View Full Version : Bugfix - Complete Pike/Sheild/2-Hander Fix
It can be found in this (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showpost.php?p=1390967&postcount=310) post with full details of what i've done. It includes no personal balance changes beyond those required to make 2-handed swords competetive with the rest of the 2-handers.
Enjoy.
A 102 veiws and no comments:smash:? I though loads of you wanted this...
:embarassed:
We're all too busy downloading and installing to be grateful!
Thank you so much! This was precisley what I asked for in an earlier thread.
You're a lovely man (woman/human being)
(is that better? :beam: )
LOL, yeah. Man actually~;p. I was hoping it might be somthing like that but I wasn't sure:smash:.
If any of you spot any 2-handers I missed, let me know. I think i've got them all, but you never know...
*looks embarrssed* got it wrong with the Viking Raiders. They're fine actually, I was doing a side by side comparision to the vanillia file to make sure I knew which units have sheilds in vanillia and got mixed up...
Marchicus
01-18-2007, 13:15
I'm at work so cannot d/l the file, but does it deal with the Varangian Guard?
Yep.
p.s. theirs no self installer so you'll need to know how to set it up or ask somone to explain, (it's pretty easy if you know how TBH, i'm just not much good at explaining it).
Ok can someone post the explanantion. I was just going to find a file of the same name on M2TW and paste this one over it. I take it that's not what to do....
:embarassed:
Hey, I'm a social science graduate. What do you expect....
Just had a thought, i'll create a version you can just copy and paste in properly. Give me about 5 mins.
Added a new updated download to the post linked to in the first post of this thread. it's a ZIP file. Instillation instructions are also in the post linked to.
If anyone want to tell me how to crate an auto-installer or would like to create one, then feel free to do so. i'll give you credits where due.
So you need to start a new campaign to get the fixes?
But you can still continue with your old Vanilla campaigns using the old M2TW shortcut?
Thanks for all your help (and work)
No, you don't need a new campaign normally, it will let you pick up where you left off with the changes in place. All it changes is where the game looks for the unit stats.
Your Welcome BTW.
Zatoichi
01-18-2007, 14:18
What happens when units get armour upgrades with this fix? Do they lose the extra bonus you've given them, or do they become really armoured? I'm at work at the moment, and so I can't see for myself!
Also, how does this fix affect autocalc and the AI's willingness to build units? Or is it too early to tell?
Thanks for putting this out there though!
They get the upgrades as normal. It has no effect on auto-calc as total defence values havn't changed for anything, (auto-calc assumes the sheilds are working in vanillia even though they arn't), and only 2-handed swords get better attack. They will effect auto-calc a bit, but where honestly a bit underpowered in vanillia auto-calc for their price anyway.
Raffi Fleischmann
01-18-2007, 20:26
Hey
im new here so ill introduce myself first
my name is Raffi Fleischmann and ive been a fan of the TW franchise since it began in Shogun total war. im 21 years old and my occupation is a medic.
my question is
will the change in armor class not make units with shields in general more resistant to missle weapons?. Why do u boost the armor stat instead of perhaps the Defence skill?
The sheild value is zeroed so it has no effect against missile fire from the front and left. it does effect missile fire from the right and rear as these are not normally protected by the sheild. It was not put into defence skill because doing so would have left the units in question with less than half their defence against missile fire in most cases.
zstajerski
01-18-2007, 21:46
thnx man
Goofball
01-18-2007, 22:09
Thanks for the great work Carl. One question: I don't know if you are familiar with it, but I'm using ShellShocks's MedManager tool to manage mods. How would I install your fix using that?
I haven't tried installing your fix yet, but I believe all I should need to do is install your fix into the specific mod folder I want it to apply to in my MedManager mod folder, but in order to do that I need to know exactly which files are involved with this fix. Can you please list them? Or tell me if I'm way out in left field?
Thanks in advance.
The only changed file is the one called
export_descr_unit
I've never even heard of MedManeger so I don't have a clue how to install it with that. I just included a structure that would allow people with nothing but the basic game to easilly install it.
Goofball
01-18-2007, 22:20
The only changed file is the one called
I've never even heard of MedManeger so I don't have a clue how to install it with that. I just included a structure that would allow people with nothing but the basic game to easilly install it.
If that's the only changed file, how is the 2-hander problem fixed?
The current two-hander fix I have installed required me to replace a couple of animation files.
I've changed the Soilder line in that fil for the bugged unit. it dosen't change the apperrance, but it does change the animation thy use. I think thats all the solider line controlls TBH. What animations it uses.
i.e. my 2-hander fix changes which animations the bugged units use, rather than changing the animation file as the one you described does.
Goofball
01-18-2007, 22:26
Oops. Don't worry about answering that last question. I just read the "Which 2-Handed Fix Do You Prefer" thread and answered my own question.
:oops:
Allready anwsered. but don't wory about it.
Thanks for this all-in-one fix. However I think that in order for this to be playable you need to rebalance a lot more units. For instance the previous king of melee, 840 gold JHI, gets utterly slaughtered by the 530 gold DEK with this file. I tried a little in custom battle by lowering DEK/DNK/DPK attack value to 18 and raising the "working" units like JHI by 4 (like you did with 2Hsword) and it atleast felt closer to what I think they should do.
Also I don't think the costs should be changed for units, it's probably better to change attack/defense stats until the unit "matches" its cost.
@Yanar: I go with the view that their stats indicate what they should be doing, that’s indicative in my mind of what CA wanted and in addition, ALL fixed 2-hinders are WAY under priced with this mod. English bills are just worse. JHI are the ONLY working high power 2-hander in vanilla, so they actually got given a price worthy of their stats, everyone else didn't, and as a result the fixed 2-handers makes JHI look expensive but are actually fairly well cost balanced vs. each other, with the exception of Billmen/heavy Billmen/militia Billmen/heavy militia Billmen.
It's also worth noting that DEK remain the ONLY 2-hander I’ve found that can beat JHI. Considering that the DEK have 9 more attack and 6 more defence, I’d say the JHI do pretty well.
I chose not to re-balance the costs as it's a very subjective thing, and 2-handed swords are subjective enough.
The same issue your describing also effected vanilla pikes for the few people who actually got them to work, (very hard), they could easily beat much larger, (i.e. expensive), forces in these circumstances. (My pike fix just makes it fairly easy to get your pikes working).
For what it’s worth, I understand your complaint, but that kind of balancing is subjective and I feel that units should perform according to their stats, with the cost changed to match stats, not according to their cost.
Just had a thought. Your idea of applying my 2-handed sword fix to JHI is a good one as they are really the only unit that took a hit from the 2-hander fix. doing that would put them back where they where in large part and would mean they arn't so badly messed up in auto-calc.
I think I will do that as it should clear things up nicely.
One thing that's not be discussed is how the shield to armour fix and any other subsequent rebalancing affects the shieldless halberd units. The halberd units (e.g. voulgiers, halberd militia, swordstaff, etc) presumably might have been balanced versus the old "bugged" shield units and it's unclear how these changes have affected them. Increases to the 2HS units would suggest there may be a need? There's no tests to indicate otherwise.
Regards
I'm not sure myself TBH. But I think your right, it's also worth noting that Halberd Militia and Heavy Billmen cost the same yet are tottally diffrent in terms of avalibility and suppposed quality, both in game and historiclly, which makes me think theirs some seriouslly bad pricing for the english bill units.
I also missed a 2-hander in my fixing (Dismounted French Noble Knights).
Expect a 1.01 version with fixed JHI and HFNK soon. (Like a hour or less). With possiblly a 1.02 late tonight if tests show the composite pike/hlberd units are UP now.
