I'm really glad KZitem randomly recommended me this channel today. Subscribed!
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Eyyy thank you Imperiused! An absolute pleasure to have you!
@Edelweiss1102
Жыл бұрын
Being Swiss, a history nerd and and AoE2 fan, I absolutely love videos like this with lots of thoughts put into it, definitely some great work. Maybe a few historical notes: - the forming of Switzerland as confederacy and later a nation with a united sense of nationality was a process that went on for centuries. The "old confederacy" as it's generally known started out as a purely defensive alliance between the 3 founding cantons because they were fed up with paying taxes and getting harassed by Lords they barely even knew. After fending of the Habsburgs a few times, more parties became interested in joining the alliance and especially the city states of Lucerne, Bern and Zürich gave the confederacy a lot of wealth and mitlitary power. But part of reality is also that more often than not, nobody really cared about these few weirdos between their mountains as long as they'd stay in there in the grand scheme of things. Some did and tried to intervene, and payed the price, like the Habsburgs of Phillip the brave, but they were the exception. What I'm trying to say, in the the relevant time frame of AO2e, the Swiss weren't as much a nation as they were a mostly autonomous part of the Holy Roman Empire, as there were many at that time. They surely made a name for themselves, but it was as much out of profit and might as it was for independence and such. For example the Swiss confederacy wasn't formally recognized as an independent faction until 1648 at the treaty of Westfallen after the 30 years war. And it continued to be a lose confederacy between the cantons with lots of bickering and even some civil wars between them until Napoleon annexed them in 1797 and formed the Helvetic Republic. After Napoleon there was an effort to restore the old confederacy, but they ultimately got swept by new liberal and national ways of thinking which ultimately lead to the foundation of Switzerland as country and as we know it today in 1848. - conversely the famous Swiss neutrality was something that formed similarly over centuries. It's not like the Swiss lost once at Mariagno and said "neutrality it is", or that they never fought offensively and intervened with other factions during the constant struggles of might during the middle ages. In fact Mariagno was a direct consequence of the Swiss meddling with affairs in Italy and installing a puppet governor. After they lost, King Franz I offered 700'000 crones, an eternal peace with France, the opportunity for Swiss mercenaries to fight in French armies and of the Swiss confederacy to keep most of the then Italian territories they conquered (nowadays known as canton Tessin) in exchange for the Swiss to stop all expansive plans, which they took after wanting to fight on initially. Similarly after the Burgundian wars the Swiss were offered large sums of money by both France and the Hubsburgs in order to persuade them from taking any Burgundian land, which they obliged to. If they were more aggressive, the Swiss potentially could have formed an empire expanding between the modern day Netherlands, Lombardy and Austria. After the battle of Mariagno Swiss mercenaries became famous and were used all over Europe for centuries until the Napoleonic wars. The complete neutrality was actually a suggestion made on the congress of Vienna in 1815 after Napoleon lost, with idea of having a neutral buffer zone between France and Austria. Many Swiss at the time were actually against it, cause they wanted back the old confederacy and to continue the lucrative mercenary trade, but they were overpowered by the victorious nations. Ironically this may very well have been the thing that allowed Switzerland to keep existing as such a small country in the heart of Europe and later, especially during the world wars, Switzerland discovered the benefits of armed neutrality, especially the economical ones, which is a can of worms in itself. - once again tied to the things above, the meaning of the Bundesbrief from 1291 has been largely mystified and overblown. It's pretty much a declaration of intend to help each other in times of need with very little actual meaningfulness. There were likely dozen such documents from that time an this is the oldest one that survived. It has its place in history, but it's not like some people believe that on August 1st 1291, peasants came together to form a nation based on neutrality. TL:DR: Switzerlands history certainly is a very interesting one, but like with many things a lot of stuff has been mystified and streamlined and things weren't always as simple as they were a nessacity, a consequence of some actions or outside forces doing their part. As for the actual AoE2 segments, some people already made some great in detail analyses and as with many things, it's really hard to say how things would actually work out in game, but from my experience with the game and based on what other said, I'd reconsider the following things: - The civ bonuses seem mostly fine to me, but I'd ditch the +1 range for arbs and just give them bracer. Bracer is a absolute nessacity if you want your ranged units to deal any kind of significant damage in Imp, outside of Persian Trashbows and it would definitely give them more viable options in Imp with faster arbs and HC while still being squishy due to the lack of the last armor upgrade. In exchange maybe remove CVA entierly like with Bohemians as historically Swiss didn't use them at all. - They should absolutely get the last infantry armour upgrade and Champs if they are supposed to work as an infantry civ, otherwise they will just die to everything and lack any really good power unit outside of the Reiseläufer, or any viable Trash unit. Goths can get away with it due to 35% cheaper and 220% faster Barracks. The Swiss, with no other infantry bonuses, should get generic FU infantry at least. - I like the City centers replacing castles idea, but as they stand it feels they are too weak and too expensive to fulfill their intended double role as castles simply outrange them, so castle drops can pretty much kill 2 birds with one stone. Maybe make it so that the upgrade cost equals the resources needed for a castle minus the cost for the town center. - Trebs out of siege workshops and single player trade between TCs sounds incredibly hard to balance, and will either be incredibly broken or useless based on how you balance it. I'd let the trebs be built in City centers starting in Imp and maybe give the Swiss some kind of economic/gold based bonus - The UTs are very historically accurate and fun, especially the Reisläufer merscenary mechanic, but they also feel very situational. I'd make it so that the -10 Gold applies in single player regardless or that it has an affect like +1 attack/armor/range to all infantry units. - Maybe give them light Cav and/or Cavalier to have some sort of mobility option at the very least. They will still be subpar without husbandry, the last armor upgrade and Hussar/Paladin, but it's something at least. There are a lot of great and unique aspects about this Swiss civ build, but as they stand they feel like a lost case in any battle that goes into imp with missing nearly every blacksmith upgrade and terrible trash. Or it becomes a very unbalanced struggle where you try to hang on until your opponent runs out of gold, and you have infinite gold thanks to trade, at which it becomes pretty much an auto win. And as much as I love the Reisläufer as a concept, I feel like there is a huge risk of the Swiss becoming a one trick pony if the Reisläufer is becoming their answer to everything, including their power unit. The best civs tend to be the ones that have clear identities and strengths withe some viable options at least, this Swiss build may be a bit to unique for that purpose.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
WOW, this is some really exceptional feedback. Thank you SO much Edelweiss, I'm delighted that you like the build and honored that you would give such comprehensive input! You make some great historical clarifications there. I often have to oversimplify history during my segments and plenty of important stuff gets lost in the shuffle. I can promise you though that during my eventual Recraft for this civilization I will make sure these historical mistakes are corrected! You also make a lot of good points on the mechanics. I've been having some fantastic conversations with other commenters, many of whom have come to similar conclusions. I have a bunch of changes planned already that I *hope* would address your issues! So those will all be in the eventual Recraft for sure. That being said, you're one of the first people to focus on trebuchets out of the Siege Workshop being a potential issue. Now, even if it would be much simpler to ditch the city center idea and give the Swiss castles like everyone else, I'm really quite married to it at this point! HOWEVER, I would be very interested in hearing any thoughts you might have on how workshop trebuchets might be better balanced assuming the castle solution is off the table! Right now I have them being trained 50% slower, which should at least help out with them not being able to be massed in an oppressive fashion, but if you have any other thoughts on how to remedy the issue I'd be extremely interested! Thanks again for the fantastic comment Edelweiss. There is little that makes me happier when I do a build and people of that very culture tell me they enjoyed it. Hope to see you in the comments section of future videos too man!
@Edelweiss1102
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava You're welcome mate, I just love to nerd about history and games, so this was a very welcome opportunity. I'm fully aware that you cannot possibly do like 500+ years worth of history justice in a 30 min video (where the main focus is on the game anyway) and have to streamline things. I also hope it didn't come off as overly critical, I think the general theme of your build about the Swiss being an economical powerhouse with a defensive orientation is spot on. Just wanted to put out there that like with so many things in history. The battle of Mariagno is a very special case because it was a direct consequence of the one time the Swiss as a whole really had imperialistic ambitions and took part in the struggle over power in Italy. An even then there were disagreements between the different factions. King Franz I made a similar offer to the one he did after to prevent the battle. Each of the cantons had their own leaders and mercenaries, and some took the offer an went home before the battle (including my home canton of Solothurn). Others wanted to fight for power, and lost. And then wanted to continue until King Franz I made the offer mentioned in my first post, being fully aware that he could gain a strong ally out of a dangerous enemy. Ultimately the majority of the Swiss decided to put their imperialistic ambitions aside and pursue the economic benefits of mercenaries. Just to say my ancestors weren't just always defending themselves, but they were opportunistic and adaptable, which may have been part of why they survived until today as their own faction and later country. I'm very interested to see your changes. Your concept definitely would be very interesting on their own, but as mentioned some things may have to be generalized a bit for the sake of viability. Otherwise I'm afraid these Swiss may just end up like the current Bengalies, who rely entirely on Elephants and Rhatas to be viable, with one unit being slow af and hard to get to out of team games and the other having a multi role as Cav Archer/Knight/Power Unit but fails due to being so expensive to upgrade and dying to every counter unit in the came. With Trebs, at the very least in top games, they are the first thing that come out in Imp in most cases and they can give you an extreme power spike until your opponent(s) get to Imp and their own Trebs and defensive upgrades. In that regard, being able to get like 3-4 of them as soon as you get to Imp (of course you'd need the resources and siege workshops, but it's not impossible, especially with the Lumberjack drop off bonus) sounds potentially broken (would have to be tested ofc). Especially if you can research conscription at the City Center at the same time, which is another dilemma people face when reaching Imp. The 50% slower training time may be a way to work around it. I don't have any better suggestion at this point. And I think it could work pretty good with your initial build of a subpar Imp for the Swiss. Like a last big umpf until they have to hang on until their better economic kicks in. But if we buff some of their Imp stuff for more viability it may become to broken. There's a reason Trebs are locked behind castles and Imp at least. You're welcome and I'm happy if I can inspire some fellow history/game enthusiasts. The algorithm brought me here by chance and seems like I found quite the gem. Chances are this isn't my last comment.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Oh no, you didn't come off as overly critical at all Edelweiss! You gave some extremely valuable and could put it, and I really appreciate you for it! And you get even more good input here, thanks for sharing more about the history side my friend. In my recraft video I will definitely reiterate that the Swiss cantons were NOT a unified nation, despite their tight alliances, and would often act independently! If anything that just adds to the narrative I was trying to convey in the History section of this video. You make a great point about my current build possibly playing too much like a civ like the bengalis. Definitely looking forward to hearing how you think the recraft goes! Probably about 2 months out, so hopefully you find the rest of the content enjoyable enough to keep your interest in the meantime! And I completely agree with you that the trebuchets thing is really a tough one to call. I will keep it for now with the explicit understanding that if people point out any other better ways of fixing the problem, or if we actually somehow end up being able to test it and find that it's busted, I will gladly change it! It's a delight and a pleasure to have you in the comments section, my friend. Really glad the algorithm sent you my way!
@Edelweiss1102
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava Thank you for such a great feedback! Sometimes it's a fine line between being insightful/nerdy and coming off as overly critical or just overwhelming. I tend to be that guy that sits quietly in the corner of the room until you speak about something that interests me, at which point I can bust in and talk for hours about the weirdest and most useless bits of information, which definitely can rub some people the wrong way. Again I think for a civ overview and why you did some bonuses the way you did, your history section is absolutely fine. I just like to point out that like so many things in history, the Swiss origin is very nuanced and with different ideologies, ideas and ambitions clashing. The old confederacy, especially within the AoE2 relevant time frame between like 1100 and 1500 was by no means purely defensive, neutral or united. There is also the question of when exactely the Swiss really started to think of themselves as a separate faction and act accordingly, there are multiple points in history you could argue about, as I said, it was a staggered and nuanced process over centuries. Definitely looking forward to the recraft version of this one goes. I'm a big fan of unique and different quirks for civs and your initial build definitely has that, but they just tend to get swept under the rug by the now over 40 civs if they can't keep up in some scenarios and/or give some viable options, so maybe some changes for the sake of gameplay may be necessary. Also take my suggestion with a huge grain of salt. I'm a middle ELO player and by now means an expert, so my view on the Treb mechanic is purely based on my own experience and how top players tend to use them. And it would have to be tested in game and see how balanced it is. If you are interested and haven't heard about it yet, there is a guy named Krakenmeister who made a website called civ builder where you can create custom civ mods and he has added a ton of bonuses and unique units that go way beyond the standard game. For example there is a Swiss Pikemen UU that actually has a +1 range mechanic like the Kamayuk and isn't to far off your idea of the Reisläufer, and you can also give whacky civ and Team bonuses like faster moving archers or training spearmen from town centers. I have created multiple Swiss civ concepts on my own based on it, it's really fun. Obviously it has limits to what you can do, but it might give some ideas about how some stuff might work out ingame. Or you use triggers in the scenario editor, but that goes way beyond my knowledge. Thank you for the warm welcome, looking forward to more stuff like this.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
My absolute pleasure Edelweiss! I don't know for sure, but I would guess that many people who are interested in history and theorycrafting have a similar disposition to you. It's one that I tend to get along with well at the very least! "A staggered and nuanced process over centuries" it's probably the best comprehensive summary of medieval history in general I could ever have imagined. Amen to that brother! And I'm a mid ELO player as well lolol I have heard of the krakenmeister civ builder! And saw the Spirit of the law video on it, like so many others did. I definitely see what you mean that with some trigger work I might be able to use the builder to put some of these civilizations in game. But if I'm honest, it's really not my forte! Though I will say, one tentative plan I have for far in the future if this channel does really well is to pay a talented modder to put some civilizations of mine together as a modpack. That would be absolutely sick, eh? Until then though, I am perfectly happy to stick to pure theory. If it wasn't blindingly obvious I'm a pretty chatty person, and these videos are such good exercise for my game dev instincts. Hopefully they are as fun to watch as they are to make!
@ThebassTHX
Жыл бұрын
as a swiss man i approve of your ideas. would love to see this civ in age 2 and 4 tbh. cool that you tried to pronounce all the weird german words. props to you on the effort you spent making this build.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Thanks bud! Really appreciate the kind words
@rynoks3504
Жыл бұрын
this so good. Hopefully you'll get more attention...What a real diamond my algorithm gave to me, time to binge every theorycraft video
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
YO thank you so much for saying so Rynoks! Fantastic to have you my friend!
