I feel like the monk counter play should not be so much more expensive that the techs for monks themselves. Like Faith should be a common tech to get if you're up against a lot of monks ((not for your own monks, but for your army), like getting pierce armor upgrades against crossbows. Maybe make it a castle age upgrade with a lower percentage and then an imp tech to get to the full 50%. Now it is an extreemly expensive tech that would be useless by the time the time you already in a 10 vs 10 monk war. Even if light cav counter monks it, shouldn't be the only option.
I think the counter play of light cav which comes from a feudal age building makes it easy at lower levels which we all are. Maybe we’re blaming a lack of early castle scouting for monks being op
Thank you! For nearly every attack in the game there is both a counterplay and a mitigation. Skirms kill archers, but armor mitigates them. Cav kills siege, but masonry mitigates them. The problem is faith is 1750 resources! That is insane! That kind of cost for something that is far worse than heresy at 1k res, and the civs that need it the most (Persians) only get the unpractical one.
Light cav isn't the only counter to monks though. Crossbows, skirms, and pikes are varying levels of units that have a good matchup into monks. Units with range, mass, or low cost take away from the value of monks, which very much already counts as counterplay. Monks are a core part of AoE2, and the goal isn't to make monks disappear from games, just have the options to not allow monks to be an overbearing part of the game.
Also what kinda games is he playing where 475g for Redemption is "cheap" lmao? That's usually such a significant investment. And you're usually researching Sanctity as well, so that your monk has a chance at surviving mangonel shot, worst case scenario. So vs a mangonel push, that's minimum 750 gold (Redemption+Sanctity+1 monk minimum) vs a mangonel(295 res) sometimes isn't a favourable res swing unless you convert at least 2 mangonels.
I have heard a good point elsewhere that the RNG aspect does serve the purpose of nerfing "deleting" as a viable counter to monks. I can imagine a world in which the conversion time is precisely set where pro players just get insanely good at timing their deletes. I also like the slight element of risk and comeback potential. All that said, the RNG range should definitely reduced.
RobbyLava proposed scaling the conversion time based on the target's remaining HP, making it hard to know when you have to delete your unit. Another option would be to make units undeletable while more than halfway into a conversion, unless you have Heresy. That would require a consistently high conversion time tho, for example always 10 seconds
There should be two type of monks coming out of monasteries. 1- Monks that can convert 2- Monks that can heal and pick relics Single unit doing so much stuff is bonkers. Every unit in Aoe is supposed to do one thing work or fight, not both.
@@gauravbhandari732I disagree here. Don't break what isn't broken. Relics aren't an issue - monks grabbing relics aren't broken, they have easy counterplay. There's a lot more that can be changed other than that.
It's kinda funny to hear the discussion about monks being OP. I only really use monks for relics and healing. It's difficult to target conversions, and I'm too slow to get them most of the time. Usually I don't have any issues playing against them, just make more army. Monks being OP seems like a problem only for the top handful of players.
Well completely OP they are at top level, but they are very frustrating unit to play against since like 1.5k, however I guess by describtion it is kind of top players. But if low elo players don't use monks until they grabing relics, they shouldnt care much to begin with, nothing is changing to them.
Totally agree. Monks are in a strange place where they need buffing at lower elo and nerving at higher elo. I think a buff would be to allow auto convert at maybe 7 range rather than their max 9 range. This would allow them to be useful al lower elo while not making them OP.
At lower elos many units are a lot worse (Archers, siege, militia etc.). Usually units more micro intensive tend to be really bad at lower levels. Even if the player gets a conversion the res swing monks provide barely matter when both players float 2k res in castle anyways Even at mid level monks are very frustrating to play against though, a coverted knight is a big resource swing (260 res, 160 if the monks dies which isn't always the case), sometimes your units get instaconverted anyways and I know a lot of player around and above my range who absolutely hate them and shouldn't be a part of the game in their current form (Which I agree with) Is not just a top level issue, is just blatantly obvious there
I think the RNG aspect is very important because if it was a fixed timer, you would know depending on distance and DPS whether or not it's worth to dive a monk, thus we would see perfectly timed deletes. I would like to see the range narrowed a bit, perhaps by 1 or 2 seconds on both ends. I agree with the points about Heresy for all and more expensive Block Printing.
@@flyingsteaks The advantage of conversions being RNG is that it makes them unreliable, which is a factor one has to then include when using them. There are plenty of high skill ceilings games that prominently use RNG such as MOBA's with crit chances to realistic shooters with randomized recoil. The unreliability of an action then does have to play a factor in the decision, and many of the decisions in games such as Age of Empires are often based on that. Any time you guess what your opponent is doing instead of scouting it, you are gambling. Hell, Any time you decide to try a specific build on a map prior to the match starting you are gambling. The only difference is the chance of monks convertingt is exceptionally visible, whilst the decision to not scout your opponent fundamentally isn't as visible, so the monks are the things that is more prominent. The monk conversation somewhat reminds me of the discussion about random pellet spread in shotguns for TF2, where some players are exceedingly against it in a game filled with randomness just because it is a more visible form of randomness, and then figure it is unacceptable. There can be a point where something is too random, but less Randomness isn't always better as then you are eventually looking at a game that has absolutely no strategy too it as it would necessitate being both simpler and a solved unchanging meta. Good strategy and play is fundamentally figuring the odds of many different things succeeding, and hedging as much as you can into a success.
@@bewawolf19 You point that other games also have RNG, but I don't think that's a good argument. Just because other games have RNG we need conversion RNG? Also, by the end you're talking about removing all randomness that the game becomes stale... what? We're just talking about one feature that's annoying for a lot of players. Removing monk RNG won't make this game stale at all. I understand your point about the unreability of the monks but making them non RNG will just flower other aspects of micro and counter micro that can't be done right now. People will learn when to dive monks but after that people will learn how to counter those dives. This is how this game has grown and will continue if it has enough depth.
@@flyingsteaks You either ignored or fundamentally misunderstood my point there is *no difference* in the randomness of not scouting the opponent and guessing and the RNG of a monk conversion other than the monk conversion is more visible. There are issues with Monks like the tech cost, monks not losing conversion progress when losing LOS, and the ability to charge a conversion and then switch it to another unit. However, none of these are in the RNG of it. I have to imagine if you fix these issues, then people won't have nearly as much legitimate complaints about monks as the RNG time to convert *isn't* the thing that is convincing people make monks. And monks not having the ability to reliably convert after X amount of time is an interesting attribute to the *strategy* of using them. It means that players can't have perfect knowledge on the outcome of an engagement in low numbers, which for both the player with the monks and against the monks, means they need to factor in a strong risk-reward choice in their action of engagement. Age of Empires itself and many strategic games implement things that prevent perfect knowledge for the purpose of encouraging more diverse and riskier play. Fog of war serves the same purpose, and the reason why really good players invest resources into outposts is explicitly to remove that uncertainty. Remove RNG conversion from monks, and you are adjusting the game to be less strategic and more just micro-tactics focused. If you prefer the game to be more micro focused, that is fine. If you are a player that prefers it to be more strategic, then simplifying a game mechanic for no other reason than just to make it simpler will *never* make the game more strategic. Honestly the current issue with monks is probably just charge time abuse with switching units and some issues with tech, which is then inflated heavily from a small amount of players being massively over-bombastic about it instead of approaching it with any nuance.
@@bewawolf19 There is a significant difference between not scounting and make the consequences random and the inherit randomness of monks. The first can be solved by skill by scouting, the other cannot be solved and that alone make it a huge difference. Talking about no difference is just not the truth. You better compare the RNG of monks with with map generation. For me those are 2 complete different concepts to generate imperfect knowledge. I would understand your point if you said there is no difference in uncertainty of FoW and conversion time. And if i understand correct, the problem is not the removal of RNG per se but more the uncertainy that also get removed by it. A solution to that could be something like a tech that boost conversion speed or conversion speed get boosted by relic count so you still have uncertainty about the conversion speed. There are so many possiblities to create uncertainy without computer generated randomness but randomness of player decision instead. That is also the strength of Age of Empires 2, it creates most of its randomness with player decision and not RNG.
That's actually a good one... It would also consequently reduce the percentage of successful conversions since monks would have less time to convert before the units gets to him... I think that might be a good solution.
@@sgtpepper8581 Block Printing could be +4 range instead of +3 and just be more expensive, probably quite a lot more expensive, that solves any imp problems like bombard cannons. Conqs are extremely powerful in castle age on exactly 1 map, which I think is fine, and Janissaries are generally only viable on closed maps. 8 range monks would still outrange them, but even with 9 range, monks can still die very quickly to Janissaries, so I don't know if I'd consider them much of a true "counter" even as things are now.
@@sgtpepper8581 Monks still as an option, but the game has more options like cavalry against siege, skirms/archers/siege against janissaries and conqs. It is an interesting game when there is more than the one option of monks.
It seems again that the issue is in how powerful walling is rather than monks? and it speeds up the meta into low eco boom playstyles with little military, where monks excell
@@MoreTheViper What if building foundations would not stop units from walking over them? It would be quite a drastic change. Though surely this possibilty has to have been discussed before
Viper`s suggestion for more monk techs neglects one important principle of aoe: Simplicity (on the surface at least) . We dont want deter new players. For me even the current amount of monk techs were too many and complicated at the beginning.
