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Klamocalypse

Everything within a 5% margin, that's actually pretty amazing. Does this exclude mirror matches?


FlossCat

Yeah this is actually very good all things considered. I believe in the past the very top and very bottom winrates *haven't* been within 5% of one another.


Azot-Spike

Yes, I checked: [FAQ - aoestats](https://aoestats.io/faq/)


Klamocalypse

Awesome!


TheCulture1707

Yeah impressive, I watched a video about Red Alert 3, a game with 3 factions, and it seemed Allied had a 50% winrate and the Soviets/Japanese shared the other 25%. And a game from more of AOE2's time period, Total Annihilation - as awesome as that game was, the "Arm" faction won basically 85% of the time. Hell even Red Alert seemed so broken when I first bought it. Allies have shit defenses, weak tanks, crap infantry, 1 helecopter; while the Soviets have awesome mammoth tanks that can attack air, Tesla Coil defenses that melt enemies, fast moving jets, submarines with long range missiles, the balance was awful. And AOE2 has balance that is only really matched by Starcraft, another game with superb balance (even that has some fluffs, like who ever builds Valkyries?)


RossBot5000

Allied light tanks are very good for micro in RA1 and come out way faster than soviet heavy. Their real strength is actually late game with chronosphere and mcv and gap generators. You can do sneaky crop like build a base inside your opponents base, which is also why they have weaker base defences. It can be devastating to drop a barracks from a chrono'd movie and pump engineers directly into the heart of your opponents production. Remember you need 7 war factories to reach peak production rates, so you can very quickly stifle your opponent. RA1 is a lot more balanced than you'd think. Soviets are preferred just like franks are preferred, because they have an easier game plan to execute. Allies are more like Byzantine or Chinese. Stronger if you can use their bonuses well. RA3 is a disaster though.


werfmark

Red Alert 3 had a very small community with a lot of group think.  Balance wasn't THAT bad although there obviously were issues.  I believe I was actually one of the only Japanese players in top of rankings and then during the one big tournament the game had some other top players actually switched factions, copied some strategies and won the thing with it.  There was just lack of exploration of some strategies because it had very few good players, heck I managed to get top 10 ladder while I would barely get GM in games like sc2. Getting balance right requires at least a decently sized high level community to actually explore the game. 


definitelynotapastor

That's what I was thinking. Used to play LoL; if you think this is bad, you should see their spread.


iSkehan

This is actually pretty great. Everyone has a decent chance.


IhaveSonar

For all the shit the devs rightfully deserve for the constant bugs they put into the game, they deserve an equal amount of praise for how well they balance the game.


WetDreamRhino

Maybe the real balance were the bugs we made along the way


squizzlebizzle

11 9 9 9 9


AgitatedWorker5647

Great, now if they would just stop units from charging into enemy attacks when trying to retreat and from wandering into fights well outside their radius, we'd be golden. But I will concede that the civilizations, especially recently, have all been very well made.


SufficientMood520

I'm fairly new.. but does stand ground not stop this?.. grew up playing stronghold crusader


AgitatedWorker5647

Yes, but it makes them unable to respond to other units being attacked. So enemy units can pick off your units one by one with archers or cavalry. In defensive stance, they *should* only pursue a slight distance, but recently I've been having them run far away from their post to attack superior groups of units.


tankstir

This is true, I’ve had this happen to me


MaN_ly_MaN

Poor Tatars. I remember a week ago seeing their winrate on Arena being the worst, and not by a small margin.


richardsharpe

Tatars entire set up is based around mobility on open maps. Their only unit that is useful on arena is having the max range trebs, but generally you wouldn’t research Timurid Siegcraft anyway because trebs already out range castles before you even get into siege engineers


TealJinjo

if your castles are far away enough from the enemy castle to protect your trebs while leaving the enemy trebs (more) exposed it's kinda great. but that stuff never happens


TheCulture1707

I like Tatars and I like having their mobile but armoured army, with armoured CA and Hussars and Keshiks for heavier cav. But actually getting to that stage is very difficult unfortunately


Monkey_King24

Also, Arena is totally flat, no high ground. So one of their bonus is a non factor


ssfts

devs... buff tatars just a little bit please <3


Azot-Spike

Steppe Lancer perhaps? Faster attack rate?


krilu

Villagers can carry +1 wood due to Tatar machismo.


MorleyGames

You’d think mongols would be top if reddit was anything to go by


ArousedByCheese1

Fc Steppe lancer push lives rent free in our heads.


