As a campaign casual, my main issue with the difficulty is the arbitrary time limits. Gaiseric was fine, it was a soft limit with periodic Hun spawns pushing you along. Having a time limit in something like Nobunaga just made me have to rush the castles and TCs after resigning to make note of where they are first. A waste of an otherwise awesome scenario.

After watching this tier list, the sad truth is: I wouldn't want to replay most of those missions. Many were fine and full of interesting ideas, but they always come with one tedious, unfun aspect. Gaiseric would be so much better if unpacking the TC didn't take 5 minutes. Vortigern would be so much better if we started with 4 or 6 peasants. Charlemagne would be so much better if Carloman didn't die right away and if there were 6 or 7 scholars. Ragnar would be so much better if we could replace peasants that get killed by those annoying raids, and if ships didn't degrade over time (why is this even a thing?). Ironside would be so much better if we didn't have to ferry troups from our only base all over the Medditerranean. Finehair would be so much better if the AI actually did something. Seldjuk would be so much better if the early AI spam would hunt your army and not your (limited in number and irrepleacable) peasants. The list goes on. And it must be said that so many AI factions just wait and do nothing, get timed upgrades, and then start spamming millions of units when you poke them. And, to make up for their passivity, you get random spawns of units that go straight for your (usually limited) eco while you're busy elsewhere. This wouldn't be an issue if those were all custom scenarios made by a passionate creator and available for free. In a costly DLC? Heh... The production value just isn't here.

Re: "where is Vortigern?" I the scenario was originally called "The Fall of Roman Britain", and I think the naming of scenarios after people was just a marketing thing - the DLC is called Victors and Vanquished after all, so you do need someone to be the victor (or vanquished) - as well as to contrast with Historical Battles with regard to naming convention. It would have been nice to have him as a unit anyway but I think this was just a straight rename to fit a theme.

For some reason filthy is in love with the norse warrior unit in this dlc

I'll copy-paste what I put in my Steam review: This is one of those times where I wish I could give a "mixed" rating on Steam. I've played most of these scenarios before, in the mod workshop, and I was excited to see them refurbished and redone. But it's just...ehh? Of the ones I have played, they seem almost downgraded. You can't recruit or attack the Maroons and Natives in Drake anymore, and you can't get extra "slaves" (villagers) in Fairhair. I assume this was done for "sensitivity" but...just remove them altogether then? Vortigern was a fun defense mission, reminds me of Lepanto a bit. I was savvy enough to try attack-grounding the Saxons but that clever bastard Filthy made them turn on you if you do :P. Also a big fan of Karlsefni; felt like a redux of Vinlandsaga, already one of my favourite levels. Gaiseric was also great, if a bit confusing. Made the timer by the skin of my teeth, mostly thanks to Dromons nuking everything on the coastline. Charlemagne, Nobunaga, and Robert feel like the most standard levels, but WHY OH WHY did they made Imp so hard to get to in Charlemagne? I was searching for the final monk for quite a while before I saw him in Rome... I love the idea of choosing your faction like in Nobunaga, and it seems executed well there, though the Takeda AI built like 20 castles right next to each other. IDK if that's a bug or not. Temujin, Fairhair, and Ironside are fairly interchangeable and fall into the category of "8x speed and rush into a static base". Drake and Seljuk are quite similar but Drake has you ration every unit, and Seljuk has the timers Speaking of the timers....ugh. They don't make it more fun, just more stressful. I managed to get the Gaiseric and Fetih timed achievements by the skin of my teeth but it was just not...fun. At least in Gaiseric the time limit is optional. Fetih forces you to make a beeline for the targets instead of having fun taking out the city. Oh, and I still don't know why yellow is there in Fetih. Ragnar is a great idea with good execution, but the lack of instructions is a fault rather than a benefit. I scraped every nook and cranny of the map and only ended up with 47/50 before I had to look up help. At least Orange puts the pressure on you there, unlike other static-AI levels. TL;DR - Good idea, poorish execution. These sorts of levels can be fun if you're in the right mood and expecting them, since they're more akin to puzzles than regular AOE gameplay, but I unfortunately think they dropped the ball a bit. I really really wanted to like this, since I love all the previous campaigns Filthy has made, but here...hmm.