@sergiomedina1099
Жыл бұрын
free conscription could be a great bonus since is part of the history
@foxnyl4141
Жыл бұрын
Great and very detailed video! I love civs that feel unique and can certainly see the appeal of many of your suggestions. Given the amount of attention that this game still gets, we can be very hopeful to see something like this within the next years. Well done.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey, thank you so much for saying so Foxy! If you're enjoying the videos, that's all I could ever ask for. Here's hoping the game we love continues to get the attention it so rightly deserves for years to come!
@armchairsaurus
Жыл бұрын
Hi Robby, I noticed you in my comments but didnt know that you are doing AoE videos as well!!! ...until this one was in my recommendations. Great Energy and I envy your skill to talk fluently without ehmmm's or slip of the tongues for so long;)
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
YO. This genuinely made my day, WELCOME to the channel Saurus! Thank you so much for the words of encouragement my friend, it is an utter delight to see you in the comments! No joke, it was your first video that actually inspired me to start doing KZitem myself last year, so I owe you a lot man. Hey! If you're ever feeling up to it, I would absolutely love to do a collab with you. Totally fine if you're not up for it of course! But if you'd like to try it out, you are one of the few people on KZitem right now who does anything even close to what I'm trying to do! Regardless, thank you so much for saying hello man! I love your work, and I really hope you enjoy the stuff I'm doing here!
@armchairsaurus
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava And this return made my day in return! Believe me, hearing that I at least inspired one person to try sth new (in this case you making vids) gives my work a whole new level of meaning! and yes, I enjoy the stuff you are doing here. A very creative approach with concepts that really bend the gameplay to new directions. A bit challenging in terms of implementation and balance (I think the Swiss for example would be kinda underpowered) but valuable nonetheless. And the historical depth is immense. Either you do a lot of research before each video (as I do) or you have a library in your head. About the collab: Im genuinely wondering how youtubers do that. E.g. the first question that strikes me is on whose channel to upload. Would you already have an idea?
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
My man I'm delighted to hear it. You really do have my favorite AOE2 content on youtube. And holy hell -- hearing that YOU of all people think my research is good is just about the best compliment I've ever received on the channel! Thrilled to hear that you're enjoying the builds! Yeah, I definitely take a much more erratic approach to the whole thing, but I'm already working on a second installment in my recraft series so I can amend a bunch of the issues with this build and others based on commenter feedback! Easily my favorite part of doing KZitem so far is audience participation. If you have any input in that regard I'd love to hear! To be honest Saurus, I really have no idea what I'm doing when it comes to KZitem yet. But I have seen other creators do collabs where each channel puts a video out covering like half of a broader topic. If you'd be up for it, I ABSOLUTELY have a couple ideas that I think could work really well for both of our focuses! And of course I'd love to hear any ideas you have as well. So if that sounds at all palatable to you man then hit me up! My email is viewable in the about section of my channel if you're on a computer. Also on Instagram at the same handle if you prefer that. But again, totally understand if you don't feel like you have time for it right now Either way, thanks again for taking the time to reach out. It really is a pleasure.
@ianbrown7066
2 ай бұрын
This would be one of the most fun civs to play
@robbylava
2 ай бұрын
Thanks so much for saying so my friend! It's pretty outdated at this point and I've changed my design philosophy a lot since I made this, but I'm still quite proud of how this one came out considering my lack of experience at the time.
@ivanstrydom8417
Жыл бұрын
Swabian League/Hapsburgs/Babenburgs. Late Medieval infantry + cavalry civ (Teutons are early to High Middle ages) Castle: konopiště castle. UU: Dopplesalder - Heavy swordsman with a sweep attack. does vast amounts of damage to pikemen as well as a small area of effect damage with each swing (small amount of damage though) Equal strength to a champion but it does massive damage to polearm/spear line units. Strong vs buildings ,average vs sword line, average vs cavalry , weak to ranged units. (Uses DE3 skin) cost 80 food 50 gold UT castle:Kroon landen - you receive 50 gold for every house and mill that you own. UT Imp: "Zweihänder" - Upgrades two handed swordsmen to Landsknechts and + 1 attack and more area damage to Dopplesalders. Schmalkkaldic League - Protestant League. Civ bonus 1:SW+Scorpions can be made in the Feudal age Civ bonus 2: Scorpions cost less gold. 75W,45 gold Civ bonus 3:Can upgrade Billhook levies to Leipheimer hauffen. Civ bonus 4 Illumination + Block printing is free. Team bonus:Protestant reformation: Monks cost decrease to 50gold + 50 Food. (Bohemians monk cost only 50 food) Barracks Dark age Peasant levy - available in dark age , cheap, cost 20 food and 20 wood, trains extremely fast. Very low hp. Spam these to defend against early rushes, overwhelm militia + man at arms with numbers. Does 1 more attack than a villager but is weaker to arrow fire than a villager. Feudal age Upgrades to BIll hook levy - More HP, benefits from scale mail armour , cost 30 food 30wood Strong vs scout cav, same stats as Man at arms but still very weak to ranged attack. Does not benefit from forging. Can work on farms to gather food. (Regional unit) Castle age: Upgrades to Leipheimer hauffen - cost 30 food 50 wood, leipheimer hauffen use spears and clubs and knives , benefits from Blacksmith infantry techs , very strong at killing villagers, strong vs light cav,rams,trebs, monks ,and non defensive buildings , used to swarm and overwhelm your enemy with a flood of units. Average vs archers (Can overwhelm with numbers) Weak vs heavy cavalry, infantry higher than Man tat arms + spearmen , hand cannoneers and projectile siege. Can no longer work on farms. Two handled swordsmen (Sallet helm, plate armour,Heater shield+sword skin) Unlocks when you research UT:"Zweihänder" - Landsknecht (Uses DE3 skin) Same stats as a Champion but does slightly more anti cavalry damage. cost: 50 food 25 gold Halb (Uses DE3 skin) Stable Light cav Paladin - frankish paladin skin / DE3 Papal Lancer skin No husbandry AR Crossbow (Uses DE3 skin) Hand cannoneer No Skirmishers (Use archer micro + scorpions/mangonel + cavalry to repel archers) SW BBC Heavy scorpion Capped ram mangonel Monastery: No theocracy Wonder: El Escorial Doppelsoldners were a group of specialized Landsknechts, whose role was to charge lines of pike and halberds. They were actually mercenaries that fought under Maximilian II. They were armed with halberds, arquebuses, and long two-handed swords (zweihänders). They stood in the front ranks and earned double the normal pay (and their name) from the privilege of breaking up ranks of pike. Dress in this era was flamboyant, and Doppelsoldners are depicted with striped leggings, puffy sleeves (for mobility), large or elaborately plumed hats, and richly slashed and decorated uniforms.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Sick build Ivan! One of my favorites that you've done yet. The direction you decided to go in with zweihanders and two-handed swords in general is not too far off from a plan I have for them too. I think the civ bonuses are overall very interesting. The main question I would have is that the civilization feels very generally german, while the name you give it seems to depict it more as a South German civilization. What would you say makes it distinctly south german, or do you think it could be a more general depiction of Renaissance Germany overall?
@smcasas9367
Жыл бұрын
I always thought that Landsturm was a Nazi specific thing but it turns out to be germanic thing with a much older history. The Swiss Douche, I think it would have been very fun.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Absolutely! Hope you enjoyed the build SM, thanks for commenting!
@andreyhempburn
Жыл бұрын
Historic Swiss Units we're about 1/3 Halberd-/Pikenen, 2/3 "Plänkler" that used any Kind of Missile weapons
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey Andrey! Would you mind telling me where you got that figure from? I did a good amount of research for this video and never saw numbers even close to that drastic! So if I just completely missed an important source or something then I would absolutely love to see it. Similarly, I never came across that term "Plänker" before! Where did you find it? Thanks for taking the time to comment my friend.
@andreyhempburn
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava the number is very rough i don't remenber that well. I got IT fromm a Video of sandrhoman History, but im Not shure If it was in German or english. The Skirmisher unit is called "Plänkler" in the German version of AoE2
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Oh no problem! If you ever happen to come across it again please do shoot me the link. And that is a very useful term regardless. Hope you enjoyed the build man!
@andreyhempburn
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava I got the numbers wrong. If you want to know more about Swiss infantry tactics, look up "Gewalthaufen" which is the german name for the Swiss phalanx. kzitem.info/news/bejne/zZuV0Y6jsmqmZHo
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
No worries at all mate, I appreciate you taking the time to give input! I'll give the video a watch.
@thoughtful1233
14 күн бұрын
Next AoE2 Release: The Mercantilists! New Civs The Dutch and The Swiss!
@Lord_Sorin
6 ай бұрын
The Swiss seem to me like a realistic choice for an AoE 2 civilisation. Would be nice to see my southern neighbours in action :)
@medicinadeldeportevaldivia8924
4 ай бұрын
What a creative guy, congrats. I would love to play with the swiss
@robbylava
4 ай бұрын
Very kind of you to say my friend! Thanks for the words of support!
@gurugru5958
Жыл бұрын
Okay, I have a civ build for you. I never had any interest in doing Albania, until I found out about the man, the myth, the legend, Skanderbeg. Basically, Albania passed hands through many empires and eventually the Ottomans. It's a mountainous and small country. Skanderbeg led a decades long war of resistance against them, winning countless remarkable victories and accumulating renown in Europe as the greatest anti-Ottoman hero. He especially used cavalry and hit and run. Albanians: cavalry and defensive civ -Military units +1 Los in Dark Age, +2 in Imperial Age -Repairers work 50% faster (originally envisioned as an Armenian bonus) -Villagers can drop off resources to defensive structures Team Bonus -Whole team benefits from allies' researched Stables techs UU: Stradiot (fast, high damage light cavalry; not too durable) UT: Via Egnatia (guard towers increase units' movement speed in a radius), Gjakmarrja (trash units +2/2 armor) Architecture: Mediterranean Wonder: Kruje Castle Campaign: Skanderbeg Via Egnatia was an ancient road that played a huge role in Albanian economic and military history. Gjakmarrja is Albanian blood feud, representing their resistance. They're designed to resist and raid until allies can swoop in to save them, more or less. Historically accurate, accept Europe never ended up saving them.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
That is a truly sick build Guru. A great combination of conventional and unconventional! The villagers dropping at defensive structures is definitely the high point for me, that has SO many cool implications (especially using outposts in Dark Age instead of camps!). I also think the team bonus is exceptionally unique and interesting, fantastic job coming up with really creative concepts that don't deviate too far from the AOE2 standard! For me I only see two potential concerns: one is that the unique unit feels a little plain, though my tastes are definitely more extreme than average. Do you see it as being kind of like a shotel warrior but cavalry or something? Secondly, they seem a little bit on the weak side to me. I might be underestimating, but I think a fourth civilization bonus, especially one that helps them out a little bit more with mid-game raiding, could be merited. Maybe one specifically for cavalry to help reinforce that aspect of their identity. Overall, really sick build Guru. One of the coolest that anyone's ever showed me in the comment section.
@gurugru5958
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava Oh wow, thank you. Yeah, I agree, they need some kind of raiding damage boost; maybe a light charge attack for light cavalry. And Stradiots are pretty generic. I couldn't think of a unique medium cavalry UU that wasn't a derivative of Coustilliers or Leitises, honestly.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
WELL. If you're interested in stuff that isn't generic then you've come to the right place, my good man! Would you mind sharing a little bit more about the history of the Stradiot? I don't just want to fling stuff at you rapid fire without knowing the context behind it! But once you do I'm more than happy to throw shit at the wall until something sticks.
@dragonlord4643
Жыл бұрын
I really like that on alot, i've already seen some swiss crafts but this is by far my most favorite one. Like the thoughts you made about them.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Wow, that's very high praise Dragonlord! I'm truly honored. Thank you so much for saying so my friend!
@Blauboad
Жыл бұрын
Cool video! I think the tibetan empire would make an awesome civ. They could bring an unique flavor to AoE2.
@Blauboad
Жыл бұрын
They could make a "mountain expansion" and include the swiss and the tibetan empire^^
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey! Thank you so much for saying so Blau! And holy shit dude, I love that theming. A great suggestion with Tibet! I've thought about doing them before, but now you can definitely expect to see them at some point over the next couple months. Great to have you in the comments section my friend!
@TeutonicEmperor1198
Жыл бұрын
if only!! China would never accept that
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Oohhhh yeah, absolutely zero chance. I don't think any sort of Chinese subdivision could ever happen, but Tibet is like a -100% chance. But doesn't stop us from dreaming!
@KroM234
Жыл бұрын
I've been calling out the Swiss as a new civ for the last 3 DLCs so far, I really hope it comes out at some point. My family was traced back to the Entlebuch valley from the Luzern county from Middle Ages up to 1650's when it rebelled against the townsfolk's taxes (Peasants Wars) and got clapped or exiled in Germany and Eastern France, where we founded a village that still exist today with a guy from my family as mayor. Stunningly well designed in terms of gameplay.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
HEY! Thank you so much for saying so Manu, I am delighted and humbled that you think my build was well designed! It's so cool that your family has held on to that story. Really an incredible piece of living history. At some point in the not too distant future I plan on doing a Scots build, maybe I'll get a chance to share some of my own family history during that! Couldn't agree with you more that the Swiss deserve addition into the game. And thank you so much for commenting man! I really hope to see you in future videos.
@KroM234
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava You bet, just found your channel, and I'm following everything AOE2 related quality content. I'm in the process of binging your videos at the moment haha. Your Swiss civ concept REALLY stands out to be honest, and I really wished I could play it because finding starts and meta using it sounds so much fun. I hope devs look up your ideas! Keep up your amazing work, cheers!
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Wow, that's very high praise Manu! I'm really touched that you think so. And I'm VERY pleased that you're enjoying the content binge! I've been on a roll with content creation recently, so you can expect a video every Friday for at least the next couple weeks! And hey! This video is really blowing up, so things continue to do well, maybe I'll get to the point where I can pay a modder to create a mod pack for these civilizations! Wouldn't that be something?! Well it's on my mind, here's a question for you! Since you're following all things AOE2 these days, are there any other small content creators you'd recommend? The only other small-scale aoe2 KZitem channel that I follow regularly is armchairsaurus, who's awesome, but I'm very interested to check out others! Hopefully get a couple of collaborations going if I'm lucky. Really hope you continue to enjoy man, and I very much look forward to hearing what you think of other videos!