Version 1.01 (http://www.fileshack.us/v/774625/1.01.zip.html) Now up.
README below:
CHANGES
Below is a list of the various things done in each version of this fix.
1.00
All animation bugged 2-Handers eithier use the Halberd-Militia, (Bills and DEK/DPK only), or Voulgier, (all others), animation set now. No units have been re-priced so a few units, (mostly Bills and DEK/DPK), are underpriced ATM.
The Pike fix simply removes all Pike units secondery weapons.
The Sheild fix is the same as Foz's, and move the sheild value into the armour, then zeros the sheild.
2-Handed Swords have been given +4 Attack, increased to 8 Charge Stat, (this makes up for swords having a worse animation that the rest of the 2-handers), and have been given the AP attribute. This roughly brings them into balance with comparable 2-Handers (price wise) with fixed animations.
1.01
Dismounted French Noble Knights, (DFNK), have now had the 2-Hander animation Fix applied to them. I missed them the first time round
All 2-Handers have been given an additinal +2 attack as DEK/DPK/DFNK where still beating them too hard considering their reletive prices.
JHI have now had the 2-Handed Sword Fix applied to them as they, like 2-handed Swords, where proving underpowered vs. Animation Fixed 2-Handers of a similar or lower price.
INSTALLATION
To install copy the SEGA Folder into C:/Program Files:
If it asks you if you want to Overwrite, click "yes to all". Then Copy the Medievil 2 Total War Mod Shortcut to your desktop and use that to play the game with the fixes in place.
MEDMANAGER INSTALLATION
For the purposes of MedManager, the only file that has been modified is the "export_descr_unit" file.
COMMENTS AND BUG REPORTING
You can Find my online thread relating to this fix at the following address
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=77759
CREDITS
CARL BARRASS (me)
THE_FOZ_4 (For the Sheild Fix)
DOPP (For the Pike Fix)
AND EVERYONE ELSE AT THE GUILD (For the 2-Hander Fix and Support)
napoleon526
01-20-2007, 05:43
This might be a dumb question, but does the 1.01 version also have all the changes in the 1.00 fix, or should I install both?
Ermm...
Except now Foz has changed his shield fix to 1.1...
(adding half shield to armour and zeroiing stat - upon the advice of a developer no less. This way the units becoem slightly better against rear attacks than they should be, but slightly worse from the front - averaging out. At least I think that's the gist of teh 12 page argument :sweatdrop: )
....doesn't that mean that you need to change your all in one fix to add the 2H and pike fixes to his new shield stats?
Because obviously you have nothing better to do than run around modding for us forumites who can't...:whip:
But it is very appreciated :2thumbsup:
Is this fix compatible with other mods, such as Lands to Conquer? cause I want a pike fix but i'm not sure if it would cause problems...
It's probably not conmpatiable i'm afraid.
1.01 includes all 1.00 changes as well.
I'm probably not going to copy Foz exactly. But rather use CA's uggested method of zero sheild and half into armour, half into defence skilll. Experiments have shown that lowering defence by even a couple of points can drasticly reduce the ability of spearmen to recive cav charges. So i'm not fond of changing it as the vanillia sheild fix is only baerly enough to make most spearmen useful IMHO.
It may be a while before I can update as i'm having comp problems so a complete OS re-install is in order i'm afraid.
Make that Shield Fix 1.2 now... and yes consensus seems to be that the extra defense is needed, but should be in the form of the other half of the shield going into defense skill. I have made it that in 1.2. So you can yet again "borrow" my work if you like, Carl :smile:
And for the record, at the point where I made Shield Fix 1.1, the suggestion had been to put half into armor, then see if putting more into skill was required. It seems to have taken us about 3/4 of a day to figure out that it in fact is required. The primary difference from the very first proposed fix, then, is that flanking (especially rear) will retain more of its effect, and archers (HA included) remain competitive/useful.
So... eh, i've been looking for just a pike fix and I can't seem to find one... could you pretty please direct me to one? I would be forever grateful...
Lord_hazard
01-20-2007, 19:58
Nicely done to be sure, but ill rather wait for the devs to fix the problem.
But still :2thumbsup:
So... eh, i've been looking for just a pike fix and I can't seem to find one... could you pretty please direct me to one? I would be forever grateful...
It's one you can do yourself. Copy the following line:
stat_sec 0, 0, no, 0, 0, no, melee_simple, blunt, none, 25, 1
Paste it over the unit's stat_sec line for all the units in the export_descr_unit.txt file that have long_pike as a stat_pri_attr, as those are the pike units. AFAIK we've all been doing this by hand by doing a search for long_pike in the file, then pasting in the line. I suppose it could be automated, but since there only are like 20 pike units, no one has done so yet that I know of.
It's one you can do yourself. Copy the following line:
stat_sec 0, 0, no, 0, 0, no, melee_simple, blunt, none, 25, 1
Paste it over the unit's stat_sec line for all the units in the export_descr_unit.txt file that have long_pike as a stat_pri_attr, as those are the pike units. AFAIK we've all been doing this by hand by doing a search for long_pike in the file, then pasting in the line. I suppose it could be automated, but since there only are like 20 pike units, no one has done so yet that I know of.
Actually there are a couple of units with long_pike that aren't pike units. Those being the voulgiers-type units and swiss guard.
As far as I can see all pike units have "pike" under "attributes" after "can_withdraw"
Thanks for the permishon Foz:smash:.
It may be a few days or I may get it done tonight. depends how backing up goes.
V1.02 up. Include Foz's new Sheild Fix. Follow the link at the top of the page as allways.
Armoured Hoplite
01-21-2007, 11:49
Awesome work to all involved, thanks. I just put the export_desc_unit file in my m2tw_lite mod (backed up the m2tw_lite export_desc_unit file just in case) along with the ultimate AI mod, so I am using all 3 and it is pretty sweet.
One thing though, after a bunch of custom battle testing I would agree/argue that Halberd units are now too weak. They are decent vs. bogged down cavalry but are horrible against the charge and get spanked pretty hard by most infantry. Basically most units got a significant boost whether it be 2-handed axe/poleaxe units, units with shields, 2-handed swords, and pikes. That makes up most of the units. Halberdiers were not improved however, and I don't think anyone felt they were really overpowered before. Just my opinion though, and others are free to disagree.
Thanks again to all of the modders for their incredible work.
Thanks for the feedback, my comp problems have been stopping most of my testing, but I suspected this might be the case TBH.
I had the comp crash last night and had to do the Windows re-install, (which it was in need of due to bugs), then so it's going to be at least 24 hours before i'm even done with updates and stuff., as I effectivlly have a clean PC with no M2TW installed.
It actually crashed 10 mmins after I put the 1.02 file up so you where lucky to get it.
Awesome work to all involved, thanks. I just put the export_desc_unit file in my m2tw_lite mod (backed up the m2tw_lite export_desc_unit file just in case) along with the ultimate AI mod, so I am using all 3 and it is pretty sweet.
One thing though, after a bunch of custom battle testing I would agree/argue that Halberd units are now too weak. They are decent vs. bogged down cavalry but are horrible against the charge and get spanked pretty hard by most infantry. Basically most units got a significant boost whether it be 2-handed axe/poleaxe units, units with shields, 2-handed swords, and pikes. That makes up most of the units. Halberdiers were not improved however, and I don't think anyone felt they were really overpowered before. Just my opinion though, and others are free to disagree.
Thanks again to all of the modders for their incredible work.