That's so true. I think the two hardest buildings in AOE are Monastery and Dock. T90 made a dock video ages ago and nothings changed, so we probably shouldn't expect anything soon for monks with that in mind 😢
I don't think adding a tech specifically for converting buildings and keeping Redemption for siege makes monks way more complicated for beginners. Is very easy to understand what they do I'd say, which I think is the most important thing rather than the amount of techs, usually new players tend to fail understanding the power of monks (Most of us mostly used them for healing/picking up relics. And then forgetting to pick up relics while improving at the game 11) Honestly I think the only genuinely confusing part of the game is still the Dock and is not even close. Is even clunky to use due to it forcing to change page for some of the ships and upgrades.
There's actually an argument that more monk techs is more simple. At the moment monks do like 5 different things with little to no explanation. Picking up relics, healing, converting units, converting buildings, converting siege. The more options you hide behind tech with explanations the more simple it is for people learning.
Is there some way that making redemption conversations lower range could be balenced? Like rams and trebs are already only converted in melee range, what if mangos and bombards were 4-7 range or something. Or would that just kill the viability completely?
Thanks for the video Viper, I love these debates. Speaking as some1 who watches the game more often than playing it now, I will agree with Hera that I'm tired of seeing monks dominate the meta. Its true that recency bias makes it seem worse because TTL3 had a lot of monk friendly maps, but its also true that many of those maps would not have seen heavy monk play 10, 5, or even 2 years ago. Hera is right when he says that pro player speeds are needed to fully take advantage of monks, but I think one thing to add is that while monks haven't really ever been buffed to my recollection, they have been indirectly buffed by all the little quality of life things we've had since user patch on Voobly, then Wololo Kingdoms, then DE. Things such as farm queuing, then unlimited farm queuing, select-all hotkeys, other new hotkeys, multi-queue, reduced latency, etc. All of these things have made it so pros can keep a strong eco with less and less time spent looking at their TCs, and thus more time looking at their army. And no army benefits more from close attention than monks. So the reason we're seeing a monk meta these days is not just maps, its that in the past, even the best players were not able to unlock the full potential of monks. So I think Hera is more or less right about the need for a significant nerf. Some good ideas that have been suggested are things like increasing the cost of Imp monk upgrades, decreasing the cost of heresy and giving it to every civ as Viper suggested, and decreasing monk base range by 1. And why not make the conversion time not random (or shrink randomness window even more) So what if people know the conversion timings? They'll either delete their units or not depending on their apm and timing ability. Better that than the frustration and unfairness of RNG on such important game swings. I also really like Viper's idea of separating the conversion of siege from the conversion of buildings into different techs, perhaps that come one after the other.
1. conversion speed based entirely on faith 2. start faith on 0 (or higher with tech) 3. conversion timer resets when target is out of range (but it remains if new unit is picked without losing range, still allowing monk zoning with good micro)
Lol how about conversion speed on whoever has the lower score? There's a greater need for faith in your fearless leader when your loosing, makes monks more of a backfoot recovery tool then a dominating strat
And AM still wonders why they don't have sponsors... Just compare the way Vipi, Tatoh, Nili talk and argument. Well Daut is Daut, yet there's not this sense of drama and lack of a mature way of expressing....
The tihing with monks being the stronger unit in the game is that the better you get with them, the stronger the unit becomes... then the snowball effect beggins. techs to counter the monk play style are the expensive ones (faith, heresy), so maybe making them available for all civs and cheaper would make a counter meassure, maybe(?)
it's the RNG of the conversion speed that is the big problem for me, seen so many pro players tilt over having the "insta" conversion happen to them, it should not be a thing.
something interesting could be based upon the amount of monks created or currently existing reducing their power potential - like how too many cooks spoil the broth or decentralising their power makes them weaker if that makes any sense??
Top 20 players aren’t magically all decide to play safe. It’s because the risk takers can’t compete against the passive strategy in the long run so they dropped out of Top 20
Exactly!! the success rate of the risky players and plays has dropped off so significantly that everyone is sticking to the passive plays. I did not agree with Viper's point there at all. And yes, we understand that this is limited more to pro players, but most of the community *watches* the game.
What if the converted unit has low HP? What if the converted mango stands next to knights? These calculations ignore that the comverted units often die instantly due to a bad position. Fir example under castle
I am a 1450-1500 ish player. Normally I play with knight civs and for the last 2/3 months specially I am seeing a lot of my opponents are using monks to defend and collect relics. I really agree with what hera says in the video the best option ultimately is defending and booming with monk/seige defence and play for imperial. The raid meta with knights has become forgotten past now unless you have significant advantage in feudal age.
I also think knight is too powerful compared to other castle unit. Knight rush makes the intermediate elo game too monotonous. It's nice that monk counters knight.
I would argue that at a high level, monks hard counter the units they counter much harder than any other unit hard counters another. They 100% shut down early castle knights, and elephants of any sort. If the enemy picks up redemption, they completely shut down aggressive mangonel pushes. And if they get block printing they 100% counter bombard cannons. That's not something you see with other counter units, there's always some squishiness to the counter where a properly played countered unit can beat a countering unit, except like huscarls. The fact that monks can do such incredibly effective total area denial for so many types of units is unique. They're like little mobile castles. I feel like every balance discussion about them needs to lead with an understanding that they shouldn't be balanced in equality with other units, they should be balanced as something genuinely unique and different in terms of role and power.
I think people are calling OP something that its just 'P', in the right hands, maps and circumstances, monks are simply powerful. Its like calling Mongols OP on a map with a bunch of hunt and chokepoints
Great video. I do think monastery should have a cheap technology that allows monks to convert units, so it will give a little bit of time . 100 gold for heal and convert instantly is too good imo. Just a random idea to slightly nerft the unit.
Another factor in the monks being stronger at high level is the scouting. Sure it’s a risk to make enough army to overwhelm the defensive/monk player when he sees it coming. If I’m sitting on 3 TC with 5 monks and 8 light cav, my first thought isn’t “time to go imp” it’s “when are the 25 knights coming from this frank player”
Breaking it down from what I understand, monks are: 1. Converting at random times 2. Cost effective Hera's (primary) argument: 1. Xbows used to counter Monks (I don't see why skirms can't fill this role since monks have low hp and no armour but hey, maybe just give skirms +5 to monks and call it a day lol) Why not make monk conversion speed based on distance? A unit further away takes longer to convert then a nearby unit, it doesn't change the idea that knights are not effective against monks, and would make ranged units as viable as before, the math behind the calculation could be that the more monks are present, the less impact distance has. Formula for conversion with distance should probably look like this: (distance^2 / monk's range^2 * 7) + 5 So at point blank, 5s conversion time, at 4 range this is 6.38s conversion time, at 8 range 10.53s conversion time etc, 5 is the minimum conversion time, 7 is the max time, 12 - minimum. The max might be too harsh here, maybe 10 is more reasonable and the min is probably too small, but the key point is the exponential growth curve for distance to give ranged units an "edge" at countering monks effectively. I imagine something similar to how multiple vills working on constructing a building would be appropriate for having multiple monks affecting their "distance" debuff, but not sure if that's necessary. This would make it harder for siege (mango's, bombards) to get converted at range too so it would resolve the points brought up, another extension is to make it bound to unit type so monks are still effective against ships for example (there was a vid awhile ago of some pro player trying to convert the same turtle ship 2 or 3 times and getting the worst RNG each time lol) Also kind of fits the in game situation, hard to be convinced to betray your kingdom by someone screaming sermons at you from the other side of the battlefield lol Not going to comment about costs of the techs or staggering them, that can open an unexpected can of beans for some whacky strategies
hera is like the young blood "protege" with a looot of talent and viper is gettin more and more like the wise grounded master, still owning 90% of the people 11
I really liked your suggestions towards the end of the video. Making monks worse from the start with the need to improve them gradually over time would require better planning and strategy for it, instead if being an easy solution for when needed
I agree with Viper on this. Maps greatly dictate the meta used and many of the top players refuse to do something non standard. Hera complains about monks but he refuses to attempt to find a different meta. He will rather abuse the current meta and then complain about it. But this is kind of why people like Daut and Tatoh. They are two players who are never afraid to try out new things.
Meta used to be full feudal armies; you never see this anymore. There was a record some time ago of Viper doing it but I think it was more shits and giggles, not something he'd do in a tournament.
Honestly, i thought the xbow nerf would create a monk meta the moment i heared about it. I think rather than nerfing monks, the horse patting needs to be fixed and then xbows can be de-nerfed again. Another option could be partial reimbursements, bonus damage against monks by knights, fixed conversion times, reduced range for mango conversions, some cost and tech adjustments, free heresy on imp (like with the chared vision). I am also happy on the other hand that mango's finally have a decent counter in Castle, they used to be such a game braker at one point: you are loosing massively, build 2 mango's and you are winning; was so annoying. It shifted a bit too much though.
I love the idea of little techs to upgrade the monks. I’ve always been a fan of adding techs to the game, as it makes the game keep progressing. And that is a good point about Bombard cannons getting +1 range for 1100 while monks get 3 for so much cheaper. I think they should obviously be able to reach that range, but with multiple upgrades, maybe +1 or +2 at a time with increasing costs. This would allow other civs to be sprinkled with some more monk techs too, so it’s not ONLY “monk civs” that have a chance.
I haven't used monks much, but does a separate technology for converting buildings really make sense? Players typically invest in this technology to convert siege units, and it also allows them to convert buildings as a bonus. So, why not use it? Is it worth spending resources on a technology solely for building conversion? I'd like to hear opinions on this, as my limited experience with monks might be causing me to miss something.