@BloodyQShark
Жыл бұрын
Very creative but I change the unique tech for Castel age with the first bonus and here is the reason: 1 - the castle age is named after a castle you can build and allow you to research the imperial age without needing any other building. 2 - the castle is used for map control to secure gold and stone in your case that your opponent sees that you build your castle and try to attack you still have a chance to secure the zone depending on how much is complete on another hand you need to complete the town center and then wait to upgrade to the city center by time is complete your opponent could destroy it. 3 - the castle drop is a pretty common strategy and is pretty impossible for the Swiss and that can put them in a bad spot. So why not give them some generic or weak castle and the bonus move as tech like Malay which tech Thalassocracy, and here you have the option to increase the price of tech or increase the price of the building after research. And you can still put a civ bonus that castle siege unit to be created from the Siege Workshop and that can make a pretty sick civ on the arena that you make a workshop create some petard to blow the wall and some knight to raid the opponent. And here is a list wicht Swiss medival castel : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_castles_and_fortresses_in_Switzerland
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey there QShark! A couple other people mentioned this as well when I initially released the build -- my argument for lacking Castle is that I believe literally all of the castles you see in Switzerland right now were made by other powers rather than members of the Swiss Confederacy itself. And since my build was focusing on them rather than the other powers who often laid claim to the region, it felt like a cool way to give some extra flavor and make the civilization feel very unique from any others! I also recently did a recraft video where I tweaked this civilization quite a bit, overall a lot of buffs. If you ever get a chance to check that out I'd love to hear what you think of it!
@jurgnobs1308
11 ай бұрын
@@robbylava uh that is definitely not true, historically. the states of bern and zurich built most of the swiss castles. and they were members of the confederacy. some castles are of course older than the confederacy but that is the case with a lot of civs
@veidt3764
Жыл бұрын
it is really nice to see how enthusiastic you are about your topic, this makes it a pleasure for me to watch your video. Even if your video is maybe not so professional as the videos from "big you-tubers". And ur pronunciation of germannic words seems genuinely good for a person with an English-speaking backround (as i assume that ur mother tongue is english). I consider ur pronunciation to be superior to the pronunciation of most history You-tubes, who have hundred thousands follwers and and a whole team behind them, and still can't say a proper "Umlaut". And i also strongly hope, that they will make the swiss in an upcoming dlc an official faction. I think the Swiss would have an very unique feeling, because they were one of the few peoples in Europe who weren't ruled by a nobel family in the middle ages. ;-)
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Why thank you Veit! Very kind of you to say my friend, unprofessionalism is what I strive for heheheh Couldn't agree with you more that the Swiss deserve to be in the game, even if they don't look nearly as wacky as my build. And I very much hope you enjoy the future content on the channel! It's great to have you around.
@thomasfplm
4 ай бұрын
23:52 Something to be considered would be to unlock the UU and the usual castle units behind the first TC being upgraded. It would be a delay similar to building a castle to have access to them.
@danielmunsaka2051
Жыл бұрын
seeing that they had viable peasants, I was thinking a buff to their villagers in terms of their attack, or armor not just HP would have played nicely as well. Of course it shouldn't be as good as supremacy but something that makes them harder to raid
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Absolutely Daniel! I tried to represent that in one of their two team bonuses -- they have one that gives them and their allies scaling bonus HP on all villagers. So cool to see us coming to the same conclusion after looking at the history. That's always the sign to me that a bonus is right where it should be!
@danielmunsaka2051
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava of course!, if there was a way you should definately be in contact with the devs to see if some of these ideas could be implemented into the game. Would have been even better if they launched the Xbox version along with some Civ DLC
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Maaaan I wish! That would literally be a childhood dream come true. And who knows! People seem to be really enjoying the content recently, so if I keep it up there's always a chance someone with authority will notice. Thank you so much for the vote of confidence Daniel. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on future builds!
@ivanstrydom8417
Жыл бұрын
Swiss. Late Medieval infantry + crossbow civ Swiss Diet Vogt - Ruling title Castle: Spiez Castle or Castlegrande UU: Swiss Pikemen - Slow moving,very gold intensive but high attack and high melee armour. Negates any charge damage such as that of Coustilier and Urumi/wootz steel. Very strong vs cavalry, Strong vs buildings strong vs Trash, Average vs Sword infantry , weak vs archers and siege. Will lose a 1 on 1 duel with a regular champion. (Uses Swiss pikemen Skin from DE3) UT Imp: Affair of the Sausages - Protestant reformation, villagers cost increase to 60 food but are trained much faster. UT Castle:Rutlischmur defence treaty - can train Swiss pikemen + Swiss Halbadiers in Guard towers. Civ bonus 1:Alpine Trance Humance - If on a temperate map you gain more food from livestock when on top of elevated ground. When on a cold/winter/snow map ,you gain more food from livestock when located on low/regular terrain. Civ bonus 2:Reichsfrei - semi autonomous cantons - TCs enhance the gold gather rate of villagers in the vicinity. Civ bonus 3:Wilhelm Tell - Archers/Crossbows automatically gain thumb ring. Civ bonus 4: you receive 50% of the gold spent on training Reisläufer Halbadiers by your allies. Team Bonus: Reisläufer Mercenary corpse - Allies gain access to Reisläufer Halbadier in imperial age Swiss mercenaries wore a variety of uniforms, favouring colourful Landsknecht-style dress with striped leggings and mismatched stockings, and bright, slashed doublets and sleeves in alternating colours. When allied to the Papal States , both Swiss and IPapa; states gain access to Papal Guards. Can hook enemies with his halberd to slow them down. Papal Guards are slower and have less Line of Sight than Halberdiers, but have more attack , more HP and gains added pierce armour when in the vicinity of any church. Does bonus damage to Landsknechts + Dopplesalders. (Uses Papal Guard skin from DE3) Barracks Dark age Peasant levy - available in dark age , cheap, cost 20 food and 20 wood, trains extremely fast. Very low hp. Spam these to defend against early rushes, overwhelm militia + man at arms with numbers. Does 1 more attack than a villager but is weaker to arrow fire than a villager. Feudal age, Upgrades to BIll hook levy - More HP, benefits from scale mail armour , cost 30 food 30wood Strong vs scout cav, same stats as Man at arms but still very weak to ranged attack. Does not benefit from forging. Can work on farms to gather food. (Regional unit) Upon reaching Castle age: Peasant levies automatically upgrade to Billhook Levies Billhook levies automatically upgrade to jesa Halberds (but not Peasant levies) whom benefit from all Blacksmith infantry techs. Spear line replaced by Swiss Halb line: Castle age - jesa Halberds Upgrades to - (imperial age) Reisläufer Halbadier Does more damage to infantry than regular Halbs. Protects nearby allies by absorbing some of the inflicted range damage. Very strong vs cavalry, strong vs infantry + hand cannoneers + archers (Good damage resistance but can still be micro’d down by ranged units) ,very weak vs siege (Cost food 30 and gold 50) Still loses in a 1 to 1 dule with a basic champion. jesa Halberds Uses skin of DE3 Halbardiers Reisläufer Halbardier - Uses skin of DE3 Trabant (with helm) Dark age: Militia - (Feudal age): Morningstar man at arms - (Castle age): long swordman. Faster than Swiss halbs but much less damage resistant to range units. Stable Scout AR Arbalester Hand Cannoneer No skirmishers - (Use accurate archer micro + scouts + Peasant levies to repel early archer rushes) SW BBC Monastery: No redemption No heresy No anointment No theocracy Livestock Penn:Cows Wonder:Cathedral of Notre Dame of Lausanne During the late medieval period, the Swiss Confederacy rose to international fame due to its adept use of polearm tactics on difficult terrain to crush invading enemy armies such as those of the Duchy of Burgundy. This reputation caused neighboring regions to enlist them as mercenaries - one such being the Papacy, which hired its first regiment in 1506. After the conclusion of the Italian War of 1551-1559, the Swiss Papal Guard was relegated from field service to become a personal bodyguard of the Pope in Rome - a decision borne partially out of the desire to preserve these valuable troops, and also owing to their outstanding record in military service. Five centuries later, the Swiss Papal Guard remains the bodyguard of the Pope.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
I think I remember you posting this build on another video Ivan. It's definitely a cool one! You always take the bonuses and uniques in very different directions from me, how would you say our two builds compared to each other in this case?
@thomasfplm
4 ай бұрын
12:29 I just imagined a bonus where when one of your palissades is destroyed, enemy units nearby take some damage, not enough to kill them, but enough to be relevant, at least in the beginning of the game.
@robbylava
4 ай бұрын
I LOVE this idea. Quite possibly my favorite that you've come up with, and you've had some really good ones. Permission to use it?
@thomasfplm
4 ай бұрын
@@robbylava, you have the permission to use any of my ideas.
@yuuumtheepic4118
Жыл бұрын
I think the biggest issue I see with this civ is that their army compositions would seem unintuitive due to some internal anti-synergy. Come late-game, when I think about what a swiss army would look like, their move speed bonus to archers would make me think of a very mobile, raiding playstyle. Imagine arbs that can keep up with hussars or kite melee units or dodge onagers more easily, that seems very powerful. But they have no late-game cavalry options, so that doesn't feel like it'd work. Another direction to go would be to use the fact that they train trebs from workshops to amass siege and use your eco to slowly grind your opponent down. But there the issue seems to be that with them lacking bracer and archer armor that in ranged battles they'd actually lose. You're also discouraged from using their unique unit together with trebs because they're awful protectors. A single hussar riding into vision ranges sends them charging after, leaving your trebs completely undefended from the actual cavalry force. I guess I'm a bit lost to how their late-game playstyle would actually work. But that's not necessarily a bad thing. Some players like civs with unintuitive playstyles or odd army compositions. I just think I'd dislike them.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Extremely reasonable review! In my last recraft video I actually made some really substantial changes to the Swiss that would hopefully address some of your problems while keeping them feeling unique. If you ever get a chance I'd love to hear your thoughts on it! But regardless, I really appreciate you taking the time to watch and leave your thoughts! Hope you enjoyed the build despite your reservations
@CG-eh6oe
Жыл бұрын
Hey, swiss historian here. While i kinda like your approach, you made some big mistakes in your history part. Most importantly, you keep talking about the "austrian habsburgs" as some foreign invaders. But the destinction of austrian habsburg was made way later on, to distinguish them from the spanish habsburg; in the time the confedereacy formed, they were just the "von Habsburg" ("from hawk castle" in english). They were the local nobility; their name literally comes from a castle that is todays switzerland. They were not the invaders; on the contrary, the confederacy attacked their possesions and kicked them out of what is today switzerland, thats why you nowadays think of austria when hearing habsburg despite them beeing local rulers in what is today Aargau.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey CG, thanks for clarifying that! I did try to mention in my history section that the habsburgs were booted from their ancestral homelands, but I definitely agree that my framing makes it seem a lot more black and white as an invading force. When I do my recraft video I will definitely clarify that the situation was a lot more nuanced than that!
@CG-eh6oe
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava I mean my comment isnt that much of a clarification either, because the entire situation is just such a mess in the 13th century and the fact that we have barely any sources, but 500 years of nationalistic fan fiction makes it really hard to Tell what was going on... you certainly did a better job than most people talking about it :)
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Ha! Well I'm gratified and humbled that you think so CG. I hope you liked the build!
@WenceslausDerErste
Жыл бұрын
im glad that i found this channel, its amazing! keep going.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Ey! Thank you so much for saying so Kain! It honestly means a lot to me that you would say so
@FlymanMS
Жыл бұрын
I love the ideas and I think the game is definitely missing Swiss and Austrians as relevant and important civs. If they ever realise your ideas in any way those two civs should come in the same DLC.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Thank you so much for saying so Flyman! It's very gratifying that you liked the design, despite how wacky it is! I do certainly hope both those civilizations are added in the future -- even though I'm sure they'll be much less extreme than what I have here, they certainly deserve to be in the game!
@jenexopie464
Жыл бұрын
Ayy, it's here^^ Glad i could motivate you to do this video ;)
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hell yeah dude! Thanks for the fantastic suggestion -- really hope you think I did it justice!
@jenexopie464
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava Just love the comparisons to other games like AoE3 and other civ theories. Banks as a gold only Feitoria, imperial pikeman, elite trade units, military monks (with the popes guard) etc... love the video!
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Fantastic to hear mate! You loving the video is exactly what I was hoping for. Do you have some great ideas there! Many of them align with plans I have for future videos, so I can't wait to hear what you think of other builds down the line.
@Kiemenbeisser
Жыл бұрын
The Burgundy Wars, Swabian War, Appenzell Wars or several battle scenarios would be a great portraition of the Swiss as a civ in AoE 2. About the unique unit Reisläufer I’m not keen of this charge attack ability - its just a Burgundian Custilier w/o a horse. I thought more of an ability or upgrade called Gewalthaufen (Violence Pile) allowing to bunch up several Reisläufern in square formation grants them a buff on armor & pierce armor but much slower movement
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey St3thrich! Great to hear from you mate, I couldn't agree more about the campaigns. The Burgundian war would be my personal pick I think! So to clarify the Reisläufer: it's charge attack actually works completely different from others currently in the game! Instead it gains a burst of movement and attack speed but cannot be retasked while this effect lingers. I have all the specific details and numbers on the linked civilization doc in the description if you'd like to take a further look! My inspiration for this ability was both to improve the units mobility and DPS in certain circumstances but also because in history Swiss mercenaries were renowned for being very brave and hot blooded, often to the point of being almost suicidal! So it felt like a cool way to give the unit a little more dynamicism while still being pretty historical. Your idea for armor boosts when information is definitely something that crossed my mind though. I'll have a video coming out in a couple months talking about how I might fix infantry as a unit class overall, and an ability like that is pretty high on my list! Hope that makes sense! Either way, really hope you enjoyed the build.
@darkranger116
Жыл бұрын
Awesome stuff! This is very unique
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey! Thank you so much for saying so Darkranger! It's a pleasure to have you in the comments man, looking forward to hearing what you think about future builds!
@thomasfplm
4 ай бұрын
13:45 They could appear in many others as mercenaries, even ones further from their lands.
