View Full Version : Question about lethality on Roman units
From the export_descr_unit, it seems like the Camillian Hastati has a lethality of 0.1, while the Rorarii has a lethality of 0.125. Shouldn't it be the other way round, since Rorarii are just reserve troops, while Hastatis do at least form the battle line.
I'd also query the velites lethality of 0.04. It would seem to make them a major step down from leves, with a lethality of 0.125. This does not seem right from a gameplay point of view, where they are effectively an upgrade of leves.
You could rationalise it as deriving from their using a "knife". But the archer auxilia also have a "knife" and yet their lethality is 0.1.
fallen851
02-19-2007, 22:17
Yes it is quite odd how lethality is worked out, it may be randomly generated, however I'd venture to say that it might have to do with the quality of the weapons? The lethality takes a jump after the Polybian reforms to .13.
Also the animation speed may have to do with it, and the fact they have a much higher attack. Lastly the higher lethality may be to deal with cavalry.
I'd like to think EB has carefully balanced each of the units, so that you can't find out the effectiveness of a unit simply by looking at the numbers.
From the export_descr_unit, it seems like the Camillian Hastati has a lethality of 0.1, while the Rorarii has a lethality of 0.125. Shouldn't it be the other way round, since Rorarii are just reserve troops, while Hastatis do at least form the battle line.
As far as I understand the lethality is weapon based, for example short swords have lethality 0.1 (Camillan Hastati) and underhand spears 0.125 (Rorarii, Leves)
IIRC according to the unit description velites should carry short swords, but in edu they have knives.
IIRC according to the unit description velites should carry short swords, but in edu they have knives.
It should be born in mind that this entry does nothing but describe the sound the weapon makes when it strikes something.
Watchman
02-20-2007, 12:41
Normal short swords have 0.1. The better Iberian type, which the Romans start using later, has 0.13.
It should be born in mind that this entry does nothing but describe the sound the weapon makes when it strikes something.
I mean they have lethality 0.04 (or had in .80, not played .81 yet), while short swords in unit description make me think that 0.1 may be more appropriate.
Kralizec
02-20-2007, 15:38
How does lethality work exactly? I always pictured that the attack stat deterines wether a stab/slash/strike would hit the target, and the lethality stat then determined wether the target would die or just be knocked over.
I have a feeling I'm horroribly wrong, though.
Yes you are right; lethality kicks in after the attack calculation has penetrated the target's defense, to see if the target dies or fall over.
So am I right in reading all this to mean that spears are more likely to kill on any one attempt than a sword?
I thought that swords were supposed to be good versus a spear (unless you're waving a sword in front of a fully prepared phalanx).
QwertyMIDX
02-20-2007, 18:48
There are two stats that determine the effectiveness of an attack, attack factor and lethality. A short sword has less lethality than a spear (which are further broken down into overhand and underhand), but it does come with a larger bonus to attack factor.
Watchman
02-20-2007, 21:11
And longswords (such as the heavier Celtic units use) come with a whopping 0.225 lethality. The attack rating usually isn't too shabby either, although I must say I never quite comprehended why the Taxeis Triballoi get shafted in this regard.
QwertyMIDX
02-20-2007, 21:25
The attack rating of a unit is based on two things, A) the skill of the troops and B) the type or weapon. A Celtic longsword has a great lethality rating, but it doesn't give any attack rating bonus.
Watchman
02-21-2007, 01:03
Sure, but for fierce barbarian longswordsmen shock troops prancing around in what, scale cuirasses, an attack skill of measly 7 seems a bit low don't you think ?
It would be nice if you could write something about each units lethality in their description. That way you would know about how good the unit actually is.
But how does archery works? It looks like they got a lethality of 1, which would mean that they would kill everything they hit? Yet they sometimes hit without a kill, just causing wounds or a block by the shield.
Indeed I think writing lethality in unit descriptions would be an excellent idea, as it is a crucial figure for understanding the attacking power of a said unit.
As a side note, I am not opposed to make it myself for the sake of general welfare, if you think it is useful just PM me.
Cataphract_Of_The_City
02-21-2007, 10:35
Sure, but for fierce barbarian longswordsmen shock troops prancing around in what, scale cuirasses, an attack skill of measly 7 seems a bit low don't you think ?
Didn't Polybian in his account of Telamon something like the swords of the Gauls bending on the first few blows so much that the Gauls had to withdraw to straighten them out? Or is it just nonsense?
Watchman
02-21-2007, 10:43
That'd have been the crap low-budget ones, at most (I don't see why the Celts wouldn't have made a fair few el cheapo crap blades on the side of decent ones). Certainly not the quality any warrior able to afford decent armour would bother with. Think of the "fake Rolex" principle and apply it to young, dumb and boastful barbarian warriors in a macho culture where a long sword is a hardcore status symbol... :no:
"Arrgh! Die, you *********'s!"
