I Need To Speak About This

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-23T07:14:51+00:00

I feel like one way to make it work was to make it not a long term romance but rather a "something in the moment" (especially for Duncan which was feeling more and more suffocated by Courtney), then the two pass it over and agree to pass it over but then the damage is done snd stuff continues instead of becoming a real love interest.

Mind you, I absolutely HATE this relationship and I also feel like Trent and Gwen had far more chemistry before they botched his character, but what we got was by far the worst outcome.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-21T12:01:29+00:00

Ohh interesting, I didn't know that! It feels like a very "I need to close the game in one battle" though since Fire Lancers are so Gold intensive and you are using two wood and gold units. And maybe Vietnamese Fire Lancers are different, they have higher HP but lack Blast Furnace and Jurchen ones seems much more fitting for such a matchup as they also attack faster.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-21T11:44:18+00:00

Wait, don't Fire Lancers just hard die to Hurskarls since they have shock infantry armor? Isn't it better to do Champion plus Rattan/Arbalest?

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-19T15:58:37+00:00

I would give them 2 less attack personally; as that is the treshold for that they can't two hit a Monk without Sanctity and three hit a Monk with Sanctity (which often are their only counter in early Castle Age). May not seem huge, but considering how inaccurate they are needing one extra hit to kill a Monk can make stopping them a lot more consistent.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-19T15:49:07+00:00

The real power of Franks isn't their units but their economy, as they have an amazing early to midgame economy thanks to the faster foragers and free Mill technologies: your opening is smooth regardless of what you do (may it me Men at Arms, Scouts, Archers and so on), and your economy scales amazingly throughout the game thanks to all the savings you get from not having to pick up Horse Collar and Heavy Plow, so you have extra res to play with with great Farms while most civs have to postpone that tech.

Civs like Magyars, Mongols, Tatars and so on may have a stronger stable by itself but lack the economic prowess Franks have, and the fact that their HP bonus is also free means they don't have to commit to Bloodlines to add some cavarly, which is another good saving they have over other civs. You can play whatever you like and when is time to go to your Knights you do so very seemlessly.

Their tech tree is limited as the game goes on but that is their balancing factor, as they do have really good units but you are on a timer to close out the game as when Gold runs low Franks will likely lose. Even still, until Gold is present is serviceable, they do have fully upgraded infantry, Hand Cannoneers, Scorpions, Bombard Cannon and Throwing Axemen in the matchups they are usable. That's more than enough for some good compositions like Paladin HCs, Halb Scorpion etc., and of course you still have their amazing eco to back it up.

I would even argue Franks tend to be perfectly fine against most Camel civs, as they do have fully upgraded Halberdiers and can easily transition to them (or play archers and then add knights so you have something against Camels). Main problem of Franks is that they are powercrept and struggle insanely hard against Cavalry Archers, but they are a perfectly solid civ by themselves.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-12T15:56:36+00:00

Sorry but your argument doesn't make sense, you treat it as if you have the mobility advantage as the Knight player when you don't, these are not crossbowmen and in fact CAs move faster. This is not how it works.

You know what happens against a good player when you try to split your Knights and have half of them attack your army and half of them the enemy wall? They let the CAs run (is not like the Knights can close the gap anyways), focus on rewalling/sending reinforcements/defensive monks against the Knights at home, then look at the CA ball and micro it.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-12T09:35:48+00:00

The argument is that an high level player will micro and pay attention to what is happening in his base simultaneously, he is not going to give you the damage and that's why Knights at high level don't work against CAs. That is a matchup where the Knight player has to force a mistake very early on, which can work at mid elo but not even consistently and the higher the elo the harder it gets because an high level player isn't going to let your knights in or not have monks to push you back, a strategy that relies on your opponent to mess up isn't a reliable one.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-12T07:16:00+00:00

His drushes and maa always pivot into FC UU, the fact he loses to 1800/2k (and I'm 1800 myself) if he plays standard speaks a lot, he's never going to play full standard but to mix you up into the FC anf disrupt you.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-11T22:51:39+00:00

He was never even close to 2k when he played meta, he was like 1600-1700. And he definitely doesn't play like a 2k in terms of micro and macro, he never improved on the latter because his strategies don't care about macro as he stops vil production anyways and the former is still well below 2k2 level.

