u/SeaworthinessNice414

Love the Aztec campaign so much, probably the best single player add-on so far. Well worth the price, all things considered. That being said, I don't think the Aztecs fit into the multiplayer experience nearly as well as they do in single player, at least in the current patch. The base civ has a ton of potential and all the tools to be awesome, but I'm not seeing it so far. I'm going to briefly explain why, and offer a few suggestions.

This is just my personal opinion after playing with (and against) the Aztecs so far, feel free to disagree or tell me why I'm wrong.

The Aztecs feel balanced in the sense that they are very capable of winning, and very powerful if you play them a certain way, but also have some weaknesses and inconsistencies.

As a whole, this feels like the most inconsistent, unreliable civ to play with or against out of all the pantheons in the game. It's really hard to replicate a reliable gameplay pattern from game to game, mostly due to the complex build orders, timings, and decision trees. From that perspective, you could say that it's maybe a bit unbalanced.

My biggest problem with the civ, or at least 2/3 of the gods, is that it feels like if you aren't abusing some early rush or ridiculous power spike, the civ doesn't excel enough in other areas to be competitive playing a "straight up" game. My experience playing with and against these guys in the 14-1500 elo bracket is that if you're not abusing, you're probably losing.

When I say "abuse" I'm refering to the 3:30 blood pact/scorpion rush, the armadillo rush, the butterfly spam, the priest tower rush, etc. I'm not necessarily saying these strategies should be nerfed, but my point is that there are very aggressive all-in strategies that are powerful and can win games in the first 4-9 minutes. Not the most fun stuff to play against, and in my opinion, it's not fun to play that way all the time. Somtimes it's a blast, but I don't want to have to rely on getting insane value off of one power spike to be competitive in every game. There are some matchups where it's absolutely brutal to try to counter stuff like this, and playing as the Aztecs, some matchups where it's hard to get value out of these strategies.

Huitzlipotchli, who is maybe the biggest offender due to blood pact, has above a 60% win rate against EIGHT different gods so far in this patch (small sample), and below a 45% win rate against six. So, maybe you see my point. It's very boom or bust, inconsistent, matchup-dependent, reliant on getting max value from extremely powerful timings and mechanics, etc.

The stuff I think holds the civ back from being able to play and compete in a "straight up" setting are things like the complicated economy macro, lack of healers, hero design, favor mechanics, and human units. I have a ton of suggestions, but I'll just name a few because this post is getting long. My general theory is that the "abusive" things should be tonned down a bit, and other aspects of the civ should be buffed slightly to compensate.

Remove or reduce the cost of switching calpuli types.

I've already invested 150w into this tech, now I need to pay 50w every time I switch? It makes the eco macro decision-making even more complicated. I don't want to constantly micromanage my eco, I want to focus on army micro, scouting, unit comp, and reacting to my opponent.

Every god should have bloodletting.

Bloodletting is an insanely cool and useful mechanic, why is it locked to one god? His god bonus should be to do it more efficiently, not being the only one who gets to do it. This would make favor gathering WAY more consistent and reliable for the Aztecs.

Warrior Priest, less DPS against non-myth units, more armor, trains from the Great Temple, upgrade costs more favor.

These things shouldn't be an all-around super soldier or early game raider. Heros are for countering myth units. It's very strong in the early game, but asking it to touch a petsuchos on a back line mixed with charriots in the late game is an exercise in futility. Same thing against centaur, but starting at 4 minutes into the game. Playing Aztec against Hermes isn't fun or fair in any way.

They need to train from another building or train faster; it's been obvious since launch day. Not being able to build them on the front without a second temple is frustrating.

The upgrade is great, but it's too strong early on in a ton of matchups. It should be up from 12 to 15 favor, or more if they extend the lifespan.

Stronger age 2 units, reduced unit cost, faster train time, or more healing. 1 of the 4.

The reason Egypt gets away with bad classical age units and no age 2 cavalry is because they have the best healing. If you retreat from a bad fight as Egypt you can heal your army in 60 seconds or less. If you take a bad fight as the Aztecs and retreat, your units are 40% hp and you'll need to replace them anyway. The 0.25 regen on the milk tech and the temporary healing tree isn't good enough to compensate for this.

If you pay full price for units and line upgrades with no healing, the units need to be very competent. Japan, for example, has great units AND great healing. The Aztecs have neither.

Nerf the armadillo and the obsidian butterfly.
Tone down blood pact slightly (time or power).
Jaguar rider unlocked in age 3.

This is a sick unit and it hardly ever gets used because there are no god bonuses associated with it and it's locked to the mythic age. This is the only civ that doesn't get a cav time mythical, and it's the only civ without a 6 speed unit in general.

Thanks for reading!

“Big patch this week”

Aztec Balance in 1v1 Supremacy