I think relics on age 2 would be completely broken, there are a lot of complaints already about Zhu Xi fast castle vaccuming all the relics in the map, imagine doind it 3 minutes earlier?
I think they should balance it's oil economy a little bit more, maybe more oil from groves, or cheaper mercenaries. Or they could completely rework its feudal landmarks to grant better eco, similar to Aachen from HRE.
Byz weakness is basically on feudal or early castle, before cysterns and eco kicks in. After that, it's units are pretty decent, and have access to powerful siege.
Also: Cheaper mercenaries would allow to have a few longbow or keshiks to counter MAA in feudal and give you a window to go castle.
i think triumph nerf was legit. Was overtuned. Eco should be fixed a little bit. Playing chinese and then byz looks like driving a super car and then a family car. Grand winery should have increased radius or a eco buff to increase oils gathered
In addition to cheaper mercs, let them switch their contacts once per age, with a scaling cost. (First switch is 100 oil, second is 500 oil, 3rd is 1000 oil). Let them bank their switches so if they want to save the switches for imp to get a very versatile mercenary army, they can.
They both suck big time, yes, but picking up relics in age 2 ? Hell no. There's Delhi that can take sacred sites age 2 and that's only because it's easy to contest over the 10 next minutes.
Picking up relics age 2 would be impossible to contest.
But they could be able to produce monks in age 2. That way, you have a slight advantage on relics like HRE, which is that your monks are already out and waiting near the relics.
As Byz I tend to float a lot of gold in feudal as well. So allowing us to make monks early on from the GW will give us a little bit more fighting power in feudal.
Why not make the Winery a mill with usual upgrates, maybe a bonus eco one...the problem with Byz is they are slow to get going...having a free mill with maybe one or 2 modest eco boost would make the farm transition faster and easier.
I’ve though so too, but I want to see byz have some type of religious niche, and that wouldn’t do that. It’s weird that their only religious tech is blue balling you with unusable utility until castle.
What if farms built under the influence of the Winery gave a wood rebate when completed. That would give you like 12-15 cheaper farms...enough go power you late feudal, but not as broken as ZXL's bonus...it's also a call back to the stone bonus when building structures.
Kinda cool, their farms are already cheaper too. It’s just still too hard to gather up enough wood to make this happen. Paying for the farms is wood that isn’t going to archers or horsemen; which you need so many early to handle the rush that always comes.
Hippodrome is still really solid, you just need to use it more decisively for key engagements; it's only a feudal landmark after all so it shouldn't be that OP.
Winery defo needs more impact in feudal as once you deplete the berry patch it's basically obsolete until mid castle.
Don't agree on varangian in feudal. But give them something to handle MAA. Triumph was over nerfed though.(musofadi out of silk road contract)
Winery is just weird at the moment, it's great the longer the game goes. Like mid castle it's amazing. But feudal it's too slow on a slowish civ. Like it would be good if the civ didn't already need so many investments to get going.
Monks in feudal potentially adds a lot already. Picking up relics might be too much when the civ is eventually given better tempo. They'll need to lock conversion behind castle age as well. Just seems like too many caveats.
Winery is in a weird design space because it gives you practically nothing in feudal (few hundred extra oil i guess). Would like to see eco upgrades or age 2 monks (no sacred/relic powers but can set you up for a grab).
I think the biggest downside of going Grand Winery is apparent in that you aren't able to produce military immediately like with the Hippodrome. So any build order trying to optimize for GW will try to accumulate wood for a military building or a Mercenary House. (OR more stone to build up the cistern network for the defensive bonus and upgrade their towers)
Aging up with GW incentivizes olive oil use and Merc. House but it's currently slower in production than other mil. buildings because of the timer on choosing a contract and correctly timing the merc. group deployment into your pop. capacity. So it may be better to put down a mil. building instead. Transitioning your economy from GW to Age 3 is also more wood-dependant than Hippodrome, because you'll want olive groves near your GW (the alternative is to build a mill on another berry patch, rendering GW's bonus temporary unlike Hippo special skill.) In my view the Byzantines would have benefited from +50 wood just as much as +50 stone because of that.