@simbelmyne1476
Жыл бұрын
Lots and of good and very interesting ideas in this civilization design! My excessively long and meandering thoughts: Bonuses: -- Upgrade to City centers bonus (no castles) Very interesting, may be interesting concept for other civs as well who maybe didn't have lots of fortifications historically. However, I have four major concerns. 1.) the cost is too high, I think, for a viable defensive building, 500 res on top of 375 for the base TC makes them more expensive than a castle. Note that Persian TCs also have the same HP (4800) as a castle and faster work rate as a starting bonus (which is probably better than the simultaneous vil/tech ability for eco), without needing to pay the 500res cost -- so I think this idea needs to be taken farther/made stronger if it is going to work. 2). they have -1 range compared to a castle (-4 including the fact that TC range does not benefit from fletching/bodkin/bracer) and worse building armor. This means that the Swiss will have a terrible time defending vs. enemy castle drops, since an enemy can drop outside the range of the City Center to render it useless for eco and then fairly quickly shoot/ram it down under the cover of the castle. 3). {{EDIT: I also realized that treb being built from siege shops is very risky, lots of pro games are decided by early imp. treb wars where castle numbers and treb counts are decisive, so I wonder if treb production should be restricted to city centers, perhaps at a higher build rate than castle, and not siege shops.}} 4). Where will petards be built???? [ok this isn't a major concern haha] -- Lumberjacks don't need drop off points (withinin LOS) A decent eco bonus, presumably strong enough to support a good civ. How strong this is likely depends on how it is exactly tuned -- so that means it should be simple to balance, which is good! -- Palisades cheaper / faster Nice early on, at least for Arabia & other open maps that ought be more like arena 11 -- archer-line speed / imp atk This is a very solid bonus --Team bonuses I don't suspect the trade bonus would be used much, except perhaps briefly as you wait for your ally to notice the 27 pings you laid down on the edge of map where you want him to build markets 11. Markets are just cheaper and more economical than TCs, and usually the edge of the map isn't prime real estate for TC-building. But team bonuses ought to be weak. The vil bonus is quite large for a team bonus, but since vills don't do a lot of fighting outside of tower-rushes and castle drops it shouldn't be too imbalanced. UTs: -- These are both a little odd and situational, hopefully their price would be low, else I fear they wouldn't see much use, especially in 1v1. Of course, once researched they'd be nice boosts to have, especially the -10 gold cost on the UU. Tech tree & UU: This is where my main concerns lie! Outside of the UU (whose stats are unclear), this civ seems to have no viable imp. / late imp. composition. I fear that the missing tech are far more damaging than can be managed for a viable civ: 1). Their cavalry is completely useless. This goes without saying after castle age, is obviously intentional. 2). Their infantry also appear to be unusable. This is hard to tell, not knowing the UUs exact stats, but if I heard correctly you said that they would not have any base pierce armor. Between that and lacking the last armor, they will melt to anything with range, unless they have gobsmacking levels of hp. Their other infantry is poor without the last armor, although the halb will still be helpful vs. cav, but the UU presumably can also do that. 3). Their archers will be poor once upgrades are in: the +1 attack from bracer is especially crucial for fighting vs. high pierce armor targets. With fully upgraded units, lacling bracer is -25% attack vs. cavalier/Heavy Cav Archer, -33% attack vs. paladin, and -50% attack vs. skirmishers (to only dealing 1 damage vs. skrirms!). And they miss the last armor as well. 3). for trash, this civ has terrible light cav, terrible skirms (they even lose vs. arbs!), and low quality halbs. 4). I don't think eco can compensate. At this stage, wood is rarely a major concern for anyone's economies, and their only important eco bonus will be the lumberjack drop-off boost. Essentially, I'm concerned they'll have no viable core unit for their army after castle age. Pure skirm might even be able to kill everything they have -- Fully upgraded skirms will be taking almost no damage from arbalest, dealing 5 dmg vs. UU, and not having to fear from cavalry. Their siege / monks are alright / poor, and don't fundamentally change the situation -- I assume they do get BBC though? Also being bad on water means I don't see any situation where they'd be good, except perhaps certain team games where other civs can better leverage the UU (perhaps with the last armor + another infantry bonus?) while feeding lots of gold back to the Swiss player, who might be best served by slinging that gold back to teammates that actually build useful army haha. Before imperial, the strength of the civ really depends on how good the archer speed bonuses and the wood eco bonuses are, but if these were made strong enough to compensate for their very weak late game, they'd probably become oppressively strong in the early game. This also means that they would be almost certainly a pure x-bow civ in castle. My primary suggestions: -- it may or may not be historical -- but I think the last infantry armor is a must to make their infantry viable. Alternatively their UU could be given 2-3 base armor, but then the UU will have to be capable of supporting the bulk of civ's composition in late game and the civ would be at grave risk of being a 1 unit civ, as it would then be the Swiss' counter vs. archers, cavalry, enemy infantry, and trash. -- I'd also be inclined to remove the +1 range for arb. portion of their civ bonus, and just give them bracer. This would make their late game defenses more viable, and most importantly make their skirmishers and arbalest more viable. If this made their arbs too strong, then you could tweak / stagger the archer speed bonus (something like +10/15% speed, or even +5/10/15%), or remove thumb ring, but remember they still will lack the final armor so that might not even be necessary. -- The City Center's cost should probably be lower & the effect increased somewhat. Maybe making them benefit from fletching/bodkin range, or giving them higher building armor or hp (the same or greater than a castle?) or something that would mean they can't be easily dominated by castle drops. Conclusion: I think this civ design is unique and incorporates a lot of solid, interesting bonuses! I'm worried that you got a little carried away axing things from their tech tree 1111, but otherwise I think it could be balanced to be a fantastic new civ! Good job!
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
WOW, that is SUCH an exceptional review Simbelmynë. Thank you so much for the incredible feedback! I've had a couple other commenters bring up how weak the blacksmith is too. As I'm sure you know by now, I really like pushing the boundaries of tech trees, and this build was no exception! Let me pitch to you the ideas I came to with help of another commenter who also shared your concerns: 1. Replace further arb speed in imperial age with a decent bit of bonus damage versus archers to allow them to be used as pseudo skirmishers 2. Give the Reisläufer +1 Pierce armor at base and another plus one when upgraded I think that these two would help reduce their weakness to cav and give them a pretty solid late game comp of halbs plus Arbs with Reisläufer as the anvil. They can mix in siege onagers as well, and should have a pretty decent supply of gold with their self-trading bonus. I have zero idea whether this would actually fix the problems, but it's at least a step in the right direction. And I am determined to at least TRY to make this work while keeping my wacky tech distribution if at all possible! Beyond that, I think that your point about the city center's cost is quite good too. I gave them the cost I did because in general wood is much less valuable than Stone, but there's definitely a chance it's a little too high in its current form. I should note though that just like a castle City centers do benefit from blacksmith archery techs! I can make a note to make that more clear during my eventual recraft. Does this change your opinion at all about their cost? And if not, I'd love to hear what you think it should be retuned to to be more fair! Once again, thank you for the excellent review Simbelmynë! I'm very excited to hear your thoughts on some of my proposals here! And if any other thoughts on this build or others come to your mind, I am always 100% interested in hearing!
@simbelmyne1476
Жыл бұрын
Once again a long ramble, but hopefully a reasonable long ramble? Those changes should make the civ more manageable in imperial, but I'm not sure if it will really be sufficient? Hard to tell without actual play-testing of course! I'm also worried that gutting so many tech lines and trying to compensate with targeted civ bonuses to specific unit lines will heavily restrict the civ into only a couple viable options. This might be tolerable, but ideally civilizations have a little bit of space & usable options to pick from, even if there is clearly a few "best" units in most circumstances. For the Swiss, even if their arb / UU is viable with those changes, their trash will still be weak, so they will have poor options for the typical 1gold unit / 1 trash unit (+siege) army composition. The composition you mentioned is probably the best (arb + halb), and if affordable perhaps Reislaufer with that (but since their stats are not clear, IDK how they might or might not be used). I guess the arb would counter enemy infantry and archers and the halb would be for enemy cavalry -- so it could work, but probably still struggles against even pure skirmisher. But even so maybe those changes could be enough to allow the civ to work as a whole between early / late game (strong early, weak late). Of course, I may also be a hypocrite-- I realized I also designed a Kanem-Bornu civ that lacks all the imp. blacksmith armors 111111 (still have bracer though)-- and oddly enough that civ concept had a +5/10/15% movement speed as a civ bonus for the archer-line too. Also, I don't think I realized when writing my earlier comment that the trade with TCs bonus is meant to allow you to trade with yourself in a 1v1. That seems.....broken, very broken haha. It actually does sound interesting to me since it might be able to balance out their terrible late game army composition if carefully tuned -- but there is a second problem: it provides infinites resource like a Portuguese Feitoria (or the former Malay fishtraps) but far better, and especially far more population efficient. This would convert them into an strange civ where mid-imp. is a tremendously uphill battle because of bad unit options, until the enemy runs out of gold and you then auto-win with your infinite gold (presuming you've set up trade). Because no matter how bad I've been talking about the Swiss options -- pure gold unit + gold unit compositions almost always beats trash, not to mention the ability to add as much siege as you might like. Also, to me this would a tiny bit amusing, since it would end up being a 1v1 bonus masquerading as a team bonus 11111. Overall, there is part of me that would be very interested to see this implemented and tested since it would create very different imbalances in the game, and maybe it would work, but ultimately I suspect this kind of self-trade idea would not be balanced for any civ and would be a non-starter. It also breaks the game in a way that likely goes too far: in 1v1 gold is meant to be a limited resource and maps, units, and civs are all balanced around that assumption, so incorporating a civ that will fit well in Aoe2 while also giving it limitless gold seems like a very hard, if not an essentially impossible, game design problem. For City Center, I think the gold cost is probably unneeded. Without the stats of the City Center to make concrete comparisons, it is hard to say, but the city center idea seems somewhat comparable to Kreposts (which have -1 range, and ~1/2 hp compared to castles, but similar/same building armor) which are very cheap, but have an unfortunate tendency to just die when castle dropped. Since the city center is supposed to replace the castle, I'd think that the cost of the base TC + upgrade shouldn't exceed that of a castle, and depending on the comparison with kreposts, should not substantially exceed the price of those either. Benefitting from fletching/bodkin range is good -- but this also reminds me that lacking bracer also contributes a bit to my worry about these. Although usually in Imp. it is siege, not enemy castle drops, that decide whether buildings go down. Perhaps the stats of a city center could like a krepost but with higher hp (maybe even hp = to a castle), and just cost 250 or so stone to upgrade from a town center. This seems reasonable to me, but I'd still worry about vulnerability to castle drops & I'm not sure whether this would be a civilization handicap instead of a civilization bonus.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Another very thoughtful comment! You make a great point about viable comps. Between that point and some other really good feedback that commenters have given me I think I will bend and give them the last infantry upgrade! I do really want to keep the rest of the blacksmith restrictive, but plate mail should help their core halb plus Reisläufer combo stay really resilient. I think reducing City center cost is definitely a good change! I like the gold cost, but I could see reducing it to something like 100 gold 200 Stone and buffing up its HP a little bit. What do you think of that idea? I don't personally mind at all when civilization bonuses have penalizing effects. In fact, I kind of wish there were civilization penalties explicitly built in as well as civilization bonuses to add more dynamicism and open new design routes! That being said, my goal with the city center was to offer them a side grade rather than a explicit buff or nerf. It should be much better than a castle in some regards! But definitely worse than others. And you are totally right about the self trade bonus really being a 1v1 bonus masquerading as a team bonus! Having played a decent amount of age of mythology, including competitive, I do not personally think that infinite resources is a problem. But I know a lot of AOE 2 players are very against it! I actually intend on doing a full video about it at some point in the future, do you think that would be an interesting topic to cover? I really like the bonus and would be very reluctant to remove it, but do you think that reducing the trade efficiency if you do it with yourself would help tone it down? Really enjoying this conversation Simbelmynë , if you have other thoughts please keep them coming!
@simbelmyne1476
Жыл бұрын
Interesting! I do like how you integrate feedback from many sources as you do these! Hopefully our advice is good 11. The exact cost of the City center and gold/stone ratio could be shifted around I imagine, and would probably need a decent bit of balancing if a civ with it was actually released in a DLC, but I agree that the general cost of the upgrade should probably in the 250-350 resource range, depending on how strong the stats are. I'm not familiar with the playstyle of Age of Mythology, but would I be correct is thinking that every faction in AoM have access to scalable infinite gold? The issue with bringing infinite god into Aoe2 is not that infinite resources is bad game design per se-- Aoe3 and Aoe4 have infinite resources in 1v1s and of course relics already give a small, non-scalable quantity of infinite gold in aoe2-- but that since the game has been designed for 20+ years with finite gold in mind, the balancing of map design, general unit/upgrade costs, etc. for the existing 40+ civs depends on that assumption. So having a civ with large-scale infinite gold playing those same maps and sharing the same generic units & upgrades will create a massive balancing disparity with all the current civs without scalable infinite gold. I think the bonus can stay, but probably with a cap on the number of self-trading trade carts active at a time (say 5-10?). An efficiency reduction might also work, but a hard cap on the potential gold income is far easier to guarantee balance with and more in-line with other 1v1 infinite-gold mechanics existing in the game like relics, feitoria, burgundian vineyards, and so on. Another issue with an efficiency reduction is that since the price / pop cost of a trade cart is fixed (and fairly high) for the purposes of normal efficiency trade, adding any substantial efficiency reduction to self-trade could risk making it too expensive/slow to ever attempt in the first place. Or put another way, unlike the feitoria you can't freely adjust the population cost / price of trade carts to create balance with their necessarily low-efficiency resource collection in the context of self-trade. But yes this is an interesting conversation! I wonder if the official devs have similar debates when they think about creating new civs or if they do this individually or just use the empirical test of playtesting
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
I certainly hope they have similar debates! This is like the best part of the design process in my eyes at least. I would partially agree with you that the game is not fully balanced around infinite gold in 1v1, but it's definitely the case that team games are! And those don't tend to be particularly wacky or lopsided for most civilizations, at least on the infinite gold front. That tells me that such a thing could be brought to 1v1, though I agree that if only one civilization that's it then it would be a huge bonus, hence why I'm very willing to limit it substantially for the Swiss! My current inclination is to say something like it has steadily diminishing returns the more trade with yourself you are doing, capping out at something like 20 trade carts or so. That way, if you only do 5 to 10, it's extremely population efficient, but if you try to go all the way to 20 then you may as well just be creating feitorias, and a trade line is much more expensive and vulnerable than those are. Does that sound like a good starting point to you?