I lowkey think monk techs are a bigger piece to the puzzle than people realize. The techs are generally very cheap for what they buy, except things like Heresy and Faith which are insanely overpriced. I could see the possibility of fixing most peoples problems with monks just by messing with the techs and costs.
Also a big underlined problem with the monk upgrades is that they only cost gold. Yes, most of the time, gold is the first resource to run out in the map due to how good gold units are and how scarce it is, but it's also not a very demanded resource in early castle age for getting your eco rolling. You can have 4 or 5 vills on gold to make monks and get the upgrades while using the other 50+ vills to get food and wood for booming on multiple tcs, placing a bunch of farms, getting a huge eco lead because the only things there that cost gold are the monks and the techs, and they are cheap enough where they don't need a massive amount of vills on gold to afford and are exceptionally effective
pretty much agree with what viper is saying. Reduce monk rng, make the counter monk monastery techs cheaper, and make the imp monk techs more expensive. Should make it much more interesting and fun to play and watch, even if it doesn't change the meta much.
I feel like it can be strong all in castle/tower play with monks. They keep hopping in and out of the castle/tower forward and just convert everything. Put all vills on stone/gold only.
I know elephants are normally a pretty goofy unit to go to, but don’t you think giving heresy to all the elephant civs might throw the balance off a bit? Or maybe that’s a boost elephants are kind of in need of?
Maybe rather than the standard training time for upgrades, you have to have monks garrisoned in your monestary for the timer to start and its very slow with only a couple in there?
What would you think about reducing the RNG range from now 4-10s (if I'm not mistaken), to sth like 6-8s so people can still not exactly time their unit deletes, but the extreme cases are not possible anymore?
monks are seen at mid level, I was shocked to play unranked games (after not playing for two years) and see people around 1000-1100 elo use monks massively while two years ago if I went knight under 1200 everyone would have just spammed pikes
because people realised, that in castle age pikes doesn't counter knights, especially if knights have few monks to heal. If you want to counter kts, you need monks+pikes, pikes alone in my experience usually doesn't cut, especially if civ has some bonus to kts, f.e. lithuanians, burgundians. Also on top of it, pikemen are easiest unit to counter. Like you get 10 xbow, even archers with bodkin and they do so much in a fight, or like 2-3 scorps. Also there is another huge downside of pikemen, knight guy has few monks for healing, converts 3 pikemen and those 3 pikemen tanks so many hits of your pikemen that it can change whole outcome of fight. But yes, I would say overall level is growing, people learning new stuff and same elo is much better than it was some time ago.
@@Lokalo1 yes I know I went from 1000 to 1200 just by adding a siege workshop with scorps when going knights. And when against knights I was the only one using monks in that Elo range. But times have changed
Monks shouldn't have an RNG conversion, it should be a set timer that gets longer based on the converting unit This way it is more in line with the other mechanics in the game & works well with unit upgrades & civ bonuses. Example: Infantry, 4 sec base coversion +.25 sec per tier. (Champ 5 sec) Knights, 4 sec base, +.25 per tier (Paladin 4.5 sec) Light cav, 4 sec base, +1 per tier (Hussar 6 sec) Archer, 4 sec base, +.50 per tier. (Arb 5 sec) UU, 4 sec base, +1 per tier (Elite UU 5 sec) Villager, 6 sec base
Other comments have pointed out that at the pro level, players would be able to time the delete too well if it's linear.... But I do feel that different unit types should have a different time, particularly ships since it would allow someone to get back onto the water, I don't think there's a real way to retake water once lost in aoe2 except tower rush but that's not a "real" solution imho
Viper, I didn't understand your critique that this is because the player style in the top 15 is to not play risky and play meta. I understand that there will be more variance if players played more risky, but there is nothing wrong with playing meta. It is a problem if the meta is getting so stale that all other options don't play out and so it is forcing players to stick to the "safe" monk heavy playstyle. The meta should not be so stuck. I won't lie, as a viewer, I am kinda bored of the monk-light cav play among pros. The games have become less dynamic and less fun. (because the more "fun" and risky players are also seeing less success against this meta).
Focusing on the cost of techs like Block Printing is a misdirect, I think. Monks are rarely OP in the lategame; they are primarily OP in the very earliest parts of castle age. Basically, whenever you have just a few units on the field, whether it be knights, or siege, or elephants, monks are naturally OP. But once you have a lot of units on the field, they naturally fall off. The problem is, there are times in the game where monks have ZERO counterplay. If you have put most of your resources into siege and don't have enough resources to get scouts, then redemption monks are OP. If you have put most of your resources into 6 knights and don't have enough resources to get scouts, monks are OP. At that point, you have no choice but to engage and roll the dice, or surrender and go home, which, if you're going for a fast strategy, loses you the game. But the answer to this isn't nerfing later techs, or even nerfing Redemption, because all that will do is make them useless for much of the game, without fixing where they're OP. The simple change that would fix early monks is this: Instead of losing all faith at the end of a conversion, you instantly lose 25% of your faith at the START of the conversion. This means if you are hyper-aggressive with your monks with nothing to back them up, your enemy retreats, you lose the conversion charge, and then they counter attack and you die. It means you can't garrison your monks and try to convert repeatedly. But in the later parts of the game, and for lower-skill players, the negative impact would be much diminished.
I don't think Heresy is too expensive: it shuts down monk play by itself (by making monks trade 1-to-1 at best), and Sanctity + Fervor + Redemption + 2 monks is 990 gold. You're probably right that it should be available to all civs. Increasing the cost of block printing seems fair. Interesting suggestion about splitting/staggering siege/building conversion, and starting with less range (maybe 8+1 instead of 7+2, to begin with, and see?). Not sure I agree with conversion time being fixed, perhaps a reduced range and/or more individual unit resistance being tinkered with (not just eagle/scouts having extra res). Monks don't need to be massively nerfed as Hera says, he's exaggerating a lot (like you pointed out at times for example with the Bracer comparison, or using the TTL maps as a biased example), it would just become knights play or knights/siege every game instead, which may just be his preferred playstyle/meta.
I think one think that should be noted that early castle age. Gold is the second most abundant resouce after wood. It's easy to start mining a lot of gold, compared to food which requires twice the investment in the economy. This means that it's easier to get the monk techs that cost purely gold than lot of other techs that cost gold and food. Of course it does have long term cost in sense you might less gold for yourself in late game, if the game goes late and if opponent is able to equalize the map control.
I agree with hera. Appreciate viper response on it but there is a reason why players don't take risk cause those risk will not pay off. Your argument of why the top 20 players aren't risk takers should be interpret as if you take risk you usually won't end up a top 20 player!!
That is not at all the argument that he made. It was a piece of important context , not an argument. The points that Hera is making are not very well thought out; The fact that monks are completely useless with a block printing in imperial age, for example. Block printing is a necessary tech, especially considering monks are still a support unit. If Halberdiers are missing blast furnace, it's not a big deal. The unit still functions, the upgrade improves the performance and costs accordingly. If monks are missing block printing, they're actually useless and impossible to use in imperial age. The cost reflects this. There's a lot of points like this throughout Hera's video that just are not thought out. I don't disagree that monks could use changes, but he's way over the top with this and It could really have a big negative impact on the game if everything he says is implemented.
@Walkop Yeah but those parts clearly shows he wasn't thinking it all which his video that goes into detail should have. I think viper covered most of things you brought up so im not going to waste my time. Comparing monks to blast furnace is 11. Also your whole argument failed when you started talking about imp upgrades when many maps have monks abused in castle age. I don't know Dave hun very well but seem like a arena player cause most of his argument kinda based on that maps. The rest of his argument about maps was just ridiculous, since he basically telling omg the maps we have suck, yep t90, nili, memb the tounrmanet maps you make that are open or hybrid are horrible. Like we fuxking saw monks armies in migration. MIGRATION for god sake. It's a op unit that should require a conversions to be locked behind a tech. Anyone who calls monks a support unit is a joke. Maybe at low elo but we are not talking about that but pro elo. Freaking andy literally made army of monk only and won so many tournament games just with monk and 0 other unit.
1- Monks should not be able to garrison in town centers, castles or towers. So light cabs can dive in. 2- solve the range issue. Make it more expensive, or lower the distance. This two and problem solved. Monks still best unit but managing then becomes more difficult
There's one (?) thing I haven't seen considered yet, even if related subject was brought up. Why has the playstyle changed to more careful/defensive/boomy? It's because playing this way become easier. DE added a lot of QoL which made economy management much easier (and map scripting became more predictable and more friendly to players with closer spawning resources which results in early game being easier). That's why players can go up to feudal and castle age faster and on smaller eco. They also have more attention to spare for defending vs for example Vivi's tower rushes or for quickwalling vs enemy scouts. This results in smooth transition to feudal and castle age where you get access to powerful units like knights and mangonels. And monks, which counter them. And because you advanced faster, without feudal army, monks become a lot more attractive option. That's the real reason imo. Why it took so long to figure out and wasn't the case since DE? Many factors. Old habits die hard, it takes time to adapt to new meta, map scripting wasn't where it is now instantly, it took years to fine tune resource generation and other things mentioned in the video like crossbow nerf (I think Viper doesn't give enough credit to impact of that, crossbow nerf also disincentives archer play in feudal because you can't rely on easy power spike and as we all agree feudal play would make monks less appealing), other balance changes, adding more civs with strong monks, heavier focus on melee units, more civs with eco bonuses steering them toward fast castle play and so on. You could say monks would be made for picking up relics anyway - that's not entirely true. Picking up relics has become completely trivialized. It was much more difficult in the past. Why, you ask? Now you can send the monk to the relic and shift click back to the monastery. That wasn't the case in the past. Years ago it was common for monk to pick up a relic, be forgotten for 5 seconds, 30 seconds, a minute - and any delay, even the smallest one could be the difference between getting the relic back home or not. And if you lose a monk once, twice, again, you decide there's no point wasting gold on that risk. That's why players in the past thought picking up relics wasn't often worth it, to despaired groans of low elo viewers. Now however there's zero delay, monks instantly head back toward safety of home base. Furthermore, combined with previous point about games being more defensive/boomy/skipping feudal age, this made worrying about late game much mroe common concern and relics are what can decide the late game in many match ups. Relics aspect alone has changed enough to push monks meta and it's just one of many reasons why monks are a lot more appealing than they used to be.
