hastati's pila won't kill a single hoplitai haploi in frontal phalanx attack

When I try to test this out, my hastati never get their volleys in before the lines have engaged. I've done this five times now. Each time the haploi, just before they get in range, turn their shields towards the hastati, and run to their right, reform the line a little closer, then charge with spears out. When they hit, the first row of the hastati engage them, but the others let go their spears and immediately the 163 hastati trim the 162 haploi down to about 148 (immediately). When the hastati are reduced to 137, the haploi are at 42 and rout. Almost the same result all four times I played it out. As the greeks, I hit the line before they could throw their pila. Results were about the same still though in the end.

but you're using the internal set-up for the patch, not the .8 set-up with phalanx mode (i think), which was why i asked a non-member to test the fire-at-will and passive approaches to see if the effect differed.

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Originally Posted by Teleklos Archelaou

DUDE JUST HANG ON. THIS THREAD IS AN HOUR OLD.

You people are ridiculous. We have freaking lives you know. Just give it more than a damned hour.

ARGH!!!!*(^&*)%$!

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Wow. TA. Control man.

You guys are missing the obvious. Sometimes the Pila "don't" (I can almost hearing the gasping of the EB team members now) hit the hoplon, and instead go into the leg, arm, neck, whatever of the hoplite.

Now most of the time they shield will take the blow, but not always, and when you have that many pila being thrown at once, if two are coming at one guy, he may only be able to block one with his shield.

Another addition to the "Why I Hate Vanilla Phalanx Formation" list.

I loaded up an old V.80 game and ran three custom battles. In all of them, the Hastati were able to get off at least one pila attack, and every time it killed two Hoplites. So the whole premise that in a frontal attack, "not a single Hoplite can be killed by pila" is complete baloney. And after the two units met in melee, the results were invariably a crushing loss for the hoplites. In my three battles the hoplites lost 66, 68, and 75 men while the hastati lost 7, 2, and 4.

You know it was almost as if.......the Hoplites were fighting without shields....you know, shields that had to be dropped because of the pila sticking in them. No, THAT can't be right! Instead it must be that EB has screwed up again! Yeah, that's the ticket! :wall:

Wow, Kull, TA, you guys are really getting upset over this.

How did you kill 66 men and only lose 7? Did you attack frontally?

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Originally Posted by fallen851

Wow, Kull, TA, you guys are really getting upset over this.

How did you kill 66 men and only lose 7? Did you attack frontally?

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I'm not upset. It's just ho hum, another day of defending ourselves against baseless accusations. Somebody makes the bogus statement that pila don't kill ANY hoplites, and does anybody out here actually test it to see if it's true? Did you? Why of course not, it just validated your theory that our EDU is completely messed up. And almost everyone else just immediately assumed the statement was true. "What pila can't kill any hoplites? Well EB has gotten it wrong again!" What a load of horse hooey.

And TA is correct to remind people that we are under no obligation to provide ANY answers to ANYBODY out here. And certainly not when it is couched as a demand ("so where are those stat people anyway?!?!")

Yes, it was a frontal attack. And the third battle I was the Hoplites and the AI was the Hastati. Made no difference. If you watch the battle up close, it's pretty clear what's going on. As swordsmen, the Hastati "wrap around" the phalanx formation and start chewing away at the guys on the flanks. After a few kills, the wrap turns into a full fledged double envelopment. Few units can overcome that.

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Originally Posted by Teleklos Archelaou

When I try to test this out, my hastati never get their volleys in before the lines have engaged. I've done this five times now. Each time the haploi, just before they get in range, turn their shields towards the hastati, and run to their right, reform the line a little closer, then charge with spears out. When they hit, the first row of the hastati engage them, but the others let go their spears and immediately the 163 hastati trim the 162 haploi down to about 148 (immediately). When the hastati are reduced to 137, the haploi are at 42 and rout. Almost the same result all four times I played it out. As the greeks, I hit the line before they could throw their pila. Results were about the same still though in the end.