@Xastor994
Жыл бұрын
Honestly quite a hot take that Austrians should be a civ of their own - would like to discuss this with you. All in all yet another very wild build. Conceptually this sounded quite similar to the current Bohemians, what with the civilian defense, strong spear line, archers and HC. Honestly, I didn't think it was very similar to your Dutch build at all. I love the multiple languages and multiple architectures thing. There are mods already doing this with multiple skins for buildings other than houses, and the unit thing is also possible with the same mechanic that gives male and female villagers. The clock tower wonder has the potential for a really beautiful easter egg - the clock showing your local time. The Kapellbrücke wouldn't work as a square wonder (see the Persian wonder which is also very wide IRL) but it could very well work as set dressing in a campaign and is honestly beautiful. Lacking Castles is huge, but if the City Center works the same as the Fortified House then that's going to be a major defensive disadvantage. One of the most common panic buttons for "an overwhelming force is in my base" is "raze random buildings/farms and build a defensive castle with all nearby villagers", and timing is key here. If it's just a TC upgrade that can't be sped up with additional villagers then it's not very flexible defensively, and would only really be useful for preemptive area denial. I don't think this would make them useful offensively like castle drops are since you would still have to build a TC first, but having the possibility to speed this up with villagers would definitely help defensively, since at the moment it's quite a weakness. Also, if I'm reading your doc correctly, they would benefit from archer range upgrades (like castles) but only have 1 more range than TCs, so capping out at 6+2 since your build lacks Bracer, which feels a bit low tbh. They would cover a bit more than half the area of a Castle with Bracer, or roughly two thirds of the area of a Castle without Bracer. This is fair when considering the stone cost comparison, and again would be quite terrible as an offensive strategy (quite genius how you did this), but I worry that even defensively it wouldn't be very strong, since given 8 or 9 base attack and 8 range it couldn't stand up to a ton of units, and either one of these two could be as good as a castle without making it too strong. Alternatively, you could have it so that villagers garrisoned inside all contribute one arrow each, again hitting that civilian defense motif. Also, being outranged by Onagers with Siege Engineers or any Arbalester with Bracer would probably not be a good look for a defensive building - I think maxing out at 9 range is a minimum, otherwise the Swiss would just make towers instead. Overall I love the idea but I think it's quite restricted in its current form. I love the lumberjack bonus - it's very thematically appropriate and an interesting take on a resource bonus in general. Another top Forest Nothing civ confirmed :D William Tell is perhaps a bit too mythological for an AoE2 campaign (though he can join Robin Hood, Little John and the Sheriff of Nottingham as a scenario editor hero), I'm just not seeing the thematic connection between that and the faster archer line units - that to me seems like a purely offensive bonus and potentially quite oppressive in Castle Age. Also, seeing as they do get the extra 1 range in Imperial, is there a reason that they should have worse defensive buildings and skirmishers? Trade carts trading with Town Centers is another out of the blue idea that has some potential, but would need to be clarified. I may have missed it, but it wasn't in the doc as far as I could see - does this mean you could trade with your own TC (like an infinite gold mechanic - would probably need to be nerfed into the ground in order to be balanced for 1v1s) or just with your allies' TCs (so not much different than trading with Markets - what's the novelty here?) Having two team bonuses is a really nice motif of how alliances are really important here - I would say of all your builds this one is probably the best at hitting the theme of the civ well. I like how the Reislaufer benefits from your upgrades rather than your enemies, but I worry about the feasibility of a melee infantry that costs 60 gold and maxes out at 2 pierce armor. Generally, is there a reason they need to have such a terrible blacksmith - no other civ is missing all 3 final armor upgrades. IIRC the Celts have it the worst and they still get both Blast Furnace and Plate Mail Armor. Does this mean we are getting the first civ that doesn't have access to the Petard? "Spirit of the Law style, beginning with the infantry" XDDD I get the whole "landlocked" thing, but many other civs are also "landlocked" or otherwise weren't known for going out to sea, yet no civ is missing both Galleon and Fast Fire Ship. Gold trickle whenever villagers are working sounds a bit lazy IMO as well as deriving from both Burgundian Vineyards and Paper Money while not giving an interesting choice to the player, but it would be very thematically appropriate. Would work in a game like AoE3 maybe, but not AoE2. All units having bonuses against the common power units would be a really interesting way to power up a civ thematically based on traditionally weaker units. A bit of a tangent: My own Swiss ideas went in a bit of a different direction, showcasing their decentralization by having no castle UU, but instead 3 unique upgrades to common units: the Crossbow, the Pikeman, and the Scout, and this would be a very fitting bonus for such a build. Town bell making temporary soldiers - your WC3 is showing again :D
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Eyyy my boy back at it again with another incredible comment! You always give such incredible feedback man, builds don't feel complete until I get your take on them. I am flattered and delighted that you think I hit the theming of this build so well my friend! Thank you so much for saying so! I'll try to address all your points, but forgive me if I miss any (you can remind me over discord and we can discuss there too). Your idea to give the city center plus one range and make villagers each contribute one arrow is LITERALLY PERFECT. That suggestion alone shores up a big hole in the build, what a home run! My idea in giving them the crappy blacksmith was both to reflect history, since literally every one of their units besides the Reisläufer were known for using lighter armor, and to help compensate for the infinite gold. Yes, the trade bonus would let you trade with yourself! Another commenter already suggested a way to help balance it out, mainly by having the bonus taper down the more you are using it and cap out at around 20 cards, but it would still be infinite gold, albeit relatively fragile and finite. But you'll be glad to hear that I was persuaded to give the civ plate mail armor and buff up the Reisläufer's Pierce armor a little bit! You're definitely right that William Tell alone wouldn't be enough to justify the crossbow bonus. But the weapon was a major part of Swiss iconography pretty much from the founding of the old Confederacy! Additionally, Swiss skirmishers were famous for their use of light crossbows, lower damage than most but using maneuverability to dart in and out of Pike formations while taking pot shots. Hence my desire to keep the range the same as normal but have damage be a little lower from lack of bracer and improve the speed. Another commenter helped me refine a way to make this bonus a little more dynamic by replacing the further speed in imperial age with an attack bonus against archers. This will allow your arbalests to almost function like skirmishers, hopefully helping compensate for their lower damage against everything else! And yes, no petard for the poor Swiss! Though if for some reason people wear clamoring for it we could always throw it in the siege workshop same as the trebuchet. Thanks as always for the great review my friend! You know where to find me if you ever want to discuss any of this further.
@ivanstrydom8417
Жыл бұрын
I like the city centre Idea.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Thanks man! I've got some great feedback on it from other comments, but I generally really like the idea too!
@ValerietheLovelyDeadlyItalian
Жыл бұрын
Kind of wish that was how the tech Cuman Mercanaries worked
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Saaame dude, glad you liked the implementation!
@carlosmartinezcaballer8203
Жыл бұрын
Maybe Aragon as a civ, to separate spanish into castille and aragon, as Spain is a XVI century political product. Nice vid
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey there Carlos, really glad you liked the video! And an excellent suggestion with Aragon and Castille! I thought about doing so myself in the past, but you giving the suggestion definitely motivates me to put it on my to-do list. Thanks for the input man! Hope to see you in future comment sections.
@WelcomeToTheGooniverse
Жыл бұрын
Hello again. Just a quick thought, the battle at Marignano instead of being a Swiss protagonist campaign could be a French protagonist campaign, since they won.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
A very legitimate idea Daniel! If it were up to me I would go for a Swiss protagonist, both because I think it's interesting to play the loser and because that battle was so pivotal to Swiss history, but I certainly wouldn't fault anyone choosing for the player to take the role of the French. In fact, how cool would it be if it were a multiplayer scenario where one person took the Swiss and the other the French? The outcome of the battle could actually be left up to the players' own tactical skill!
@jurgnobs1308
11 ай бұрын
@@robbylava i think a swiss campaign could focus on the wars against burgundy for instance. or wars against austria/the german empire
@danielbentley7117
Жыл бұрын
Really nice and well thought ideas. I'm guessing petards would be made at siege workshops? Plus the castle techs like Spies and Sappers etc. I do think they are slightly too weak though overall. Every unit type is severely disabled in some way. Infantry, Cavalry and Ranged units. Aside from that, I think the only thing missing is some kind of hill bonus, since the mountainous terrain is what made Switzerland historically so difficult to invade.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey! Thank you so much for saying so Daniel, it's a pleasure hearing from you! Yeah, I mentioned during the tech tree section that trebuchets would actually be made from The Siege workshop but take 50% longer than other civilizations. Petards on the other hand I didn't actually specify, so good catch there! I'll make sure to put in a note on how to make those, though if I'm honest I don't think anyone would cry if the Swiss missed petards entirely. I've got a ton of great feedback from commenters, so this civilization is definitely going to be getting a major recraft when I do another of those videos in future. Buffs will certainly be forthcoming, as you correctly identify! I do see what you mean about the elevation bonus, but I'm pretty married to my current ideas if I'm honest! But if any room does open up then an elevation bonus would definitely be one of the main places my mind turns to. Thanks for the great input Daniel! Very much hope to see you in the comment section of future videos.
@simbelmyne1476
Жыл бұрын
Hopefully this shows up this time: Here was my attempt to design a Swiss civ. It is very different, and much les creative (they still had castles in this version,, unfortunately!) but has some similarities as you might expect. Brief historical and design notes: - History / Flavor: I try to encompass the famous heavy pike formations & mercenaries of the Swiss by their strong infantry, UUs, and imp. UT. The mountainous nature of Switzerland is referenced in the castle UT. The idea of defensive local militias (& the William tell legend) are meant to be captured by the town watch bonus & villager bonus. Finally, the importance of the church in organizing the earlier Swiss confederation (if I recall correctly from when I read about it) is meant to be referenced by the monastery bonus. - Design: This is an infantry / siege oriented civilization with passable archers, and poor cavalry, and little meaningful eco bonuses early in the game. They will want to leverage its defensive or infantry bonuses to survive until castle age, when its siege bonus and monastery eco options will kick in. Long-term, the civ will want to use strong infantry and siege, but likely will also use their archer-line in many games, despite its lack of bonuses. *The Swiss:* Infantry civilization *Bonuses:* *-- Infantry Armor upgrades are free* *-- Town Watch / Town Patrol research 100% faster, and spawn 2 / 6 spearman-line units at the researching TC* *-- Starting Castle Age, villagers fight with cross-bows* (gain ranged attack vs. all units and deal pierce damage) -------->Specifics: base 3 range & 3 atk, accuracy = 100%. Vils now affected by chemistry, fletching/bodkin/bracer,, and ballistics. This bonus is an oblique reference to the William Tell legend 111111. *-- Monasteries garrisoned with relics can train villagers* (but at higher training time / cost, which can be reduced by garrisoning more relics). ----------->Specifics: monasteries garrisoned with 1 relic produce villagers at +20% cost/time compared to TCs (so 60 food, 30 seconds). Each further garrisoned relic reduces the extra villager training/cost by 5%, so a 5-relic monastery would have the same production/cost as a normal TC. Garrisoned >5 relics would have no further benefits. A Swiss player with multiple relics could choose to multiple villager-producing monasteries at the higher cost, or one TC-monastery with more relics & cheaper costs. Monasteries without relics, of course, cannot produce villagers. *-- Siege units +15% movement speed* *Team bonus:* *- Villagers +2 bonus vs. buildings and siege units* ---->this is primarily meant to prevent their castle/imp age villagers from being unable to fight rams now that they deal pierce damage, but could be useful in other circumstances and for your teammates, too. UTs: Castle - *Mountain Tactics (350w/350g) units on elevated ground have +10% movement & attack speed* ---->Note that this applies regardless of relative elevation to an enemy, just so long as the Swiss unit is on elevated ground. Elevated ground in this case means tiles with an elevation number >1, so on perfectly flat maps (like arena) this tech will be useless, but on maps with hills it will be useful when you are fighting on a slope/hill regardless of whether or not you are the one on top of that hill. Imperial - *Papal Contracts (500f / 350 g) Units refund 25% of their gold cost when they die, and all units will die instead of converting.* *UUs:* *- Unique upgrade: Swiss Pikeman* (replaces halberdier upgrade, like winged hussar replaces hussar) 400f / 800g --->Specifics: same stats as standard halb, except 7 base attack (+1), 65 hp (+5), 1.05 movement speed (+0.05), and 1/0 armor (+1 melee). - *Castle UU: Swiss Guard (10f / 100g) heavily armored merc. infantry* -----> Specifics: base(elite) stats = 80 (100) hp, 1/2 (2/3) armor, 11 (14) atk, 2 (1.9) ROF, 0.95 movement speed, 15(13)s training time, +6 (+9) bonus vs. cavalry, +3 (+6) bonus vs. camels, +12 bonus vs. elephants. 3(5) hidden infantry armor. Elite upgrade = 100f / 1000g. Idea: a really, really strong generalist infantry, with some bonus vs. cav & quick train time but also a high cost that is extremely biased towards gold. *Tech tree* (missing techs listed): Barracks: eagle warrior Archery range: Heavy Cav Archer, Parthian Tactics, Elephant Archer, Thumb Ring. Stable: Battle Elephant, Steppe Lancer, Paladin, camel, bloodlines Blacksmith: Plate Barding Armor. Siege Workshop: Siege Elephant, Heavy scorpion. Monastery: heresy, theocracy, atonement. University/Castle/Economic/market: heatedshot, architecture, hoardings, fortified wall, two-man saw, gold shaft mining. Dock: Galleon, shipwright, dry dock.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Yep, that did it! And I'm very glad I can see the build now, this is very cool Simbelmynë. I think you undersell yourself my friend -- this is awesome! The vill crossbows are sick, Mountain Tactics looks fun as hell (and very smart making it an optional UT instead of a bonus), and free Spears off of LoS upgrades is super slick. The monastery training is something I've considered for other civs but is done really cleanly here! Overall, brilliant work in my eyes! A question: where did you find the Siege subtheme? I certainly saw plenty of sieges listed in the history that I consulted, but I didn't see anything that really lent itself to a proper Siege clarification.
@simbelmyne1476
Жыл бұрын
Thanks! The siege bit I think was mainly directed at game balance / to complement their overall gameplay design and less of a historical choice. This was also the one of the later concepts in my series of civ designs, so the design space was starting to feel cramped in terms of which more traditional civ bonuses were left for me to use. However, I think that MantisAOE's civ design for the Swiss also had an identical +15% siege speed bonus (independently derived though, I think a flat speed boost for siege is one of the more logical/traditional siege bonuses left to use for any new civs). So maybe he mentioned some history behind that choice? For the gameplay reason for the siege bonus, my civ design is almost exclusively directed at infantry/defenses by its bonuses and has poor early game eco, so it will be expected to have a very difficult early game in general. Since its archers were only OK, and its cavalry poor, I used the classic pairing of infantry/siege to round out the civ, provide a clear counter to ranged units, and give it a more late-game identity.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
That sounds very logical. I wouldn't be surprised if the devs took a much more similar route to you than to me if they were to implement the civ. HOWEVER, as I'm sure you've noticed, I am more than happy to define mechanical sense in pursuit of historical authenticity in my builds! Big respect to your approach either way. I totally agree that there is a distinct lack of Siege civs in the game (as well as archers, weirdly enough), by the way. I have a bunch of ideas on how to remedy that problem, could make for a cool video in future. Would you be interested in seeing something like that?
