I had some discussions with Thal on this one. What appears to have been done was raising the tech exponent value slightly, which raised later game units (across the board). To the extent this was desirable, which I think it was since I suggested it, it might have been on the high end but is otherwise okay. The gunpowder unit value was raised from .75 to .85 (better, but not ideal, it combines with the tech exponent well since most gun units are later in the game).
Cities are largely unaffected from before (some modifications to tech effects, and garrison units should be somewhat stronger), so melee units overall should be more effective, and somewhat stronger against air and ranged or mobile units.
Overall, I think the shifts are fine, but on the high side tech wise (the exponent could be tweaked a little to 1.3 or 1.31 and produce okay balance without as many extremes), and still a little low for infantry units but much, much better than before.
I'm not sure where the lancer/helo change to ranged and chariot archer range change came from. Maybe to get rid of the first strike and treat them like land subs. Land glass cannons with high attack and low strength? Not sure what the rationale was. But it does look like that's why the hand-axe is ridiculous as it gets modified by the chariot changes, and has its own stat line that gets better modifiers instead of the chariot's base stats.
Airborne was also removed entirely. Which I'm not sure about either.
The spreadsheet in the mod is pretty close to a design document, but not exactly.
Some specific notes to how those panned out (as compared to previous CEP version).
Naval/air units
Gunpowder line
Other land
Most of the increases are coupled with increases to unit costs, with gunpowder, naval, and air units getting lower increases.
Cities are largely unaffected from before (some modifications to tech effects, and garrison units should be somewhat stronger), so melee units overall should be more effective, and somewhat stronger against air and ranged or mobile units.
Overall, I think the shifts are fine, but on the high side tech wise (the exponent could be tweaked a little to 1.3 or 1.31 and produce okay balance without as many extremes), and still a little low for infantry units but much, much better than before.
I'm not sure where the lancer/helo change to ranged and chariot archer range change came from. Maybe to get rid of the first strike and treat them like land subs. Land glass cannons with high attack and low strength? Not sure what the rationale was. But it does look like that's why the hand-axe is ridiculous as it gets modified by the chariot changes, and has its own stat line that gets better modifiers instead of the chariot's base stats.
Airborne was also removed entirely. Which I'm not sure about either.
The spreadsheet in the mod is pretty close to a design document, but not exactly.
Some specific notes to how those panned out (as compared to previous CEP version).
Naval/air units
Spoiler :
)Gunpowder line
Spoiler :
Other land
Spoiler :
Most of the increases are coupled with increases to unit costs, with gunpowder, naval, and air units getting lower increases.
I'd guess that it's being played around with as the first strike promo was a bit of an overpowered effect on attack that did the same thing as making them ranged. Except for the XP. But I agree making them ranged doesn't really resolve them. They seem fine with attack bonuses, move after, the counter-unit ability for dragoons and reasonably high strength (but not overpoweringly so). Gunships are in the same boat. I'm less sure about how chariots fit into that architecture, maybe because they've always been ranged.