This is what I've been thinking. If they were ok to begin with then surely all the improvements to pikes, 2H axe and 2H swords, and shield units, then halberd's would then be too weak...
Armoured Hoplite
01-21-2007, 12:18
Very lucky to get it :beam:.
One more thing after more testing, as much as I like pikemen (see my forum name), I think they are overpowered by quite a bit after fix. Highland pikemen devastate even Janissary heavy infantry with fix, this just seems wrong. From what I have seen they are pretty unbeatable, but at least they remain somewhat vulnerable to archers. I'm not sure how effective flanking is, will have to test more, but it would be pretty difficult to flank a line of pikemen. The alternate sword attack is obviously much more realistic because pikes could be broken or passed through somewhat, but obviously the old method was not working well at all as they would draw swords too early. To be honest it was a beautiful sight seeing pikemen skewer their opponents, but after several tests, I felt more than a little guilty. Ahhh, reminds me of the days of RTW and my beloved Greek Cities, row after row of armoured hoplites.
Thanks again, many of us in the community can't express our appreciate enough for all of the work you do. Good luck getting the cpu stuff sorted out.
Armoured Hoplite
01-21-2007, 12:24
Can't seem to edit so...
What I maent to say is that flanking with cavalry may be a possibility, and may be effective, will have to try. But flanking with infantry is a bit more unrealistic in terms of possibility, and pikemen shouldn't have this much control on enemies tactics. It just seems to me they are way too effective head on now, and I encourage others to test and provide feedback as this is getting close to be very very acceptable in terms of balance.
Armoured Hoplite
01-21-2007, 12:42
One more thing, just to throw some results out there from 1vs. 1 tests on grassy plain, medium difficulty:
Highland pikemen had guard mode off and formation widened by two presses of + key:
On average they would beat Janissary heavy infantry with 54+ units remaining.
On average they would beat dismounted English knights with 52+ units remaining.
On average they would beat dismounted feudal knights with 50+ units remaining.
Also, I was pretty generous on averages, sometimes it was much high (55-60+ units remaining. Keep in mind this is a unit with no shield, no armor, and a defense skill of 3 (total of 3 defense).
I tried testing with Aventuros and obviously it was even worse.
One last thing, please don't take my comments as being ungrateful/critical, I'm just trying to help provide useful feedback.
Thanks again.
@Jambo: Yeah, Like I ssaid I suspected this might happen TBH with Halberds.
Regarding Pikes:
Pikes are VERY strong from the front now, but remain weak from the flanks.
The first thing to realise is that you need REALLY high defence frontally to get through pikes head on. So no genuine 2-hander in the game actually has much of a chance of stopping them head on. Sword and Sheild infantry with a defence of 20 oir more will do FAR better.
The Second Point is that even Sword and Sheild Infantry will suffer heavy losses head on against unarmoured Pikemen, and will get beat after inflicting heavy losses on the Pikes if the Pikes are armoured Pikes, (thats Noble Pikemen, Heavy Pike Militia and Aventuros ). Armoured Pikes are natrually much more resistant to the typical counters than most in fact.
Third, Pikes are very vulnrable to missile and flank attacks. Especially for unarmoured Pikes. Even simple peseants or Spear militia could do a lot of damage under these circumstances. However Pikes are nearly untouchable from the front and few units can easilly beat them that arn't other pikemen.
Fourth, Pikes and 2-Handers are roughly similar in that they are both late era heavy infantry who are desgined to take on and beat all prior infantry units. Pikes sacrafice flank and rear resistance and a lot of defence over 2-handers to get exceptional cav charge resistance and frontal killing power. 2-Handers tend to have better armour but are more vulnrable to cav charges. They also lack some of the raw frontal attack power. But make up for this defecit by being much more resistant to infantry flanking actions and much more able to manouvre than pikes.
Five, Having Pikes in your army will tottally dictate your tactics to you as everything has to be based around protecting them from flank and rear attack. In efect the rest of your army is their to support the Pikes. his limits your options heavilly.
The Point of all that stuff above: Yes pikes are a touch OTT and like english bills they need a serious re-costing IMHO. However, they are also meant to be nearly impirvuious to frontal attack and 2-Handers are one of the worst units to use against them in a head on fight. They are also very eas for an amy with no Pikes of their own to avoid as they are not tied down protecting their own pikes and have greater freedom of movment. (A bit like Roman Legions vs. Hoplites really).
p.s. Don't worry, i'm taking them seriously. I just wanted to point out that attacking pikes head on is a prett bad idea TBH. It's a bit like doing the same to Hoplites, which is effectivlly what they are.
TBH I need to do more testing and work on this matter before I make any final decisions on things.
Armoured Hoplite
01-21-2007, 12:51
Looks like you posted seconds after I did. I tried using more heavily armoured sword and shield units, but as you can see it didn't make too much difference, and this was against a pike unit with no armor at all. I'll try the flanking stuff tomorrow, as it is early morning here so I guess I should get some sleep :shame: . Again, sorry if I sounf ungrateful in any way.
No, you don't sound ungratful.
TBH you need Chivalric Knights/Dismounted Christian Guard/Dismounted Norman Knights/Noble Swordsmen. i.e. the really tough stuff at the very top of the sword and sheild set.
I'd try the flanking with a unit of Dismounted English Knights and a Unit of Spear Militia. Let the spears attack head on and run your swords round the rear. it'll be a blood bath based on my expiriance.
Armoured Hoplite
01-21-2007, 13:08
Couldn't help myself from trying flanking real quick, what I forgot is that the AI is hopeless with pikes, they just walk into you and never really seem to attack. Oh well, I will mess around more tomorrow. One more thing, I just wanted to be clear and state that I am not asking for any changes to the mod, just offering feedback to discuss. It's a shame we even have to attempt to work (or have others work :idea2:) around this issue, but oh well.
It's a shame we even have to attempt to work (or have others work ) around this issue, but oh well.
LOL, and true.
Couldn't help myself from trying flanking real quick, what I forgot is that the AI is hopeless with pikes, they just walk into you and never really seem to attack. Oh well, I will mess around more tomorrow. One more thing, I just wanted to be clear and state that I am not asking for any changes to the mod, just offering feedback to discuss.
Don't worry, the feedbacks appreciated, but i'm trying to keep subjectiive rebalancing to a minimum ATM and that means i'm loathe to mess with pikes prices/stats, (i may have to though, depends). If it starts getting into subjective balance changes on a large scale we no longer really have a bugfixer do we but a balance mod.
Though I've decided to stop playing M2TW for a while, this fix looks damn good. Thou hast done a great service to the TW community, as all of ye has who contributed thereto :)
When I decide to play again, and the problems aren't yet fixed by patches, I'll make sure to include the proper mods/fixes, including this one :2thumbsup:
Thnx for the compliments~:). Glad people think it's good.
Anyone think it's bad then LOL:smash:?
Pikemen remain horribly vulnerable to rear charges. Nothing like a dose of demi-lancer in the rear to spoil your day.
I actually modded my pikemen to have 3 armor base instead of 0 armor because it helps the armor upgrades scale better. Same for all unarmored troops that can potentially be upgraded (including peasants, who can wear heavy mail).
One thing: While Pikemen seem unbeatable from the front, and people are claiming halberdiers need help, note that halberdiers will absolutely MASSACRE an equivalent unit of pikemen from the front (That is, Halberd Militia vs. Pike Militia, or Swiss Guard vs Noble Pikemen or Aventuros). It doesn't matter whether you control the Halberds of the Pikemen, the Halberds win it, and quite handily. And this is with the pike fix in place.
So I don't know if the halberds really need a buffing.