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I can usually get a volley off, but it all depends on the situation. I usually only see about 3-6 Haploi dead, but I play on large. This has to do with the fact that they have no armor. Normal hoplites, Spartans, and Carthaginian Libyan hoplites receive very few casualties. In melee Hoplitai Haploi don't stand much of a chance against Hastati, especially if they are in guard position and get surrounded.

Yeah, I got ticked off, and I still am. I just posted that we (talking to the other EB members who had posted) should let the stat guys answer it - and immediately (within two minutes) our new friend posted "well what is their reasoning?". If they don't get around to answering something (not just them, but anyone) inside EB after a couple of days, it's not a really big deal, but we ask for something again then. But two freaking minutes is too long to wait - there had to be a response "well..." within that two minute window. If I say we will let the stat guys respond, then posting TWO MINUTES LATER "well what is their reasoning" is going to really irritate me and is not going to get them to post. We don't rush to the internal forum and start a new thread with the title "HURRY UP - SOMEONE MUST POST ANSWER NOW!!!" or start PM'ing each other or something. Christ. Let's stop everything we are doing - call someone up on their cell phone if need be - and get the answer back within the hour that this thread has been open when this takes place. :wall:

I'm serious: we do have better things to do than get our project manager and project whip to stop their work and run tests on this that just totally blows the whole matter away anyhoo.

(Kull mentioned his 0.80 test and my numbers with 0.81 show a 162 men hoplitai haploi unit loses about 7 men with the pila throw of the hastati).

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Originally Posted by Kull

I'm not upset. It's just ho hum, another day of defending ourselves against baseless accusations.

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Next time just tell them, "Don't like it, make your own mod." :idea2:

This mod is such a grand piece of work they will still come back for more. Guarenteed. I do, however, think you have sufficiently justified your work. Between the phalanx formation thing for .81 (if I understood correctly) and the fact that we don't want this to be a "Rome rolls over the rest of the world" mod.

After my first 30 minutes of playing this mod when 0.8 came out I decided to put my full faith in the EB mod team to work out the kinks and come up with the best solutions for what I would confidently consider the best mod to date for RTW.

Show some faith guys. Just look what they've done with what is, in my opinion, an otherwise unplayable game in it's vanilla state.

I can't give you all enough Kudos.

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Originally Posted by tk-421

In melee Hoplitai Haploi don't stand much of a chance against Hastati, especially if they are in guard position and get surrounded.

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I tried a few more, all with Hoplites under human control. The pila casualties didn't alter much (a one and a couple two's), but removing Guard mode reduced the impact of flanking quite a bit. When I was on a hill charging down at the Hastati, i killed 20 and lost 72, which was much better. On level ground the effect was much less, killing 5 and losing 59. The big difference was armoring up and adding morale. A gold chevron hoplite with a bronze sword and shield was extremely competitive against raw hastati. I lost in the end, but killed 48 (losing 75).

The big difference in this battle seemed to be that Roman units have two extra officers - a general, a captain, and a standard bearer. My single General helped hold one flank steady, but their three were able to collapse the other and once those three Roman Officers got behind my men and started chopping away, it was impossible to overcome. It was a very interesting battle for a while though. I had lost almost 20 guys to their 5, but then began whittling away until the differential was only eight. The messages talked of victory for me, but the differential held even for another 20 losses, after which their officers collapsed my right flank, and victory fled.

I did a quick test and everything seems fine to me.