I think the random raids stealing your towns in Ragnar are extremly annoying and just a big waste of time in an extremly long scenario to begin with, especially with rare villagers. I think it should have been like big events wherecyou brace for a contender or some invasion rather than pesky raiding parties.

As is most usually the case, I largely agree with Ornlu's analysis, but I still feel the need to put forward a few counterpoints, the main one being that, unfortunately for him, it's probably unreasonable for any designer/developer in AoE2DE to balance a mission for him to find it difficult, as that would make it right inaccessible for the vast majority of us :). I can't believe that he managed to make it to Imperial Age in Vortigern tbh, the best I could do is post-Castle crossbowmen (which were enough for the gold medal), but still that's quite something. That being said, I really think there should be another tier below "D" for Drake to be put in lol. Otto: Like others, I find the loyalty mechanic here to be rather clunky, and should probably be replaced with your retainers betraying you once you unite with the Kingdom of Italy (and therefore becoming enemies with West Francia at the same time), and with your retainers/barons/whatever becoming entirely defeatable once that happens. To prevent you from keeping yourself out of Italy too long, uniting with Italy could be made a condition of getting to Imperial Age (to borrow a mechanic from Charlemagne). West Francia's behavior could thus be made a bit more regular i.e. less reconstruction. Charlemagne: Seriously, getting Charlemagne to the Pope/Italy should be sufficient to unlock Imperial Age. I personally also find that the Umayyads are way too cracked up on reconstruction, not sure how they can really be defeatable - out of sheer laziness I opted for the Wonder victory there, especially after spending so much time chasing after the Monks. Ragnar: Loved it myself, and I actually happen to both love that one and York, despite Ornlu saying it probably is one or the other. I think the free-flowing rhythm of Ragnar is part of what makes it great, it is a scenario that is focused on exploration and spending the time to discover every inch of the map, and I think it's a good thing, considering the obvious effort and attention to detail that went into it. That being said, I'd "fix" a few things (all of which are imho, of course): --I'd still give the player some initial hints over where to start, possibly with a tiny flag in Scotland letting them know this is a good place to start, otherwise it can be daunting; --it can be challenging, by design of the game, to tell where one region starts and the other ends, especially when it comes to building settlements in the Scottish isles - these should be marked with a flag and the dialogue should suggest you to install a more "permanent" presence there when you find people - even when I discovered those areas I didn't feel like I really needed them and it was too easy to skip over these and then forget about them. --Ship decay should stop once you research Careening or Dry Dock, because it stops being a real challenge only to become a chore. --Once you unite Scandinavia, you should stop losing control over your Great Halls, instead the Jomsburgvikings or whatever they're called becoming a regular faction, and so with the English and Franks, and from this point on becoming a more regular skirmish scenario (only becoming Free Play once you've defeated all three and thus being freed up to pursue remaining sagas). Robert: Both Ornlu and other people have already pointed out how arbitrary the timer was on Robert on Hard, so I don't think there is much to add there.

Some of them feel completely impossible if you don't use a very specific strategy. The difficulty feels very arbitrary overall.

The timers are really my biggest gripe with these scenarios, that and how long these scenarios can be. The scenarios are a mixed bag, but I like the ones that are more allowing of eco and build and destroy rather than forcing you to play a specific way I'm uncomfortable with. A minor nitpick I have is how you play Tatars in Seljuk instead of the Turks. It definitely would have helped tie this scenario with Manzikert which you play Turks in that one to represent the Seljuks.

Robert also has a major fault: you can win it ignoring the dukes, just defeat de vikings and tribute every duke until everyone is loyal and you win, the dukes are allied from the start and you are never forced to enemy them

Obviously these campaigns were very different than regular campaigns, but I did still have fun with them. Mstislav was probably my favorite, even with the buggy villagers. Still waiting on a Chinese campaign though.

Only problem with Seljuk is you play as the tatars in a scenario about the Seljuk TURKS

Buyer beware. This DLC is not for people of low skill. These scenarios are hard, even on standard difficulty.

