Quote from MasterKaito

Personally think albows are fine the way they are in OvO, a couple can eat through spears very quickly

I don't see how reducing their cost will make them any more viable in OvC or OvE

Quicker que and lower cost means that they can be replaced relatively faster than what they currently are. Cycloids pretty much dominate albows from even being a thing yet ele has all of the ground dominance if played correctly by the ele player. Allowing the order player to tech into the sky with less difficulty then what is already present gives order another option... in theory.

Same goes for CvO where deads can pretty much shut out archers once the numbers are too great since jugs and shit will just tank for them. Lower cost means an albow can be used before the numbers got dreadfully high; allowing the order player to shred through the tanky units if say the opponent is stalling at base and simply mashing the three button.

Quote from PUMU

Quicker que and lower cost means that they can be replaced relatively faster than what they currently are. Cycloids pretty much dominate albows from even being a thing yet ele has all of the ground dominance if played correctly by the ele player. Allowing the order player to tech into the sky with less difficulty then what is already present gives order another option... in theory.

Same goes for CvO where deads can pretty much shut out archers once the numbers are too great since jugs and shit will just tank for them. Lower cost means an albow can be used before the numbers got dreadfully high; allowing the order player to shred through the tanky units if say the opponent is stalling at base and simply mashing the three button.

Weren't albows meant to be anti deads? lol.

Albows are easily killed by deads with poison. Three bars plus poison > two and fire (even with armor pierce). Albows definitely are not as viable as wings or archers and I think que time and cost reduction would be a good idea.

Man, albows are worthless against deads...

Albows are too weak for their population cost.

They're definitely strong units on their own for their gold and mana cost, but they're not worth it in the end as giants, magikill, and ninjas are much more population-efficient dps. They come at a really strange time in order's tech tree and don't fill very many roles better than archers or giants. Unless you can close out a game with the albows they're not worth buying because two albows is one less giant, two less ninjas, or two less merics you can field.

If there were any changes made to them they'd have to make them less reliant on being situationally strong(which can be achieved by making them fill a stronger specialist role than they do now or making them a more viable core unit than archers). Previously they cost the exact same amount they gold and mana wise do now but had a queue time of 20 seconds. This made them ridiculous as there was nothing that came out fast enough to stop them as Archers couldn't match the DPS and Giants weren't cost effective enough in comparison. This should really demonstrate that the cost that they have now is fine. At the same time though the current meta necessitating dead/archer numbers much more than in the past I'm not quite sure if that example is a fair comparison.

I don't really know how they could address these issues without fundamentally changing albows in a way that creates an interesting dynamic rather than "always make albows because they're better than archers" as it was in the past or "always make archers because albows aren't good" as it is now.

The /cost/ of the unit is fine though, I must stress, and it's not the limiting factor in fielding them. It's a combination of the current metagame not being friendly to making them as it was in the past (rageswords vs eclipsors was how it was back then, and albows were king until giants were fielded on either side in OvO or until the wing numbers got unmanageable), the queue time being marginally less than giants while nearly double that of archers (causes you to not want them late game as giants are just better in every way, and not being able to get them out early unless there's a large scale archer trade on both sides), and the amount of population they take up just being too much relative to what they do.

Don't think there's an easy solution like "make them cost less" or "make them have less queue time." No, I think the only way to really make them have a role in the meta would be to have them changed to serve a different role than "archer with more damage AND IT FLIES!!!!" Perhaps a new ability or something to make them interesting. Blazing bolts could be changed to an activated ability to do something other than "flat damage boost," which is not interesting conceptually or competitively.

Chang blazing bolts to the old damage model (damage increase)
and keep blazing bolts the same (they would be like posion guts).

tbh Id as a chaos play I would have no problems with albows costing the same as eclipsors. The speed and quicker Rate of fire of the eclipsors is easily matched by the albows extra damage

plus albows have a ability. that might be a cause for concern thou

Quote from Nyarlathotep

They're definitely strong units on their own for their gold and mana cost, but they're not worth it in the end as giants, magikill, and ninjas are much more population-efficient dps. They come at a really strange time in order's tech tree and don't fill very many roles better than archers or giants. Unless you can close out a game with the albows they're not worth buying because two albows is one less giant, two less ninjas, or two less merics you can field.