I think I like the idea of Redemption into Consecration as techs for converting siege and then converting structures. Although wouldn't that technically buff end-game Aztecs? It's +5 health per tech isn't it?
haha I hadn't even thought about how adding extra techs would affect Aztecs. They would likley need to change the Aztec bonus to like +4 if they added monk techs.
What if monks would cost some food . Like 40 food/ 80 gold for example. It would change the timing of their efficient usage massively. Especially for the pro level gameplay where the tight Ecos are key. I can imagine this could create a time window in early castle age where knights will be seen again. Also it would weaken those fast ups clown moves by a lot.
I was thinking that something similar but for missionaries. Make missionaries cost like 40 food for the donkey additionally to 100 gold, have equal range as monks without additional techs. Then they are the stronger monks in battle at the cost of extra food and not being able to move relics. That way monks and missionaries each have their own viable role. For an overall nerf to monks reduce all range by 1.
But Light Cav upgrades with it all being FOOD, the monks are just so cheap early on with them being gold. I think cheap in the sense of not expensive it can be seen as not necessarily or wrong in some cases. But in the sense of cheap in early to mid castle, then Hera is correct.
I'm definitely not a high level player, mainly enjoy watching AOE2. The main issue for me when watching is that hopping in TC's and castles. Because that's what makes monks super strong in defence. I would argue that's a bad thing, as it kills aggression. And for spectators, more aggression would be nice on high level.
Only thing they really need to do to fix monks is remove the random range for conversions and make it a set amount of time, give all civs heresy, and cut the price of heresy to 500g.
I think on resource cost he isn't factoring in the fact there is an opportunity cos in mining gold cost in castle age comes at the expense of investing wood/food into the economy.
what if redemtion was an imperial age tech avaliable for all civs? That would weaken castle age monks but still provide a way how to use monks against siege....
Something I haven't heard yet is making conversion an imperial age action. Then you'd have to move all the conversion techs to imp and move the speed, healing techs to castle. Open to discuss!
I generally don't like rng in games but not sure how to fix monks by removing their rng. they would probably because too powerful, in doing so, or making them not worth having. it is kind of as if they need to be made more consistent but either have less power ramp up or be a little harder to tech into and get running. I think they are one of those units that if they are slightly nerfed they might as well be removed from the game. But many games are like that, especially when there is no rng. If something is slightly better than other options it quickly becomes the only option. it is fairly hard to make everything fairly balanced.
Tbh I don't love the argument that because less feudal army leads to monks, the solution is more feudal army. Because castle age is just full of power spike units, and not limited to monks. A mangonel destroys feudal archers, Knights destroy most feudal units, Camels destroy scouts. And these require little to tech into, it's not like going monks is a decision you have to make long in advance. Really the broken unit is the palisade wall.
Not that I play enough, but I think heresy should not be researched in a monastery. If you're the player not going for monks you should be able to research that without having to get that extra building. The castle or university is my pick
I agree with Hera: Monks need a tweak for balance. I'd also like to see two different types of monks out of the temples - offensive and defensive. I'd also like to see monks strength or access to OP monk techs based on the villager population! (I know, dynamic power will never be a thing). I think the monk conversion randomness is good - keep it - but need to make it more balanced.
I think the solution is opposite. Monk RNG should be even higher. Make it even higher risk, high reward. You said it yourself, that there are less players taking risks and eliminating yet another randomness from the game, would most definitely make it boring.
It’s so fascinating to me that the original devs of aoe2 thought monks were nerfed into the ground when compared to the original aoe. Not very much has changed about the unit over the years, so I wonder if this meta would have evolved without balance patches or if Hera is right about the crossbow nerf being to blame
Is more of walls being super strong and ppl using market and overall ppl became faster and faster to get to castle age. I feel there are tons of little things playing out. Short feudal age meaning having weak eco in castle age. Pikemen in early castle age don't do well vs kts, so if you are vs kts, you kind of forced to get monks to begin with. Also one of biggest things what changed is lag, at old times good luck microing all monks vs light cav or blocking light cav with few of your own. Nowadays it's so hard to snipe any monk, even if you are close, you get blocked or monk just running around kts, more often i lose my light cav than i actually kill monks and light cav is big investment early on, food is costly and needs a lot of macro, while you just put rally point on gold and voila. Although imp techs of monks are dirty cheap. I literally see ppl like Yo, Hearttt, Hera getting block printing every arabia game even if they have only few monks, they just give amazing value even if converts few units and heals others. 200 gold at imp is almost nothing unless we are talking when you already out of gold.
we had the discussion in chess b4, but in our hand, it was about chess opening preparation and how it was making most of the top players' games boring.
I think I started seeing more monks around TTL season 2, with e.g. Dracken beating some more favored players with clown strats. That's my recollection at least, and I may be wrong.
My point on monks is that probably the rng should be reduced and conversion should be longer. Let's say that the minimum conversion time is 5 second and the max 13 second: it's 7 range. I would say that the range should be 4, but the minimum conversion time should be 9 seconds. I think it would be enough to prevent the snowball because knights may have time enough to reach monks and cause damage, but monks would be useful anyway. I think also you are right: some techs could be expensive and redemption should be splitted, but I don't think this would change so much. I also think this won't affect too much low elo players like me, as at our level we don't have the micro to use monks effectively.
I feel like heresy shouldn't be any cheaper, it should be available to all civs, but it does negate monks for the rest of the game essentially. It at least takes away the value they bring, should be expensive right?
There should be two type of monks coming out of monasteries. 1- Monks that can convert 2- Monks that can heal and pick relics Single unit doing so much stuff is bonkers. Every unit in Aoe is supposed to do one thing work or fight, not both.
Hera's video: ua-cam.com/video/Tjahsy3jjtM/v-deo.htmlsi=kN46dzgGEd_IkyQx
DaveHun's video: ua-cam.com/video/Av2fYgUJJig/v-deo.htmlsi=6389UobClfjMOYIK
I feel like the monk counter play should not be so much more expensive that the techs for monks themselves. Like Faith should be a common tech to get if you're up against a lot of monks ((not for your own monks, but for your army), like getting pierce armor upgrades against crossbows. Maybe make it a castle age upgrade with a lower percentage and then an imp tech to get to the full 50%. Now it is an extreemly expensive tech that would be useless by the time the time you already in a 10 vs 10 monk war. Even if light cav counter monks it, shouldn't be the only option.
Because Faith isn't the intended counterplay to monks, the intended counterplay for monks is light cav and eagle scouts, or ranged units.
I think the counter play of light cav which comes from a feudal age building makes it easy at lower levels which we all are. Maybe we’re blaming a lack of early castle scouting for monks being op
Thank you! For nearly every attack in the game there is both a counterplay and a mitigation. Skirms kill archers, but armor mitigates them. Cav kills siege, but masonry mitigates them. The problem is faith is 1750 resources! That is insane! That kind of cost for something that is far worse than heresy at 1k res, and the civs that need it the most (Persians) only get the unpractical one.
Light cav isn't the only counter to monks though.
Crossbows, skirms, and pikes are varying levels of units that have a good matchup into monks. Units with range, mass, or low cost take away from the value of monks, which very much already counts as counterplay. Monks are a core part of AoE2, and the goal isn't to make monks disappear from games, just have the options to not allow monks to be an overbearing part of the game.
I think the devs listened to you by splitting Faith into Devotion & Faith! Crazy!
One counter argument Hera forgets is how many monks often get sniped before they give any value back..
Also what kinda games is he playing where 475g for Redemption is "cheap" lmao? That's usually such a significant investment. And you're usually researching Sanctity as well, so that your monk has a chance at surviving mangonel shot, worst case scenario. So vs a mangonel push, that's minimum 750 gold (Redemption+Sanctity+1 monk minimum) vs a mangonel(295 res) sometimes isn't a favourable res swing unless you convert at least 2 mangonels.
@@anirudhviswanathan3986 all this nuance and you forget that Heresy cost 1k gold, an anti-Monk tech
I have heard a good point elsewhere that the RNG aspect does serve the purpose of nerfing "deleting" as a viable counter to monks. I can imagine a world in which the conversion time is precisely set where pro players just get insanely good at timing their deletes. I also like the slight element of risk and comeback potential. All that said, the RNG range should definitely reduced.