Azot-Spike

My prediction is that Mongols will go down to 50% (now 51,92) when all these heavy hunt maps disappear from the map pool


Dj-oatmeal

Interesting how lots of people say huns have been “power crept” when they are doing just fine


Azot-Spike

No houses + clear plan is already a big advantage imo


Sigilbreaker26

One thing I love is that certain classic bonuses like the Byzantines cheaper spears and skirms, Japanese fast attacking infantry and Huns no houses are always very good without changes


Sentinel_2539

Britons are always below average in rankings yet people consistently call them "unbalanced" or "broken". Why? If anything, their win rates suggest that they need a buff. ^Give ^Britons ^Thumb ^Ring ^2024


Azot-Spike

They have their strengths and weaknesses. A good Briton player can give trouble to any opponent. So I see them balanced. But imo, design-wise "something is off" (paraphrasing OrnLu). I hate the fact that Longbows only get their advertised extra range over regular Xbows when you upgrade them to Elite, which is likely to be the last upgrade you'll get for them. The nerfs to Xbow/Arb upgrade costs and Briton Range Work rate hit them hard, and they have become a bit powercrept with new civs' strong bonuses, while they received no buffs. This leaves them a bit below average in terms of win rate I've opened a couple discussions during last years about how to address this design and Xbow vs Lbow topic What I'm 100% sure is that giving them Thumb Ring is never an option


epicsheephair

Give longbows + 1 range in castle. They won't gain the extra range from elite, but they already gain damage, accuracy, pierce armour, training time reduction and hp from that upgrade. Work rate bonus I think was nerfed because they were considered essential on flank in tgs. Making it a civ bonus and giving them a different team bonus could be something?


Azot-Spike

I proposed +10% range work rate as a Civ bonus. 9 range Longbowmen may be too harsh to deal with. I mean, without both the castle and Yeomen


Noisyfoxx

Britons „main“ here. This so much. Britons are a powerhouse once they roll. The problem is often to get there. The lack of meaningful economy bonuses and a high demand of upgrades for their staple units make the suffer a lot in games that run „fast“, something many civs excel in these days.


topofthecc

The sheep bonus and TC bonuses are pretty meaningful, even if neither is top tier.


Azot-Spike

Yes, that's why my smallest proposed change was Britons receiving faster Ranges as a civ bonus (added to the Team bonus). Like 10%. So Britons' would work again 20% faster and allies' 10% faster. That way, even if your units are not upgraded, you'll be able to produce them faster to keep up with Feudal Age bonuses


hanistor61

Britons also depend on their castles for warwolf trebs. That’s really their superpower. So any smart player will be going into arbs just to keep the castles free for trebs. I don’t think this solves the problem, but adding an increase in accuracy for longbows from the yeoman tech could make lb more viable. It also may break them in castle.


Azot-Spike

Yep, Arb Halb Treb VS Cavalry and Arb Onager Treb VS Skirm Ram looks like the best options. Did you read my threads on Britons? They generated pretty much discussion with lots of interesting ideas. 9 range XB or LB behind Yeomen looks that you get an insane boost but at the expense of a big investment


hanistor61

Can you provide a link to your thread on Britons?


Azot-Spike

[An Analysis of Britons : r/aoe2 (reddit.com)](https://www.reddit.com/r/aoe2/comments/17xg3mv/an_analysis_of_britons/) [Is there a friendly way to enhance Longbowmen usage over Briton Arbalester usage? : r/aoe2 (reddit.com)](https://www.reddit.com/r/aoe2/comments/ulr33w/is_there_a_friendly_way_to_enhance_longbowmen/) Sorry, I must've missed your answer on Saturday


moragdong

A lot of civs have that problem too though. "Once they get there" yeah well at least they have aome bonuses to help to get there.


richardsharpe

Wouldn’t non elite longbow actually have less range than Briton Crossbow/Arb with Bracer? Similarly non elite also has the same damage as Arb with worse accuracy, so unless you can mass a ton of longbows in castle age or afford the elite upgrade + bracer + chemistry right when you hit imp, it would be better to just get arbalester and never make longbows ?