Excited about the video! I don't have all DCLs and this one is certainly one I'm not sure if I'm prioritizing now, but I think I'll eventually buy it. I like campaigns and, honestly, I don't usually play the custom campaigns, so having them polished and organized in an official DLC might be good for me. But with everything being said about it, I was looking forward to seeing Ornulu's review, because I don't know if it's as bad as people are saying, and I'd like to know if there were in fact improvements from the custom scenarios they used for this(and just get Ornulu's opinion since he's my go-to guy about campaigns haha)

To add, I really wish they added unique campaign only units and heroes with unique looks there too. Like just look at the Varangians, they are just copy and pasted viking berserkers, or those Norman guys in Mstislav's scenario. I've also had a weird experience in Temujin's scenario, not sure if anyone else experienced it, but the area you have to place wild horses to recruit mangudais is not marked well, so there's a chance that the game still thinks you haven't placed the wild horses in the invisible box area thing. This could be problematic when you're raiding and defending at the same time as enemies could just kill those horses when you're not paying attention. I'm not super skilled at the game, so it felt like that part of the DLC was unpolished. Overall it felt "moddy" if that's the right term, than a DLC/expansion. I still enjoyed it all things considered. But it could have been better. I love the ideas, but with a bit more polished experience, a better pacing in between events within the scenarios (since it felt like the rules of AoE2's gone upside down and the game's bombarding my newbie brain with info at the same time) and better storytelling, this would be a great one. More power to the devs, I hope they learn from this.

I had no clue reception was so negative. I hope this doesn't put them off from campaign focused DLCs as a whole, since I like that idea. There are only so many more civs we can have. I agree wholeheartedly about price. I was especially pissed off about mountain royals. The cover art looked AI generated, so I thought the game needed to be cheaper if it's cutting corners.😂

Huh, and I was just re-watching some older Ornlu videos haha. My personal problem with these scenarios is that they were all too long. Like, I have to set aside much more time to play them, and I am not a fan of saving mid-level (as for some reason it takes like 15 mins for the save option to come up...). So for me, these all get a bit too tedious.

My favorite were Stephen, Robert campaign and the Otto the Great one. I feel like Otto could be better if the French betrayed you at the very end but it was very nice.

Great video Ornlu. I really hope that one day you get a chance to do a playthrough of "A Khaleesi's Journey". It's a long one but if you are a GOT fan you will enjoy it. I also have the single scenario "Dawn of the Maya - The Sons of Chak" as well as the 6 scenario "The Legend of William Wallace" and 5 scenario "The Qin Dynasty".

Great analysis at the start! I am one of those 30% who loved it, but I admit I had only played 2 of the already existing missions, and I am a fan of the changed game mechanics as someone who has played around making my own in the scenario editor. Let’s be honest, $13.00 is what you just spend on a burger and fries 😂

Looks like Thorfinn is already see the future who knows about Van Kleiss, even he never go Viking Skool before. Van Kleiss is Megatron of the Viking Age and can translate the rare Native American Languages!!

So as I found out, I cannot let the Magyars defeat my insolent vassals in Otto. It turns out, the vassals’ TCs magically respawn after they get destroyed by Mgayars like you said. That is jank 11.

I love both ragnar and york - great campaigns just depends on my mood - also one similarity between both you do not really get attacked with any real threat so they are both good if you just wana chill and explore/boom - ragnar ofcourse is less boom and more raid but still good

Seljuk is S tier if you try to obtain all the Leaders Ambitions within the time limit, but I agree that the missions without a significant threat are redundant for the most part. Fun way to practice efficiency though if you dont wanna grind too much.

Thanks so much Orlu for not only your dispassionate comments about the V & V DLC and your past playthroughs of each of them. And thanks to Philthydelphia for his creative efforts in putting together 5 new scenarios as well as his past (uncompensated) efforts which are on display in this DLC. I was happy to buy the DLC if for no other reason than to support his past and present creative efforts. I will not echo criticisms of the scenarios. I was happy to see some old favorites included (Alexis Komenos; Ragnar’s Saga (btw please fix what appears to be a broken trading system to the east), and Vortigen (please fix the broken AI trigger for the Saxon revolt - it’s simply too random) and Last Romans). However, I was disappointed at having to play 4 largely redundant Viking scenarios. Although they cover different time or areas, nonetheless they are interchangeable in terms of playing mechanics. Also did we really need 3 scenarios featuring central Europe or France, especially one like Otto whose central idea is really complicated? Same for the Japanese. One would have been sufficient. Perhaps included in the DLC could have been one or two of Philthy’s several other Asian scenarios; for example, Khmer Kings of Old Cambodia -; or one of the excellent Three Kingdoms scenarios - notably according the Steam Mod section Three Kingdoms- Cao Cao’s Ambition is the most downloaded custom campaign of all time; or others in different parts of the world - Kings of West Africa; or instead of the very easy Drake mission, included one of the other meso American scenarios Blood for the Serpent God or Escape of Hernan Cortes.