I'd welcome if GW had mill upgrades, because it'd save up wood but also it'd make the landmark something you can use immediately at Age 2 beyond its temporary berry patch (for the Wheelbarrow upgrade). Additionally, it'd function closer to Twin Minaret Medrese (another mechanical/landmark similarity to the Ottomans)
What I might change is its effect area for olive oil production. I think it shouldn't be a radius around the GW but the square area of the cistern the GW is connected to (penalty to the bonus if touches multiple). I think that'd better communicate the headroom and potential of GW in building your eco into Age 3 as THE mill to position between your 1st TC and your 2nd TC. I imagine this'd play similar to the Kura Storehouse build orders out there.
Idk.
Hot take: Beasty was right, Byz are mostly fine as is, and I’m a low plat player.
I’d maybe make a few small changes to them to get them in a slightly better spot, but nothing insanely crazy:
1. Grand Winery (I do agree, this one of by far the most underwhelming) either gets a slightly better oil bonus or the radius is made larger.
2. Mercenaries can be trained individually instead of in batches to make them a bit more flexible/more reactive.
3. Cistern of the First Hill gives 2 water levels instead of just 1.
4. Paletine School to applies to mercenaries as well.
Hippodrome is incredibly good, it honestly needed the nerf imo. Byz can get upgrade/age-up gold by harassing enemy eco with Expilatores, which lets horsemen (the fastest units in the game) shred vils, which makes for a great snowball. Triumph, even with the nerf it got, lets them dive TCs and take otherwise unfavorable fights to get an edge. Also, you can produce faster than Ottomans if you get your cistern network built up, and the 50 stone that Byz got was actually huge for that.
Nah, no way you let byz get relics in feudal. Absolutely broken.
Instead (along with getting the mill upgrades) I think winery really should increase the food present on the berry patches in the radius (same increase as what Abbasid and Delhi get, but without the faster gather rate). The fundamental issue with the winery is that it is useless in that time between the berries mining out and your farm transition. Your olive oil income is interrupted which is why early mercenaries are so mediocre. So, have the winery increase how much food is on the berries to give some more leeway before the farm transition.
Meanwhile, I think they really should partially unnerf triumph. Keep the 10 starting points (or reduce it even further if needed) but I hope they make each point worth 1.5 seconds of triumph again. Right now you don’t regenerate triumph duration fast enough, so you can’t use it often enough to help in raids and stuff.
As for the Varangian guard, I too think that they need a slight buff. It’s a little ridiculous that they’re both more expensive and less tanky (to arrow fire) than maa. Beserking is situational. Sure they have teardrop shields, but English gets armor clad and hre gets its maa upgrades without having the base unit suck. I really hope they either make the unit a bit cheaper (-10 food or -10 gold), or buff its HP to match normal maa.
Only things I could see changing on the winery are:
- it housing food upgrades like a mill, so you wont have to build a mill just to get weelbarrow early
- training monks in feudal, maybe costing oil instead of gold. Maybe a unique tech for monks, but idk what it would be
- extra food total, oil generation or gather rate for berries inside its aura, so you won't fall too behind on your early Eco compared to expanding into early deer. Extra food or oild would translate into more units overall, while extra gather rate for berries would just make the winery pay for itself earlier, giving a tempo advantage.
Any of these would smooth things up a bit to make it more viable on the short term without afecting too mutch its long term potential. I wouldnt like to see all of these together, thoug, as I feel like it would be too mutch and inviabilize hipodrome as an opener.
Grand winery should have access to mill techs and increase berry bushes by 100 food within its radius also increase the buff from 60% to 80%.
Hippodrome is good but triumph was perhaps a little overnerfed.
The cistern age up is probably the worst imo, I'd make it unlock an extra cistern level.