V8.0 - Unit Size 160

Two Volleys Then Attack Head On

Pre Marian Hastati

Battle #1

Fist Volley: 2 Hoplitai Dead
Second Volley: 1 Hoplitai Dead

Hastati Kills: 139
Hastati Remaining: 151

Hoplitai Kills: 14
Hoplitai Remaining: 22

Battle #2

First Volley: 1 Hopliti Dead
Second Volley: 3 Hopliti Dead

Hastati Kills: 125
Hastati Remaining: 149

Hoplitai Kills: 17
Hoplitai Remaining: 36

Marian

Battle #1

First Volley: 0 Hopliti Dead
Second Volley: 2 Hopliti Dead

Hastati Kills: 134
Hastati Remaining: 154

Hoplitai Kills: 11
Hoplitai Remaining: 27

Battle #2

First Volley 0 Hopliti Dead
Second Volley: 3 Hoplliti Dead

Hastati Kills: 110
Hastati Remaining: 155

Hoplitai Kills: 9
Hoplitai Remaining: 51


One Volley Then Attack Head On


Pre Marian Hastati

Battle #1

Fist Volley: 0 Hoplitai Dead

Hastati Kills: 143
Hastati Remaining: 149

Hoplitai Kills: 17
Hoplitai Remaining: 18

Battle #2

First Volley: 0 Hopliti Dead

Hastati Kills: 131
Hastati Remaining: 138

Hoplitai Kills: 29
Hoplitai Remaining: 30


Marian

Battle #1

First Volley: 2 Hopliti Dead

Hastati Kills: 132
Hastati Remaining: 154

Hoplitai Kills: 11
Hoplitai Remaining: 29

Battle #2

First Volley 1 Hopliti Dead

Hastati Kills: 98
Hastati Remaining: 149

Hoplitai Kills: 16
Hoplitai Remaining: 63

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Originally Posted by Kull

I'm not upset. It's just ho hum, another day of defending ourselves against baseless accusations. Somebody makes the bogus statement that pila don't kill ANY hoplites, and does anybody out here actually test it to see if it's true? Did you? Why of course not, it just validated your theory that our EDU is completely messed up.

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Wow, when did I say the EDU is completely messed up? For a team that makes a living on picking apart vocabularly of those who criticize, I'm disappointed in your usage. I'll write it off because I think you are upset.

The EDU is not completely messed up, but it has some major issues. First there are alot of errors. Second, I hate the way missle units are balanced, mostly because the balancing job does absolutely nothing to save us from the archer bug, and there is good ways to compensate for the archer bug, without archers being overwhemling.

Third, I hate the way elite units are. Some are just too powerful, particularly any unit with 2hp. Finally, cavalry is poorly balanced. Cataphracts are too powerful, particularly against other cavalry. Since they have armor all over, they can't see or move well, and another rider would easily be able to defeat them. Maybe you don't agree, doesn't really matter, but as Alexander the Pretty Good once said on the Guild about Vanilla "if you have to use strategy, you don't have enough elite units." That rings very true for EB. How many people went into a battle with great tactics only to lose to Gaesatae?

But did I test it? No. I didn't. Why? Because EB's edu text is currently in many pieces as I edit it, planning to put it back together for 0.81, and I don't have my CD with me.

So why did I believe it? I don't know how many times I've thrown a missle unit against a Hellenistic phalanx only to see no kills. I believe that at 1-2 men should die when 160 pila are thrown, if you are fighting a top-tier phalanx. Lesser phalanx's = more kills. So 2 deaths for 160 pila, isn't right.

Flame Away.

OK, it's clear now that Hoplitai Haploi are just waayyyyyy overpowered! When a Gold shield, Gold sword, triple Gold Chevron Hoplite takes on raw Hastati on the side of a cliff, the Hastati get annhilated. Final numbers were 73 dead Hastati, only 4 dead Hoplites. Back to drawing board, I guess! :laugh4:

https://img49.imageshack.us/img49/53...hastatihq2.jpg

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Originally Posted by fallen851

The EDU text balancing is the worst part (which is why I'm rebalancing it...)of the wonderful mod in my opinion.

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Flame you? Why bother. Let your own words do the roasting. I'd say that "messed up" is a pretty good parapharase of that statement.

I wonder if there are any backup developers for EB once the current ones break down... You guys need a press secretary, like the former white house one who could make the press cry from frustration. That should ease some of the pain. Give him a ring, he might be available. ~:wacko:

My thought about this is I find it strange that generally arrows and javelins have the same damage. That may be because I started with RTR and it has a whole different arrow/javelin balance. I don't know much about the calculations behind these, so I'm really not fit to comment.

I think it is a compliment to the team that people have to go to such detail to try and find areas of weakness. Notice i didnt use the words fault or error here.