@simbelmyne1476
Жыл бұрын
Yes, I did think that we have fundamentally different approaches: For me designing a civ, history should guide, but (theoretical) gameplay will decide, while for you gameplay guides but history decides 11 Having videos about broader topics than a single civ / unit idea could be interesting, IDK how that would be formatted though!
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
I have no idea either, to be honest. But then again, I've been stumbling through this whole KZitem thing pretty much completely blindfolded so far! I might frame it similarly to how I do recraft videos, going one subtopic at a time. That could be pretty fun! Regardless of how I end up figuring out how to do it, I'll certainly put the idea on my list of things to do. Thanks again Simbelmynë!
@Grevnor
Жыл бұрын
Amazing, off kilter, gonzo, dare I even say ballsy? *applause*
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
You're making me blush!
@Grevnor
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava Also, congratulations on your 10th civ build! That's a pretty big milestone.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
HEY! Thank you SO much for saying so Johannes! I actually forgot until you brought it up, but this is definitely a big step for the channel! Hopefully I'm starting to have enough of a backlog that newcomers have a fun binge ahead of them.
@matthewjohnson3656
Ай бұрын
No high ground bonus? Edit- never mind. You got there
@magic_claw
Жыл бұрын
Cool stuff. I might take a stab at redesigning some existing civs I have knowledge of too. For example, the Dravidians are terrible essentially lifting much of the lore and units from the wikipedia page. Side note: Some of your smaller campaign ideas could become "Historical Battles". Those are featured in the game as well.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Absolutely Magic Claw! You literally just missed me accepting submissions for a civ design contest, but I will for sure be hosting another one in future! The dravidians are a particular sore spot for me, as I had almost finished a design for the tamils when the DLC dropped. I was so excited to see what they had done with them!... And then so, so underwhelmed, possibly my least favorite civilization design currently in the game. Absolutely agree with you that some of the smaller stuff could be historical battles! And some of my later videos I specify that a bit more clearly, but in this video The Battle of Marignano for example would make for an absolutely perfect one off.
@magic_claw
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava Ooh! I’ll follow along. I just discovered your channel recently. Would love to participate in a civ design contest 🙂. And yes, I did start to notice that. I haven’t been watching sequentially since I am not yet caught up on all of your old videos haha.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Excellent! Well it's great to have you Magic Claw, really hope you're enjoying the content!
@arsenixkikokoro
Жыл бұрын
love the intro, keep em coming
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
You better believe it bud!
@mikeocksmall1695
Жыл бұрын
I reckon you should give spirit's lumber video another watch, I reckon the 5% slower wood chopping speed with auto dropoff works out to a nerf when directly beside a lumber camp, and once you're chopping wood at a point where it would help your efficiency you're at or on the edge of line of sight, so benefit is lost.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey there Mike, good to hear from you man. You know, in retrospect you might actually be right about that. I did watch the video, of course, but since I was trying to mirror Khmer farming I didn't really consider how much of a nerf the 5% might be. Great catch there man!
@mikeocksmall1695
Жыл бұрын
Just go all out and do insta dropoff when the building, that is the lumber camp or TC/CC has line of sight of the villager, then the bonus gets a buff from town watch/town patrol. And just from my own game design background (LARP mechanics) I'd be asking "what do I want this mechanic to do?" So is the extra wood for more buildings/palisades? Is it to trade for more gold? Is there a wood unit I'm interested in training? Wood for thought there.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Heheheh plenty of wood for thought. Mike Woodslarge if you will. The drop off mechanics you describe are actually exactly how I have to implement it now, so all that would need to be done is remove the 5% nerf! I have a very similar approach to you when it comes to you designing bonuses! In this particular case my goal was to make it so that the Swiss player "didn't have to worry about" the resource in the mid and late game so they can focus their micro elsewhere and maybe get a surplus that could be spent on production buildings, more farms, etc. Plus, you know me, historical authenticity is always a big pull, I just felt like a great way to represent how the Alps were colonized over the centuries. Also HOLY SHIT DUDE I had no idea how our game design backgrounds were so similar! I've been designing and hosting my own subgenre of ttrpgs for almost 15 years now. My stuff is a lot closer to LARP than other ttrpgs get too! I'm nearing the completion of a published rule set, and when I do I'm definitely going to be putting content out on the channel. What sort of games do you work on man? What got you into the genre?
@mikeocksmall1695
Жыл бұрын
Been a larper for 12 years, in the last few some mates and I started our own company (Exodus Battle Larp, kzitem.info/news/bejne/mYdqrH17bKyYnHY) We run pre-1600''s style fantasy battle games, weekend and week long camping events, and working on post 1600's stuff too.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Wow... That is insanely cool man. I've subscribed to you guys on KZitem! How did you get into LARP and do you do any other ttrpgs or adjacent stuff in addition to it?
@danielbentley7117
Жыл бұрын
Also the 10% / 20% speed boost for crossbow / arbalest is not as OP as it initially seems when you consider that the archer line normal speed is only 0.96 and a 10% boost makes it 1.05, going up to 20% at 1.15 max speed in imperial age. Compare that to Plumed Archers who get 1.2 base speed already in Castle Age and have access to bracer and all the armour upgrades, plus staggered discounts on archer units through the ages.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Yeah! That was pretty much what I was thinking! Though I did get a suggestion from another commenter that I really like which should help the Swiss crossbows have even more of a unique niche than just being fast. I look forward to hearing what you think once I put out the recraft video in a couple weeks!
@paweborkowski6959
Жыл бұрын
Would the City Center be, strength-wise, between a tower and a krepost: Tower > City Center > Krepost > Castle?
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Pretty much! But much closer to the krepost side than the tower side. And I'd say the HP and defenses would be between that and the castle. If you'd like to see the numbers I do have them on the civilization document linked in the description!
@hugoboss3707
Жыл бұрын
on the battle field they will always lose, against slavs for example. In addition, you dont have anything against archers. Only Siege Onagers, but that means they have to go anti cav, but they miss armor. Its an early game civ, and in late game its very defensive and eco focused. I like it.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Thank you very much for saying so Hugo! I've gotten some really good feedback from commenters, so you can expect some updates to this build in the not terribly distant future. But hopefully it keeps a similar early game aggression late game defensive/eco identity!
@hugoboss3707
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava Yea, nice :) But maybe give them a strength that stands out in late game, and try to make them viable in 1v1. Their golden unique tech is ONLY for team games. But in a 4v4 flank or pocket they seem nice
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
In 1v1 their unique tech does actually reduce their unique units gold cost by 10! But yeah, I would generally agree that as of now the build is much more suited to team games. I'll hopefully address that in the recraft! Thanks so much for the kind words Hugo. Look forward to hearing your thoughts on other builds!
@gurugru5958
Жыл бұрын
Man, Mantis also gave them better crossbowmen! Did I miss something in their history? Anyway, I like this build. Fortified TCs replacing castles and aggressive spearmen fits really. And the Swiss Guard feature is a really clever merger of history and game play. My personal build for Swiss had free Sappers in Dark Age, a very fast spearman UU, some other stuff, and faster firing TCs. Honestly, I think that last bonus is really cool and fitting, since they were defensive, decentralized, and isolated for a long time. Try to scout my base? Boom! Come back in 100 years.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey, thank you so much for saying so Guru! I'm really pleased with how this one turned out. The crossbow is a huge part of Swiss iconography, primarily because of William Tell, but the weapon was a big part of their combined arms! Light crossbows were frequently used in Pike Squares for skirmishing and covering fire, hence why my version has them a little weaker but much faster. I like your build as well! Seems like we have a good amount in common. The Dark Age sappers is really creative, though I would personally worry about potential cheese. It opens up some really cool options though, if you don't mind I might use that in the future build!
@gurugru5958
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava Heck yeah, use it if you'd like. I guess there's the small wood gathering bonus from it, but mainly anti-tower protection.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Thanks! I can see it working great in another of my projects. Great to hear from you as always my friend!
@AxenfonKlatismrek
Жыл бұрын
Doesnt Switzerland have castles? I mean Habsburg is a castle in Switzerland.
@gurugru5958
Жыл бұрын
@@AxenfonKlatismrek I think the idea is to match how Switzerland was a decentralized confederation of towns and cities and more republican than feudal, hence emphasizing town centers and spearmen over castles and knights. I mean, I'm not an expert, but that's my guess.
@DigitalDiscDreamer
Жыл бұрын
Hey Robby! Back at it again with a new theorycrafting video I see? I thought it was wonderful and close to what I myself would have envisioned the Swiss if they were implemented in AoE2. One thing I would be concerned about when it comes to balancing is the lack of armor upgrades. For a defensive civilization, they sure have terrible armor. I wouldn't mind some gaps in the blacksmith, but I would have imagined not only Bracer but also Blast Furnace as missing techs due to a higher emphasis on defense over offense. Similarly, the Swiss should get the final armors for infantry, archers, and perhaps even cavalry. As it currently stands, the Swiss are extremely weak to Archer and Cav Archer civs in late game because they lack all these armor techs. Their Elite Skirmishers are quite frankly (see what I did there) very terrible in late game due to not only lacking Bracer but also Ring Archer Armor. As far as the civ bonus goes, Elite Skirmishers are unaffected by the increase in speed so the final armor upgrade can be at least on par with soaking up pierce damage as a generic civ. They lack good cavalry late game (as they should) without the final armor and no husbandry so they are completely helpless against arbalesters. Their infantry is interesting depending on how strong the Reislaufer is in practice. If they are fast enough to close in on the archers (similar to Ghulams) then they could be a good counter against them. But again, they miss plate mail armor, so they are bit squishy against Arbalesters and struggle to reach elite cav archers in late game as well. This leaves them with siege such as their SO which could reasonably handle Arbalesters with proper micro, but without siege engineers, they might struggle against them because of the missing +1 range. Additionally, SO could struggle against Cav archers especially Mangudai. The last reason to give them the armor is to also allow their HCs and the proposed Arq units to have the final armor so they can be at least be fully upgraded generic gundpowder units. As for the archer speed bonus, I think it could be changed a bit. It is similar to the Lithuanian speed bonus for pikes and skirmishers and I believe it is quite balanced as it is. So I would recommend that the bonus is 10% across the board but applies to archers, xbows, and arbs starting in Castle Age. In Imperial Age, the +1 Range is automatic regardless of upgrading to arbalester but at least gives the Swiss player a bit of an early Imp boost to their army. +20% speed in late game is quite busted for arbalests but leaves their skirms as pretty mediocre. Thus with my previous change with the blacksmith, the two units are more balanced in terms of gameplay. Very late game, they have serviceable trash units such as the E. Skirms and the Halbs but lack even Light Cav which really sells on the idea that they are a dependent on gold for any hope of raiding and thus are more defensively inclined. Besides that, I think the overall concept is perfect and I must commend on the idea of a civ without even castles to work with.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey david! Great to hear from you man, thanks for the kind words and the extremely thoughtful comment! You make some really compelling points. To give you my reasoning, a number of sources I consulted consistently said that Swiss soldiery were consistently lightly armored, with the exception of their famous pikemen. I went with the low armor both to reference that and also because I thought it would be interesting juxtaposing a defensive civilization identity with relatively low armored units. I definitely agree with you that the civilization is weak to archers, that is at least somewhat by design! But I can see what you mean about it being a little too weak too late game arbs or heavy CA. But if you'll humor me a second I'd like to propose a couple other potential buffs we could give to help with this rather than just opening up the armor upgrades (many of which are adaptations of your excellent suggestions)! 1. Gain siege engineers but LOSE siege onager (overall buff to range but helps keep the civ from feeling two siege oriented, which I want to avoid) 2. Nerf the speed bonus to 10% like you suggest and have it apply to ALL foot archery range units; have Skirms also benefit from range bonus 3. Give Arbs bonus damage against archers instead of further speed in Imp (I quite like this one -- authentic to how the Swiss used crossbows as skirmishers!) 4. Give the Reisläufer more pierce armor Do you think that any combination of these bonuses would address the issues to the point where armor upgrades aren't needed? Thanks again for the feedback my friend! Love seeing you show up in the comments.
@DigitalDiscDreamer
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava Thanks for replying! I understand your reasoning for the lack of armor upgrades. I may have disagreed with it initially, but I now agree with the historical basis of it and see its merits. As for your four suggestions, here are my thoughts: 1) Not a good idea because it goes against the core design of a defensive civ (like Byzantines). SE would fix the issue but it would make their BBC and Trebs stronger than the typical defensive civ (except for Koreans or even Teutons IIRC). The whole concept of already making trebs at Siege Workshops makes up for lacking SE. 2) A good idea but I feel it resembles Lithuanians a bit too much because of the faster moving skirms which can take away the identities of both the Swiss and them. 3) A solid choice! It would compliment well with their fast speed making them anti-archer archers (like Vietnamese UU) while playing to their foot soldier strengths. 4) More pierce armor would be great! If they get more PA, they also can be used to raid much like how it represents the quick expansion of the Old Swiss Confederacy. Its balanced by the fact that they lack good cav late game and that it costs gold, so it checks out. Anyways, thanks for considering my thoughts! If other people have some cool unique solutions to this, they can combine with what I have said.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Thanks for the follow up David! Really glad the reasoning translated well, and I really appreciate you taking the time to go through my ideas! The two that you settled on are also my two favorites, so this works out very nicely. I've put a note down in my personal feedback document, so expect to see this change in a future Recraft video! Really pleased with this particular edit. Thanks again for being in the impetus behind it!
@divicospower9112
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava During the battle of Grandson, the Burgundians bowmen and HC shot at the Swiss squares and it did nothing to them. So I would not see them as a weak factions against range units.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
You know Divicos, that is a very good point. A lot of the sources I read focused on how lightly armored Swiss troops were for the majority of their forces, but the elite pikes were substantially tougher. I think that this point, along with some other great input other commenters have raised, has convinced me to give the Swiss the final infantry armor upgrade. That should mean that their core backbone of halbs plus Reisläufer should be very resilient. I still want to keep the rest of the blacksmith week, but hopefully you see this as a strong step in the right direction towards evening out the civilization!