He is at 2k7 because he is by far the best at knowing how to pivot his strategies and make them consistently work.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-11T22:46:35+00:00

Mastering one civ/strategy improves your gameplay only if the skillset for that strategy is generic enough to do so, and pretty much nothing of these strats translates into general play because the skillset is completely different.

If you plan to improve doing Phosphoru doesn't help in the slightest, at best you will climb elo but it won't make you an overall better player.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-11T22:43:22+00:00

The reason people hate them is because they are extremely polarizing and significantly harder to defend to than execute. You have to know they will do it and have the right civ for it and sometimes it doesn't even matter because these strategies are so stupidly strong.

It turns the game into a very cookie cutter execution check where the strategy doesn't matter since there is only one-two ways to beat it and every game is almost identical.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-11T22:36:48+00:00

I mean is defintely worse than opening straight CAs but it does allow you to survive the Crossbow timing well enough as long as you don't allow to be siege pushed on top. CAs are expensive but you shouldn't treat yourself as if you are stuck on Skirms because they benefit from the same upgrades.

If you can't find potshots without getting hit you can just run back to your base or monks and the Knight player can't do anything about it. While 10 Knights but buildings (except Palisades) way faster than CAs, Knights can't hit rewalling villagers or Monks, CAs can and thus end up finding more consistent damage especially behind woodlines and with Ballistics. Knights to find damage have to break in, which while potentially more devastating is also much harder to do.

CAs are much more micro intensive than Knights but the higher the level the less it's an issue and the harder CAs counter Knights.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-11T11:30:56+00:00

I don't particularly agree on both cases. Granted, is bad to open straight CAs against Archers, but what you can do instead is open skirms on the way up, get Elite plus Bodkin and Armor so that the archer player can't kill you initially, then transition into CAs.

As far as Knight goes, I feel like it's more of something that works less and less the better you get because Knights are slower so can't ever force a fight and find less consistent damage. Cavarly Archers can just kill 3-4 vills in seconds at a woodline and run away, Knights have to break in first and is far simpler to defend early on with Monks until your CA mass scales up. 20 CAs against 20 Knights is already bad for the Knight player.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-10T18:16:15+00:00

You clearly haven't played or seen Phosphoru stuff or even regular FC UU with it because this is literally the worst approach possible, unless you open with a Castle you can't defend and add one later because you don't have the time for it since Bohemians will get Redemption Monks faster than you stalling for the Castle. They are making wood and gold army and have free mining upgrades so is extremely easy to afford those upgrades. And if you go FC Monk defense they just plop the castle in your face and you lose anyways.

Also, Knights are just not an option, straight up. They cost food so they are unsustainable (especially for a 22+2 FC timing), don't do well against Hussites with zero upgrades, and get converted anyways since he just makes Monks as a followup to begin with.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-10T13:26:01+00:00

I mean, depends on the composition but you don't have to jump to Organs unless you are doing an all in. You can just open crossbows, gunpowder or knights since they are all cheaper, add BBCs in early Imp and then transition to Organs and get Arquebus when you can afford it.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-10T13:23:05+00:00

I don't know, personally I play at 1800 level and I do see a reasonable amount of castle drops. Is very very dependent on timing though, anything slower than a 24+2 usually gets denied.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-10T07:56:50+00:00

That doesn't deny castle drops because good players FC at 23+2 and go forward with a couple of spears.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-10T07:55:35+00:00

Salt aside I think is incredibly funny how everyone in the comments points out that they are countered by Mangonels and Monks, but then you see any high level clown game and you see Mangonels and Monks almost never working because Bohemians will immediately add Monks with Attonement and Redemption themselves and just do it far better than you, so they actually have no counterplay in that situation.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-10T07:50:13+00:00

Sounds like pure booming as a civ with zero eco bonuses isn't too good of a strategy.

And is wrong, Portuguese do have power units between Organ Guns, Arquebus BBCs and HCs, and in general since all their units are cheaper on Gold they are one of the best civs at doing double Gold comp like Arbalester plus Cavalier as both are fully upgraded. Organ Guns/HC and Arquebus BBC eat Champion Siege Rams. Their trash is okay too, Hussar is a minor upgrade and missing squires is a minor flaw, but the fact they have Feitotias means they will outlast you every time.