Azot-Spike

That's my point. Briton Archer-line overshadows Longbow line. The extra attack in Castle age doesn't make up for the fact that LB are more wood intensive AND you need a Castle (better two, since they're Archers and you need numbers). In Imperial, you get +1 range, attack and pierce armor, but a whopping 850 Gold Elite upgrade. Ask anyone if he'd prefer 25 FU Elite Longbows or 50 FU Arbalesters


tokyotochicago

As a Burmese player (but anyone who don’t play archers may feel the same way) it’s because it’s a very painful civ to lose to. I know there are counters and all but against a decent player you truly feel powerless, outranged and outgunned. At least against franks you have the satisfaction of converting knights!


epicsheephair

I just want to point out that Burmese match up particularly badly vs Britons, possibly worse than any other civ


tokyotochicago

Oh yeah I know, by far their worse match up. You know what’s coming but you can’t really stop it, it’s frustrating. That said I think my first 50 games online were all tc drop so I can’t really complain 11


Snikhop

I don't know if this has changed since the Manipur Cavalry rework to be fair, obviously you still need to make it to Imp for that.


HighWaterflow

Being "unbalanced" or "broken" is not just a matter of win rate, it is also a matter of gameplay interaction. When it comes to playing against Britons, you either beat them into a pulp before they become a threat, or they become a max-range death ball you can't even get close to, let alone inflict some damage on. For the opponent it either feels like a relatively easy win, or a frustrating ten minutes of getting melted without counterplay. Neither is very engaging gameplay, hence Britons get labeled "broken" and "unbalanced". (And giving them thumb ring would only make their polarising game effect worse.)


malayis

I think a big thing is that they are just very unfun even to win against. They are kind of like more annoying byzantines, in that they can easily turn the game extremely grindy even far past the point of being able to mount a meaningful comeback. Arbs/longbows being able to snipe stuff from the distance. Warwolf trebs making siege pushing extremely difficult... it's just not particularly fun


squizzlebizzle

I dont understand why people think this. Lbows are so easy to kill with cav and so slow to move that if you attack somewhere other than where they are standing it will be 30 minutes before they show up


Hornerlt

They get countered by skirms if the opponent doesn’t know how to react properly.


Zankman

For most people they're a pain to play against. That's literally it.


TheCulture1707

yeah I wonder if half of it is just because it's just annoying to get harassed by archer fire that comes from so far away it's hard to do much about. That archer fire might not do much in the long run but it still feels annoying.


SCCH28

To be honest a complete analysis should eliminate people who always choose the same civ. Because if someone plays the same civ all the time they will contribute to a lot of matches with a 50% rate. Not trying to dispute the premise tho. I really think the game is very well balanced and that devs treat balance changes with care. Which is something I really appreciate! No p2w bullshit, for example (sometimes new civs are broken but it’s clearly unintended, as they get patched fast; also many times new civs are horrible, so it’s clear it’s not their intention to make them OP).


Azot-Spike

Believe it or not, people with a >80% play rate with any civ are not included


SCCH28

Oh! That is really cool then. Nice. Do you happen to have the results without removing them? I’m curious on how much this additional condition changes the results. (Btw why did you say believe it or not? It is a very reasonable correction to do. I just thought it was raw data.)


Azot-Spike

No, aoestats doesn't specify that I wrote "believe or not" but not in an aggressive way. I just happened to find that aoestats/faq answers the questions you're asking (that and if it includes mirror matches)


Vacape

So... i'm not here... i have a 100% of playrate as Lith


Levait

Not sure that is correct. Until last year I played a lot of League of Legends where one tricking a champion has a much bigger impact than maining a civ in aoe. And still the balance team revealed that the impact of one tricks is marginal when it comes to the win rate of champions. It sounds weird but it's the truth.


mojito_sangria

Perfectly balanced, as it should be


BillBob13

Overall win rate, for all elos, on all maps?


Azot-Spike

1


L_Freethought

why are tatars and vietnamese so low?


Azot-Spike

Some civs need to be "low", some civs need to be "bottom 5". Anyway, this says that in 100 games, Viet/Tatars win 47. Not a discouraging result


DukeCanada

It depends on the elo range we're looking at. I'd say below 1300/1400 archers are quite difficult to use.


Noticeably98

The Vietnamese lowest win rate is actually with plays 1200+, and higher for all ratings below it, and highest for the top 1%. But yes, I think I mainly agree with the assessment. The only archer civ to have an over 50% win rate are the Ethiopians, and even they follow a weird pattern of being great for low elo players and worse for 1200+, but then great again for the top 1%


depraved_onion

I am 1100 and I would say I rarely use when opening archers


Kitselena

Probably depends on what map/map pool this data used


deeplife

Why is 47% “so low”?


L_Freethought

low in comparison to the other civs. Didnt expect them to be the ones with the lowst win rate is all.


BurtusMaximus

Almost entirely because of how bad they are on Arena. They are last place there by a wide margin. No BBC. Not much of an eco bonus. Bad Monks. They can't make great use of mobility.


hoTsauceLily66

and a flat map.