@MrPeperoni79
Жыл бұрын
My suggestion is that Swiss cannot attack anybody and cannot be attacked. Only building: bank.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
ayy lmao
@thomasfplm
4 ай бұрын
19:15 I like this bonus.
@Alchemist1330
Жыл бұрын
When you say trade carts can trade with town centers what do you mean? Your own town center like AOM, or just with other players.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
The former! The teammates will also be able to trade with your town centers and vice versa if a decent market wasn't yet available, though I don't imagine that happening very often. I recently updated this build and made some clarifications to this very bonus in a recraft video. If you ever have time I'd love to hear your thoughts on it alchemist! But regardless, I really appreciate you taking the time to watch, hope you enjoyed the build!
@hal4351
Жыл бұрын
This Civ has so many power spikes its crazy. Maybe they should have siege engineers for the BBC as a way to deal with a strong archer civ in imp? I can also see the Imp Unique tech being far too strong in team games. The Condo is bordering a nerf (Hopefully not) considering the attention its been getting from players recently on any team game with a closed map and this unit already sounds a like it has stronger base stats.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey Hal! Thanks for the input man. Your idea with Siege engineers is very valid, but I'd personally prefer a different direction because I don't want the civs identity to focus too much on siege. Some other commenters have given me some really great ideas for how to shore up the Archer weakness that I'll be introducing in a recraft video sometime in the next couple weeks! And I definitely see what you mean about the imp UT. I definitely be reluctant to remove it since it's such a huge part of the civilizations history, but if you have any suggestions on how to retune it I definitely would like to hear! I actually had no idea that the condo was being considered for a Nerf, I still remember the days and people thought it was useless. Thanks for watching man!
@instantkevlar4763
Жыл бұрын
Very interesting. It could be very fun to play this civ. Trading with the TC confuses me. How do carts automatically switch between the market and TC if either goes down? With all markets down, do traders re-task to an under attack TC to meet their end there? Also, the town bell and temp soldiers seems too OP for early game.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
You know, that's a really interesting point Kevlar. I don't actually know the logic that trade units follow when their target building is destroyed, but I assume if this bonus was implemented it would work similarly to how it does now. If I were to change it, I would probably have it be such that trade cards working with one of your town centers would retask to another town center specifically if the original was destroyed, probably prioritizing the closest one to the original. But I could see it working totally differently, based on what made most logical sense in practice. Do you have any suggestions in that regard? And I think I agree with you on the Town Bell front! I have a video idea planned for far in the future where all civilizations would be able to do something like this, but I think that if just one could it would probably be a little too warping. Thanks very much for your input mate! Really glad you found the build interesting.
@instantkevlar4763
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava For some reason my previous reply never registered here. I guess you could also consider something around the lines of the caravanserai for boosting trade. It's a building that only the hindustanis get. It's akin to the Spanish trade bonus but with more investment in time and resources from the player. Units attacking trade could also lose HP and eventually die - equivalent to enraged traders fighting back.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Both valid points! I particularly like the losing HP bonus, that's extremely creative! But something I was really trying to do with this civilization is make trade available in some way for 1v1! Trying to reference how the Swiss cantons traded with each other even more than foreign powers at many points. I do love the caravanserai though. I'd personally love to see it become a regional building available to many civilizations!
@instantkevlar4763
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava @robbylava Gotcha. I do love a turtled up 1v1 michi game once in a while. Been mostly using portugese feitoria there along with relics for the infinite gold. So, any civ with similar gold regen would make my favorites list. Burgundian vineyards is also an option but the trickle of gold from farms is low.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Totally agree with you! I genuinely believe that infinite resources are vastly overhated in AOE2, and there are many ways to make them fair! I have a bunch of clarifications to this mechanic that I'll be doing in a future recraft video. When that comes out I'd love to hear your thoughts on the changes. Thanks again for posting Kevlar, it's great to hear from you!
@afz902k
Жыл бұрын
Great theorycraft as always! While watching, I kept wondering how the TC to CC upgrade would be implemented in-game. TCs are partially traversable, while castles so far aren't. If the CC is NOT traversable, then something would have to be done with units that are within the confines of the building when the upgrade happens. Some solutions could be leaving the units where they are (the player would have to move them out by garrisoning/ungarrisoning them), but this could be exploitable to protect for example a large group of ranged units from melee attackers, if they are "inside" the building when the upgrade finishes -- that could be considered a feature! Other solutions could be moving the units so they are right outside the building, or garrisoning them if there is room, perhaps a combination of those. There's also the question of whether the transitioning building stage from TC to CC would be traversable either, but I am assuming it would continue to indeed be traversable just like a regular TC, otherwise it would be less useful as a TC while upgrading it, and the upgrade itself could be exploited, especially if it's cancellable! So that's if the CC is not traversable, but if it's partially traversable (let's say perhaps the front and back are solid while the middle is traversable) then it could also be used as a gate! That would be cool, but harder to implement because the player would have to choose the orientation of the building so it lines up with a potential wall, or maybe it has several gates that can be controlled separately! This also would technically make it a gatehouse which is a building I've wanted in the game for a while ;)
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Holy shit Fergus that is such an interesting point. I never even thought about that! But you bringing this up gives me kind of a cool idea: what if the city center were traversable as normal by friendly units but it's middle was impermeable to enemies? It would work almost like it automatically had Gates! Though there isn't really precedent for this anywhere else in AOE2, I think it's a pretty natural addition that should fix the counterintuitive logic you are rightly bringing up!
@afz902k
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava that sounds very interesting as well! I like that as it's quite an elegant solution, working as an auto-gate.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Thank you very much Fergus! Full credit to you for sparking the idea in me. Expect to see it in a future recraft video!
@IamRayson
11 ай бұрын
Alternative solution for multiple languages. The Britons kings and monks speak Latin, while everyone else speaks early English. Have the sword men line speak Lombardic, the archers speak Burgundian, and the villagers speak German, and so on.
@bedwarssimple7615
Жыл бұрын
I consider many details of your build great but i think that another more unique civ design is possible. We already have so many kind of infantry + archer civs that i dont think we need another. So let me explain in short what i would suggest. The swiss could be a defensive economic superpower which suffers in return from a pretty bad tech tree. They would get good infantry and passable ranged and siege units. civ identity: defensive, economic ifantry civ civ bonuses: -the working efficiency of each villager increases about 1% for each 2 minutes he works (maxed at 15%) -villagers can be converted into "swiss militias" beginning at feudal age (with a hotkey like the rathas but with a conversion time of 40 seconds in which the villagers cant work. swiss militias have the the stats of a regular militia with +1 attack and +1/1 armor and are effected by blacksmith upgrades. After such a conversion the villager loses all the previously gained working efficieny) -pallisades are build 50% faster -swiss militias can be created at a barrack (50 food each, can not be converted to villagers, can build palisades) -defensive buildings do bonus damage when they stand on a higher ground Unique unit: -Reisläufer: (25 food, 35 gold) 70hp, 8 attack, 1/1 armor, gets +2/+2 armor if at least 10 other Reisläufer are nearby, +2 attack vs cavalary, speed 0,9, deals +5 bonus damage vs units of a lower age Elite Reisläufer: 80hp, 10 attack, 1/1 armor, +3/+3 armor if at least 10 other Reisläufer are nearby, +4 attack vs cav, deals +8 bonus damage vs units of a lower age Unique techs: -Militärkapitulation: Reisläufer can be created in barracks and by allies giving the swiss player +10 gold per unit -Gewalthaufen: infantry, ranged and siege units suffer 25% less melee damage from cavalary units Team bonus: all units get +3 LOS towards tiles beneath them Tech tree Ranged -no CA -no arblest -gets HC -all other upgrades Barrack -all upgrades stable -only scouts and light cav, no knigts, bloodlines or husbandry -all blacksmith upgrades Siege workshop -every unit besides caped ram and siege ram -gets siege engineers university -all upgrades exapt heated shot Economy -no heavy blow (for balance reasons), only the first mining upgrades Monastery -no redemption, blockprinting or sanctity Dock -no galleon, dry dock, shipwright or elite canon galleon Please let me know how you like my attempt
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey! Great to hear from you BedWars! Really glad you like the build, and I'm delighted to see your take on it! One of the things that really delights me about your bill here is that we actually have a lot of the same ideas! We both have strong eco, palisade bonus, and gold generated when an ally creates a Reisläufer! Besides it just being cool as hell, it means that we're both picking up on similar elements of Swiss history, which is extremely satisfying to see! I definitely like the route you're going. A lot of people say I make way too crazy and out their builds, and yours is pretty extreme even by my standards! But I respect the hell out of it. Your villager work rate thing is especially cool! I think that your build would have similar issues to what other commenters have brought up about mine: it'll be tough for them to stay competitive in the late game due to having relatively few viable comps. But that being said, your build has such a powerful Eco it might not even need them! In summary, I love it. Thank you so much for sharing my friend, and I very much hope to see you in the comments section of future videos!
@iwersonsch5131
Жыл бұрын
The "call to arms" thing should be a Burgundian rework rather than being added as a new thing
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Hey! I'm guessing you mean in the context of Flemish revolution, yes? If so, I actually have another proposal on how to deal with that tech in my Dutch build. If you ever get a chance to watch that, I'd love to hear what you think of my solution!
@iwersonsch5131
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava Thanks, gonna check it out sometime!
@thomasfplm
4 ай бұрын
28:05 You could make them affect the City Centers
@thomasfplm
4 ай бұрын
24:47 What would happen if there is more than one Swiss in a team? (I know repetition is usually avoided, but it can be relevant)
@thomasfplm
4 ай бұрын
25:06 This should be included in the description, and it makes my previous question even more relevant. I love the idea, but implementation would be quite complicated.
@2nightwehunt
Жыл бұрын
Cool thumbnail! :D
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Heheheh thanks! I had some great people helping design it
@tjones2112
Жыл бұрын
I think if I randomed this Civ I would just resign 😂
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
As a Random Only player myself, I call this strategy "The Sicilian Method"
@deathdealer312
Жыл бұрын
What about North American civs? I really think they should be added in. Would like to see some theory crafting on them
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
It certainly an interesting topic! While I haven't looked into the subject as deeply as I might like, from what I have seen there really seems to only be one North American civilization that could possibly fit in the game, namely the Mississippians and even that would be quite a long shot. I certainly plan on doing a build for them at some point in the future though! And if you'd like to see them then that makes me want to do them all the more. Are there any other North American cultures you think I should look into in addition to the Mississippians?
@deathdealer312
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava The Pueblo Americans, they're one of the oldest cultures in the North Americas and traded with Native cultures in Meso-America. They were pretty advanced at the time.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
I've considered the Pueblo peoples myself! Their structures and civilization size certainly placed them as contenders. My hesitancy for them mostly comes from how little we know about them. Famous people, army composition, most of these things are fairly hazy for the Puebloans. Plus, my guess is that they mostly fought less organized tribal wars, which would require almost a full revamp of their tech tree to make them even slightly fitting in aoe2 as we know it now. That being said, I think that they, alongside a couple other American civilizations, would be great fits for an expanded AOE1 roster! A better match for their tech level and civilizational scope. But if you happen to have any suggestions for where I can look to learn more about them, I would love to be proven wrong about their viability for AOE2. And beyond the puebloans are there any other specific North American civilizations that you might advocate for? Thanks for continuing the conversation Atheist, this is really engaging to discuss!
@deathdealer312
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava "mostly fought less organized tribal wars" What does this mean? What is the difference between the nomadic steppe people and Native American "tribal" wars? Why are the meso-American civs in the game? Just because they encountered the Spanish? The Incans didn't, neither did the Mayans. Whats different between the "tribal" wars of the Aztecs and North American civs? "That being said, I think that they, alongside a couple other American civilizations, would be great fits for an expanded AOE1 roster! A better match for their tech level and civilizational scope" Ok, I think you need to reword this. It kind of sounds like you're saying the North American cultures were stone age primitives. Again, whats the difference between them and the Aztecs? Also the scope of the game is a time period, not a tech level. Otherwise, why are the Huns in the game? Why are the Goths in the game? Steel weapons? That makes their tribal cultures more advanced than the North American cultures? Yes you definitely need more information about them.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Very valid questions. But I do think there are very distinct differences between some of the Central and South American cultures and North American ones like the puebloans, though once again if you can point me towards any sources that counter what I'm saying I am more than happy to be proven wrong. By "tribal wars", I mean that from everything I can see it looks like warfare among the puebloans, and probably most other North American cultures, was far less organized. No standing armies, no distinct categories of troops, and probably mostly done on a smaller scale. Many old world powers also fit this bill in some regards! But I would argue that all the civilizations that currently exist in the game were at various points militarized in a much more formalized and large-scale manner than anything that seems to have been mustered in North America. What sets the Aztecs, Mayans, Incas, and many other American civilizations apart is that they all had highly complex and expansive empires rather than being largely confined to isolated clans. Even the steppe peoples of the old world, though typically organized into clans, at one point or another in history established some sort of greater centralized nation, usually with imperial ambitions. Lastly, I think you're misrepresenting the technology argument. None of the American cultures currently represented in game were Stone Age civilizations. In fact, it's quite likely that the main reason they mostly use stone weapons is that they did not have tin to couple with their abundant copper to produce bronze! But even with their "primitive" stone weapons they were able to actually give European Invaders of a far more advanced technological level a serious run for their money on multiple occasions, and that alone in my opinion means they deserve a space on the roster. In fact, it's so funny that this is coming up now, because I have a build on a mesoamerican civilization dropping tomorrow that I recorded a couple weeks back that talks a bit about this very subject. Lastly, and unfortunately this one is the nail in the coffin for me at least, even if I'm wrong about literally all of the above there is not a single accessible source I have found that can fill the gaps in my knowledge. There's plenty of information about their burgeoning economy and architecture, but I cannot find a single link on Google that goes into any manner of detail about their military. And in a game where much of what you do is fighting, that seems like a really big hole to leave entirely to the imagination of the designer. Don't get me wrong man, I would love to see North American civilizations in the game. But if you couldn't tell from my videos, I'm very much a history purist! While I totally understand that speculative history has to be incorporated to some degree, such as with siege weapons, I do personally feel that there is a line and that a build for the puebloans would cross it. Are there any other North American civilizations that you think would not? As mentioned, I think the Mississippians are potential candidate, but I haven't researched them enough yet to be anywhere near certain.