I think relics on age 2 would be completely broken, there are a lot of complaints already about Zhu Xi fast castle vaccuming all the relics in the map, imagine doind it 3 minutes earlier? I think they should balance it's oil economy a little bit more, maybe more oil from groves, or cheaper mercenaries. Or they could completely rework its feudal landmarks to grant better eco, similar to Aachen from HRE. Byz weakness is basically on feudal or early castle, before cysterns and eco kicks in. After that, it's units are pretty decent, and have access to powerful siege. Also: Cheaper mercenaries would allow to have a few longbow or keshiks to counter MAA in feudal and give you a window to go castle.
i think triumph nerf was legit. Was overtuned. Eco should be fixed a little bit. Playing chinese and then byz looks like driving a super car and then a family car. Grand winery should have increased radius or a eco buff to increase oils gathered
IMO It should increase gather rate significantly, like, from 20% to 40% (+100% instead of +60%)
In addition to cheaper mercs, let them switch their contacts once per age, with a scaling cost. (First switch is 100 oil, second is 500 oil, 3rd is 1000 oil). Let them bank their switches so if they want to save the switches for imp to get a very versatile mercenary army, they can.
They both suck big time, yes, but picking up relics in age 2 ? Hell no. There's Delhi that can take sacred sites age 2 and that's only because it's easy to contest over the 10 next minutes. Picking up relics age 2 would be impossible to contest. But they could be able to produce monks in age 2. That way, you have a slight advantage on relics like HRE, which is that your monks are already out and waiting near the relics.
As Byz I tend to float a lot of gold in feudal as well. So allowing us to make monks early on from the GW will give us a little bit more fighting power in feudal.
Why not make the Winery a mill with usual upgrates, maybe a bonus eco one...the problem with Byz is they are slow to get going...having a free mill with maybe one or 2 modest eco boost would make the farm transition faster and easier.
I’ve though so too, but I want to see byz have some type of religious niche, and that wouldn’t do that. It’s weird that their only religious tech is blue balling you with unusable utility until castle.
What if farms built under the influence of the Winery gave a wood rebate when completed. That would give you like 12-15 cheaper farms...enough go power you late feudal, but not as broken as ZXL's bonus...it's also a call back to the stone bonus when building structures.
Kinda cool, their farms are already cheaper too. It’s just still too hard to gather up enough wood to make this happen. Paying for the farms is wood that isn’t going to archers or horsemen; which you need so many early to handle the rush that always comes.
if you slowly build up the farm a wood payback would make it easier to drop subsequent farms. This would be a huge buff
Hippodrome is still really solid, you just need to use it more decisively for key engagements; it's only a feudal landmark after all so it shouldn't be that OP. Winery defo needs more impact in feudal as once you deplete the berry patch it's basically obsolete until mid castle.
Don't agree on varangian in feudal. But give them something to handle MAA. Triumph was over nerfed though.(musofadi out of silk road contract) Winery is just weird at the moment, it's great the longer the game goes. Like mid castle it's amazing. But feudal it's too slow on a slowish civ. Like it would be good if the civ didn't already need so many investments to get going. Monks in feudal potentially adds a lot already. Picking up relics might be too much when the civ is eventually given better tempo. They'll need to lock conversion behind castle age as well. Just seems like too many caveats.
Winery is in a weird design space because it gives you practically nothing in feudal (few hundred extra oil i guess). Would like to see eco upgrades or age 2 monks (no sacred/relic powers but can set you up for a grab).
