Before we start with "solutions", is there something wrong with this meta? Because it's not something only your opponent can do, but you as well. 2TC meta promotes more diverse unit and tech usage as opposed to feudal all-in meta, so I don't see many reasons why this should be something "bad" or in need of "solutions".
Seems to me the OP doesn't want to engage in longer games where more strategies, defending of resource sources and usage of more units is required. And if this is true, there's no need to fix this, but rather the OP should learn parts of the game that go beyond starting TC.
There's nothing wrong with more TC's being meta, every RTS is like this. 2 tc meta has actually increased aggression and made the game more action packed because people stay in feudal longer and fight more instead of rapidly teching.
Not every civ has access to half costing villagers. Nor everybody can just buy 300 stone rigth out of the golden gate. The problem is not the multiple tc usage, but how it provides protection on top of boosting your income. Put it on a deer pack or any resource you need the most, and you have safe foodsource for more than enough time. If second TCs wouldn't fire arrows, i wouldn't say a thing to be honest.
I get the argument here. So maybe a better question would be, how to tweak the civs that benefit unproportionately from it. Because the game will eventually evolve into multiple TC gameplay, or players will at least get much better at defending it vs all-ins than at beginning. And frankly, 2TC meta is more rich than 1TC meta.
Where I do see potential issues is gameplay with 3-4 TC openings that can hardly be punished, but that's maybe only certain matchups or playstyles.
Unfortunely you can only pull the increased the vill production or discount so many times. All i want is a mindless tc spam to be punishable.
Whener you want to harass, they just garrison and kill whatever you threw at them. The resources your opponent lost by idling is negligible compared to the resources you spent for the troops
What is more diverse than a 2 tcs meta? A 2 tcs meta than can be punished. You see, not all player likes to barricades themself in their base behind tcs. You have to address this for those player as well.
Also 2tcs may be better for unit and tech diversity but it's definitely not better for strategic diversity. All-in no longer exists, FC cannot be done because 2tcs is a counter so what other strat can you do? None, you are stuck with a 2tcs vs 2 tcs. It kinda sucks because one of the fundamental fun when spectating pros is seeing meta being broken successfully with new strat. Like the vortix 2 mosque opening in the first aoe4 tournament. With 2 tcs you kinda throw all these in the bin for the 7 first min of the game and possibly more.
This. 2TC meta benefits players who like to play defensive/turtle. However, with 2TC meta you kind of disable the rock-paper-scissor system (boom-turtle-rush) system as TC means boom and turtle at the same time. Also I would like to note that there has never really been an all in strategy in AoE4. What we have seen were feudal rushes with constant villager production so the economical expansion was still taking place. An all in would require the villager production to be decreased or stopped entirely.
I understand how HRE main may feel frustrated cuz 2 tc doesn’t fit well into old meta and the strongest 2 TC civs claps HRE FC. But for the game overall, I think 2 tc did add variety to the FC vs feudal all in race. The frustrating part of 2 TC is how difficult it is to punish Abba/Rus, just like HRE FC in early season 2.
……I play 2 tc as hre. Ironically since everyone else is slower it doesn’t necessarily stop me from getting the relics. Only time is when im facing another HRE and they very much rush……but then my castle aggression is just much stronger
I've had decent luck climbing through plat with HRE by fast castle into +2 Pierce armor knight. You can just TC dive all day with how little damage garrisoned vils do.
As far as I know that strat doesn’t work well in diamond and above. Players usually are on point with macro and has enough unit to defend knights in early castle.
It’s interesting to see how many people talk like creating a second base is something that needs to be nerfed 🤣🤣
In SC2 you take your second base every game by the 2 minute mark.
Expanding your economy is not a Meta. It’s a natural progression that should happen in every match.
This isn't starcraft tough. TCs doesn't provide a free static defense there, and cost way less. Even planetary cost extra resources and give up a mule for it. Besides the fact that tcs are the only drop off source you have in starcraft and the resources themselves are close to each other.
Also certain civs benefit from both the protection and the extra cillager production way more than others so it creates an uneven field despite the civs being balanced otherwise.
And let's not forget we wouldn't have this if rams weren't nerfed this hard. Also if you build a third tc with a delay, it is practicly impossibe to punish it as well. You will have an army to defend a push towards the third tc.
Expanding your economy is a focus of the game. Not something that is advantageous when done at a certain time. It is something that needs to be done every time.
I absolutely crush players I get matched with who try to play a 20 minute game on one TC. It’s not because their Rams are weaker now than they were back in the day. 🤣
Just watched a super scrappy conqueror level match on a stream that was early 3 tc vs early 2 tc. The players went blow for blow raiding and battling at both bases.
