Mauryas are OP not because of Archers.

[Dizaka]

  

9 minutes ago, Yekaterina said:

And who is this hero?

 

My guess is this guy (Bonuses for upgrades are really useful.  Mauryas only civ that can do max upgrades + wonder in under 20 mins just b/c of this hero):

 

Alternatively, this hero is also really useful (Build this guy first, build a few temples, do all temple upgrades, then kill him and build priest):

Edited June 12, 2021 by Dizaka

[Yekaterina]

@Thorfinn the Shallow Minded and @Genava55 @Ultimate Aurelian can you give your opinions on Visha Kanya?

Another complaint is to do with elephant archers. I am not sure whether the patch to increase their health and cost has been passed but I think their cost should be a bit more expensive, I suggest somwhere at 400 food and 100 wood. The reason being the elephant eats 300 food and the 2 drivers eat 50 each. Then each driver gets a bow and bows cost 50 wood each. 

[Dizaka]

  

3 minutes ago, Yekaterina said:

A problem with the Mauryas roster is their Visha Kanya. These champions strengthens the army but historically these were unarmed poison girls who assassinate leaders of the opposition instead of fielding themselves in massive hand-to-hand combat. If we remove these then Maurya civ would be more historically accurate and less OP. 

Maiden guards are rarely used.  Partly b/c they can't be build in barracks so you have only 1 production source.

 

 

[Yekaterina]

Just now, Dizaka said:

Maiden guards are rarely used.  Partly b/c they can't be build in barracks so you have only 1 production source.

So how do you play mauryans then?

[Yekaterina]

Even after all of the patches, the Mauryan max pop bonus is still not removed in A25. 

[LetswaveaBook]

1 minute ago, Dizaka said:

Maiden guards are rarely used.  Partly b/c they can't be build in barracks so you have only 1 production source.

I like to use them. With their poison they are stronger than most archer champions and the poison ignores armor, making the more useful against pikemen and elephants.

You can't train a lot of them, but even if you have just 10 that might help.

[Dizaka]

My general gameplay:

Build 2 horses.

Spot check if wood/food are close to each other to place gathering ele.  If can't do this build grainery first and put worker ele near wood gatherers.

Send 1 of 3 horses scouting.

Building women 1 by 1 from CC until 20 pop.

Build 1st house.

Upgrade fertility festival.

Build 2nd house

Plan out where berries are for migrations.

Build a storage pit near main woodline.

Upgrade grainery berry gathering.

Build 1-2 worker elephants.

Start building women from houses.  Use CC to mostly build infantry units that cost wood.

Make sure to have about 10 farms before going p2.  In phase 2 make sure farms is up to 14/15 (since eles cost a lot of food).

Get 1st and 2nd barracks.

To go p3 build 2 ele stables, a market, and a forge.

While going to p3 build 3rd and/or 4th ele stable.

 

Edited June 12, 2021 by Dizaka

[Yekaterina]

3 minutes ago, LetswaveaBook said:

and elephants.

You see, this is the problem. Poison girls would never give elephants any poison :p 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visha_Kanya

 

[Ultimate Aurelian]

On 12/06/2021 at 5:27 PM, Yekaterina said:

@Thorfinn the Shallow Minded and @Genava55 @Ultimate Aurelian can you give your opinions on Visha Kanya?

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visha_Kanya

Not sure how appropriate it is as name; could just be legendary.

And they were assassins (not really combat units like ingame.).

[Yekaterina]

1 minute ago, Ultimate Aurelian said:

Not sure how appropriate it is as name; could just be legendary.

And they were assassins (not really combat units like ingame.).

We can replace the visha kanya with a special unit that can kill the enemy hero without getting caught. 

An unit that targets enemy heroes, but no other unit, and one use only. Low health, no armour, etc

[Yekaterina]

Did the Mauryans have champion archers or swordsman that were female? We can just name them maiden archer instead of Visha Kanya.

[Ultimate Aurelian]

 I have yet to look into it deeply but i found at least one source for femlae guards:

https://issuu.com/wikimilitaria.com/docs/_wargames_research_group__armies_of_the_macedonian

Around page 142.

But seems may have not been combat units; also nothing on bow (only weapon mentioned is sword).

Edited June 14, 2021 by Ultimate Aurelian

[Yekaterina]

Remove the champion archer visha kanya then!

[chrstgtr]

35 minutes ago, Yekaterina said:

Remove the champion archer visha kanya then!

Better: rename to something more appropriate.