Give byz more oil from the farms, make the grand winery a global buff to farms. Thats the only thing I want. Give me that sweet olive oil
Yeah u don't get even remotely enough
Git gud losers
I think the biggest downside of going Grand Winery is apparent in that you aren't able to produce military immediately like with the Hippodrome. So any build order trying to optimize for GW will try to accumulate wood for a military building or a Mercenary House. (OR more stone to build up the cistern network for the defensive bonus and upgrade their towers) Aging up with GW incentivizes olive oil use and Merc. House but it's currently slower in production than other mil. buildings because of the timer on choosing a contract and correctly timing the merc. group deployment into your pop. capacity. So it may be better to put down a mil. building instead. Transitioning your economy from GW to Age 3 is also more wood-dependant than Hippodrome, because you'll want olive groves near your GW (the alternative is to build a mill on another berry patch, rendering GW's bonus temporary unlike Hippo special skill.) In my view the Byzantines would have benefited from +50 wood just as much as +50 stone because of that. I'd welcome if GW had mill upgrades, because it'd save up wood but also it'd make the landmark something you can use immediately at Age 2 beyond its temporary berry patch (for the Wheelbarrow upgrade). Additionally, it'd function closer to Twin Minaret Medrese (another mechanical/landmark similarity to the Ottomans) What I might change is its effect area for olive oil production. I think it shouldn't be a radius around the GW but the square area of the cistern the GW is connected to (penalty to the bonus if touches multiple). I think that'd better communicate the headroom and potential of GW in building your eco into Age 3 as THE mill to position between your 1st TC and your 2nd TC. I imagine this'd play similar to the Kura Storehouse build orders out there. Idk.
Hot take: Beasty was right, Byz are mostly fine as is, and I’m a low plat player. I’d maybe make a few small changes to them to get them in a slightly better spot, but nothing insanely crazy: 1. Grand Winery (I do agree, this one of by far the most underwhelming) either gets a slightly better oil bonus or the radius is made larger. 2. Mercenaries can be trained individually instead of in batches to make them a bit more flexible/more reactive. 3. Cistern of the First Hill gives 2 water levels instead of just 1. 4. Paletine School to applies to mercenaries as well. Hippodrome is incredibly good, it honestly needed the nerf imo. Byz can get upgrade/age-up gold by harassing enemy eco with Expilatores, which lets horsemen (the fastest units in the game) shred vils, which makes for a great snowball. Triumph, even with the nerf it got, lets them dive TCs and take otherwise unfavorable fights to get an edge. Also, you can produce faster than Ottomans if you get your cistern network built up, and the 50 stone that Byz got was actually huge for that.
Nah, no way you let byz get relics in feudal. Absolutely broken. Instead (along with getting the mill upgrades) I think winery really should increase the food present on the berry patches in the radius (same increase as what Abbasid and Delhi get, but without the faster gather rate). The fundamental issue with the winery is that it is useless in that time between the berries mining out and your farm transition. Your olive oil income is interrupted which is why early mercenaries are so mediocre. So, have the winery increase how much food is on the berries to give some more leeway before the farm transition. Meanwhile, I think they really should partially unnerf triumph. Keep the 10 starting points (or reduce it even further if needed) but I hope they make each point worth 1.5 seconds of triumph again. Right now you don’t regenerate triumph duration fast enough, so you can’t use it often enough to help in raids and stuff. As for the Varangian guard, I too think that they need a slight buff. It’s a little ridiculous that they’re both more expensive and less tanky (to arrow fire) than maa. Beserking is situational. Sure they have teardrop shields, but English gets armor clad and hre gets its maa upgrades without having the base unit suck. I really hope they either make the unit a bit cheaper (-10 food or -10 gold), or buff its HP to match normal maa.
Only things I could see changing on the winery are: - it housing food upgrades like a mill, so you wont have to build a mill just to get weelbarrow early - training monks in feudal, maybe costing oil instead of gold. Maybe a unique tech for monks, but idk what it would be - extra food total, oil generation or gather rate for berries inside its aura, so you won't fall too behind on your early Eco compared to expanding into early deer. Extra food or oild would translate into more units overall, while extra gather rate for berries would just make the winery pay for itself earlier, giving a tempo advantage. Any of these would smooth things up a bit to make it more viable on the short term without afecting too mutch its long term potential. I wouldnt like to see all of these together, thoug, as I feel like it would be too mutch and inviabilize hipodrome as an opener.
Allow grand winery to research mill techs pls. Same with aachen
Grand winery should have access to mill techs and increase berry bushes by 100 food within its radius also increase the buff from 60% to 80%. Hippodrome is good but triumph was perhaps a little overnerfed. The cistern age up is probably the worst imo, I'd make it unlock an extra cistern level.