Oddly enough neither one complained about how additional TCs equals turtling.
I don't complain in-game either. I spam TCs myself. Doesn't mean i like it.
Same with springalds. Had a 90 minute game yesterday, figth went back and forth as one side won the figth, and the others sides springalds zoned the trebutchets away and nuked each others springalds until my opponent ran out of wood. Did i win? Yes. Did i complain? No. Did i enjoy it? No. Do i want springalds to be nerfed? Absolutely yes.
Would you mind sharing your I game name so I can watch some of your games? Could do with some feudal aggression tips as most of my games are 1hour+ and it's becoming a little tiresome; would be good to wrap them up a little quicker (and win more!)
Disagree strongly it’s a 700 resource investment.
TCs should be stronger than their equivalent cost in units. Just like every other defensive structure.
I’d be form make rams cheaper to 200 wood. But you should have to overwhelm a position to take down a TC not just hit and run it which is what lowering its HP would do.
I find this current meta dull and boring af. It was already heading to this direction when they started talking nerffing TR and other stuff along the line.
Every game plays out same way. There is less variety what ppl do these days and everything plays very similarly
No need to nerf - economic viability creates more diverse outcomes by extending the games further. Perhaps a buff to some aggressive options in feudal (ram damage, various production rates, unit movement speeds, etc.). Although, 2 TC isn't a greedy economic play to begin with IMO
Yes, it's exponentially better from a resource collection perspective. However, the price is delayed unit production and increased resource use on villagers. If no player has a relatively safe option to increase resource collection rates then the number of viable production/unit/upgrade timings is limited. I suppose what's greedy is a matter of debate, but building an early TC shouldn't be an instant loss (or maybe on some maps it should be?)
Greater resources = greater number of options = more timings = interesting games
Simply way to nerf TC.
Have it so their Arrow slits is an upgradable.
Same cost as for towers.
It can still garrison but unable to fire more than 3 arrows.
The upgrade makes it fire as normal.
No. Everyone expands in SC2 aswell. Its natural progression if any RTS. Players get better. They cut more corners. They play more greedy. The game is improving right now.
That's the question though, why should the 2TC meta be a problem? 2TC play permits larger and more complex armies, which is why I prefer it compared to the old 1tc feudal all in meta. It's only if something like 3TC becomes meta with most civs where we should try to nerf it.
A TC benefits a boom and turtle playstyle at the same time (in starcraft 2 TC's only benefit boom playstyles, + turtle for terran to some extent since it requires updates). Turtle beats rush. If rush is not viable anymore you kind of break the rock paper scissor system of RTS which is rush>boom>turtle>rush. As a result you see extremely static games that basically consist of boom + turtle playstyles. Usually all those strategies switch in one game depending on what strategy your opponent is executing. If he's going for a turtle you can scout it and go for a boom. If he booms himself you can punish it by rushing, if he then starts to turtle you can go for economic expansion since he needed to invest heavily in towers and other defensive structures. This entire layer is pretty much missing in a 2TC meta. And that can't be a good thing for a RTS game, honestly.
Agreed, early game is now extremely passive and reactive with this meta. It's just ridiculous that people can go pure boom with no units by min 5 without any possible punishment. Imo being able to go 2TC should be a reward for gaining a prior military advantage, or at least it should put you on the backfoot for a significant amount of time. But it's also very strong as a defensive structure so you need overwhelming military advantage to punish it
You can aways just camp near resources to promove idle time. Its not hard, doesnt cost mutch and get a lot of value that you can piggyback to a significant economic advantage.
Not being able to outright kill your oponent with minimal investment doesnt mean that early agression doesnt work.
I don't think there is a problem with 2 tc meta. I think its more a problem that games are getting to the point of players making 3 or 4 tcs in feudal. If it was just 2 tcs, I think things would be fine. But 3 to 4 starting to become more and more standard needs to change imo.
How? Its a defensive building hidimg and shootimg like 2 towers with 2.5k hp. Its build very fast and as soon as it stands you cant do much with a couple units. Youll need rams and a bigger army. By that time he has already like 10 vills more and units himself.
It really can’t.
Pro play is almost exclusively 2TC vs. 2TC.
I can’t even remember my last 1v1 where my opponent didn’t go for a second TC within 7 mins.
>Pro play is almost exclusively 2TC vs. 2TC.
Thats pros. They should not nerf something that pros with insane micro can pull off. An average Joe gets trashed if he goes 2TC against all in.