Shimakaze has over a DOZEN full campaigns all of which are of complexity and difficulty beyond the game itself. He should not produce that for the regular game, but he KNOWS MUCH OF THE WAY THE GAME WORKS TECHNICALLY. The fact he is not working with the OFFICAL is a crime considering how consistent he is. Many do not enjoy how difficult his campaigns are, but that is not the point, he is immensely talented. Disclaimer: i do test levels for him, so i have inside idea

Some issues I'm having: 1) I've beaten gaiseric, Charlemagne, & Ragnar but doesn't show crown 👑 to prove ive finished 2) In Ragnar I got the relic cart on my shore then lost control somehow never able to move it to wonder (warrior halls) 3) fine hair: to begin the campaign it says research perfusion at haralds hall but I have no options when I click on the hall. Aka I can't even play this level Help please? I'm done with these campaigns until I get some more help lol

Never been this early to a video I remember last video you were missing some achievements

Just wanted to mention what Ironside did right is not give you a monk like Finehair did. Instead Ironside gave your ally a monk to heal your units. I barely produced units in Finehair as it’s so easy to abuse converts even on hard difficulty. So resources were never an issue as they all went to upgrades. That’s why I liked Ironside better to give me the small village, raider feel.

Thanks!

In my first play through of Otto, I accidentally claimed Italy very early with auto-scout and all my vassals rebelled, leading West Francia to declare on me. Definitely made the mission more engaging 11

ORNLU, another reason I believe SHIMAKAZE is an ideal choice is not only his understanding of mechanics and balance-making SERIOUS GRIND POSSIBLE makes this a necessity or the level is impossible-but he is Chinese and they are easily the most visible community in custom scenario and campaign design, period. This would give that community input they do not have which is slightly bizarre but “reasons”

If Otto was a well balanced defense scenario like Vortigen, it would be awesome. As it stands, its mediocre.

you played these all on gold?! Unbelievable!!! Thx for the TierList.

My opinion : Gaiseric : Nice, but slow TC. And I don't like the achievement. Charlemagne : I honestly like it.. except the scholars. Ironside : I like it. Not much to say there, it just feels.. satisfying in a way. Less tedious than the others to me. Finehair : Nice, but too slow for me. Robert : I like it a lot.. except that the alliances feel badly made. They push you to keep alliance in mind to avoid 1vs6. Except that in my numerous runs, they almost always happen in an order that makes it pretty much impossible to attack only some of the dukes. By the time I'm ready to fight properly, they're all allied in some way. And I find the sidequests important so I don't want to rush it. And the weird thing is.. They're not that much of a threat. Once you realize they resign when they lose all TCs and Castles, it's not that much of a threat and 1vs6 is really not that difficult to pull off. The only tricky part is the timer as killing everyone can be long if you go this route. Otto : Great concept.. meh execution. Seljuk : Weirdly enough, I love this one. It feels good to progress and fullfill ambitions.

Gaiseric deserves an A-ranking at least. It's not perfect, but at least it's fun, which more than can be said for the majority of the V&V scenarios.

The voice acting was so good in RoR, but so underwhelming in most of the V&V scenarios. The actor who voices Pyrrhus voices a couple of other heros (all or most of them Byzantine?) in the new scenarios and I love the emotional charge of his voice, but the narrations are so dull. Most sound like an IA.

Nice to see you're finally doing a tier list for custom campaigns

Love Victors and vanquished personally. I dont like to scour the workshop for custom scenarios, so a polished collection was worth it for me. Really enjoyed 90% of the scenarios and how unique the new mechanics are. The only thing I dislike is the Fetih and Constantine scenarios, they are much too difficult and at present the only scenarios I have been unable to beat

Funny. Ironside was the only viking scenario that didn't put me to sleep. Mainly because it was shorter than the others, not because it was particularly good, mind you.