Sure every now and again someone will find something that needs tweaking, but generally I've seen bugger all found.

If people do want to report something strange......they should test it more than once before reacting as a rule and give clearer context. Just posting before they have reproduced the 'observation' at least twice is something that should be avoided.

I wouldn't expect a swathe of casualties from the Roman tactic, as the tactic in this case was to impair and disrupt the formation NOT kill swathes of hoplon. They did this so they could get close in and THEN destroy the phalanx.

I just think this is someone overreacting because they are passionate about something, just as the team are.

The problem was the tone of what was typed :) it came across in a non constructive manner that probably wasnt intended.

So guys...get back to .81 please...were desparate out here :whip:

According to another thread we had around here, the penetration strength of a heavy javelin was about 8,2mm of bronze.
(https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=77958)
Despite what the number about arrow says, this one seems reasonable.

A hoplon shield was essentially a circle about 1m across, so the area covered was 0,785m^2. This would correspond to a volume of 7,850 cm^2* 0,82 cm = 6437 cm^3
Since density of bronze is approximately 8,3 grams per cubic centimeter, the weight of the shield would be approximately 53 kilograms, nearly twice the maximum reasonable weight of a soldiers' equipment.

Therefore, a heavy javelin should pierce through any reasonable shield with ease.

McHrozni

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Originally Posted by Kull

The big difference in this battle seemed to be that Roman units have two extra officers - a general, a captain, and a standard bearer. My single General helped hold one flank steady, but their three were able to collapse the other and once those three Roman Officers got behind my men and started chopping away, it was impossible to overcome.

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Do the officers have different stats then? I know the general does, but I thought that the standard bearer and captain shared stats with the rest of the unit.

Thanks for the laughs, Kull! :laugh4: :2thumbsup:

To me, more annoying still with phalanxs is the way that they can immediately turn around or to the side and present their spears that way, or higher-end units ( in EB pezhetairoi and above), are able to resist direct hits ( charges from cavalry or shock infantry) frm behinf, while engaged from the front. But that has more to do with the way the phalanx formation is coded in RTW engine than anything else.

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Originally Posted by Kugutsu

Do the officers have different stats then? I know the general does, but I thought that the standard bearer and captain shared stats with the rest of the unit.

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The same question was asked a couple of weeks ago, and the answer is that no-one really knows, but they almost certainly have multiple hitpoints, and a high lethality, which means every succesful hit is a kill. (I initially didn't believe the latter when QwertyMIDX told me, but after watching them in combat I must admit it's true.)

Out of interest: how do you know that generals have different stats?

Wow, didn't expect so many comments. Interesting to read what everybody has to say on this.

Orb: I was playing with Camillan hastati. I'm also using huge unit size. So it was 160 hastati vs. 160 hoplitai haploi. I set the hastati to fire at will, let them stand still, and let the hoplitai haploi approach them (they approach in a phalanx and hastati stand still, so the hastati have enough time for two volleys, also I didn't change the width of the formation). First volley was from a distance, the second was reasonably up close. But hey, even if they use hastae and not pila, they throw 160 x 2 at the haploi's, so there should be a realistic chance that some of the pila hit some haploi's in the legs, head or neck, no?

Besides that, from the description I read that hoplitai haploi are basically the poorest citizens levied into a phalanx. If you're a poor guy, wouldn't it be less likely for you to be able to afford such an excellent bronze shield which can ward off pila/hastae?

keravnos: I don't want to make life easier for the Romanii, but I thought that no casualties at all was another extreme.

EB developers: thank you very much for your attention to this and your explanations. I did not mean to be annoying and whine about this trivial issue, if that's how you perceive it. I was just wondering for the reason the game behaves this way. It saddened me when I read the posts that some of you are so annoyed by this, I didn't mean to. Let me make this clear, I think you are all doing a great job and hold you in high respect. My question about pila vs. phalanx was just a question, not a complaint. If the EB team thinks it's fine that it causes no casualties I'm ok with that.

Kull: I can assure you that I'm telling the truth, I'm not lying. If you want evidence, I can capture the custom battle in a movie.

