Combat calculations!

[Swoosh So]

Ok say my chiv knight v0 charges a chiv seargent unit head on both 4 ranks deep what happens in terms of combat calculations? Does anyone know?

[Panther]

Well the intial part eill be the charge (8 for knights)
vs spears anti cav defence (4) meaning knights will kill alot at point of contact (even more so if it is in wedge which is very effective for knights. The battle will then stabalise. Sgts attack and deence (including bonuses will be attack 0 defence 7 and knights will be 5 and 5 which means alot of Knights will die but they should win.

[Swoosh So]

Im looking for the exact calculations http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

[Panther]

i was doing the exacxt calculations
in meh head http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/joker.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/mecry.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/mecry.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/mecry.gif

[econ21]

Ok, to keep it simple, let's suppose the Chiv knights charge head first in the spears on flat ground, no one tired etc.

The Chiv knights have an attack of 5; they get no charge bonus against spears.

The Chiv sergeants have a defence of 3 plus 2 for large shield plus 4 for anti-cav bonus plus 2 for ranks. That makes 11.

Other things being equal, the knights attack at 5 vs 11, ie -6. The strategy guide says attacking at -5 gives you a 0.76 kill chance, which rises by 20% for every combat factor. So I make a -6 giving you the front row of the knights having around a 0.63 kill chance against one sergeant each in the first round.

Let's say, to keep it simple, the chiv. sergeants receive the charge stationary (dumb move, but what the heck). Their attack is -1 plus 1 for anti-cav plus 1 for ranks, ie 1.

The knights defense is 5.

So the CS attack the knights at -4, which gives a 0.92 kill chance, according to the strategy guide.

This will continue in further rounds. The odds one-on-one favour the CS, but the killer is that there is 100 chiv sergeants againt 40 chiv knights. Failing an unlikely morale collapse, I figure CS win all the time.

[Lord Of Storms]

I have some info for the combat algorithm formula for hand to hand combat that was given by Longjohn a MTW Program Developer it goes like this df=attack-defend. chance to kill = 1.9% * 1.2 ^df. defense = base +valor bonus +shield (+1small +2 large +3pavise). attack= base + valor bonus +weapon bonus. the faq stated "Ihave no idea what dfstands for, but apparently it is just a value used to calculate the chance to kill in a particular round. Each point of valor represents a bonus of + 1 attack/melee , +1defend , and +2 morale. this was taken from a faq over at MTW.Com a few months back. hope it helps.

[Kristaps]

Quote[/b] (Simon Appleton @ Mar. 13 2003,16:07)]Ok, to keep it simple, let's suppose the Chiv knights charge head first in the spears on flat ground, no one tired etc.

The Chiv knights have an attack of 5; they get no charge bonus against spears.

The Chiv sergeants have a defence of 3 plus 2 for large shield plus 4 for anti-cav bonus plus 2 for ranks. That makes 11.

Other things being equal, the knights attack at 5 vs 11, ie -6. The strategy guide says attacking at -5 gives you a 0.76 kill chance, which rises by 20% for every combat factor. So I make a -6 giving you the front row of the knights having around a 0.63 kill chance against one sergeant each in the first round.

Let's say, to keep it simple, the chiv. sergeants receive the charge stationary (dumb move, but what the heck). Their attack is -1 plus 1 for anti-cav plus 1 for ranks, ie 1.

The knights defense is 5.

So the CS attack the knights at -4, which gives a 0.92 kill chance, according to the strategy guide.

This will continue in further rounds. The odds one-on-one favour the CS, but the killer is that there is 100 chiv sergeants againt 40 chiv knights. Failing an unlikely morale collapse, I figure CS win all the time.
don't have the strategy guide handy, but I believe, the base 'chance to kill' was significantly lower than 63%. Will check it later and post it here.

[Puzz3D]

The table is given in percent, so it's 0.63% or 0.0063 chance to kill.

df (difference factor) = attack - defend.

[Lord Of Storms]

Read the formula in my post by a CA DEVELOPER /PROGRAMMER and do the math

[econ21]

Quote[/b] ]The table is given in percent, so it's 0.63% or 0.0063 chance to kill.

I knew this, honest, but now I think about it, these are very low probabilities. I wonder how long a unit of time is, ie 0.63% chance to kill per what, eg second or what? If the units of time are relatively small, I guess the charge bonus matters relatively less (there will be many more chances to hit after the charge).

The calculations really bring home the importance of striking the right target in the flank. Let's say the chiv knights charge FMAA in the flank. Their attack is 5 (base) +8 (charge) +5 (flank) +2 (charge into flank) = 20 against a defence of 2,ie +18 or a 51% kill chance.

[Puzz3D]

It's 0.63% chance to kill per combat cycle. A combat cycle consists of one attack (strike) and up to 2 defend (parries) for each man involved in combat. If a man is killed, he still gets to strike within that combat cycle, so it doesn't matter who strikes first.

The charge appears to last for 1 or 2 combat cycles. I believe each man's charge bonus is proportional to his forward momentum, so, if he gets consecutive pushbacks on the opponent, he could retain some of his charge bonus into the 3 combat cycle. Likewise, if a unit bunches up during a charge, men in the back are going to loose their forward momentum before they engage and thus will loose their charge bonus.

[econ21]

Ok, but how long is a combat cycle in real life time? It's probably quite short (a few seconds?), at least that's what I infer when watching very high odds attacks (naginata cavalry http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/eek.gif )

[DrNo]

One thing that is often missed in these calculations and what gives Cavalry a big disadvantage is the number of men who can engage a single opponent.

Knights charge with 40 men but say only 10 per line with 4 columns. The Chiv Sergeants defend with say 20 men in a line.
Both formations are equal width meaning that it's a 2 to 1 fight on the front line.
Once melee is in full swing infantry can engage in much greater numbers than Cavalry in a particular area due to the spacing between men/horses. So you end up with say 3 or 4 Chiv Sergeants attacking each knight on the front line.

[Puzz3D]

Simon Appleton,

I measured a combat animation cycle with a stopwatch as best I could and it looks to be 0.8 seconds. I believe my system is fast enough that I'm running at the 14 frames/second limit. If a man gets pushed back, the combat is interrupted for a few cycles until the men come back to within fighting distance, and his opponent gets +6 attack bonus on the next combat cycle. As you can see from the formula (1.2^df), that is an increase of 300% on the chance to kill. Cavalry always pushes back non-spear/non-pike infantry on first contact, and, since the v1.1 patch, has a small chance of pushing back a man facing it with a spear/pike on first contact and during the melee.


Dr No,

The game engine limits attacks to not more than 2 on 1, but that is still a big advantage, especially since a second attack in the same combat cycle is probably a flank blow which gets a +5 attack bonus. Also, it's been shown in MP that cav can increase its advantage by using its greater spacing to extend its line out beyond the width of the infantry unit. The men extending beyond the enemy unit will come down on the flanks and get a +5 attack bonus. When perfected this technique can allow some of the cav to wrap around the infantry unit and get some rear attacks which give +7 combat bonus. In addition, if the center of the cav unit passes to the side of the infantry unit, the infantry unit gets a -2 morale penalty. The cav won't get a counter penalty if its center rotates enough toward the infantry unit's center such that it's still considered to be facing the infantry unit. The Strategy Guide mentions the advantage of this wide deployment with reference to swords fighting spears. Of course, it's better to engage inf with another inf and then charge into flank or rear with cav, That way you get the unit's charge bonus, an additional +2 attack bonus for charging into flank or rear and the +5 or +7 attack bonus for strike at the flank or rear of a man until the enemy men react and turn to face the cav.