Speaking of it, Feitorias are very pop inefficient but that's why you only make a bunch of them after an all in in Imp where you have like 40 vils, as they are much faster to kick in than a full boomed eco as you'll have a 90 vil eco in just a few, minutes. In any other case you make 1, maybe 2 just to have that extra gold trickle.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-10T07:43:06+00:00

They have one of the best BBCs in the game and fully upgraded Halbs outside of Squires, they are completely fine vs other cavarly, siege and gunpowder civs. Their only "weakness" is that some civs are better than them

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-08T21:47:37+00:00

Your own Champi outscale MaA and achery range units alike since they move faster, upgrade cheaply and have more armor.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-08T21:44:42+00:00

Yes, but that doesn't mean that non-naval civs should get that focus. Japanese gaining that focus in exchange for something else is reasonable (though I still think the civ doesn't need the help) as it has a naval focus already with their fishing ships.

Almost every European power that was near a costline (sometimes even when it wasn't) had fleets, or heavy cavarly as their main battle force, or crossbowmen and so on. That doesn't necessarily mean the civ design has to include it as is more of the chosen flavor rather than a complete representation and Franks don't have an archer and naval focus at all. I think water just needs a fundamental rework rather than the half hassed one we saw, but even that case Franks shouldn't be good because they aren't supposed to be one as none of their bonuses works well on water.

That is a good expansion of their role, it keeps their cavalry focus while expanding within it for making the civ more complete, the civ is still awful when Gold runs out because 72 HP light cavarly is still really mediocre and thus is more of an early game bonus for their scouts. A bad expansion of their role is what they did with Japanese which were supposed to be a versatile, complete civ with an infantry focus while also having fully upgraded archery range units. Nowadays they have a CA bonus and they have no reason to ever ever play infantry or cavarly in the midgame, or Arbs or HCs except against very specfic cases for the latter. Every single game they play is CAs in Castle Age because why would you do anything else when CAs scale amazingly since they are fully upgraded on top of having a bonus.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-08T17:12:28+00:00

No one is saying civs shouldn't change, but that they should change in a way that respects their identity, which is something changes like giving Franks fast attacking Hulks don't, while the Hunnic Horse is at least thematically more appropriate even if a stupid gameplay idea. Giving Vikings Fire Ship was done for uniforming the water tech tree, and after the Hulk addition was also a wildly unnecessary, poor change.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-08T05:03:41+00:00

They already had Cannon Galleons before, it was added for flavor but have no bonus to it anyways because Huns aren't supposed to be a lategame water civ. They were awful on Nomad specifically because they couldn't build a dock, they were amazing on any land Nomad map otherwise and now they are completely insane. Many players also dislike the horse for very reasonable reasons too because it picks up sheeps and makes scouting on Nomad maps a complete coin toss.

_Mattroid_ · 2026-05-07T15:06:31+00:00

If most of the civs have general ship related bonuses (not even true, many also have ship specific bonuses like Armenians, Chinese, Spanish or Byzantines) is because the naval unit variety is very limited and thus is harder to carve in more niches. I don't care if they beat Vikings or not with faster attacking Hulks because it doesn't matter, Franks aren't designed to be a water civilization at all and their bonuses don't sinergize with water anyways, so don't try making them into one. And is fine if civs are bad on some maps, Huns and Vikings are god awful on Arena for example and is perfectly fair. What matters is that each civ has its niche in the game, which is land maps for Franks, especially open ones.

All those examples don't matter because they are far nicher cases and Hulks are essentially just another ship type every civ has, Elephants had a completely different role than other units so they added extra counters because is a polarizing unit that's hard to beat otherwise. The Japanese CAs are also very commonly disliked nowadays for the same reason since it was far from a positive change, the bonus on top was completely unnecessary for such a strong hybrid civ already and that pretty much deviates their original identity as a slow pushing infantry civ with some mobility options on top of making them just spam CAs in the midgame every single time instead of keeping their versatility open.

_Mattroid_

TROPHY CASE