Better to fix what exists than to delete what is unique. 

[Yekaterina]

1 hour ago, chrstgtr said:

Better: rename to something more appropriate.

Better to fix what exists than to delete what is unique. 

 

Would you like me to patch that?

[Player of 0AD]

2 hours ago, Yekaterina said:

Remove the champion archer visha kanya then!

Will not weaken them significantly, because champions are a waste of resources in comparison to elephants

[chrstgtr]

1 hour ago, Yekaterina said:

Would you like me to patch that?

No--I could care less what the unit is called. I am speaking specifically (and generally) to your stated desire to remove a unique unit when another course of action (i.e., renaming the unit) is available. 

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

Maiden Guards instead of Poison Maidens.  Done.

[Yekaterina]

Well, Mauryas right now is OP because of a combination of different factors:

1. Worker elephant - amazing economy

2. Asian Elephants (can be spammed because of good economy)

3. Archers (less problematic in A25)

4. Extra pop

 

 

[Player of 0AD]

Another significant strength of the Mauryans are their strong sword units.

What about reducing the max pop bonus to 5% for them and for Persians? Currently its like half a wonder, which is a huge advantage

[Yekaterina]

We can either remove 2 of these or give all other civs some of these advantages. Hellenic civs now have hoplite tradition to counter archers better, but the amazing economy + elephant spam means a tsunami of elephants that cannot be stopped. I know elephants have been weakened in A25 but they are still significant.

What really should be removed is the extra pop, because that threatens all other players in late game confrontations. In a typical TG it means the Mauryan can field 20 more units in a fight than the others, and more troops than opponent = higher kd. By default, every soldier aim at random enemy units instead of focusing on just one (unless you order them to), so more units = less wound per unit, so the formation can maintain high fire output for a longer time, meanwhile, the player with slightly less units will see their soldiers dying very quickly after some time. 

Persians are allowed this pop bonus because of historical reasons and their weak early economy as well as slow boom. Mauryans don't need this.

Another problem is elephant archers. If you have a good food eco (which is easy to set up if you are Mauryan) and enough wood (provided by worker elephant), then you can spam them. These are very OP in large numbers and by the time you amass 40 of them they can take out any unit and shoot down CCs by brute force.

 

[Yekaterina]

4 minutes ago, Player of 0AD said:

Another significant strength of the Mauryans are their strong sword units.

Ahh yes, that is another problem. I am not sure if the Indians even had sword cavalry back then. Having both sword infantry and cavalry removes the necessity of a maiden guard, so they have too many swords in excess. On top of that the Mauryan player can afford all these swords because the worker ele can steal all the metals. 

[Yekaterina]

7 minutes ago, Player of 0AD said:

What about reducing the max pop bonus to 5% for them and for Persians? Currently its like half a wonder, which is a huge advantage

I think Persians can remain at 10 while Mauryans can have no pop bonus or even a negative pop bonus like the Spartans did in A23. Persians had pop bonus back in A23 and no one ever said they are a strong civ, because of their trash economy and huge demand for resources.  

[LetswaveaBook]

14 hours ago, chrstgtr said:

Better to fix what exists than to delete what is unique. 

I agree with that and I think we should try Maurya and Persians to keep their flavour.

I would prefer to look at other ways, like increasing champion elephant cost. Then we could get gameplay where elephants are stong, but due to their cost they need to be used careful and saved where possible. If elephants get nerfed, then Maurya and Persians are more affected by their lackluster siege department.

1 hour ago, Yekaterina said:

In a typical TG it means the Mauryan can field 20 more units in a fight than the others, and more troops than opponent = higher kd. By default, every soldier aim at random enemy units instead of focusing on just one (unless you order them to), so more units = less wound per unit, so the formation can maintain high fire output for a longer time, meanwhile, the player with slightly less units will see their soldiers dying very quickly after some time. 

This is not just the issue for Maurya and Persians, but in any case where you are outnumbered, this will be true for ranged units. My suggestion would be to nerf ranged units.

[chrstgtr]

38 minutes ago, LetswaveaBook said:

This is not just the issue for Maurya and Persians, but in any case where you are outnumbered, this will be true for ranged units. My suggestion would be to nerf ranged units.

People need to make melee units. They're quite good when used. 

 

Also, please note that this entire discussion is predicated on an alpha that will be obsolete very soon and that the units in a24 were rebalanced for a25. Before we create a narrative of "what needs to done in a26" to make the game more balanced, I recommend we play a25 to see how units are actually balanced.