A unit that can insta kill any unit from a very long range that forces a lot of micro is still good
RobbyLava proposed scaling the conversion time based on the target's remaining HP, making it hard to know when you have to delete your unit.
Another option would be to make units undeletable while more than halfway into a conversion, unless you have Heresy. That would require a consistently high conversion time tho, for example always 10 seconds
There should be two type of monks coming out of monasteries.
1- Monks that can convert
2- Monks that can heal and pick relics
Single unit doing so much stuff is bonkers. Every unit in Aoe is supposed to do one thing work or fight, not both.
@@gauravbhandari732I disagree here. Don't break what isn't broken. Relics aren't an issue - monks grabbing relics aren't broken, they have easy counterplay.
There's a lot more that can be changed other than that.
@@gauravbhandari732 Maybe the warrior monk can be a step in that direction, a regional unit to replace the new healing monk
It's kinda funny to hear the discussion about monks being OP. I only really use monks for relics and healing. It's difficult to target conversions, and I'm too slow to get them most of the time. Usually I don't have any issues playing against them, just make more army. Monks being OP seems like a problem only for the top handful of players.
Well completely OP they are at top level, but they are very frustrating unit to play against since like 1.5k, however I guess by describtion it is kind of top players. But if low elo players don't use monks until they grabing relics, they shouldnt care much to begin with, nothing is changing to them.
Totally agree. Monks are in a strange place where they need buffing at lower elo and nerving at higher elo.
I think a buff would be to allow auto convert at maybe 7 range rather than their max 9 range. This would allow them to be useful al lower elo while not making them OP.
At lower elos many units are a lot worse (Archers, siege, militia etc.). Usually units more micro intensive tend to be really bad at lower levels.
Even if the player gets a conversion the res swing monks provide barely matter when both players float 2k res in castle anyways
Even at mid level monks are very frustrating to play against though, a coverted knight is a big resource swing (260 res, 160 if the monks dies which isn't always the case), sometimes your units get instaconverted anyways and I know a lot of player around and above my range who absolutely hate them and shouldn't be a part of the game in their current form (Which I agree with)
Is not just a top level issue, is just blatantly obvious there
All these pros want to balance the game for Arabia. How am I going to go full missionaries on Michi if all civs get Heresy?!
I think the RNG aspect is very important because if it was a fixed timer, you would know depending on distance and DPS whether or not it's worth to dive a monk, thus we would see perfectly timed deletes. I would like to see the range narrowed a bit, perhaps by 1 or 2 seconds on both ends.
I agree with the points about Heresy for all and more expensive Block Printing.
I really don't get how making the game less RNG would be a bad thing
@@flyingsteaks The advantage of conversions being RNG is that it makes them unreliable, which is a factor one has to then include when using them. There are plenty of high skill ceilings games that prominently use RNG such as MOBA's with crit chances to realistic shooters with randomized recoil. The unreliability of an action then does have to play a factor in the decision, and many of the decisions in games such as Age of Empires are often based on that. Any time you guess what your opponent is doing instead of scouting it, you are gambling. Hell, Any time you decide to try a specific build on a map prior to the match starting you are gambling. The only difference is the chance of monks convertingt is exceptionally visible, whilst the decision to not scout your opponent fundamentally isn't as visible, so the monks are the things that is more prominent. The monk conversation somewhat reminds me of the discussion about random pellet spread in shotguns for TF2, where some players are exceedingly against it in a game filled with randomness just because it is a more visible form of randomness, and then figure it is unacceptable.
There can be a point where something is too random, but less Randomness isn't always better as then you are eventually looking at a game that has absolutely no strategy too it as it would necessitate being both simpler and a solved unchanging meta. Good strategy and play is fundamentally figuring the odds of many different things succeeding, and hedging as much as you can into a success.
@@bewawolf19 You point that other games also have RNG, but I don't think that's a good argument. Just because other games have RNG we need conversion RNG? Also, by the end you're talking about removing all randomness that the game becomes stale... what? We're just talking about one feature that's annoying for a lot of players. Removing monk RNG won't make this game stale at all. I understand your point about the unreability of the monks but making them non RNG will just flower other aspects of micro and counter micro that can't be done right now. People will learn when to dive monks but after that people will learn how to counter those dives. This is how this game has grown and will continue if it has enough depth.
@@flyingsteaks You either ignored or fundamentally misunderstood my point there is *no difference* in the randomness of not scouting the opponent and guessing and the RNG of a monk conversion other than the monk conversion is more visible. There are issues with Monks like the tech cost, monks not losing conversion progress when losing LOS, and the ability to charge a conversion and then switch it to another unit. However, none of these are in the RNG of it. I have to imagine if you fix these issues, then people won't have nearly as much legitimate complaints about monks as the RNG time to convert *isn't* the thing that is convincing people make monks.
And monks not having the ability to reliably convert after X amount of time is an interesting attribute to the *strategy* of using them. It means that players can't have perfect knowledge on the outcome of an engagement in low numbers, which for both the player with the monks and against the monks, means they need to factor in a strong risk-reward choice in their action of engagement. Age of Empires itself and many strategic games implement things that prevent perfect knowledge for the purpose of encouraging more diverse and riskier play. Fog of war serves the same purpose, and the reason why really good players invest resources into outposts is explicitly to remove that uncertainty.
Remove RNG conversion from monks, and you are adjusting the game to be less strategic and more just micro-tactics focused. If you prefer the game to be more micro focused, that is fine. If you are a player that prefers it to be more strategic, then simplifying a game mechanic for no other reason than just to make it simpler will *never* make the game more strategic. Honestly the current issue with monks is probably just charge time abuse with switching units and some issues with tech, which is then inflated heavily from a small amount of players being massively over-bombastic about it instead of approaching it with any nuance.
@@bewawolf19 There is a significant difference between not scounting and make the consequences random and the inherit randomness of monks. The first can be solved by skill by scouting, the other cannot be solved and that alone make it a huge difference. Talking about no difference is just not the truth. You better compare the RNG of monks with with map generation. For me those are 2 complete different concepts to generate imperfect knowledge. I would understand your point if you said there is no difference in uncertainty of FoW and conversion time.
And if i understand correct, the problem is not the removal of RNG per se but more the uncertainy that also get removed by it. A solution to that could be something like a tech that boost conversion speed or conversion speed get boosted by relic count so you still have uncertainty about the conversion speed. There are so many possiblities to create uncertainy without computer generated randomness but randomness of player decision instead. That is also the strength of Age of Empires 2, it creates most of its randomness with player decision and not RNG.
I have always been amazed by conversion range. Reducing by one tile range would be an overall monk nerf.
That's actually a good one... It would also consequently reduce the percentage of successful conversions since monks would have less time to convert before the units gets to him... I think that might be a good solution.
No way, how would you counter bombard canons and onagers push?? What about janissaries and conqs in castle age being powerful too?
@@sgtpepper8581 Block Printing could be +4 range instead of +3 and just be more expensive, probably quite a lot more expensive, that solves any imp problems like bombard cannons. Conqs are extremely powerful in castle age on exactly 1 map, which I think is fine, and Janissaries are generally only viable on closed maps. 8 range monks would still outrange them, but even with 9 range, monks can still die very quickly to Janissaries, so I don't know if I'd consider them much of a true "counter" even as things are now.
@@sgtpepper8581what about +1 range against siege?
@@sgtpepper8581 Monks still as an option, but the game has more options like cavalry against siege, skirms/archers/siege against janissaries and conqs. It is an interesting game when there is more than the one option of monks.
Just making conversion time standardized would eliminate so much frustration
And fun.
It seems again that the issue is in how powerful walling is rather than monks? and it speeds up the meta into low eco boom playstyles with little military, where monks excell
Walling has an impact for sure.
@@MoreTheViper What if building foundations would not stop units from walking over them? It would be quite a drastic change. Though surely this possibilty has to have been discussed before
Viper`s suggestion for more monk techs neglects one important principle of aoe: Simplicity (on the surface at least) . We dont want deter new players. For me even the current amount of monk techs were too many and complicated at the beginning.
we already have over 40 civs and they keep adding more and more, one more monastery tech is nothing
That's so true. I think the two hardest buildings in AOE are Monastery and Dock.
T90 made a dock video ages ago and nothings changed, so we probably shouldn't expect anything soon for monks with that in mind 😢
I don't think adding a tech specifically for converting buildings and keeping Redemption for siege makes monks way more complicated for beginners.
Is very easy to understand what they do I'd say, which I think is the most important thing rather than the amount of techs, usually new players tend to fail understanding the power of monks (Most of us mostly used them for healing/picking up relics. And then forgetting to pick up relics while improving at the game 11)
Honestly I think the only genuinely confusing part of the game is still the Dock and is not even close. Is even clunky to use due to it forcing to change page for some of the ships and upgrades.
There's actually an argument that more monk techs is more simple. At the moment monks do like 5 different things with little to no explanation. Picking up relics, healing, converting units, converting buildings, converting siege. The more options you hide behind tech with explanations the more simple it is for people learning.
Is there some way that making redemption conversations lower range could be balenced? Like rams and trebs are already only converted in melee range, what if mangos and bombards were 4-7 range or something. Or would that just kill the viability completely?
Roxy roasting him while Hera gets more and more agitated made my day 😂
Thanks for pointing that out! 11 Not usually what I notice.
100% agree with Viper's take on heresy being available to all civs. If not all civs at least it must be available to all Elephant and siege civs.