Intresting data Musashi...
I'm going to try that out once I get M2TW re-installed and working to see what happens. (I don't disbelive you, i just want to see it for myself).
Why the Varangians animation is considered borked? I ran some tests with the latest shield fix and they have beaten DEK and DGK, but were pretty much butchered by JHI, which seems ok to me. They should cost more judging by their performance.
@Rollen: That requires some checking then, as with the base animation and no sheild fix they don't attack. I assumed it would be the same with the sheild fix and "fixed" their animation.
@Musashi: uld you give me the test conditions you used please as i'm not getting the same results as you. Pike Militia are sending Swiss Guard Packing when I control the Pikes, (with less than 3 dead too), and even when i control the Swiss Guard I suffer 50% losses killing them. remeber, Pikemen have a defualt Formation that is far deeper than they need, (4 ranks will do thank you), and have guard Mode on. You need to disable Guard Mode. Make the enemy advance into your pikes and deploy them reletivly wide and they steamroller Swiss Guard, (who don't seem to care if they are in Guard Mode or not).
So could I have the full details of your tests please?
Armoured Hoplite
01-21-2007, 19:45
I guess I should have clarified earlier, but when controlling pikemen I am letting them come to me. Just did some tests and...
Halberd milita 49 losses, Highland pikemen 1 loss.
Obudshear 60 losses, Highland Pikemen 1 loss.
So if you hold your ground (although I have guard mode off), it is simply a slaughter. I'm not sure what happens when trying to use pikes offensively but in this case I just walk up to enemy and stop a very short distance away but having my pikes make contact, or just out of range. This usually makes them attack and I'm guessing with nearly the same results.
Yeah, thats about what i'm seeing Hoplite. But Musashi is claiming otherwise and i'm wondering what he's doing to get those results TBH.
Armoured Hoplite
01-21-2007, 20:09
Just for fun I tried Highland pikemen vs. dismounted feudal knights with origianl (vanilla) stats.
1 vs. 1 the highland pikemen lose and inflict about 30 casualties.
but...
3 vs. 3 with pikemen shoulder to shoulder, the Highland pikemen won while inflicting approx 160 casualties and taking approx 80 losses. Not too bad for an unarmored unit with an upkeep of only 125 (vs. 225 of DFK).
Also, the Highland pikemen had no trouble defeating feudal knights, again not too bad for a unit with half the upkeep cost.
I never thought pikes needed fixing per se, its just that you have to use them standing still vs. RTW where you could slowly walk up and attack. That is the real problem. Yes, they draw their swords too early, but as you can see they are still quite effective even when doing so. What really needs to be fixed is better sword/pike management and the ability to slowly wade in with lowered pikes, but in terms of effectiveness they are fine, and have been if used defensively, which in truth was their real purpose.
Armoured Hoplite
01-21-2007, 20:22
Another test with vanilla stats:
Aventuros vs. dismounted feudal kinghts 3 vs. 3.
Dismounted feudal knight 138 losses, Aventuros 35.
Like I said, pikemen are good even in vanilla M2TW, people just are not using them correctly, or should I say efficiently. As a man who loves pike units, I have to be honest and say I don't see the need for a "fix", but rather a minor tweak in second and third rows holding pikes longer. But as you can see for their upkeep costs they are capable of inflicitng heavy losses vs much more expensive, and armored troops. They do very well vs. cavalry as well, you just can't attack with them but you you can walk up to enemy and stop. This is how I have been using them from the beginning and had only very minor complaints. Just my thoughts.
As a note, the same holds true for vanilla halberd units. When testing these units you really need to try 3 vs. 3 or more, 1 vs. 1 will yield substancially different results. I always have guard mode off and generally widen the formation slightly, and it works very well. With vanilla stats, I still found pikemen to be superior to halberd units.
Pikes have a lot of anti-cav benefits though so even Chivalric Knighjts vs. Pike Militia will be a loss for the pikes. Also, Dismounted Fuedal Knights are nowhere near as far up the tech tree as most proffeshional pikemen, so it's hardly suprising the pikes can do so well. 2-Handers and ikes (when working or fixed), are alike in that they tottally demolish any other infantry, but equally late Sword and heild units can inflict moderate losses, and somtimes even win if the quality disparity is big enough.
The problem with pikes ATM without the fix is they won't attack if you move them, and they don't tend to do a proper push of pike as it where, (dopp can explain it better as he's actually used these units under vanillia, i'm just quoting others), If they try to do anything other than sit their and poke at somon who walks upto them they simply disintigrate. In general the Pike Fix is for those that can't get the working, or those that can but want less hassle with it, (it has also to be remebered that their are a number of ways a human can cheat vs. vanillia pikes to force them to draw swords. With the fix the AI still stands somthing of a chance against these tactics, though if I could get the AI out of Guard Mode it would be better).
Your results are intresting mind, and give me a lot of useful info. For what it's worth I think Pikes are a bit good with the fix, but if Dopp's accounts and yours are correct, a bit weak in vanillia, (mostly due to a near total inability to move).
p.s. for what it's worth, (and as i've said before), I tend to feel that Pikes have been as badly undercosted in vanillia as english Bill units. Late Bill units and most pikes are the equivelent of 2-handers tech-tree and should have similar combat performance, and as a consequence price IMHO. Most armies only get Pikes OR 2-hander after all.
Armoured Hoplite
01-21-2007, 20:40
One more then I'll shut up :embarassed: .
Highland pikemen vs. Gothic knights with vanilla stats:
Gothic knights 40 losses (1 remaining), highland pikemen 50 losses (26 men remaining). Second test; Gothic knights 41 losses (0 remaining), Highland pikemen 42 losses (29 remaining). This is without any armor/weapon upgrades.
Upkeep cost, 125 for Highland pikemen, 320 for Gothic knights. Considering that you can field 2 of these units for the cost of one of most cavalry units (250), this seems pretty good.
Goofball
01-21-2007, 20:57
Can't seem to edit so...
What I maent to say is that flanking with cavalry may be a possibility, and may be effective, will have to try. But flanking with infantry is a bit more unrealistic in terms of possibility, and pikemen shouldn't have this much control on enemies tactics. It just seems to me they are way too effective head on now, and I encourage others to test and provide feedback as this is getting close to be very very acceptable in terms of balance.
Build some peasant archers. Arrows pretty much decimate pikes.
Armoured Hoplite
01-21-2007, 21:01
Still, just to try I had 3 pike militia vs. 3 dismounted chivalric knights and they still did ok but lost. They were routing the knight units at times and generally lost at a 2 to 1 ratio. Considering that pike militia have 75 men vs. 60, and that these were militia (non-professional armies) with a much lower upkeep, I think that is fair.
Aventuros had no trouble beating the dismounted chivalric knights. Highland pikemen are on the same level as dismounted feudal knights and Aventuros are on the same level as dismounted chivalric knights. Both are professional armies and the pikes win. This with a lower upkeep cost and the ability to beat up on cavalry (whereas other units are devastated by charge). Militia units are supposed to be weak and generally have very low morale. They are to defend cities, which they do very well. If people take milita units out into the filed vs. same tier professional armies, they should lose handily. Keep in mind there are VERY few professional pike units as well.
I just don't see the problem with pike units in vanilla vs. same tier, similarly trained units.
This is not to say they don't have problems that need addressed, its just that I think they are certainly more than useable in vanilla game. They still do great vs. cavalry, and do well vs. infantry units as well. They are even better when forming and holding a line. Not much more you can ask for. Still, there is room for some improvement, but I don't want to see them made too dominant either.