@divicospower9112
Жыл бұрын
As a Swiss, I must react to this video. Fun fact, I am not that excited to see a Swiss faction in the game (Teutons are good enough I think) but that's not the point. First of all, the flag. In reality there was not one flag for th whole confederation. I would have chosen the flag of Uri but that's just because I love it and it would give more flavor to the civilization. Fun fact, the Rütli oath is the mirror of the old Celtic Lugnassad. The same mind for both of them. Second fun fact, Swiss were called Germans in middle ages. Lower Germans to be clear (in the geographic sense). The neutrality doesn't appear in 1515. For example, in 1536, Bern went to war with the duchy of Savoy and Bern took from it what will become the canton of Vaud. But that's true that after Marignano, the growth slowed down. Switzerland became neutral in 1815. I love this wonder. If you can visit Bern (and Switzerland overall) do it! For the campaign, Dietbold Schielling could tell it. You see him writting the deeds of Swiss while explaining them to the players. Now for the tech tree. I must say that for the first time, I strongly desagree. You just created the only civilization who has only one blacksmith upgrade in imperial age. They will die to everything in imperial age. What I would do (for history and gameplay). - I really like your wood bonus, as long as your defensive flavor and your emphasis on arbalesters. Your imperial unique technologie is great for history but for the gameplay I won't see them being very useful. The city centers are a good idea but I would see them more for Incas. What do you think of that? Infantry and defensive civilization - Wood bonus as you show - palisades as you show - Maconery and architecture free - Towers +10% HP - Team bonus: what you show for villagers - Castle age unique technology => Landsturm as you show it - Imperial age unique technology => Reisläufer/enfants perdus (lost children), 500F 500G: infantry units, arbalesters and skirmishers gain +1 attack - Unique unit => Swiss haleberdier 55F 15G 55HP, 10 attack, 0/0 armor, same speed as a pikeman, elite Swiss haleberdier (upgrade at 600F and 800G) 25F 55G 14 attack, 2/2 armor, same speed as champion, gains +3 attack bonus against infantry and +6 against cavalry. It shows the evolution of Swiss infantry. First lightly armored and quick, then heavily armored and master of battlefields. The elite upgrade changes that but also the cost of the unit itself. - Archery rang => Thumb ring, arbalesters, elite skirmishers and HC available but no HA - Barracks => squires, supplies available and 2 unique units. Instead of the champion you get the zweihänder, a stronger version but also more expansive. 80HP, 14 attack, 2/1 armor. Instead of the haleberdier you get the heavy pikeman, also stronger and more expansive. 70HP, 7 attack, 1/1 armor (same bonus attack) - Stable => the same as the Bohemians - Siege workshop => Siege ram and canons but no onager nor heavy scorpion. You get siege engineers - Blacksmith => the same as Ethiopians and Vikings - University => you lack heated shots and hoardings for castles - Monastery => you lack sanctity, fervor and illumination - Docks => you lack galeons, fast fire ships, elite canon galeon, and the imperial technologies. You only have heavy demolition ships. - You have guilds, crops rotation, the mining technologies but not 2 men saw The flavor and idea behind this civilization. You are a powerhouse in the late game but in early game you have nothing great. You must rely on your defenses. You have a poor cavalry and no onager nor heavy scorpions so you must get your best upgrades to deal with enemy range units. You don't have great hosremen so you won't compete against them with your own but instead with your infantry. You have no bonus for it (it's unique I think) but strong upgrades that make it above average. In solo games you can choose 1 or 2 elite upgrades but you must make choices so you are not overpowered. In team game on the other hand you can have all that you want.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
HOLY SHIT I had no idea you were Swiss, Divicos! An honor and a privilege to have you review the build! Your suggestion on the flag is really excellent. I had a feeling it was anachronistic but it kept coming up in my research, so I didn't really feel like I had a choice but to use it! I'll absolutely look into the flag of Uri, are there any other medieval canton flags that I could maybe take a look at as well? Also excellent points about the campaign and history! I really rely on you guys to catch me when my research fails me, so a very good note there. You are one of many commenters to point out the very weak blacksmith! I did that deliberately, cuz as you know I really like to push the boundaries and I wanted to try making a defensive civilization that had very weak Smith upgrades, which would be wholly unique to the game and reflect their history pretty well! I have a couple of plan changes based on other comment or feedback that I'm going to try to introduce in a future recraft to help compensate for this particular weakness, but I'd really like to try to keep it if possible! Can you think of any buffs that you would give to make the civilization work better in your eyes if, theoretically, you absolutely had to keep the blacksmith weak? Fantastic to hear from you my friend! Thank you so much for the great review. Much as I love it when people like my builds, them disagreeing is often even more fun to discuss!
@afz902k
Жыл бұрын
You know what would be cool? If they did not get either arbalester OR hand cannoneer, but instead got a unique unit trainable at the archery range, maybe called the Vorhutschützer (don't know if this name makes sense, would be cool if someone can pick a better name for it. Vorhut (vanguard) was apparently a part of their armies which had ranged units supported by pikes), which can switch attacks like a Ratha! Except instead of melee/ranged, this unit would be able to switch from arbalest-mode to handcannon-mode (the other weapon goes to rest on their backs). I think a unit like that would be very fun to use and it would showcase the versatility of the medieval Swiss armies during the time when they were transitioning from using arbalests to harquebuses.
@divicospower9112
Жыл бұрын
@@afz902k Why not? It could be cool. Not very realistic but cool. For the name you can say Vorhutschützer, that's fine.
@afz902k
Жыл бұрын
@@divicospower9112 thanks! I've edited the name in that comment. Indeed, not very realistic as it would be hard to keep both weapons with you at all times, but as with many things in AoE2 we could "imagine" the logistics behind, maybe the army structure these units are part of has some spare weapons at their camp that they can swap around as needed. Oh, another way to make it interesting would be if they can only switch attack mode within the Line of Sight of friendly military buildings!
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
I leave you two alone for a couple hours and you come up with such a cool idea, that's really sick! Yeah, I mentioned considering vorhut as a unique technology, but creating a unique unit around it is very cool indeed! I absolutely love weapon swap UUs, though in this particular case I think I have done enough weird stuff with this build that it might be Overkill to add yet another novelty to the mix. However, with your permission I think I will save this idea for a project I have planned well in the future!
@thomasfplm
4 ай бұрын
30:07 I think that them missing so many Blacksmith techs makes them lack versatility. And they have no counter to archers, their skirmishers are awful and they don't have good fast units to deal with them like cavalry. I would say that it would be better to remove the archer/arbalest bonus and let them have a fully upgraded vanilla archery range (widout CA). Or give them just the 10% extra speed.
@blackbellator
5 ай бұрын
Great and important build but I would make much stronger Reisläufer much stronger and I would give them stronger Xows and Cav-units maybee I would Give them stronger Towers becaus of the missing Castle
@robbylava
5 ай бұрын
I have some similar plans on the horizon! This is a very old build, and I actually ended up updating it a couple of times since this original video. If you're ever interested in checking out some of my recrafts that I did around this time, the Swiss were one of the major focus points of my reworking! The change is going all be found on the length civilization document as well if you want to see them written out.
@thomasfplm
4 ай бұрын
34:35 Sounds like a cool idea, but maybe a bit complicated to balance.
@PhoenixAlaris93
Жыл бұрын
Honestly surprising the Swiss haven't been put in the game yet
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Right?! Hence my likeliometer score
@PhoenixAlaris93
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava As for my opinion.. I do feel missing Castles is a little much. I can forgive crappy cav or navy, but no castles just pushes it over for me.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Yeah, I certainly don't fault you for thinking that. A bunch of the other commenters have been surprisingly positive on the whole no castles front, but I did anticipate people thinking it was too much. Can you see any way that a civilization without castles could work?
@PhoenixAlaris93
Жыл бұрын
@@robbylava I can’t really say. I’m just so used to all civs getting them. Even when Bulgarians came along with their Kreposts, they still had castles. Though on the topic of the Civic Center, I was honestly considering giving my Hittites concept something similar before i saw this video. Talk about a coincidence!
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Ha! That really is a wild coincidence. I know so little about hittite history, where did you get the idea for the bonus from? I do think there are ways to make castleless work! Though whether I actually succeeded in this video or not is another matter entirely.
@paweborkowski6959
Жыл бұрын
11:05 dang, I thought that was Donald Sutherland.
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Just looked him up and the resemblance is uncanny.
@thomasfplm
4 ай бұрын
10:07 That is fun
@jurgnobs1308
11 ай бұрын
as a swiss historian, the ahistoric stuff you said here makes me see your other videos in a very different light. the idea that the swiss built no castles has literally zero basis in history or reality. no, it is not true that all swiss castles were built by foreign powers. no idea what even gave you that idea. and stuff like "the austrian habsburg"... mate, habsburg is a swiss family that controlled austria and lost control over their homeland in todays canton aargau. they lost their swiss lands on 1415, way after the events you mentioned. so, at the time of the invasion you bring up, the habsburg were a swiss family that directly controlled small parts of switzerland aswell as all of austria while also having indirect control over other parts of switzerland. the habsburg only gained control of austria in 1282, so a bit under a decade before the invasion. they were definitely not an austrian family
@robbylava
11 ай бұрын
Whenever I do one of these videos I am constrained by a number of factors in conveying history accurately: 1. The sources I have access to, which all come from the web and have to be in English unless I am working with someone who can translate for me. I never use Wikipedia, but I'm sure there have been many times when I use a bad source without knowing it. 2. My understanding of the sources. Like I mention in every video, I'm a hobbyist not a historian, so there will absolutely be times when I misunderstand or get things wrong. 3. Communicating that history within a finite period of time. The history sections in my videos are generally less than 10 minutes long, and there are many times when I misspeak, misremember, or simplify elements of history when I am shooting a video. So I'm not surprised that by the standards of an actual Swiss historian this was subpar. This civilization is already one of my most controversial designs, and I have actually updated it twice since its first release. But you being a historian actually provides a really great opportunity! If you're on discord, reach out to me via the community server I've set up. I want to work with you man! If you are willing to collaborate with me, I would be happy to even do a full reimagining of this build. So what do you say, do you want to make this build better with me?
@jurgnobs1308
11 ай бұрын
@@robbylava ok fair enough, admittedly english sources on swiss history are lacki ng. but there are a few quite significant errors. for instance, 1291 isn't actually when the confederation was founded. that was made up by the city of bern (which was founded in 1191) in the late 19th century when they wanted to strengthen the claim on being the capital. they simply organided a 700 year celebratiom for switzerland to happen at the same time as the 800 year one of the city. various swiss regions still do not recognize 1291, but instead put forth other years like 1308, 1309... but the biggest issue is the part of the castles. switzerland actually has a very high density of castles, foe its terrain. and most of them were built when the powers of bern and zurich took control of aargau, vaud, ticino and so on. they are definitely swiss castles, and a lot of them. and this mistake actually plays a massive role in your civ design, which on the context of the video (it is an AoE 2 build video, not a primarily a hiistory lesson) really bothers me. sure, maybe I was a bit harsh considering you're a layman. but at the very least the castle topic is actually quite important
@robbylava
11 ай бұрын
@jurgnobs1308 very fair and reasonable of you. The Confederacy being founded on that date is something I came across in a couple of sources so I didn't think to question it. Is that common knowledge in Switzerland or is it contentious? Like if I made that amendment would I have a bunch of Bernese people freaking out at me? As for the castles, I found that in one source mentioning that while Switzerland has a very high density of castles they were pretty much all built before the times of the Confederacy when it was pretty much just an arm of the holy Roman Empire and similar German states. Similarly, me calling the Habsburg family of Austrian even before they went there was mostly a simplification since I think most audiences would associate them together. I will admit, when I saw that mention in the sources my imagination got whirling! It's a very cool gimmick to design a civilization around, so I seized on it. So just to confirm, does this mean that the Confederacy built castles regularly? And are there any Swiss Castle sieges in history that I could look to for reference?
@jurgnobs1308
11 ай бұрын
@@robbylava I'll be home in about 20 minutes, that should make this easier for now, lets just say that it is in the nature of switzerland being a loose alliance of tiny states with differing interests that this all is quite complicazed very quickly
@robbylava
11 ай бұрын
@jurgnobs1308 undoubtedly. Again, if you happen to be on Discord then that's ideal for me to communicate, but if not then I'm also happy to shift this to email. You can find my address in the About tab of my channel
@PeterRudesindus
Жыл бұрын
aren't they Teutons?
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Broadly speaking yes! Most Swiss probably would have referred to themselves as Germans during the aoe2 relevant time frame, just like most Burgundians would probably have called themselves French.
@magtag6879
4 ай бұрын
WATER WONDER
@thomasfplm
4 ай бұрын
34:16 I think it would make sense.
@maxs713
Жыл бұрын
Team bonus should be Coinage & Banking researched for free! 😁💲
@robbylava
Жыл бұрын
Heheheh I did at one point consider that! But Switzerland wasn't known for its banking at the time and wouldn't be for at least 100 to 200 years after AOE2. Plus, those technologies are completely useless in 1v1, so I would probably want to give them some sort of alternate effect to help them be more useful outside of team games if I were to go in that direction!
@hareshneeraj998
Жыл бұрын
First civ with a negative economy in the early game. It might be very historically accurate but its awful to have 5% slower lumberjacks. Remote dropoff is a bonus that's stronger after a while in castle age. This civ will be worst for 1v1.
@2Smithereens
4 ай бұрын
Each TC should produce villagers speaking a different language
@maxmichalik4938
Ай бұрын
Internal trade routes seems completely OP in 1v1 defensive maps like black forest or arena.
@mikelthemafia
2 ай бұрын
The myth of marignano is false, the swiss couldnt simply expand anymore ( with the exception of the lands of the savoyens, but they got conquered soon) Heroes: Arnold of winkelried (battle of sempach against the habsburgs) Adrian of bubenberg ( the burgundian wars with habsburgs as allies) Scenarios: The wars against the habsburgs The burgundian wars The old zurich wars ( basically a war of swiss against zurich, france and the HRE) The reformation and counterreformation Ut: castle age: gewalthaufen ( the compact formation that made them so famous): +2/+2 armor and maybe an attack bonus against cav. Iuq: swiss guard. I completly disagree that the swiss arent able to build castle, the land is strewn with em. Tech tree: the swiss should get all infantry armor Also they should get the cavalier and siege engineers.
@MaZe741
4 ай бұрын
wait what, self-trading? they trade between 2 of their own city centers? ok you did not explain this properly until 28:40
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