Thanks for the video Viper, I love these debates.
Speaking as some1 who watches the game more often than playing it now, I will agree with Hera that I'm tired of seeing monks dominate the meta. Its true that recency bias makes it seem worse because TTL3 had a lot of monk friendly maps, but its also true that many of those maps would not have seen heavy monk play 10, 5, or even 2 years ago. Hera is right when he says that pro player speeds are needed to fully take advantage of monks, but I think one thing to add is that while monks haven't really ever been buffed to my recollection, they have been indirectly buffed by all the little quality of life things we've had since user patch on Voobly, then Wololo Kingdoms, then DE. Things such as farm queuing, then unlimited farm queuing, select-all hotkeys, other new hotkeys, multi-queue, reduced latency, etc. All of these things have made it so pros can keep a strong eco with less and less time spent looking at their TCs, and thus more time looking at their army. And no army benefits more from close attention than monks. So the reason we're seeing a monk meta these days is not just maps, its that in the past, even the best players were not able to unlock the full potential of monks.
So I think Hera is more or less right about the need for a significant nerf. Some good ideas that have been suggested are things like increasing the cost of Imp monk upgrades, decreasing the cost of heresy and giving it to every civ as Viper suggested, and decreasing monk base range by 1. And why not make the conversion time not random (or shrink randomness window even more) So what if people know the conversion timings? They'll either delete their units or not depending on their apm and timing ability. Better that than the frustration and unfairness of RNG on such important game swings. I also really like Viper's idea of separating the conversion of siege from the conversion of buildings into different techs, perhaps that come one after the other.
1. conversion speed based entirely on faith
2. start faith on 0 (or higher with tech)
3. conversion timer resets when target is out of range (but it remains if new unit is picked without losing range, still allowing monk zoning with good micro)
Lol how about conversion speed on whoever has the lower score? There's a greater need for faith in your fearless leader when your loosing, makes monks more of a backfoot recovery tool then a dominating strat
And AM still wonders why they don't have sponsors... Just compare the way Vipi, Tatoh, Nili talk and argument. Well Daut is Daut, yet there's not this sense of drama and lack of a mature way of expressing....
“Hussar spam boy complains about monks”
The tihing with monks being the stronger unit in the game is that the better you get with them, the stronger the unit becomes... then the snowball effect beggins.
techs to counter the monk play style are the expensive ones (faith, heresy), so maybe making them available for all civs and cheaper would make a counter meassure, maybe(?)
it's the RNG of the conversion speed that is the big problem for me, seen so many pro players tilt over having the "insta" conversion happen to them, it should not be a thing.
something interesting could be based upon the amount of monks created or currently existing reducing their power potential - like how too many cooks spoil the broth or decentralising their power makes them weaker if that makes any sense??
Top 20 players aren’t magically all decide to play safe. It’s because the risk takers can’t compete against the passive strategy in the long run so they dropped out of Top 20
Exactly!! the success rate of the risky players and plays has dropped off so significantly that everyone is sticking to the passive plays. I did not agree with Viper's point there at all. And yes, we understand that this is limited more to pro players, but most of the community *watches* the game.
What if the converted unit has low HP? What if the converted mango stands next to knights? These calculations ignore that the comverted units often die instantly due to a bad position. Fir example under castle
I am a 1450-1500 ish player. Normally I play with knight civs and for the last 2/3 months specially I am seeing a lot of my opponents are using monks to defend and collect relics. I really agree with what hera says in the video the best option ultimately is defending and booming with monk/seige defence and play for imperial. The raid meta with knights has become forgotten past now unless you have significant advantage in feudal age.
I also think knight is too powerful compared to other castle unit. Knight rush makes the intermediate elo game too monotonous. It's nice that monk counters knight.
I absolutely love these "TheViper reacts" vidoes!
Really enjoyed the video. I like the slower meta of walling up creating minimal army and shooting for faster castle time.
I would argue that at a high level, monks hard counter the units they counter much harder than any other unit hard counters another. They 100% shut down early castle knights, and elephants of any sort. If the enemy picks up redemption, they completely shut down aggressive mangonel pushes. And if they get block printing they 100% counter bombard cannons. That's not something you see with other counter units, there's always some squishiness to the counter where a properly played countered unit can beat a countering unit, except like huscarls. The fact that monks can do such incredibly effective total area denial for so many types of units is unique. They're like little mobile castles. I feel like every balance discussion about them needs to lead with an understanding that they shouldn't be balanced in equality with other units, they should be balanced as something genuinely unique and different in terms of role and power.
I think people are calling OP something that its just 'P', in the right hands, maps and circumstances, monks are simply powerful. Its like calling Mongols OP on a map with a bunch of hunt and chokepoints
But the Mongols are OP in that case
Monks being P is OP. They shouldn't be a power unit, whether the map is open or closed.
@@IndexInvestingWithColethe key words being "in that case"
Great video. I do think monastery should have a cheap technology that allows monks to convert units, so it will give a little bit of time . 100 gold for heal and convert instantly is too good imo. Just a random idea to slightly nerft the unit.
Another factor in the monks being stronger at high level is the scouting. Sure it’s a risk to make enough army to overwhelm the defensive/monk player when he sees it coming. If I’m sitting on 3 TC with 5 monks and 8 light cav, my first thought isn’t “time to go imp” it’s “when are the 25 knights coming from this frank player”
@01:22 Hera slowly losing his grip on reality. Meanwhile this one guy in chat reminding himself to buy bread and that he is loved.
Breaking it down from what I understand, monks are:
1. Converting at random times
2. Cost effective
Hera's (primary) argument:
1. Xbows used to counter Monks (I don't see why skirms can't fill this role since monks have low hp and no armour but hey, maybe just give skirms +5 to monks and call it a day lol)
Why not make monk conversion speed based on distance? A unit further away takes longer to convert then a nearby unit, it doesn't change the idea that knights are not effective against monks, and would make ranged units as viable as before, the math behind the calculation could be that the more monks are present, the less impact distance has.
Formula for conversion with distance should probably look like this:
(distance^2 / monk's range^2 * 7) + 5
So at point blank, 5s conversion time, at 4 range this is 6.38s conversion time, at 8 range 10.53s conversion time etc,
5 is the minimum conversion time, 7 is the max time, 12 - minimum.
The max might be too harsh here, maybe 10 is more reasonable and the min is probably too small, but the key point is the exponential growth curve for distance to give ranged units an "edge" at countering monks effectively. I imagine something similar to how multiple vills working on constructing a building would be appropriate for having multiple monks affecting their "distance" debuff, but not sure if that's necessary.
This would make it harder for siege (mango's, bombards) to get converted at range too so it would resolve the points brought up, another extension is to make it bound to unit type so monks are still effective against ships for example (there was a vid awhile ago of some pro player trying to convert the same turtle ship 2 or 3 times and getting the worst RNG each time lol)
Also kind of fits the in game situation, hard to be convinced to betray your kingdom by someone screaming sermons at you from the other side of the battlefield lol
Not going to comment about costs of the techs or staggering them, that can open an unexpected can of beans for some whacky strategies
hera is like the young blood "protege" with a looot of talent and viper is gettin more and more like the wise grounded master, still owning 90% of the people 11
unpopular opinion: Monk rng is exciting to watch
I really liked your suggestions towards the end of the video. Making monks worse from the start with the need to improve them gradually over time would require better planning and strategy for it, instead if being an easy solution for when needed
I agree with Viper on this. Maps greatly dictate the meta used and many of the top players refuse to do something non standard. Hera complains about monks but he refuses to attempt to find a different meta. He will rather abuse the current meta and then complain about it. But this is kind of why people like Daut and Tatoh. They are two players who are never afraid to try out new things.
Meta used to be full feudal armies; you never see this anymore. There was a record some time ago of Viper doing it but I think it was more shits and giggles, not something he'd do in a tournament.
Yeah the guy who wins every S-Tier tournament and owns TheViper definitely isn’t warranted in his opinion
i mean... either that, or he's figured out that monks are op
I think I trust the top player's opinion hahaha.
Honestly, i thought the xbow nerf would create a monk meta the moment i heared about it.
I think rather than nerfing monks, the horse patting needs to be fixed and then xbows can be de-nerfed again.
Another option could be partial reimbursements, bonus damage against monks by knights, fixed conversion times, reduced range for mango conversions, some cost and tech adjustments, free heresy on imp (like with the chared vision).
I am also happy on the other hand that mango's finally have a decent counter in Castle, they used to be such a game braker at one point: you are loosing massively, build 2 mango's and you are winning; was so annoying. It shifted a bit too much though.
Hera is a cavalry player tbf
I love the idea of little techs to upgrade the monks. I’ve always been a fan of adding techs to the game, as it makes the game keep progressing. And that is a good point about Bombard cannons getting +1 range for 1100 while monks get 3 for so much cheaper. I think they should obviously be able to reach that range, but with multiple upgrades, maybe +1 or +2 at a time with increasing costs. This would allow other civs to be sprinkled with some more monk techs too, so it’s not ONLY “monk civs” that have a chance.
Viper's reaction: "STONKS" 11
Hearing him describe monk/light cav meta, he makes it sound like the light cav is what's OP
I haven't used monks much, but does a separate technology for converting buildings really make sense? Players typically invest in this technology to convert siege units, and it also allows them to convert buildings as a bonus. So, why not use it? Is it worth spending resources on a technology solely for building conversion? I'd like to hear opinions on this, as my limited experience with monks might be causing me to miss something.