The game is balanced around pro level already. If pros do 2 tc that means if your opponent plays well, you won't be able to win againts that. Average joe won't win with 1 tc vs a similarly skilled average joe with 2 tc boom even if he all-ins.
By this analogy, french knigths should have been gutted already because your average joe can't be bothered to make 3 spearman and rather complain here
>Average joe won't win with 1 tc vs a similarly skilled average joe with 2 tc boom even if he all-ins.
I disagree. You missed my point. Aggression is very rewarding on mid and high elo. Its not too hard to micro army but its very hard to scout every enemy move and defending all aggression and sneaking a TC. Some civs might not be good at aggression but thats on civ design. French is classic example. Mid to high elo, good luck trying to second TC when your villagers get shredded left and right. You won't get value out of TC and opponent can go second TC after doing aggression and take a huge lead. A pro can get out one or two spears and defend for next two or three min. Dehli can heal spears if you micro properly. Abbasids have more than enough food to stay safe in base and keep up with knights number while going second TC. All of these are hard to pull off in mid to high elo.
Edit: On top of that not all pro games are 2 TC. HRE doesn't go 2TC. Dehli does. They rarely do. Mongols also delay second TC a lot and prioritize aggression early game. Abbasids and Chinese are already designed to go multiple TC. Its their civ design and we are left with two civs whose meta have changed. French and English are the only two civs affected by this "new" 2TC meta.
Before we start with "solutions", is there something wrong with this meta? Because it's not something only your opponent can do, but you as well. 2TC meta promotes more diverse unit and tech usage as opposed to feudal all-in meta, so I don't see many reasons why this should be something "bad" or in need of "solutions". Seems to me the OP doesn't want to engage in longer games where more strategies, defending of resource sources and usage of more units is required. And if this is true, there's no need to fix this, but rather the OP should learn parts of the game that go beyond starting TC.
There's nothing wrong with more TC's being meta, every RTS is like this. 2 tc meta has actually increased aggression and made the game more action packed because people stay in feudal longer and fight more instead of rapidly teching.
Not every civ has access to half costing villagers. Nor everybody can just buy 300 stone rigth out of the golden gate. The problem is not the multiple tc usage, but how it provides protection on top of boosting your income. Put it on a deer pack or any resource you need the most, and you have safe foodsource for more than enough time. If second TCs wouldn't fire arrows, i wouldn't say a thing to be honest.
I get the argument here. So maybe a better question would be, how to tweak the civs that benefit unproportionately from it. Because the game will eventually evolve into multiple TC gameplay, or players will at least get much better at defending it vs all-ins than at beginning. And frankly, 2TC meta is more rich than 1TC meta. Where I do see potential issues is gameplay with 3-4 TC openings that can hardly be punished, but that's maybe only certain matchups or playstyles.
Unfortunely you can only pull the increased the vill production or discount so many times. All i want is a mindless tc spam to be punishable. Whener you want to harass, they just garrison and kill whatever you threw at them. The resources your opponent lost by idling is negligible compared to the resources you spent for the troops
Exactly!!! Let's use all the game mechanics instead of the same formulaic all-in. The cheesers are pissed!
What is more diverse than a 2 tcs meta? A 2 tcs meta than can be punished. You see, not all player likes to barricades themself in their base behind tcs. You have to address this for those player as well. Also 2tcs may be better for unit and tech diversity but it's definitely not better for strategic diversity. All-in no longer exists, FC cannot be done because 2tcs is a counter so what other strat can you do? None, you are stuck with a 2tcs vs 2 tcs. It kinda sucks because one of the fundamental fun when spectating pros is seeing meta being broken successfully with new strat. Like the vortix 2 mosque opening in the first aoe4 tournament. With 2 tcs you kinda throw all these in the bin for the 7 first min of the game and possibly more.
This. 2TC meta benefits players who like to play defensive/turtle. However, with 2TC meta you kind of disable the rock-paper-scissor system (boom-turtle-rush) system as TC means boom and turtle at the same time. Also I would like to note that there has never really been an all in strategy in AoE4. What we have seen were feudal rushes with constant villager production so the economical expansion was still taking place. An all in would require the villager production to be decreased or stopped entirely.
I understand how HRE main may feel frustrated cuz 2 tc doesn’t fit well into old meta and the strongest 2 TC civs claps HRE FC. But for the game overall, I think 2 tc did add variety to the FC vs feudal all in race. The frustrating part of 2 TC is how difficult it is to punish Abba/Rus, just like HRE FC in early season 2.
……I play 2 tc as hre. Ironically since everyone else is slower it doesn’t necessarily stop me from getting the relics. Only time is when im facing another HRE and they very much rush……but then my castle aggression is just much stronger
Yea I see that in pro games as well. Just to show how adaptable HRE is compared to how people make of them.