Am I right in thinking the difficulty of some of the scenarios that were there before V&V were changed? I seem to remember the Finehair one being much more difficult with the enemies attacking your base? Or maybe I did something to activate that by mistake. It seems like in a lot of the viking scenarios the enemy are always in defensive stance. But I have to say I don't get the hate for the DLC. Read what it is before buying and if it doesn't sound like your cup of tea then don't get it. I'm happy with the DLC and will get more like it

I loved Ragnar (hard, with all 50 objectives)

I won Charlemagne in castle age - thought I searched the whole map for the fourth scholar but still didn’t find him. Took ages to defeat the Berbers

I predict Nobunaga and Kommenos in S Tiers and maybe Constantin XI and Feith

Gaiseric - yeah, no Vandal civ, although it should be noted the closest relatives to the Vandals were Goths, if linguistics are indication of anything. Still, y no Vandal civ? Vortigern - Saxon betrayal can be avoided if you trained them only the first initial time. Vortigern makes no appearance and since you fight the Saxons, it would've made sense that Ambrosius Aurelianus (supposedly the OG King Arthur) was the historical figure the scenario is named after, if not for the summon Saxons ability which is what Vortigern did. Also, should've been a Roman scenario, not a Briton one, as Romans survived on the island until the 6th century, when the scenario ends. Charlemagne - I guess this means that The Saxon Revolt can no longer be added....*sigh*.... guess that cut Korean scenario is also not making it in? Ragnar - I genuinely don't like this scenario. Randomly spawning raiders, no gold, oversized map, many hours to get that 50 sagas, inactive AIs..... it's too slow overall yet managed to be annoying with random enemy spawnings. I would put it in bottom tier, because this is not what I want out of individual scenarios, or any scenario, really. Bigger is not better. York is barely playable, this scenario is just insufferable. Ironside - with a completely inactive AI and very limited economy, it is a pointless scenario, but at least it doesn't overstay its welcome like Ragnar, or bores to no end like Karlsefni. (Fun fact, I completed this scenario on Hard with nothing but the heroes, a transport and a single Longboat, and it still only took 3 hours) Finehair - Yet another inactive AI scenario, which gives you more to work with than Ironside, so you can get this over with even faster, making it better than the previous two. Still a competely pointless scenario, since you have an eco. Robert - this would be good, if the alliance system wasn't completely cracked. Not only alliances are turbo-forged, it also can just make two sworn enemies by stated lore ally for no good reason due to RNG. Middle-tier at best, held back by a senseless alliance system. Otto - I dunno, it's passable. I don't understand why you didn't complain about Charlemagne not using the Charlemagne hero unit, if you have problems with Otto, though. Seljuk - when you fulfill ambitions, you go and raid the other factions you haven't massacred yet. Ghaznavids, Buyids and the northern tribe you haven't allied all are ripe for raiding before you are tasked with raiding them.

If it were new, I would love it, but it is old material, some from before the age of DE 3:15

While I haven’t played all of the scenarios yet, I have done all of the ones in this video. Geiseric: I had played the mod. I think it’s solid. Interesting gameplay. Sacking Rome is a little anti-climatic, like Ornlu says, as by that time you’re steamrolling and there’s no dialogue. But overall, I give it ‘A’ Vortigern: I admit, I don’t like ‘defend sinking a ship’ type scenarios. I have beaten this one, but not on hard. Stressful. I can’t say it’s a bad design, just because I suck. But where is Vortigern? ‘C’ Charlemagne: I dont mind this one actually. Not Filthy’s best design, but I think he captured the world well enough. Just needed a better chance at finding scholars. ‘C’ Ragnar: Yeah, I was annoyed with the mod version as well. Sluggish slog. Not my favorite. I like different quests, but this was too much. “C” Ironside: What Ornlu said. ‘D’ Robert: My feelings are similar to Ornlu. But not as strong. But I didn’t play this with Filthy watching. ‘A’ Otto: The definition of a ‘B’ Seljuk: I like this one, same with its former Mod. I dont think it’s perfect, but it’s the best if the bunch, imo. ‘S’ Finehair: It’s fine. Played the old mod. Like the homage to ‘Lost Vikings’ from the SNES/Genesis era. ‘B’

I agree 100% with the tier list. Im pissed that the changes to the scenarios are so minor compare to mods. Especially AI is terrible and design of scenarios always make it too easy later, too long and boring.

