm like I'm the only one that feels this way. Everyone in the chat's like, "Oh, no. This is a great change. The Vikings were destroying me with Gambasa." I'm really happy they're getting nerfed. I really don't know, but for me it seems completely out of left field.

I don't understand it. And then our final change here, uh, the way the Zambi raider goes from 65 wood, 25 gold to 65 wood, 35 gold. I like it. It's really good. Uh, great change. Uh, very good nerf. I think the way deserves that. Tiger Cav can also probably be nerfed a bit more, but that's fine. I think this is good enough. Zambia Raider was way too cheap before on the gold. Uh, so there you have it, guys. My cortisol spike near the end, but overall very, very good patch.

I want to end on a positive note because it kind of got a little heated near the Vikings. This is a very good patch. Besides one or two changes, I think the devs completely nailed it. So, huge round of applause to the devs. Uh really well done, guys. You've really fixed the game with this patch. Like, so many of the annoyances have been completely solved in such a fair way with this balance patch. We've waited a long time for balance patch, but I have to say that when it finally came, it absolutely delivered.

So, huge shout out to the dev team. Thank you so much for all your work, continuing to make the game fun and and interesting to play, keep it fresh. I really, really appreciate that. Honestly, we don't say it enough to be honest. Uh, you know, it's it's all fun in games to yell about the pathing and to say that this is broken, this needs change. Um, but it it just feels nice to be heard and and with this change and with this balance patch, I I felt heard.

I felt like a lot of the stuff I complained about is actually being addressed in a fun and fair manner. And a lot of the stuff that I see other people complaining about is also being addressed. And even some of the deathmatch complaints with the treadmill crane and whatnot, even that was being addressed as well. So, I feel like the devs are actually listening. Uh I I really appreciate that. The changes look amazing. The new sifts feel fun to play.

The mounted crossbow looks like a fair unit and actually a fun unit to be like added into the game. Very guard sounds interesting. So, I have a lot of positives to say and uh yeah, it's a very positive note to end the uh review. Let me know what you guys thought about this in the comments below on YouTube. And if you guys are watching live, say what's up in the chat. Um you know, make some noise, whatever, whatever you want to do.

And uh if you guys enjoyed this, stay tuned. I got lots of content coming out. I'm going to be working like a slave the next three months so I can afford to buy the next DLC. [laughter] I will be working like a slave so I can actually play the game to the highest level cuz they they they ruin my Vikings, man. I got to work. I got to work hard. I'm going to go get a second job, try to afford this new DLC. But, uh, listen, very, very fun changes coming up.

I'm super excited. And honestly, uh, I'm going to tease this right now. I have a charity stream coming up. And if we hit the big donation goal of the charity stream, I'm not going to reveal the amount. It's a lot of money, but it's for charity. It's it's a good cause. If we hit that goal, I will do a full playthrough of all of the new DLC campaigns. So, a little teaser that's going to come up sometime in November, uh, sometime September, end of this month.

Uh, and I think I hope we hit that goal for the sake of the charity and for the sake of the campaigns. I think it'll be a lot of fun. But anyway, take care guys and I'll see you in the next one. Peace.