Just my opinion, and again I apologize if I sound rude or ungrateful.
Armoured Hoplite
01-21-2007, 21:10
Build some peasant archers. Arrows pretty much decimate pikes.
Which is why in the manual it says that spear wall formations are vulnerable to archers. A unit that beats same tier infantry and cavalry should have a weakness. Again, this coming from a big pike fan.
Thanks Goofball, you've given me a bit more to chew on.
Confused anyone?
Probably. What Goofball has tried pointing out (and him puting it how he has has helped organise my thoughts), is that this game ISN'T balanced on a unit X cost 600 Florins so it will beat any unit that costs less than 300 Florins easilly.
That isn't how the games balanced. look at Zwei Handlers in vanillia or my bug-fixer. In both they are a littile over 600 Florins, but will tear apart even 600 Florin Swords and Sheild units with only moderate losses. (i.e. they won't suffer equal losses). On the flip side repetetive charges allow even a 300 Florin Light Cav unit to Beat them. Their Low armour also means a 220 Florin Peasant Archer unit can wipe them out without them ever doing any damage.
Pikes are like that. Whilst defiently underpriced IMHO, they are meant to be nearly impirvious to any head on attack, (high quality Sword and Sheild units like Dismounted Christian Guard can beat low quality pikes head on, but thats the quality diffrance talking), but be lacking in turn rate, ability to fight off flankers and resistance to Archers, as well as not having as fast a kill rate as 2-Handers.
2-Handers on the other hand can much more easilly recive flank Charges, move around more freelly and kill more quickly, as well as tending to be slightly more missile resistant thank Pikes. However they lack the cav charge resistance and will take many more losses beating their opponnents than Pikes.
Regarding Militia Units: All Militia units in this game are also meant to be used in feild armies, they just arn't as good as the pro units. Pike Militia are about the same as Hoplite Militia where in RTW, and pro pikes at the level of Hoplites/Armoured Hoplites, (depending on type). The pro ones are better, but they are all used in feild armies. The only diffrance between militia units in M2TW and in RTW is that they are free upkep in M2TW. In the end they mearly represent a cheaper weaker alternative to pro units that can also freely garrission cities. Garrission duty is NOT however intended to be their only duty by any means. Indeed early on the only infantry most armies get is militia units.
I just don't see the problem with pike units in vanilla vs. same tier, similarly trained units.
Where your last lot of tests done in vanillia or under the fix as it's my understanding that in vanillia, Pikes of the same era in vanillia will tend to get beaten or baerly win against armies of the same era that are composed of other units. this really isn't how they are meant to work IMHO, and that why i bothered to include Dopps fix. (p.s. if you think it's too much, take it up in his thread, i'm just including it in my fix because a lot of people wanted a fix with everything in).
Was doing a bit of testing on 2H units and it seems like the Dismounted Gothic Knights take a severe thrashing from anything (Sword+board, other 2H) in this mod. I don't have the numbers written down but it seems like the worst comes from Venetian heavy infantry and Dismounted English/noble Knights. The closest fight was Janissary Heavies. In fact the only fights the gothics won were against units that they were quite obviously supposed to thrash, and these were quite one sided as well.
I can understand the Janissaries taking down the gothics, as based on the fact that (to my best knowledge) JHI and DGK are both not modified in the 2H fixes. However based on what I understand of the balance (Purpose and stats) the Gothics should be at least a close match for either the DEK/DNK or VHI.
While I'm hesitant to suggest making the gothics any more powerful (they do seem to be dishing out a thrashing where they should) it seems like DEKs/DNK/VHI have gone to the other extreme from where they were. These units now seem to be quite the powerhouses. I have yet to find an infantry unit that can give the DEK/DNK (they seem to be quite the mirror of each other) a run for it's money. I've not done as extensive of testing of the VHI, but it seems to be in a similar situation.
Obviously, I could just counter with heavy cav (seems to break the DEKs just fine), but I'm not really convinced that a DEK:DGK fight should go to the DEKs with double the kills (or more). Fights between somewhat similar elite 2H units should be a very bloody fight, down to the last few men on either side.
[EDIT] A bit more information. I can't seem to find any infantry that can stand up to a DEK/DNK unit, except (oddly since they're really not infantry) a unit of retinue longbowmen. Said longbowmen seem to be pretty studly in the end right now. On a Side note I've seen them stand up to a unit of Mounted Gothics before using the spikes (so sadly the AI had to control the Gothics on that fight). Seems that the combination of having to go around the spikes and charging the thin end of the formation blunted the charge well......
In any case I'll have to do more testing tomorrow night if I get the chance. Perhaps I'll have to see about finding a soldier line that seems a bit more proper for the DEK/DNK. VHI I'm not so sure on. It seems like they could stand to take a stats hit (attack perhaps? most of the non bugged heavy defense units seem to have significantly less attack, though a lot of those don't share the same purpose as the VHI). The goal I'll be going for is somewhere around a 10ish man difference from DGK/JHI. Seems like a fair number to me as both are high end unchanged elite units. The other change I miight see about is giving the DGK a fairly low Defense (somewhere between half and athird of what it is now) an giving it two HP.
Carl: I just ran some more tests and got the same results... Using grassy plain, halberds beat equivalent pikes on basically a 2:1-3:1 ratio.
I think it might be because on huge unit sizes halberd units (Being deployed in a shallower formation) have a significantly longer "line", and wrap around the flanks of the pike unit and annihilate it (They win even when set on guard mode however, so...).
Was doing a bit of testing on 2H units and it seems like the Dismounted Gothic Knights take a severe thrashing from anything (Sword+board, other 2H) in this mod. I don't have the numbers written down but it seems like the worst comes from Venetian heavy infantry and Dismounted English/noble Knights. The closest fight was Janissary Heavies. In fact the only fights the gothics won were against units that they were quite obviously supposed to thrash, and these were quite one sided as well.
I can understand the Janissaries taking down the gothics, as based on (to my best knowledge) JHI and DGK are both not modified in the 2H fixes. However based on what I understand of the balance (Purpose and stats) the Gothics should be at least a close match for either the DEK/DNK or VHI.
While I'm hesitant to suggest making the gothics any more powerful (they do seem to be dishing out a thrashing where they should) it seems like DEKs/DNK/VHI have gone to the other extreme from where they were. These units now seem to be quite the powerhouses. I have yet to find an infantry unit that can give the DEK/DNK (they seem to be quite the mirror of each other) a run for it's money. I've not done as extensive of testing of the VHI, but it seems to be in a similar situation.
Obviously, I could just counter with heavy cav (seems to break the DEKs just fine), but I'm not really convinced that a DEK:DGK fight should go to the DEKs with double the kills (or more). Fights between somewhat similar elite 2H units should be a very bloody fight, down to the last few men on either side.
Yeah the DGK stats are 14 attack, 6 charge, defense 14. For starters they lack the all-powerful AP ability, and secondly their attack and defense combo is not in the realm of the really powerful units. Either one could be considered to be, but both together, no. This is because other dismounted knights either have a shield and are therefore ~13 attack, ~3 charge, ~21 defense... or because they have insanely high attack values with ap stat like ~21 attack, ~6 charge, ~13 defense (DEK). Without one of their attack or defense stats being in the 21 range, or both totaling ~34, they probably won't be able to compete. As you mentioned they appear to have worked from the start... and therefore fall into the category of units that were not bugged and appear to have been balanced against bugged shield and bugged 2H units, making them weak now that both of the above are fixed.