Wow my list is much different, aside from the D tier, it's kinda the opposite I prefer Otto to Robert I prefer Seljuk to Ragnar And I kinda hate Vortigern and love Finehair (which might be my favorite of the DLC) I don't mind static enemies when the maps are so large, and I generally prefer conquest scenarios rather than defense ones

For me the main problem with this DLC is how much each scenario just... drags on. Individually each one has very interesting gimmicks, but when every scenario lasts at least 1 hour and a half (And often more) because they are both long and slow to start I think you need said gimmicks to be a bit more long scaling or it kind of loses its novelty quick and start to become sluggish. Especially because the maps are very big but at the same time often extremely linear when it comes to objectives so there isn't much of a creativity in approach (At that point I'd rather see full fledged campaings with each scenario being shorter and more individually well crafted). They really felt "old" to me if that makes sense. Also many of the scenarios are just something we already saw in the other campaigns. Was there a need to make me play York again? Or Vinlandsaga? Or Gengis Khan? And the presentation is just nothing short of abysmal. There is barely any slide presentation, no new illustrations, the slides are incredibly buggy, the voice acting and writing is half assed... it just screams low effort in your face, on top of the "Victors and Vanquished" theme that just isn't there. I am a sucker of single player content in AoE2 but this DLC left me extremely disappointed. My expectation was a eastern focused campaign pack for Japanese, Koreans and Chinese who got almost no love whatsoever, but even for re-realeaed content (Who I never played before) none of them was even close to be worth the price as far as I'm concerned.

28:29 Oh no miss-aligned transition!

Gaeseric: Way too many units on the map, being Onagered over and over is no fun. TC builds way too slow. Vortigern: GOAT, but the cities could use some more defenses. If you lose the wall its all over as it stands. Charlemagne: I keep forgetting this exists, says it all really. I did beat the Umayaads on hard, and it wasent fun. Ragnar: Great, but needs clearer objectives. Built so many Fulwarks on those tiny islands for the 50 saga achis.....Boats taking dmg was dumb and the raids sniping my vills was rage inducing. Ironside: Pretty meh? Having to destoy buildings was far to slow. Feels like a prototype for Ragnar. Finehair: Decent but not much more. Robert: Cool as hell, both achivements on hard are a blast. Super mega Paladins!! Otto: Should have been a defensive mission that got progressivly harder, more like Wonder of the world, changing alliance and you need your vassals. Seljuk: Pretty good, the change from nomad to settled felt kinda awkward. I felt that the civil war was cool but on replays it would be too easy.

I am sorry but I think we should DEFENITLY address the fact that you play with Britons over the Romans in Vortigern its just lazy copy pasting because Romans did not exist before when the mod was released.

the issue is NOT the scenario quality at all, but the fact that most of the content was ALREADY FREELY AVAILABLE ONLINE AS CAMPAIGN and SCENARIO MODS. This is the issue. People gave trust that there was more new content than the DLC actually contained. IT WAS FREELY AVAILABLE FOR THE MOST PART LOL. The scenarios are great if taken out of the context of PAYING FOR FREE CONTENT. They are awful when "oh wait, I already played this exact same Mstislav mod over a year ago!? i paid for this!? i already have it!?" yeah... 1:44

From the gameplay these DLC deliverd it for me but I can understand not evryone likes the Filthydelphia style of campaigns. Playing the modcenter scenarios can help there with the decision making. My disappointment with the DLC comes with the lazy Production Microsoft did with the narration segments. No expanded storytelling, not even human speakers in the german, french and spain language as i heard. The Price of the DLC felt fine for me before i knew this but after listening to the same AI with 0 pathos over and over again its just embarassing for microsoft to release this. None of the scenarios can achieve more then B Tier due to this issue compared with campaigns imo