I lowkey think monk techs are a bigger piece to the puzzle than people realize. The techs are generally very cheap for what they buy, except things like Heresy and Faith which are insanely overpriced. I could see the possibility of fixing most peoples problems with monks just by messing with the techs and costs.
Also a big underlined problem with the monk upgrades is that they only cost gold. Yes, most of the time, gold is the first resource to run out in the map due to how good gold units are and how scarce it is, but it's also not a very demanded resource in early castle age for getting your eco rolling. You can have 4 or 5 vills on gold to make monks and get the upgrades while using the other 50+ vills to get food and wood for booming on multiple tcs, placing a bunch of farms, getting a huge eco lead because the only things there that cost gold are the monks and the techs, and they are cheap enough where they don't need a massive amount of vills on gold to afford and are exceptionally effective
pretty much agree with what viper is saying. Reduce monk rng, make the counter monk monastery techs cheaper, and make the imp monk techs more expensive. Should make it much more interesting and fun to play and watch, even if it doesn't change the meta much.
making heresy cheaper would be a huge fix. lower to 750ish and it would be a lot easier to get in an emergency
This is chapter two, part one was the dravidian saga.
Sounds like a skill issue, this Hera guy should practice more then he'd be able to beat monks
I know, right? Who is this "Hera" guy, anyways? Some 200 ELO noob?
@@SchemingGoldberg even worse, i have recently has 1 elo
I feel like it can be strong all in castle/tower play with monks. They keep hopping in and out of the castle/tower forward and just convert everything. Put all vills on stone/gold only.
Extra tech for converting building sound like a decent idea
Current passive meta is great for those who use the Super Fast aggressive FC strats
I know elephants are normally a pretty goofy unit to go to, but don’t you think giving heresy to all the elephant civs might throw the balance off a bit? Or maybe that’s a boost elephants are kind of in need of?
Hera's next video - villagers are too OP. Only 50 food and you can collect resources, build stuff and repair stuff. Pls nerf vills 111111
Maybe rather than the standard training time for upgrades, you have to have monks garrisoned in your monestary for the timer to start and its very slow with only a couple in there?
What would you think about reducing the RNG range from now 4-10s (if I'm not mistaken), to sth like 6-8s so people can still not exactly time their unit deletes, but the extreme cases are not possible anymore?
monks are seen at mid level, I was shocked to play unranked games (after not playing for two years) and see people around 1000-1100 elo use monks massively while two years ago if I went knight under 1200 everyone would have just spammed pikes
because people realised, that in castle age pikes doesn't counter knights, especially if knights have few monks to heal. If you want to counter kts, you need monks+pikes, pikes alone in my experience usually doesn't cut, especially if civ has some bonus to kts, f.e. lithuanians, burgundians. Also on top of it, pikemen are easiest unit to counter. Like you get 10 xbow, even archers with bodkin and they do so much in a fight, or like 2-3 scorps. Also there is another huge downside of pikemen, knight guy has few monks for healing, converts 3 pikemen and those 3 pikemen tanks so many hits of your pikemen that it can change whole outcome of fight.
But yes, I would say overall level is growing, people learning new stuff and same elo is much better than it was some time ago.
@@Lokalo1 yes I know I went from 1000 to 1200 just by adding a siege workshop with scorps when going knights. And when against knights I was the only one using monks in that Elo range. But times have changed
Monks shouldn't have an RNG conversion, it should be a set timer that gets longer based on the converting unit
This way it is more in line with the other mechanics in the game & works well with unit upgrades & civ bonuses.
Example:
Infantry, 4 sec base coversion +.25 sec per tier. (Champ 5 sec)
Knights, 4 sec base, +.25 per tier (Paladin 4.5 sec)
Light cav, 4 sec base, +1 per tier (Hussar 6 sec)
Archer, 4 sec base, +.50 per tier. (Arb 5 sec)
UU, 4 sec base, +1 per tier (Elite UU 5 sec)
Villager, 6 sec base
Other comments have pointed out that at the pro level, players would be able to time the delete too well if it's linear.... But I do feel that different unit types should have a different time, particularly ships since it would allow someone to get back onto the water, I don't think there's a real way to retake water once lost in aoe2 except tower rush but that's not a "real" solution imho
Viper, I didn't understand your critique that this is because the player style in the top 15 is to not play risky and play meta. I understand that there will be more variance if players played more risky, but there is nothing wrong with playing meta. It is a problem if the meta is getting so stale that all other options don't play out and so it is forcing players to stick to the "safe" monk heavy playstyle. The meta should not be so stuck. I won't lie, as a viewer, I am kinda bored of the monk-light cav play among pros. The games have become less dynamic and less fun. (because the more "fun" and risky players are also seeing less success against this meta).
They need double the cost of walls. They need adresss quik wall abuse by giving far less resources back when buildings are deleted
Idea : replace rng with proportion - more hp make harder to convert.”
Are you talking max hp or current hp
@@Naccarat better for implementation for designers is max hp
Focusing on the cost of techs like Block Printing is a misdirect, I think. Monks are rarely OP in the lategame; they are primarily OP in the very earliest parts of castle age. Basically, whenever you have just a few units on the field, whether it be knights, or siege, or elephants, monks are naturally OP.
But once you have a lot of units on the field, they naturally fall off.
The problem is, there are times in the game where monks have ZERO counterplay. If you have put most of your resources into siege and don't have enough resources to get scouts, then redemption monks are OP. If you have put most of your resources into 6 knights and don't have enough resources to get scouts, monks are OP. At that point, you have no choice but to engage and roll the dice, or surrender and go home, which, if you're going for a fast strategy, loses you the game.
But the answer to this isn't nerfing later techs, or even nerfing Redemption, because all that will do is make them useless for much of the game, without fixing where they're OP.
The simple change that would fix early monks is this: Instead of losing all faith at the end of a conversion, you instantly lose 25% of your faith at the START of the conversion. This means if you are hyper-aggressive with your monks with nothing to back them up, your enemy retreats, you lose the conversion charge, and then they counter attack and you die. It means you can't garrison your monks and try to convert repeatedly.
But in the later parts of the game, and for lower-skill players, the negative impact would be much diminished.
Open any TTL match and you will see spearmen being used. Spearmen OP!
I don't think Heresy is too expensive: it shuts down monk play by itself (by making monks trade 1-to-1 at best), and Sanctity + Fervor + Redemption + 2 monks is 990 gold. You're probably right that it should be available to all civs.
Increasing the cost of block printing seems fair. Interesting suggestion about splitting/staggering siege/building conversion, and starting with less range (maybe 8+1 instead of 7+2, to begin with, and see?).
Not sure I agree with conversion time being fixed, perhaps a reduced range and/or more individual unit resistance being tinkered with (not just eagle/scouts having extra res).
Monks don't need to be massively nerfed as Hera says, he's exaggerating a lot (like you pointed out at times for example with the Bracer comparison, or using the TTL maps as a biased example), it would just become knights play or knights/siege every game instead, which may just be his preferred playstyle/meta.
I think one think that should be noted that early castle age. Gold is the second most abundant resouce after wood. It's easy to start mining a lot of gold, compared to food which requires twice the investment in the economy.
This means that it's easier to get the monk techs that cost purely gold than lot of other techs that cost gold and food. Of course it does have long term cost in sense you might less gold for yourself in late game, if the game goes late and if opponent is able to equalize the map control.
I agree with hera. Appreciate viper response on it but there is a reason why players don't take risk cause those risk will not pay off. Your argument of why the top 20 players aren't risk takers should be interpret as if you take risk you usually won't end up a top 20 player!!
That is not at all the argument that he made. It was a piece of important context , not an argument. The points that Hera is making are not very well thought out; The fact that monks are completely useless with a block printing in imperial age, for example. Block printing is a necessary tech, especially considering monks are still a support unit.
If Halberdiers are missing blast furnace, it's not a big deal. The unit still functions, the upgrade improves the performance and costs accordingly.
If monks are missing block printing, they're actually useless and impossible to use in imperial age. The cost reflects this.
There's a lot of points like this throughout Hera's video that just are not thought out.
I don't disagree that monks could use changes, but he's way over the top with this and It could really have a big negative impact on the game if everything he says is implemented.
@Walkop Yeah but those parts clearly shows he wasn't thinking it all which his video that goes into detail should have.
I think viper covered most of things you brought up so im not going to waste my time. Comparing monks to blast furnace is 11. Also your whole argument failed when you started talking about imp upgrades when many maps have monks abused in castle age.
I don't know Dave hun very well but seem like a arena player cause most of his argument kinda based on that maps. The rest of his argument about maps was just ridiculous, since he basically telling omg the maps we have suck, yep t90, nili, memb the tounrmanet maps you make that are open or hybrid are horrible. Like we fuxking saw monks armies in migration. MIGRATION for god sake. It's a op unit that should require a conversions to be locked behind a tech. Anyone who calls monks a support unit is a joke. Maybe at low elo but we are not talking about that but pro elo. Freaking andy literally made army of monk only and won so many tournament games just with monk and 0 other unit.
1- Monks should not be able to garrison in town centers, castles or towers. So light cabs can dive in.
2- solve the range issue. Make it more expensive, or lower the distance.