In fact the more I think about it, the more I do not envy the people who have to rebalance all the units for the coming patch that presumably fixes all these battlefield bugs. The reason I haven't tried to address the various underpowered units like DGK is that I don't feel comfortable doing such subjective work. After all, what exactly should a unit that costs 810 to recruit do? I have no real way to determine that, where the developers probably have derived some sort of cost system for various stats and abilities units can have, and thus I leave it to them as they can probably do it far faster and more reliably.
Thing is, in here the DGKs have 20 attack (w/ AP). And they still take an absolute thrashing.:thumbsdown:
I think the problem with the various 2h that are broken in the vanilla game is that there are motions in the animation file that error. My guess is that we see this as a no motion animation (the assumed default).
This animation file seems extraordinarily complex the more I think about it. While I'll have to check as I wasn't looking for it, but now that I think about it I don't remember seeing any VHI use a shield block motion, they all seemed to be parries or such. Likewise I think that perhaps the weapon motions are modified based on some internal modifiers.
Seemingly weapon/defensive motions are driven by a comparison of attack vs applied defense with some amount of a random variable (I'm guessing a table generated from total attack + total applicable def setting probabilites for each possible animation), this then takes into account various settings (does the soldier have a shield? I'm guessing a can this soldier parry or is attack parryable also takes place, but I'm a little sketchy on those). From here an animation is pulled from the file, played, and the calcs are done again if needed.
Now applying what I've said about animations/attack process (and assuming I'm even in the ball park) it seems like there are a few things occuring with the DEK/DNK. One is that most of the halberd types (I think that is what the anmimation used for DEKs is) attack fairly fast if I recall right. I'm guessing that the warhammer that the DEK/DNK has is supposed to swing somewhat slower. Two, I think DGK were slowed down/stat robbed during a late phase of balancing. They certainly seem to thrash those non-bugged troops that they should, and compare well against the JHI (again a non-bugged troop type, fights went to single digits for me with the AP change and higher attack). Also they get absolutely thrashed by heavy cav, ehich they should (kinda, I have my beefs with this historically, but the balance here is good). This means that they are fullfilling two cases which I would state for them 1: They counter what they should and 2: They are properly countered. This is not the fabled Rock Paper Scissors system, as that would mean such low losses as to be over the top, rather it's a bit more of a soft/psuedo counter system. What I mean by this is that they have a purpose which they carry out well, but not so well that you could throw a virtually infinate number of "that which they kill" at them and there would still be a unit of Gothics sitting there. Rather they take losses which over time renders the unit incapable of doing anything at all on the battle field till the unit has been retrained.
However at the same time it does pull a little from the "RPS" system in that two troop units that are intended for killing and being killed by the same things should "tie". That is they should both render the other impotent on the battlefield in the end. Two 60 man units reduced to single digits are pretty well demolished. This is of course again modified by how much the unit "costs" to place on the battle field, which is a whole other process. Basically cost should be a number for showing us who should rout who (assuming they aren't being attacked by "that which kills them" )
The important thing here is that we do have numbers from the cost on how they are expected to perform. The difficulty is in deriving which numbers are lowered due to balancing post-bug or are in place from pre-bug (assuming the bug appeared mid balance process and not before or after), also there is the fact that there are now so very many units that seem to be affected by one bug or another. Anything with a shield has a lower def, 2H (apparanetly, assuming I'm right) has missing animations.
If someone can provide proof that I'm wrong I'll be interested to see how it really works.
Now that I've got that block of text to build off of, (:dizzy2:) it seems to me that the dismounted knight lines and "heavy infantry" lines are intended to wade through militia type troops and lose to cav (otherwise they'd be mounted). This means that Heavy Infantry and Knights are roughly analagous and can be expected to essentially cause MAD to some degree.
I do agree with you on the boggling amount of balancing/testing to be done if a 2H/S+B fix is going into the next patch we get.
Those DEKs, DNKs and DPKs are obscene with the default 21/13 stats and the super fast spinning attack animation (assuming you used the fixed animations). 2HS units have a much slower animation. With all fixes in place (pike, shield and animation) the stats I settled on are:
JHI 14/10 ap (i.e. +2)
DEKs, DNKs and DPKs 13/13 ap
Billmen 10/3 ap
Heavy Billmen 10/10 ap
VG 13/12 ap
DGKs 16/14 ap
In fact all 2HS got +2 attack and ap.
I'm considering lowering the pike attack by 2 or buffing the halberd attack by 2, but haven't done enough testing yet.
@Stlaind: Your quite right with your tests. I noticed Similar things, I'm working on 1.1 now, (so many changes it's too many to call 1.03, the 0.1 increases are for minor bits and peices with minor effects on 1 or 2 units. the .1 numbers are for big units).
The main problem lies with the attack animations, even with 24 attack the DGK would probably still lose. On the flip side i've been experimenting witgh the Esastern Halber Militia, (ME_Halberd_Militia), animation and it seems more balanced vs. other 2-Handers. It powers some units up, and others down, (units with weaker armour get an upsides from the change). i also looks like it might be a sutibale replacment for the 2HS animation, which would make it possible to balance DGK vs. everyone else, as the slower animation problem would be gone. However in testing I found controlling the DGK yeiklded better result as they tended to charge properly and their powerful charge ability rerely helps for some reason. I might even be able to apply the same animation Fix to westeran Halberds as they seems to have a frigtfully slow secondery attack and thus get wailed on quite hard by anything they encounter, even with +10 attack. I'll talk more about them in a second after i've anwsered Musashi's post.
I think it might be because on huge unit sizes halberd units (Being deployed in a shallower formation) have a significantly longer "line", and wrap around the flanks of the pike unit and annihilate it (They win even when set on guard mode however, so...).
This explains it Musashi. in my tests I was keeping my Hlberds the same width as in my next release I was intending, (and have now implemented in the beta file on my PC), to decrease the defualt number of ranks for Pike and spear units (3 for spears, 4 for pikes), as the defualt formation is a LOT deeper than it needs to be once you fix the sheild/pike bugs. in those situations they get beat upon quite hard. I actually implemented the change and re-tried. Things went even worse. Also, Cv where easilly sweeping into the flanks and anhialating them too, and their secondery animations are so slow that Sword and Sheild units and other 2-handers where having a feld day even when stats said they should have lost.
Finding that upping attack just wasn't working and that most of the problem seemed to be down to the fact that the halberds had to be spread very thin to match the Pikes formation. I tried somthing radical. I upped the unit size to 60. the same as the Pkes, (who incidently they are similar to stats wise anyway). They still wern't beating the pikes, (even with me in control of the Halberds), but they where inflicting moderate losses and genrally doing a lot better across the board. Still need to do a few tests vs. heavier cav and 2-Handers. Plus I want to try them on Huge as Musashi did and see what happens then, (I can run small custom battles at this size).
@Jambo: those are nice figures, but they would throw the current Sword and Sheild vs. 2-Hander balance out. That blance is pretty good at defualt with all the fixs in place. Thats largly why i'm trying to bring unit upto their level.
Here's a quick rundown of what should hopefully turn up in the next release.
1. Defualt formation width changes to make the AI use the optimum formation for the fixed units.
2. 2-Hander fixing animations should now be natural looking (a lot less pokeing).
3. 2-Handed Swords and Western Halberds hopefully with a new animation to make them more competetive.
4. Eastern Halberds and 2-Handed Swords will now have 8 charge and +10 attack, (was +6), and AP to help re-balance them further vs. DEK/DNK/DPK. (NOTE: some of the changes listed are allready present in V1.02).