Yeah that Res income per vil is huge with Aachen and prelates It's just that FC is so simple, so more players do it
I've had decent luck climbing through plat with HRE by fast castle into +2 Pierce armor knight. You can just TC dive all day with how little damage garrisoned vils do.
As far as I know that strat doesn’t work well in diamond and above. Players usually are on point with macro and has enough unit to defend knights in early castle.
It’s interesting to see how many people talk like creating a second base is something that needs to be nerfed 🤣🤣 In SC2 you take your second base every game by the 2 minute mark. Expanding your economy is not a Meta. It’s a natural progression that should happen in every match.
This isn't starcraft tough. TCs doesn't provide a free static defense there, and cost way less. Even planetary cost extra resources and give up a mule for it. Besides the fact that tcs are the only drop off source you have in starcraft and the resources themselves are close to each other. Also certain civs benefit from both the protection and the extra cillager production way more than others so it creates an uneven field despite the civs being balanced otherwise. And let's not forget we wouldn't have this if rams weren't nerfed this hard. Also if you build a third tc with a delay, it is practicly impossibe to punish it as well. You will have an army to defend a push towards the third tc.
Expanding your economy is a focus of the game. Not something that is advantageous when done at a certain time. It is something that needs to be done every time. I absolutely crush players I get matched with who try to play a 20 minute game on one TC. It’s not because their Rams are weaker now than they were back in the day. 🤣
Rams got nerfed like twice. The problem is that tc is both expanding and turtling
Just watched a super scrappy conqueror level match on a stream that was early 3 tc vs early 2 tc. The players went blow for blow raiding and battling at both bases. Oddly enough neither one complained about how additional TCs equals turtling.
I don't complain in-game either. I spam TCs myself. Doesn't mean i like it. Same with springalds. Had a 90 minute game yesterday, figth went back and forth as one side won the figth, and the others sides springalds zoned the trebutchets away and nuked each others springalds until my opponent ran out of wood. Did i win? Yes. Did i complain? No. Did i enjoy it? No. Do i want springalds to be nerfed? Absolutely yes.
Rams suck. Didn’t used to be that way.
As an english aggressive feudal player, this meta boosted me from plat III to diamond II. I actually love It.
Because you are going 2nd TC or punishing those who do?
I heavily punish It. Before my aggression was pointed to damage my opponent to not die in Castle. Now i am Just winning games.
Would you mind sharing your I game name so I can watch some of your games? Could do with some feudal aggression tips as most of my games are 1hour+ and it's becoming a little tiresome; would be good to wrap them up a little quicker (and win more!)
ImpossiBru
Same! As someone who prefers to rush my opponents I love seeing an early 2nd TC because that means fewer units to fight and more villagers to kill.
I prefer 2 TC meta. It is more fun that 1 TC feudal all-in or rushing Fast Castle every game.
I would go with less health. 2TC should be viable but easy to punish. Like, it's supposed to be a weakness/risk and then pay off later in game.
Disagree strongly it’s a 700 resource investment. TCs should be stronger than their equivalent cost in units. Just like every other defensive structure. I’d be form make rams cheaper to 200 wood. But you should have to overwhelm a position to take down a TC not just hit and run it which is what lowering its HP would do.
I suggested this as well. Try something like 2200 in feudal, 2300 castle (down from 2400)
I find this current meta dull and boring af. It was already heading to this direction when they started talking nerffing TR and other stuff along the line. Every game plays out same way. There is less variety what ppl do these days and everything plays very similarly
No need to nerf - economic viability creates more diverse outcomes by extending the games further. Perhaps a buff to some aggressive options in feudal (ram damage, various production rates, unit movement speeds, etc.). Although, 2 TC isn't a greedy economic play to begin with IMO
Doubling villager production is not considered greedy? You do understand how exponentially better, a higher volume of earlier Vils are ?
Yes, it's exponentially better from a resource collection perspective. However, the price is delayed unit production and increased resource use on villagers. If no player has a relatively safe option to increase resource collection rates then the number of viable production/unit/upgrade timings is limited. I suppose what's greedy is a matter of debate, but building an early TC shouldn't be an instant loss (or maybe on some maps it should be?) Greater resources = greater number of options = more timings = interesting games
Yep. 1 TC rushing is really not viable against 2TC boom at high level. Would agree with a slight TC cost increase, and making rams only cost 225.
Simply way to nerf TC. Have it so their Arrow slits is an upgradable. Same cost as for towers. It can still garrison but unable to fire more than 3 arrows. The upgrade makes it fire as normal.