This two and problem solved. Monks still best unit but managing then becomes more difficult
So, Viper's take on this it "it depends", i expected that 11
I really like the take on giving heresy to all civs
There's one (?) thing I haven't seen considered yet, even if related subject was brought up. Why has the playstyle changed to more careful/defensive/boomy? It's because playing this way become easier.
DE added a lot of QoL which made economy management much easier (and map scripting became more predictable and more friendly to players with closer spawning resources which results in early game being easier). That's why players can go up to feudal and castle age faster and on smaller eco. They also have more attention to spare for defending vs for example Vivi's tower rushes or for quickwalling vs enemy scouts. This results in smooth transition to feudal and castle age where you get access to powerful units like knights and mangonels. And monks, which counter them. And because you advanced faster, without feudal army, monks become a lot more attractive option. That's the real reason imo.
Why it took so long to figure out and wasn't the case since DE? Many factors. Old habits die hard, it takes time to adapt to new meta, map scripting wasn't where it is now instantly, it took years to fine tune resource generation and other things mentioned in the video like crossbow nerf (I think Viper doesn't give enough credit to impact of that, crossbow nerf also disincentives archer play in feudal because you can't rely on easy power spike and as we all agree feudal play would make monks less appealing), other balance changes, adding more civs with strong monks, heavier focus on melee units, more civs with eco bonuses steering them toward fast castle play and so on.
You could say monks would be made for picking up relics anyway - that's not entirely true. Picking up relics has become completely trivialized. It was much more difficult in the past. Why, you ask? Now you can send the monk to the relic and shift click back to the monastery. That wasn't the case in the past. Years ago it was common for monk to pick up a relic, be forgotten for 5 seconds, 30 seconds, a minute - and any delay, even the smallest one could be the difference between getting the relic back home or not. And if you lose a monk once, twice, again, you decide there's no point wasting gold on that risk. That's why players in the past thought picking up relics wasn't often worth it, to despaired groans of low elo viewers. Now however there's zero delay, monks instantly head back toward safety of home base. Furthermore, combined with previous point about games being more defensive/boomy/skipping feudal age, this made worrying about late game much mroe common concern and relics are what can decide the late game in many match ups. Relics aspect alone has changed enough to push monks meta and it's just one of many reasons why monks are a lot more appealing than they used to be.
Will we get viper reacts to viper reacts video?
I think I like the idea of Redemption into Consecration as techs for converting siege and then converting structures. Although wouldn't that technically buff end-game Aztecs? It's +5 health per tech isn't it?
I don't think so. The additional 5 hp isn't really worth the resources the tech is worth.
Yeah but if they're getting it anyway for the effect then they're just up 5 health.
haha I hadn't even thought about how adding extra techs would affect Aztecs. They would likley need to change the Aztec bonus to like +4 if they added monk techs.
Why can't GL and AM collectively make suggestions on price changes?
What if monks would cost some food . Like 40 food/ 80 gold for example. It would change the timing of their efficient usage massively. Especially for the pro level gameplay where the tight Ecos are key. I can imagine this could create a time window in early castle age where knights will be seen again. Also it would weaken those fast ups clown moves by a lot.
Make them as fat as lazy as they always where in history :)
Tbh: i dont know if that's true, but I hate the church
I was thinking that something similar but for missionaries. Make missionaries cost like 40 food for the donkey additionally to 100 gold, have equal range as monks without additional techs. Then they are the stronger monks in battle at the cost of extra food and not being able to move relics. That way monks and missionaries each have their own viable role. For an overall nerf to monks reduce all range by 1.
Is Redemtion a castle age tech? Not sure but that should be an Imp tech all day
But Light Cav upgrades with it all being FOOD, the monks are just so cheap early on with them being gold.
I think cheap in the sense of not expensive it can be seen as not necessarily or wrong in some cases. But in the sense of cheap in early to mid castle, then Hera is correct.
So in the end viper agrees monks need some nerfs and suggests good ideas on some starting nerfs.
100% agree Limit redemption effects but keep it the same for civs with no stable l
I'm definitely not a high level player, mainly enjoy watching AOE2. The main issue for me when watching is that hopping in TC's and castles. Because that's what makes monks super strong in defence. I would argue that's a bad thing, as it kills aggression. And for spectators, more aggression would be nice on high level.
Only thing they really need to do to fix monks is remove the random range for conversions and make it a set amount of time, give all civs heresy, and cut the price of heresy to 500g.
I think on resource cost he isn't factoring in the fact there is an opportunity cos in mining gold cost in castle age comes at the expense of investing wood/food into the economy.
Monks are high risk high reward. If they change it so monks cant be garrisoned I think it’d allow less passive defensive gameplay
which is good for viewership and players who like some action, currently being passive pays off more often than not.
what if redemtion was an imperial age tech avaliable for all civs? That would weaken castle age monks but still provide a way how to use monks against siege....
Something I haven't heard yet is making conversion an imperial age action. Then you'd have to move all the conversion techs to imp and move the speed, healing techs to castle. Open to discuss!
Then they're useless against knights
This would ruin monks and even the game. What would even be the point?
and what you do vs elephants then?
Personally think they do need a pretty big nerf. Then they will be more circumstantial rather than in every single game.
Especially when you don't see a basic unit like MAA every game, but you see Monks. Clearly the church is more powerful than militia 😅
I generally don't like rng in games but not sure how to fix monks by removing their rng. they would probably because too powerful, in doing so, or making them not worth having. it is kind of as if they need to be made more consistent but either have less power ramp up or be a little harder to tech into and get running.
I think they are one of those units that if they are slightly nerfed they might as well be removed from the game. But many games are like that, especially when there is no rng. If something is slightly better than other options it quickly becomes the only option. it is fairly hard to make everything fairly balanced.
Tbh I don't love the argument that because less feudal army leads to monks, the solution is more feudal army. Because castle age is just full of power spike units, and not limited to monks. A mangonel destroys feudal archers, Knights destroy most feudal units, Camels destroy scouts. And these require little to tech into, it's not like going monks is a decision you have to make long in advance. Really the broken unit is the palisade wall.
Not that I play enough, but I think heresy should not be researched in a monastery. If you're the player not going for monks you should be able to research that without having to get that extra building. The castle or university is my pick
I agree with Hera: Monks need a tweak for balance. I'd also like to see two different types of monks out of the temples - offensive and defensive. I'd also like to see monks strength or access to OP monk techs based on the villager population! (I know, dynamic power will never be a thing). I think the monk conversion randomness is good - keep it - but need to make it more balanced.
i dont think theres any reason for monks to be able to convert buildings at all, people will still play monks anyways.
I think the solution is opposite. Monk RNG should be even higher. Make it even higher risk, high reward. You said it yourself, that there are less players taking risks and eliminating yet another randomness from the game, would most definitely make it boring.
Make monks unable to garrison like siege, or make garrisoning reduce faith by 50%
It’s so fascinating to me that the original devs of aoe2 thought monks were nerfed into the ground when compared to the original aoe. Not very much has changed about the unit over the years, so I wonder if this meta would have evolved without balance patches or if Hera is right about the crossbow nerf being to blame
And at release standard pop cap was only 50.
Is more of walls being super strong and ppl using market and overall ppl became faster and faster to get to castle age. I feel there are tons of little things playing out. Short feudal age meaning having weak eco in castle age. Pikemen in early castle age don't do well vs kts, so if you are vs kts, you kind of forced to get monks to begin with. Also one of biggest things what changed is lag, at old times good luck microing all monks vs light cav or blocking light cav with few of your own. Nowadays it's so hard to snipe any monk, even if you are close, you get blocked or monk just running around kts, more often i lose my light cav than i actually kill monks and light cav is big investment early on, food is costly and needs a lot of macro, while you just put rally point on gold and voila.
Although imp techs of monks are dirty cheap. I literally see ppl like Yo, Hearttt, Hera getting block printing every arabia game even if they have only few monks, they just give amazing value even if converts few units and heals others. 200 gold at imp is almost nothing unless we are talking when you already out of gold.
In theory militia line also counters monks because they are cheap on gold... but that is just that... a theory...
lol the pananana shoutout made the video XD
also the whole argument that he brought was ehhh.
we had the discussion in chess b4, but in our hand, it was about chess opening preparation and how it was making most of the top players' games boring.
I think I started seeing more monks around TTL season 2, with e.g. Dracken beating some more favored players with clown strats. That's my recollection at least, and I may be wrong.
Lol Viper asking Hera not to use the meta in ladder games
My point on monks is that probably the rng should be reduced and conversion should be longer.
Let's say that the minimum conversion time is 5 second and the max 13 second: it's 7 range. I would say that the range should be 4, but the minimum conversion time should be 9 seconds.
I think it would be enough to prevent the snowball because knights may have time enough to reach monks and cause damage, but monks would be useful anyway.
I think also you are right: some techs could be expensive and redemption should be splitted, but I don't think this would change so much.
I also think this won't affect too much low elo players like me, as at our level we don't have the micro to use monks effectively.
This is Age of Empires. Monks have ALWAYS been OP!
I feel like heresy shouldn't be any cheaper, it should be available to all civs, but it does negate monks for the rest of the game essentially. It at least takes away the value they bring, should be expensive right?
There should be two type of monks coming out of monasteries.
1- Monks that can convert
2- Monks that can heal and pick relics
Single unit doing so much stuff is bonkers. Every unit in Aoe is supposed to do one thing work or fight, not both.
"Every unit in Aoe is supposed to do one thing work or fight, not both."
S A N T I A G O