Bash Bash Crash
"Hang on, do you mind if I just sort this out? Yeah, I'll be back in a minute. Wait for me, OK?"
Cataphract_Of_The_City
02-22-2007, 00:17
"Arrgh! Die, you *********'s!"
Bash Bash Crash
"Hang on, do you mind if I just sort this out? Yeah, I'll be back in a minute. Wait for me, OK?"
Like in Asterix in Britain: Oh it's about time isn't. I beg you pardon! :P
From the export_descr_unit, it seems like the Camillian Hastati has a lethality of 0.1, while the Rorarii has a lethality of 0.125. Shouldn't it be the other way round, since Rorarii are just reserve troops, while Hastatis do at least form the battle line.
Don't these values refer to 'Min (short for minimum?) delay between attacks'? The time between attacks.....in which case less is better. That's what it says in the 'guide' at the top of the export_descr_unit file.
:dizzy2: I've heard people mention 'lethality' before and have always wondered where it was hidden. It seems, perhaps nowhere.....
Cheers,
Quilts
Watchman
02-22-2007, 10:57
Nah. Lethality is the last value in the string (the one that all EB melee attacks have under 1). Attack delay is the one before it - kontos lances have 200, for example.
In my translation of Polybius theres a note saying that the bendy sword bit is very similar to Plutarchs account of Camillus battle with the Gauls in 377BC, and that it may simply be an ancient version of an urban legend. Like Watchman said there may have been a few crap blades which bent, but I doubt it would be anything near most of them.
The more important factor seems to me to be that the gauls were using long slashing swords, while the romans had short stabby ones. The romans simply pressed forwards and didnt give the gauls room to swing their swords.
pezhetairoi
02-22-2007, 14:46
I -thought- the short stabbing swords were far more lethal than non-phalangite spears. I mean, we have stories about how the phalangitai at Kynoskephalae were dismayed when the first casualties from the skirmishes before the battle came in and they were torn apart with gaping wounds so unlike the neat and often non-lethal puncture wounds of their spears... I mean, swords do major tissue trauma.
antisocialmunky
02-22-2007, 15:43
Some short stabbing swords also allowed for the most pressure to be focused on a single point than even more so than spears due to the way it was thrust.
I -thought- the short stabbing swords were far more lethal than non-phalangite spears. I mean, we have stories about how the phalangitai at Kynoskephalae were dismayed when the first casualties from the skirmishes before the battle came in and they were torn apart with gaping wounds so unlike the neat and often non-lethal puncture wounds of their spears... I mean, swords do major tissue trauma.
That story was from a cavalry skirmish I think, not of dead phalangitai. So it wouldn't be wounds from gladi but instead of longer cavalry swords.
I think.
I hate the idea of somehow coming up with an equation that "proves" unit "x" is better overall than unit "y". You can certainly perform some rough grouping (elites vs. normal vs. levies), but within the subset of each group, who cares? The real lethality of any unit or mix of units is dependant upon your tactical skills as a general. If your strategy amounts to lining up one group that's slightly better than another and depending upon attrition to win the day......gah!
So go ahead and add some units of theoretically lesser "value" to your armies. If you are a good general, it shouldn't matter one whit. And if you aren't a good general, then practice tactics and styles and methods until you are. THAT is what results in battles you remember and tell stories about. Pah on the slaughterfests!
Watchman
02-22-2007, 21:53
That story was from a cavalry skirmish I think, not of dead phalangitai. So it wouldn't be wounds from gladi but instead of longer cavalry swords.
I think.This is AFAIK correct. And makes you wonder what the uproar was, given that one of the more popular instruments among Hellenic cavalrymen for smiting down thine neighbour was the kopis/machaira, which is pretty much designed for messily dismembering people.
As for short swords vs. spearheads, well, it wasn't that unusual for the business end of a war spear to be not much unlike a short sword stuck atop a pole... Check out the things some of the Celtic units in particular have been modelled with. And aren't some excavated sarissa tips something like well over half a meter long ?
I thought that it was a matter of game mechanics, Kull. Rather than a judgment of the value of a type of soldier in history.
As for the bendy swords. Maybe someone had an old hand-me-down bronze sword?
How much would they get bent fighting men with iron weapons? It could even be a mid-iron age 'look how out of date they are,' laugh at the barbarians joke.
Watchman
02-22-2007, 22:03
Bronze would just spring back into shape wouldn't it ? Soft iron is an entirely another issue.