5. Western Halberds will have a larger unit size and probbably improved stats.
6. All of the above are subject to change if testing shows any combination to be unbalanced.
Hope that helps everyone, and sorry for the spelling. I havn't got Word re-installed yet.
There's a reason why the 2-H Axe units all had massive attack values in vanilla, and that's because they were all neutered without their spinning attack move and headbutt move. They were slow versus infantry and wouldn't attack cavalry.
With their animations restored, the vanilla 21/13 stats and ap make them drastically overpowered even when the shield fix (half into armour, half into defence skill) is introduced. My stats might still be a little low for them, but with these they still bettered a unit of DFKs. Maybe somewhere around the 15/13 or 16/13 mark would be more appropriate...?
I'm interested to hear there's such variation between the ME halberd and the western halberd! How do the expensive Voulgier and Swordstaff units compare? I must admit, my knowledge of the halberd units is relatively poor compared to the various other 2-H units, but my initial impression of fighting against a unit of French Voulgier in the hands of the AI wasn't one of awe.
@Jambo: My point is that the 2-handers are SUPPOSED to beat any sheild unit. This game IS NOT balanced directly on Unit X beats unit Y because it's more expensive than unit Y. (IMHO of course).
The point is that 2-Handers are supposed to beat any other infantry, (pikes aside), silly, but are very vulnrable to cav charges and missile fire. DFK SHOULDN'T be beating DEK at all in my opinion. DGK or JHI is another matter of course.
Of course your free to do things how you want, but their does seem to be a general consensus amongst Foz, Dopp, and a fair few others, that in general 2-Handers arn't supposed to be beaten by S&S units. Of course what was really intended we don't know. But theirs defintlly some complex balance mechanics happening if you leave 2-handers at defualt stats. Sure DEK/DNK/DPK and English Bill are pretty badly priced. But so are most working pikes, and to a degree a few other units. Theirs just so many bugs in the game it impossible for anything working to be properly priced. but it's only really badly out of whack with a handful of units.
I'm interested to hear there's such variation between the ME halberd and the western halberd! How do the expensive Voulgier and Swordstaff units compare? I must admit, my knowledge of the halberd units is relatively poor compared to the various other 2-H units, but my initial impression of fighting against a unit of French Voulgier in the hands of the AI wasn't one of awe.
I would say they are terribile. They have a poor hacking animation and poor stats. They are also gimped with bad resistance to flanking attacks. they are outperformed by S&S, 2-Handers, AND Pikes of both similar and worse stats. Eastern units don't have Phalanx formation so they have the fast hack animation. Phalanx seems to slow em down a bit animation wise and they don't have the best animations to begin with.
Western halberd units (including Voulges, but not bills surprisingly), have the spear wall formation, just like pikemen. Their animation set includes a 'primary' halberd that pokes like a pike for the initial contact, and a 'secondary' halberd that hacks things apart. I think switching out their animations for something else might spoil their spear wall a bit.
Part of the reason why they don't do well is because they don't keep their enemies at a distance with the spear wall and so get hacked to pieces by sword and board soldiers who have better fighting skills, better armor (even after AP is taken into account) better morale, faster animations, and shields. Of course neither do vanilla pikes, who are even more disadvantaged as they have no AP or any of the other weapon bonuses when they draw their puny swords. The spear wall is the only reason they are competitive at all; without it they are simply weak unarmored axemen/swordsmen which frankly speaking don't cut it against DFK and up. Pikes are supposed to stay in spear wall historically, so people feel justified in modding them so they hold spear wall better and longer. Halberds, on the other hand, just don't look right poking like pikemen beyond the initial charge (believe me, they own if you remove their 'secondary' weapon too, but are then nothing more than AP pikemen), so making them hold spear wall longer is out of the question. The problem is then how to make them competitive in normal melee without the spear wall to hold enemies at arm's length, which is an uphill task. Being rather unarmored and just militia for the most part, it would look funny if they started pwning DFK and such, or worse still, DGK. Not sure what to do with them. They are a sort of hybrid unit that doesn't do anything particularly well.
The point is that 2-Handers are supposed to beat any other infantry, (pikes aside), silly, but are very vulnrable to cav charges and missile fire. DFK SHOULDN'T be beating DEK at all in my opinion. DGK or JHI is another matter of course.
Of course your free to do things how you want, but their does seem to be a general consensus amongst Foz, Dopp, and a fair few others, that in general 2-Handers arn't supposed to be beaten by S&S units.
I agree and that's why my post said, that even with the reduced stats I gave to the overpowered DEKs, they still beat the DFKs which is correct. My point was that 21/13 plus ap is excessive and it's the margin by what they beat the DFKs which is silly.
Couldn't the western halberds, voulgiers and swordstaff just be designed like the eastern halberds? I.e. remove their phalanx ability if that's the feature that's holding them back?
I'm finding the same issue Dopp. I ran some huge unit size tests with Swiss Guard vs. militia Pikes. Whichever side I controlled won (if i turned Guard Mode off on the Pikes. Swiss Guard don't seem to care). The biggest issue was the losses. Even if Swiss Guard won they took 50% losses. But if I controlled the Pikes the pikes sufferd almost no losses. It's that damm Guard Mode Bug.
I also re-tried the test with Swiss Guard modified to have the same number of men per unit as the Pikes and they now Beat the Pikes regardless of who I controlled. But whilst they only suffered about 25% losses when I controlled the Swiss Guard, they suffered nearly as many losses as the Pikes when I controlled the Pikes. Regardless of unit size, Pike Militia beat Halberd Militia, even if I controlled the Halberds.
I agree that turning them into AP Pikes or ordinary 2-Handers should be avoided is possible as it's their Hybrid Nature that makes the unique. The problem is they try to be a 2-Hander that more resistant to Cav charges and Pikes, but at the cost of speed and Flank/Rear charge resistance. They currently fail badly as they don't have the stats or animation to fight as 2-handers, or the Animation to take on Pikes, or the numbers to take on Pikes/Cav.
As to them beating Pro Soildiers. I don't really have any issues with Militia Pike/2-Handers/Hybrids beating S&S infantry as thats very decidedly what they are supposed to be strong against. On the other hand I would have issues if they where beating other2-handers/Pikes that where of similar era, cost and who where Pro.
On thing I want to try is giving Western Halberds the Highly_Trained ability as Pikes have it and so do JHI and JHI perform well above stats, and I think this has a lot to do with it TBH.
You could be right on an animation fix not working, I havn't had chance to try, but i'll give it a whirl.
I agree and that's why my post said, that even with the reduced stats I gave to the overpowered DEKs, they still beat the DFKs which is correct. My point was that 21/13 plus ap is excessive and it's the margin by what they beat the DFKs which is silly.
Woops, sorry i though you said that DFK should be beating DEK. Sorry. I still maintain that DFK shouldn't really be doing much to DEK though. DEK are more the equivelent of Dismounted Chivalric Knights, Dismounted Conquistidors, and Dismounted Christian Guard, Noble Swordsmen. All of whom seem to inflict 25-30% losses on the DEK before going down. Era, Cost and Stats all determine how they balance up in reality. DEK are avalibile very late on in the tech tree compared to Dismounted Fuedal Knights.
Good news and Bad News:
THE GOOD:
The ME_Halberd_Militia Animation looks fine on 2HS units. In fact I could baerly tell the diffrance even when up close, (I pitted Zwei Handlers with their defualt Animation up against Highland Nobles with the ME_Halberd_Militia animation), and is signifficantly more powerful. Balance between Fixed 2-Handers and 2HS should easilly be restored now.
THE BAD:
Dopp was right, the Eastern Halberd Militia Animation dosen't work on Western Halberds. It even Creates Crashes if you take them out of Spearwall and they won't fight at all in it.