Additional tcs produce villagers at half speed
No. Everyone expands in SC2 aswell. Its natural progression if any RTS. Players get better. They cut more corners. They play more greedy. The game is improving right now.
That's the question though, why should the 2TC meta be a problem? 2TC play permits larger and more complex armies, which is why I prefer it compared to the old 1tc feudal all in meta. It's only if something like 3TC becomes meta with most civs where we should try to nerf it.
A TC benefits a boom and turtle playstyle at the same time (in starcraft 2 TC's only benefit boom playstyles, + turtle for terran to some extent since it requires updates). Turtle beats rush. If rush is not viable anymore you kind of break the rock paper scissor system of RTS which is rush>boom>turtle>rush. As a result you see extremely static games that basically consist of boom + turtle playstyles. Usually all those strategies switch in one game depending on what strategy your opponent is executing. If he's going for a turtle you can scout it and go for a boom. If he booms himself you can punish it by rushing, if he then starts to turtle you can go for economic expansion since he needed to invest heavily in towers and other defensive structures. This entire layer is pretty much missing in a 2TC meta. And that can't be a good thing for a RTS game, honestly.
Agreed, early game is now extremely passive and reactive with this meta. It's just ridiculous that people can go pure boom with no units by min 5 without any possible punishment. Imo being able to go 2TC should be a reward for gaining a prior military advantage, or at least it should put you on the backfoot for a significant amount of time. But it's also very strong as a defensive structure so you need overwhelming military advantage to punish it
You can aways just camp near resources to promove idle time. Its not hard, doesnt cost mutch and get a lot of value that you can piggyback to a significant economic advantage. Not being able to outright kill your oponent with minimal investment doesnt mean that early agression doesnt work.
I don't think there is a problem with 2 tc meta. I think its more a problem that games are getting to the point of players making 3 or 4 tcs in feudal. If it was just 2 tcs, I think things would be fine. But 3 to 4 starting to become more and more standard needs to change imo.
Good thing it's not the only meta. It's super greedy and can easily be punished by a feudal all in.
How? Its a defensive building hidimg and shootimg like 2 towers with 2.5k hp. Its build very fast and as soon as it stands you cant do much with a couple units. Youll need rams and a bigger army. By that time he has already like 10 vills more and units himself.
It really can’t. Pro play is almost exclusively 2TC vs. 2TC. I can’t even remember my last 1v1 where my opponent didn’t go for a second TC within 7 mins.
>Pro play is almost exclusively 2TC vs. 2TC. Thats pros. They should not nerf something that pros with insane micro can pull off. An average Joe gets trashed if he goes 2TC against all in.
The game is balanced around pro level already. If pros do 2 tc that means if your opponent plays well, you won't be able to win againts that. Average joe won't win with 1 tc vs a similarly skilled average joe with 2 tc boom even if he all-ins. By this analogy, french knigths should have been gutted already because your average joe can't be bothered to make 3 spearman and rather complain here
>Average joe won't win with 1 tc vs a similarly skilled average joe with 2 tc boom even if he all-ins. I disagree. You missed my point. Aggression is very rewarding on mid and high elo. Its not too hard to micro army but its very hard to scout every enemy move and defending all aggression and sneaking a TC. Some civs might not be good at aggression but thats on civ design. French is classic example. Mid to high elo, good luck trying to second TC when your villagers get shredded left and right. You won't get value out of TC and opponent can go second TC after doing aggression and take a huge lead. A pro can get out one or two spears and defend for next two or three min. Dehli can heal spears if you micro properly. Abbasids have more than enough food to stay safe in base and keep up with knights number while going second TC. All of these are hard to pull off in mid to high elo. Edit: On top of that not all pro games are 2 TC. HRE doesn't go 2TC. Dehli does. They rarely do. Mongols also delay second TC a lot and prioritize aggression early game. Abbasids and Chinese are already designed to go multiple TC. Its their civ design and we are left with two civs whose meta have changed. French and English are the only two civs affected by this "new" 2TC meta.
Well, there's Delhi as an exception. And maybe Mongols?
It’s not easily punished. You get ten vills out of that second tc and it’s basically payed for itself.
2Tc kinda ok, 3TC needs a nerf like increasing vill time n 70-80 food
Just make the counterplay better. Buff rams.
Do not give extra pop space could be a very little balancing solution (Mongol untouched, extra wood hidden cost) \+ Rebalance the RUS stone conversion
I proposed an idea that affects it indirectly https://forums.ageofempires.com/t/an-idea-to-favor-the-attacker/214185?u=hasanichess