Methinks the Roman witnesses to the issue just found the phenomenom of low-quality specimen among the usually painfully well-made Celtic longswords peculiar enough to be worth a special mention, and the tale as usual not only grew in the telling but was also influenced by the usual Greco-Roman insistence on looking down along their noses on "barbarians". Although I've never seen a direct quote of the relevant passage of Polybius (or whoever), so I don't even know if he's implying all or most Gallic blades were cruddy in the first place...
Speaking of cavalry swords, what sort of lethality should the Roman spatha have in EB ? Wasn't it developed off Celtic longswords or something ?
This is AFAIK correct. And makes you wonder what the uproar was, given that one of the more popular instruments among Hellenic cavalrymen for smiting down thine neighbour was the kopis/machaira, which is pretty much designed for messily dismembering people.
There's a theory that the Romans just kept at it when they were dead already, so they'd not be exactly shocked at the weapons effects, but rather on how the systematic Roman soldier looked at killing. As in, butcher-work.
Bronze would just spring back into shape wouldn't it ? Soft iron is an entirely another issue.
That all depends on how the sword was made. Simply put, soft iron doesn't store as much energy as a bronze alloy, but most of these weapons had a decent amount of steel in their cutting edges, so it's not a linear thing we're discussing here.
Generally speaking, bronze is superior to iron in every way until it becomes worked steel. Oh and it's also more expensive.
@Maeran:
Steel making was far more advanced in the oppida of central Europe and Iberia than in Roman and Greek worlds.
MarcusAureliusAntoninus
02-23-2007, 04:12
Generally speaking, bronze is superior to iron in every way until it becomes worked steel.
:inquisitive:
An army equipted with iron would decimate an army equipted with bronze.
I'm afraid you're wrong, if we're applying strict terms. Every single physical property of Bronze is superior to Iron. It is the process of making a weapon that *may* make iron superior bronze by mechanical processes.
It's more a matter of the technique involved in the making of the weapon, rather than the material itself.
Watchman
02-23-2007, 04:19
:inquisitive:
An army equipted with iron would decimate an army equipted with bronze.
That's not actually so cut and dried. Take an army from the very end of the bronze-weapon period, when the technical know-how of how to make nice killy tools out of it had reached its peak (the Chinese apparently really pushed the envelope for example), and put it up against an equivalent one equipped with early, crappy iron weaponry and my money'd be on the former hands down. Iron is admirably plentiful all things considered and hence cheap, and once you figure out the tricks you can do things with it bronze can't even hope to achieve; but before you've figured out the tricky metallurgy and craftsmanship involved highly advanced bronze goods will remain competitive (in terms of quality if not quantity and price) for a good while.
Remember also that people kept making armour out of bronze long after iron weaponry became the norm.
MarcusAureliusAntoninus
02-23-2007, 04:26
Sure you take a chunk of iron ore up against a bronze sword, the bronze will win. But if you put equal quality into both (iron, admititedly, will require greater heat and probably longer time), the iron will win.
That's not actually so cut and dried. Take an army from the very end of the bronze-weapon period, when the technical know-how of how to make nice killy tools out of it had reached its peak (the Chinese apparently really pushed the envelope for example), and put it up against an equivalent one equipped with early, crappy iron weaponry and my money'd be on the former hands down. Iron is admirably plentiful all things considered and hence cheap, and once you figure out the tricks you can do things with it bronze can't even hope to achieve; but before you've figured out the tricky metallurgy and craftsmanship involved highly advanced bronze goods will remain competitive (in terms of quality if not quantity and price) for a good while.
Indeed, and that period you speak of was probably very long, as you can find both types of weapons co-existing for a couple hundred years before bronze is phased out as a weapon's material. Heck at the time of the Romans there were still tribes equipped with locally made bronze spearheads.
Iron is blissfully plentyfull, and that was it's main strength before any of it's physical characteristics, and why it gained such prominence at a time the main ingredients of bronze become scarce. You could then become a military power by yourself, instead of having to submit to those cultures that controlled the trade routes of bronze making.
Remember also that people kept making armour out of bronze long after iron weaponry became the norm.
Bronze has this magnificent property you know. There's *much* less metal-on-metal friction than other metals, so let's say you hit a guy with a bronze helmet in his head with a sword, chances are, it'll glance off and hit your shoulders, which are hopefully protected by the then [what you know, it actually makes sense] very common shoulder-reinforcements most armour had, linen or mail.
Sure you take a chunk of iron ore up against a bronze sword, the bronze will win. But if you put equal quality into both (iron, admititedly, will require greater heat and probably longer time), the iron will win.
Thing is, it is no longer iron by the time it gets better than bronze. Not entirely anyway.
vBulletin® v3.7.1, Copyright ©2000-2025, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.