I was reading steam reviews about this DLC and ok it's not good but dang... Remember that this is the work of ONE SINGLE PERSON that went on for years for free (initially), lot of passion was put into it and he tried his best to expand the game's scope. When you think of it, it's really a loooot of work while it takes only 2 minutes to comment. I didn't personally buy it and no I don't think it was fair the operation Microsoft did here but this is not Filthydelphia's fault. Even if it was his idea to monetise from his (once) free mods he would have my thumbs up since currently THERE IS NO WAY for a modder to monetise out of his hard work and this is just UNFAIR. Imagine you buy a piece of uncoltivated land from the state and work that land for YEARS. Then the land, after hard work, gives its fruits and the worker naturally wants to sell them but he's instead forced to give them away for free. Is it right in your opinion that the worker doesn't get any payment, not even 1$ out of it? Filthydelphia had no choices, if he wanted a retribution, he HAD to do what he did. This is a problem that should be adressed sooner or later, specially because some mods have the quality of official content (if not better). I mean, even youtubers can monetise simply out of playing this content (Ornlu got it for free as he said) but the same people who created it, making free ad for Microsoft and making playthroughs like this possible, CAN'T. Tell me if this is reasonable. Just lol. So the DLC was a bad move for the game as a whole but Filthy has no fault for it imo. He responds for himself, not for the whole corporation (although we can agree he could have exposed himself more about it, even going against his self-interest a bit). Personally I would have many criticism to give to his design style but I would never go on the personal, like some people do, and I would always try to comment while having in mind that I'm speaking to someone who is a WORKER. It's typical consumer mentality to believe that workers (from waiters to riders) own you something like they're your mama but this is just immature and disgusting. All people filling their mouth on how they're progressives and cheer the underdogs and then this... It's not that if you do something out of passion that doesn't mean you don't need money to survive. This is considering other human beings not as humans but as waifu-robots made to serve you. And the fault is once again of corporate mentality (and more recently AI) that made people think that things are DUE to you when nothing in life is FREE, except people. I know I'm probably making myself a bad reputation by being this passionated (a-ha, it's just an hobby then, it means you don't need money eheh!) but I feel like I can't ignore how people are missing the target this time almost as much as Microsoft did with this scammy dlc. But Filthydelphia is a free artist and a worker and that is another discussion entirely, he's not chained to satisfy you, he just make his own stuff, like it or not, and AoE is just one of many platforms he has to do it. Of course nobody likes to pay for what you can have for free but you must understand the perspective of everyone: modding is the easiest way for a game to stay alive at a literally 0 COST for Microsoft (modders basically work for free for them, yes it's their decision to do so, they're not chained slaves but still they're doing something useful for both the corportation, the players and the youtubers). If mods were not free, you could have purchased Filthy's campaigns for less than 15$, let's say he made a 5$ pack (with Microsoft getting its share because of intellectual property of course, similar to a tax on the land you're working, but still people who work a land without owning it are not SERVS). Wouldn't that be convenient for everyone? You would have payed less for this content, the modder would get his revenue and Microsoft a small %. And no scammy official dlc.

thank you for your review :) this is always a highlight, eventho this DLC is a massive letdown. I musst say this is just not a reasonable value proposition. The combination of being more expensive than the "old DLCs", not featuring ANY non-campaign content (not even for SP RM), the lack offical polish(slides, voice, models) and that the missions are not connected with a campaign really keep me from buying this product. There are plenty of Custom scenarios out there(like exactly these ones) a dedicated Campaign DLC is at least expected to feature the sort of polish you cant really do as a hobbyist. They did not even bother to make a custom Campaign map background instead reusing the worst UI element of the entire game(whats with that neareastern map??!?! are those borders? rivers?!?!? ). Disgraceful. And at the end of the day the missions may all be more involved than many Campaign missions but that's still not a huge amount of missions in comparison. The other DLCs have 15 missions and 2-3 civs. A "campaign only pack" in my opinion implies something more towards 30 missions in 4+ story campaigns. Or 3 campaigns for 5 Bucks. And either would need that element of polish absent in the DLCs presentation. Filthydelphia is a great scenario designer but just chucking his stuff in a bag with a pricetag and no backup is dissapointing.

Been looking forward to this vid :) I'll prob wait on a price drop for this one. The lack of general improvements, bland voice acting and the price tag does feel a little cash grabby. Probably not their intention, but the Mostly negative reception is justified for me.