Back to the drawing Board their then.
Good stuff, except that I wonder if we have the wrong idea about what halberds should be doing. Halberds appear lower on the barracks tree than pikes. I'm not sure they are supposed to be better or to beat pikes at all. I now think they are supposed to be the missing link between spearmen and pikemen.
Good stuff, except that I wonder if we have the wrong idea about what halberds should be doing. Halberds appear lower on the barracks tree than pikes. I'm not sure they are supposed to be better or to beat pikes at all. I now think they are supposed to be the missing link between spearmen and pikemen.
You could be right Dopp. The trouble is even peasents are beating Halberd Militia, (western), thats pretty bad, I suspect most good spears (like Italian Spear Militia), could beat them too.
Lets not forget just how good Swiss Guard are statswise. They may well be in the middile ground between the 2, but currently perform better that Papal Guard only really against high end S&S units, (because the Halberds have AP), and against Cav.
Yeah they do need a buff, I'm just wondering if pike militia is a good test unit for them.
Pike Militia wasn't the only test i ran TBH. Also did Bazantyine Infantry, DFK, and Bill Militia. They got beat by all 3 but did best vs. Bill Militia, (this was with Halberd Militia BTW). DFK and Bazantyine Infantry where both very decisive losses. I didn't try them vs. spears TBH, but i'd expect a close win vs. anything but papal Guard/Dismounted Saphi Lancers TBH.
The real worry I have with buffing them is that if I go too far it will bork auto-calc badly.
I'll try and see what happens though.
A loss to Byz Inf, oh the shame of it...
Good news and Bad News:
THE GOOD:
The ME_Halberd_Militia Animation looks fine on 2HS units. In fact I could baerly tell the diffrance even when up close, (I pitted Zwei Handlers with their defualt Animation up against Nobole Swordsmen with the ME_Halberd_Militia animation), and is signifficantly more powerful. Balance between Fixed 2-Handers and 2HS should easilly be restored now.
THE BAD:
Dopp was right, the Eastern Halberd Militia Animation dosen't work on Western Halberds. It even Creates Crashes if you take them out of Spearwall and they won't fight at all in it.
Back to the drawing Board their then.
Regarding the GOOD, did you mean to say you gave the Noble Swordsmen (1HS) the ME halberd animation? I thought the test was to give the 2HS the ME_halberd animation?
Regarding the bad, what would happen if one were to simply remove the phalanx attribute from Western Halberds? Maybe then they might do better?
/Need to get back to my home PC so I can help test... :(
Sorry, I ment Highland Nobles. I think most knew what I meant, I've Edited anyway.
I could tr removing Phalanx, but I don't really want to turn them into just another 2-hander if I can help it. I think Dopp's idea on their purpose is probably the best one. A unit meant to do better than Spears against cav, whilst doing better than Spears vs. Infantry, but not qwuite a match for 2-Handers/Proper Pikes. Exceptions aside.
Just tried them at 60 Man unit size with +5 attack. worked fine. they arn't quite as good vs. S&S as 2-handers, or as good as Pikes in general, but they do tend to beat most 2-Handers or inflict heavy losses, (their initial poking phase tneds to prevent the 2-Handers from getting blows in while charging which gives them 2-3 seconds of free attacks).
I've just got to test them vs. cav. if that works out then i'll release the 1.1 version for you guys to disect~;p.
Just tested them vs. cav.
At first even Volougiers where fining Fuedal Knights Hard Work and Swiss uard where having similar issues with Chivalric Knights. Volouge Militia and Halberd Militia where struggling with anything besides Light cav as well. Whilst they killed plenty of enemy when they where charged, they still struggled.
Whilst i can defintly put some of it down to their slash animations being bugged vs. cav, (theirs only a few they actually use vs. cav so they have poor kill rates, only their ability to stab like pikes if not too close saves them), they still seemed pretty poor at actually reciving a charge.
A quick scan of the files later turned up the issue. they Lacked the Spear Attribbute. This gives defensive benefits vs charging cav and is somth all spear have and that Pikemen have on their "Pike". A quick edit later to give them Spear on their "Pike" and Light_Spear on their "Axe", (makes em useful vs. cav when not in guard mode), and they are working fine. Expect the 1.1 version as soon as I get the readme done. I'll create a new post as linking to another post is a pain, and the thread title isn't updating when I edit so i can't use it to tell people when a new version is out.
Just tested them vs. cav.
At first even Volougiers where fining Fuedal Knights Hard Work and Swiss uard where having similar issues with Chivalric Knights. Volouge Militia and Halberd Militia where struggling with anything besides Light cav as well. Whilst they killed plenty of enemy when they where charged, they still struggled.
Whilst i can defintly put some of it down to their slash animations being bugged vs. cav, (theirs only a few they actually use vs. cav so they have poor kill rates, only their ability to stab like pikes if not too close saves them), they still seemed pretty poor at actually reciving a charge.
A quick scan of the files later turned up the issue. they Lacked the Spear Attribbute. This gives defensive benefits vs charging cav and is somth all spear have and that Pikemen have on their "Pike". A quick edit later to give them Spear on their "Pike" and Light_Spear on their "Axe", (makes em useful vs. cav when not in guard mode), and they are working fine. Expect the 1.1 version as soon as I get the readme done. I'll create a new post as linking to another post is a pain, and the thread title isn't updating when I edit so i can't use it to tell people when a new version is out.
But no halberd units have the spear attribute. In fact that seems reserved for spears and pikes only, particularly as it also gives a penalty to infantry. Halberds are also supposed to be ok versus infantry. I just think it's because their stats suck - only 5 attack for most of them. Does adding spear actually improve their animation though, as it naturally seems rather ineffectual.
@Jambo: the Long_Pike attribute seems to remove the infantry penalty and the Light_Spear attribute does NOT have a penatly vs. infantry, but it also dosen't give as good a charge resistance as Spear and gives no general melee benefits vs. cav. The test in which they got mullered had them with +5 atack and they where allready beating up other 2-Handers bad enough. Finally, no attack benefit can make up for the defence benefits of the Spear/Light_spear Attribute. I've tested with spears and found that high defence matters more than attack vs. cav charges.
hey, Carl
just wondered if you have a version of the shield fix implemented along the lines suggested by Fishpants? i.e., half the value of the shield into armor, half into defense.
thanks for the nice work.
V1.02 had that, as does V1.1 which i'm uploading now. New thread should be up in about 3-4 mins.
hey, Carl
just wondered if you have a version of the shield fix implemented along the lines suggested by Fishpants? i.e., half the value of the shield into armor, half into defense.
thanks for the nice work.
The Foz has a nice little program which will take Fishpant's suggestions and convert it from your desc_unit.txt file. This is a nice touch as any changes you made to this file are preserved. If you want to use this particular fix on a mod, only the shield, armour, and def skills settings are changed, the rest of the file remains intact.
It does in fact use Foz's Program to crate the Sheild fix used so it is the half and half fix.
New Version up in a seperate thread BTW, please move all discussion to that thrad. Link (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=78069)
The Foz has a nice little program which will take Fishpant's suggestions and convert it from your desc_unit.txt file. This is a nice touch as any changes you made to this file are preserved. If you want to use this particular fix on a mod, only the shield, armour, and def skills settings are changed, the rest of the file remains intact.
That sound's lovely. From the sound of it: this is what I'd actually prefer (I like a different 2H fix from Carl's, no offense). Will check Foz's fix.
Closed per request of original poster (and due to now being a duplicate thread).
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