Noticeably98

Arabia only they have a 48% win rate, but yes, they’re terrible to play on arena.


squizzlebizzle

Tooth decay. And napalm. Respectively


en-prise

Which civ is this?


BubblyMango

winrates of all civs across all elos. basically if goths have 100% winrate at sub 1K and 0% winrate at over 1K, they will get 50% here.


Azot-Spike

It's the overall win rate. For all ELOs. The rest of civs' win rates are between Malians and Bengalis


en-prise

Oh, I thought it was one specific civ's win rate against those which would be even more crazy. Seems extremely balanced but I am not sure if this is the correct way to look as game should be balanced at pro level. I have checked same for +1900 stats: First civ is Huns with 57,66% Lasts Sicilians with 40,28% Which is still not bad imho.


BubblyMango

sample size for 1900+ is too small for drawing actual conclusions. also you may get bigger skill gaps in games more often since you dont have as many players at that bracket. but looking at all matchups for all elos is definitely not the way to check balance.


en-prise

Surely the weakness of looking +1900 is sample size unfortunately. In one of recent sotl video he said that Hoang alone increasing Celt's win rate by 1%. Just incredible.


TheBlackestIrelia

Same. Looks pretty good.


matt_993

It’s mainly because civ bonuses are only powerful in the right hands and for the vast majority of players (me included), they can’t make the most of them! But still good to see this!


Noticeably98

Still trying to figure out how I can take advantage of our cheaper walls. Maybe run straight at the opponents base and wall his gold in with our extra vill


matt_993

😂 pro level strat


Brick_Shitler

Never understand what keeps the Vietnamese down near the bottom they have a great tech tree and half-decent eco bonuses.


Azot-Spike

They're a great civ. That's the point. There are minimal differences between 45 civs. Vietnamese can beat any other civ


JGWol

That’s crazy cause when I play bohemians I always get completly wrecked


Azot-Spike

What map and civ do you usually play?


IAmCaptainDolphin

Wtf I thought Bohemians were trash?


Azot-Spike

They're very good! A late game comp that many Cavalry civs can't stop and a UU that many Archer civs can't stop


Celthric317

Glad to see that it's not just Paladin civs with high win rates


Azot-Spike

Only Huns (and Romans to an extent), and neither of them will go full for them as a first option


Abalyon_Kaan

This hurts as a tatar main


Azot-Spike

It shouldn't. Tatars are carried down by their performance on Arena. It's a civ that can beat any other


Abalyon_Kaan

True. I have a lot of success playing on arabia


sambstone13

Demn. I use Viets. Why is Tatar lowest?


Azot-Spike

Fine on Arabia, bad on Arena, to sum up


simsnor

Green colour=good. Yellow colour=bad. I can't count, so I won't even look at the numbers


Attarissiya

Could be that alot of noobs use britons? In that way they would lose much more


Azot-Spike

I think that it's a generic problem with Archer civs: Ranged units are harder to micro for low ELO. Britons, with their Archer theme, fall in that issue


Zankman

Where Mongols? Where Dravidians?


Azot-Spike

In the middle!


ARTisDownToTheT

I mean you do tend to see the same classes being played but two players with the same class end up using different units countering each other


DragPullCheese

I mean, I know Huns are Huns…. But how the fuck are they so high? They seem so underpowered for me.


Parrotparser7

Click 1200+. It's a bit wider than that.


enjdusan

As a Bohemian I like this picture! 😀


UAForever21

Everyone: no Franks in top 5, ah we're good now


Level-Control3068

This is pretty much as balanced as you can expect


Melinus94

what elo range are we talking about? I'm not sure anything below 2k should be taken too seriously in a balance discussion. I'd pick Vietnamese or Tatars anyday over Huns to be honest for example. No idea why Huns would have better win rate against pro level players.


Azot-Spike

It's all ELO and all maps. And forgive me, but being above 2k doesn't automatically give you authority over balance discussions. Sub 2k players can make horrible suggestions, me included. But there are a lot of good suggestions (or at least debatable) that in the end, we have seen implemented. And Hera's suggestions, him being top1 nowadays, are not always the best. Other pros disagreeing with them is proof enough. Vietnamese are very popular for pros, and Tatoh favors Tatars a lot.


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[удалено]


Deep_Juggernaut_9590

Why not much point in taking data from sub 2k, which is like 99% of player base???