Robert became so much worse when played on normal difficulty, the lack of time limit means you can befriend litterally everyone except maybe gascony. so you can just grind up everyones loyalty to the point where you arethe weakest on the map but still in a position where victory is guaranteed.

THE ISSUE IS THAT MOST OF THE CONTENT WAS ALREADY FREELY AVAILABLE AND EVERYONE WHO BOUGHT IT FOUND OUT ahhah smfh The content itself it fine. but it was already free. that is the problem andf why i gave it a scathing review.

There are people making enormous amounts of insanely complex content right now on their own time. Why are their talents not utilized? Forgotten Empires WAS THAT... Why is Shimakaze/Kitty, or Hainaut, or Jimakus or whoever, a quality and experienced producer of levels and campaigns for years, not working for Microsoft right now? This is not some huge expense. It is a few hire which could create an additional infusion of creativity into the OFFICIAL game. These people KNOW how to MAKE playable and challenging levels. Maybe they focus on one type or another, but they have the technical skill to execute. CYSION needs to realize the money/sales he needs to show is from the community, but not in the way he thinks. It is the TALENT in terms of content creation that they must harness. It is unique, the degree of devotion some have for campaign creation and needs to be utilized. 4:34

No, no, no, not multiplayer content, that's not what's missing. What's missing is any sort of new material to work with, whether that be civilizations, new generic units/buildings/technologies/mechanics or scenario editor units/heroes/buildings/doodads, etc. There's nothing but scenarios here, and most of those are repackaged from mods.

Really did not enjoy this DLC, unnecessarily difficult, way too long, weird time constraints, massive maps, and overly complex for the sake of being complex. Really disappointed. There were thankfully a few good missions though

in vortigern's favor, Genghis Khan isn't anywhere in his campaign

The gameplay kicks ass. that is not the point. hire Shimakaze and Hainaut or something. this is ridiculous. If Filthy didn't have the time to make new levels, they should not hang him out to dry like this. 5:26

it has nothing to do with filthy, it has to do with putting out an already FREELY AVAILABLE AND STILL FREELY AVAILABLE--mostly--PRODUCT. That is not him at all. He has NO control over that. I am telling you now, none. No hate at all to him. The levels are phenomenal but I hated trying to play them knowing i could just play the mod and because many are FREE PLAY the voice acting and all is basically irrelevant. They need to get some new blood and do so from WITHIN the community the same way the game itself was PRESERVED. GO GET Ilam or Shimakaze Hainaut or Catschi and have these people who have or are--Shimakaze/Hainaut--putting out very complex, well-made and thoughtful material on their own dime and time. These talents should be HEAD HUNTED BY THE COMPANY for clear profit reasons. The way they make custom levels would not need to be the same as an official, but they need to remember how FORGOTTEN EMPIRES SAVED THIS GAME FROM STAGNATION and find talent from those passionate about the game, period. I would emphatically, perhaps almost rudely or patronizing dress Cysion down about this very FACT. He needs to look in the damn mirror and think how he got there 3:46

That is not a bad content. That is barely any content at all.

The level designer is the same guy who did the Forgotten Empire campaigns. By far the worst-balanced and least-fun campaigns in the game. It was a disasterous choice to reuse the same guy's levels for a DLC. It was just a low-effort content push. Obvious answer was a DLC with Chinese, Korean, and Japanese. But Microsoft got lazy.

GET SHIMAKAZE. He has the expertise and passion and Ramsey was made a scapegoat. Ramsey didn't have the time to make 19 new large-in-scope levels. Clearly or there was some rush to shove out new content and he could only do 5 new levels--they were great. He should not be blamed for this. He should never have had an entire DLC SOLD this way ON HIM. There are others outside of official employees who are incredibly talented at the mechanics and scope of the game. He makes hard campaigns, but that is not why you get him. I test his levels for all of his campaigns. yeah, those ones that are really grindy, but he doesn't need to make grind. it is about what he knows with the game. we talk. he understands much and should be utilized for the benefit of the player and the company, period. His content does not need to be the same as it is. Who knows if he would even do it? I'll ask him, theoretically, but they need to do this with a few independent content creators. if YOU ORNLU have contact, PLEASE mention this