One more thing to consider, I've also tested hastati's pila versus phalangitai deuteroi. It's the same story with the phalangitai deuteroi, no casualties. However, phalangitai deuteroi have a shield which is about twice as small and only covers their abdomen.

http://www.svanloon.nl/eb_movie.mp4

This is the evidence for 0 casualties. I recorded this with Fraps, Fraps is crap and for some reason it stopped capturing at two points in the movie, so I had to start a new capture and then join three avi files together later.

It's encoded in H.264/MPEG4, if you can't play it use the Combined Community Codec Pack. Though it's 10 MB, which might not seem much, please go easy on my webhosting (i.e. don't download it by the hundreds).

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Originally Posted by F for Fragging

Kull: I can assure you that I'm telling the truth, I'm not lying. If you want evidence, I can capture the custom battle in a movie.

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I never accused you of lying, but I still feel the assertion (i.e no kills) is "bogus", simply because it wasn't tested multiple times to ensure that you weren't looking at a statistical anomaly. I ran 7 different games and suffered hoplite casualties in every pila attack except the one with the gold shield guys (which was mostly a joke, but also I was so mad at continually losing to hastati I just wanted to find a way to beat them into the earth! :laugh4:).

And even that silly test pointed out that other factors are at play here. Armor and Experience, certainly. But also things like type of battlefield. Was it level or hilly? My point is that before you make an all-encompassing assertion, you really need to test it out. If the statement had been, "really low kill rates", then I'm CERTAIN the tone would have been different. But you said "zero", and then others jumped on board, and when the Team tested and found it was "not zero", well, there you have it.

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Originally Posted by fallen851

Third, I hate the way elite units are. Some are just too powerful, particularly any unit with 2hp. Finally, cavalry is poorly balanced. Cataphracts are too powerful, particularly against other cavalry. Since they have armor all over, they can't see or move well, and another rider would easily be able to defeat them. Maybe you don't agree, doesn't really matter, but as Alexander the Pretty Good once said on the Guild about Vanilla "if you have to use strategy, you don't have enough elite units." That rings very true for EB. How many people went into a battle with great tactics only to lose to Gaesatae?

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I've done a bunch of tests before. My saka cataphracts were always murdered by iberian lancers, despite me charging. The most kills I got was 26ish. Over 8 tests, I averaged about 10. So no, not all cataphracts are overpowered. Not even the parthians heavies are imo, I've beaten them jsut surround and charge they fall like flies. Also there is only 1 unit with 2 hps. And Gaesatae are weak, I don't know why everyone whines about them. Just hit them with archers/slingers and javeliens first and normal infantry is just as good as them. Or hit them with a heavy cav charge, they die like everyone else.

Also how would you change it so they still have a ton of armour, but are weak in meele vs other cavalry? And I've never seen anything saying they were bad in meele vs other cavalry, only that they are GOOD vs other cavalry.

AFAIK all the ironmongery they wore had a tendency to make catas kinda clumsy, and the often somewhat excessive protection to the face doubtless caused air circulation and situational awareness issues. In a freewheeling cavalry melee this could obviously become a major problem - but then those guys fought in very close and solid order specifically to avoid such situations in the first place. Lack of agility and starkly restricted peripheral vision aren't much of a problem if the opposition can't flank you to begin with, right ?

There's no shortage of instances where entire cataphract squadrons were flanked and broken of course, but really, what cavalry formation does survive getting hit in the flank or rear in any case ?

You cannot badger these guys about these little issues when they have obviously put in a lot of time to make this mod, which Im playing now instead of MTW2, you get this for free, you cant ask for more, if you feel that the javlins are not powerful enough, then edit the unit file and increase the value to your satisfaction.

None of that matters to a few folks zonks. It makes coming to the public forum a lot less interesting to me though. My interest in constantly defending the mod from post after post of complaints from about two or three people total sure has dwindled.

Just out of curiosity: are there any other units that used the RTW phalanx in 0.80 but wich get the same make-over as Hoplitai Haploi?