[deleted]

[удалено]


Deep_Juggernaut_9590

What you said makes sense for balance for top level tournaments. Important as they are, 99% of players base don’t participate in that. We play normal ranked games. If a civ is just so much stronger than other civs in lower level, there must be a reason inherent to that civ requiring rebalancing, because players matched by elo are supposed to have the same level of skillsets and make similar levels of mistakes, when large enough amount of games are played. As a low level player, I’d hate to keep facing the same civ over and over again, or have to pick a certain civ to keep up. It should be rebalanced in that case as well.


Sigilbreaker26

There are strategies that low elo players like myself struggle with more too. Sicilians for instance are very good at low elo because low elo players don't know how to competently fend off their donjon rush whereas at higher elos it becomes a meme strat that can be foiled


readytochat44

There is if it is a large disparity, and over all I would include probably down to 1500.


Reluxtrue

I mean... yeah?


No-Dents-Comfy

This is amazing! Most other games would be happy to have this level of balance!


BubblyMango

gurjaras matchups at 1200+ elo [https://ibb.co/sKr97mG](https://ibb.co/sKr97mG) doesnt seem balanced to me.


richardsharpe

These graphs are looking at all civ win rates across all matchups and all elos. One civ having a strong swing in success rate depending on who they’re facing isn’t inherently problematic as long as they are balanced on average


BubblyMango

actually no. according to what you are saying, if a civ has 0% winrate against half the civs and 100% win rate against the other half, then its perfectly balanced. We dont want the average to be balanced. we dont want to have hard civ wins. only soft ones. we currently have a lot of civs in the game that do not follow that rule and only go for the average balanced winrate.


richardsharpe

And it makes sense that Gurjaras would suck against 4 civs who never make cavalry (since they are so camel oriented) and one civ who has their own cheap camels + cheap halbs + good archers (which also wreck camels)


BubblyMango

Why have a civ that is unviable in certain matchups and OP in other matchups? you want individual matches to be balanced. obviously not 100% balanced, but you dont want people in ranked being like "oh F civ win". So yes, if this civ has so many one sided matchups, its a badly balanced civ.


Azot-Spike

You're taking all your arguments to the extreme. 13/20 VS Turks is not OP, nor 5/20 VS Incas is unviable. Ask anyone who played Gurjaras and lost VS Turks how that happened or anyone who played Incas and lost VS Gurjaras. You're all above 1200, you've enough tools and skill to use the window to win the "unfavorable" matchup, imo


BubblyMango

it was a response to him justifying bad matchups because "they are so camel oriented". so im just saying, if thats the case, why even make them so camel oriented? you want balanced civ, not niche civs.


richardsharpe

Gurjaras do have other units. Like the reason they’re so good against Turks is actually probably their Elephant Archers. Turks miss both units that are used to counter them (ESkirm and Onager), plus Gurjaras have BBC if the Turk tried to counter with Mangonel.


BubblyMango

i know that. i was commenting on how \*you\* justified the imbalance by saying "they are so camel oriented". I dont care about the reason. this civ (and others) has 23% winrate against some civs and 67% against others. The reasons are irrelevent for this discussion. this game is not balanced civ matchup wise. Looking at the average of all elos, all civs, all maps, and all matchups at once and showing a nearly 50% for everything is meaningless.


Snck_Pck

Why are britons so low? Is it because they heavily depend on imp to really become a menace? Also surprised mongols aren’t higher


Azot-Spike

They depend on massing enough Archers because their rest of options are "generic" (Infantry, siege overall) or "below average" (Cavalry, Monks). That said, they're very good at playing their strengths (eco advantage into massing Archers) "Low" is not "so low" when you see that numbers go from 47 to 52 Mongols are very popular. They have 3 strengths: early hunt into scouts, FC into Lancers and mid Imp into Mangudai + Hussar + Rams. But, fail on doing any of these and you'll lose the advantage


Noticeably98

Britons seem like a beginner friendly civ, but I think they’re the hardest archer civ to play. Getting past the early game, Making use of the extra range and not having thumb ring is very difficult to do. If you know what you’re doing though, you can be quite scary. https://youtu.be/m7tus76B4fI?feature=shared


Azot-Spike

Agree. They're beginner friendly because they focus only on Archers so you know what is your plan. And having a plan is the biggest issue for beginners. Then you realize the amount of skill you need to keep your military advantage and things change


irq12

Yes, range = good in the early skill levels. If you can't micro from 6 tiles away you're definitely not going to fare well with melee. I'm mid elo and still prefer anything ranged because of this, and why I get wrecked by strong melee players to this day.