If there were any changes made to them they'd have to make them less reliant on being situationally strong(which can be achieved by making them fill a stronger specialist role than they do now or making them a more viable core unit than archers). Previously they cost the exact same amount they gold and mana wise do now but had a queue time of 20 seconds. This made them ridiculous as there was nothing that came out fast enough to stop them as Archers couldn't match the DPS and Giants weren't cost effective enough in comparison. This should really demonstrate that the cost that they have now is fine. At the same time though the current meta necessitating dead/archer numbers much more than in the past I'm not quite sure if that example is a fair comparison.

I don't really know how they could address these issues without fundamentally changing albows in a way that creates an interesting dynamic rather than "always make albows because they're better than archers" as it was in the past or "always make archers because albows aren't good" as it is now.

The /cost/ of the unit is fine though, I must stress, and it's not the limiting factor in fielding them. It's a combination of the current metagame not being friendly to making them as it was in the past (rageswords vs eclipsors was how it was back then, and albows were king until giants were fielded on either side in OvO or until the wing numbers got unmanageable), the queue time being marginally less than giants while nearly double that of archers (causes you to not want them late game as giants are just better in every way, and not being able to get them out early unless there's a large scale archer trade on both sides), and the amount of population they take up just being too much relative to what they do.

Don't think there's an easy solution like "make them cost less" or "make them have less queue time." No, I think the only way to really make them have a role in the meta would be to have them changed to serve a different role than "archer with more damage AND IT FLIES!!!!" Perhaps a new ability or something to make them interesting. Blazing bolts could be changed to an activated ability to do something other than "flat damage boost," which is not interesting conceptually or competitively.

Feel free at any point to not just shut out the idea with prior knowledge but also add some input besides the vague "Changed to serve a different role".
What would you suggest be the role they filled and how would one go about doing this?

I think it's fine that albows are flying archers that deal more damage. May change depending on rain's idea. The current meta is archer spam and pretty much more archer spam. I want more diversity and build options.

Agree... I heard they also considered dropping spearton manna cost to 25 to help with the archer centric meta issues...

Quote from alternate

Agree... I heard they also considered dropping spearton manna cost to 25 to help with the archer centric meta issues...

I dont think their trying to change the archer meta or are they trying to change that with this change. All this change will do will encourage people to collect mana earlier spears to arrive earlier theirfore shortening the opening game.

This is Bad for Order since their have a advantage OvC aginst chaos early game

Archers will still get built people will still be able to afford them onto of spears

This will reduce the role of crawlers swords maybe bombers

This will reduce a beautiful part of the game as well as providing a change nobody wanted and will change things that people like.

I don't think people will like me for this but I think we are going to have to look at nerfing archers from a cost point of view.

Archers are too cost effective and the upgrade to albows isent viable if we are serious about reduceinv the archer meta then I think the following things should be considered

A archer cost increase. In order (no pun intended) for order to not be stuffed early game archrrs must be viable early game units theirfore a mans increase is no option. Archers to 350 gold should be considered or maybe to 400 gold (in the case of 400 gold deads should have their gold price increased.

Albows should get their old damage back and have blazing bolts just add burn cut out the armour concept and give them raw extra damage that why people buy them for the raw power.

Albows should be 20s training 400 gold and 150 mana and should be priced as equal to eclipsors.

this would help balance OvC as with Chaos haveing superior mages I see no reason why Order can't have strong tier 2 ranged support Albows should hit hard and if we want to see albows being useable they have to be strong and be able to deal with 3x 4x as many archers.

Archers are half the problem

You know what would be crazy? If archers and bombers cost mana. Getting mana early could be viable as you would have advantage, but less advantage on eco. Fires and airs could get mana as well. Not a crazy amount, just a bit? Encourages more melee play, archidons and bombers can't pop out instantly, gives ele a window of time before bombers go and rekt their stuff, increase fire and air range if it costs mana? Idk. This is just me pulling crap out of my butt.

Chaos would lose every game in OvC as you could just stream swords for no penalty without an effective means of counterplay.

Quote from Nyarlathotep

Chaos would lose every game in OvC as you could just stream swords for no penalty without an effective means of counterplay.

It wouldn't be much, like 5 mana and chaos does get eco advantage.

That's incredibly arbitrary. It wouldn't really change much, but it would force you to have one less on gold throughout early game and would make tower even more crucial in that phase as a result. In mid game it would make absolutely no difference.