light spear balance (vs. swords) in 1.2

All I know is, when I tested rather extensively the effects of both "spear" and "light_spear", the latter performed much more sanely all other things being equal. Seriously, crap levies with the "spear" attribute were pushing freakin' cataphracts and heavily armoured elite infantry all over the place...

I've no idea what the exact mechanical effects of "light_spear" actually are; what I found out is that in practice compared to their equals with "spear", the test units with it both died and killed their enemies at a slower rate.

Put short - the +4 compensation bonus on "light_spear" works. I'm not sure how or why exactly, but it does.

oh i dont deny that light_spear makes much more sense for most spear units. in the stats for RTR, i use light_spear for all spearmen except for phalanx units; those get spear (but only after reducing the unit radius to 0.3). i do, however think that CA got the modifiers for these attributes right (IMO) so i base the attack stats on unit abilty and training

@Watchman
If you claim, that spears are by long shot no different than other weapons, than why use spear attribute at all? My gripe with spear is not so much it`s performance vs infantry but it`s "Conan mode" vs horses, which with a +4 to attack becomes quite ridiculous.

As you said, spear is very effective in a close formation. At the same time it was very rarely used as a personal weapon, to be carried along for self-defence. First it`s too unwieldly and it`s not particularly good in 1v1 combat.
So... in the end I, too, lowered attack of spears by 4 points, while increasing their lethality. Guard mode offsets their malus to defence, while they killing power stays more or less the same, as it was. But they are no longer so effective vs. heavily armoured foes (lower attack), while somewhat better vs unarmoured ones (higher lethality). THEY NO LONGER SLAUGHTER HEAVY CAVALRY SO MUCH. Going out of guard mode carries a risk though, as their defense skill still gets -4 penalty.

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Originally Posted by Woreczko

If you claim, that spears are by long shot no different than other weapons, than why use spear attribute at all?

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Because spears are uniquely well suited for anti-cavalry work, and the effects of the attributes reflect that ?

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My gripe with spear is not so much it`s performance vs infantry but it`s "Conan mode" vs horses, which with a +4 to attack becomes quite ridiculous.

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*shrug* Spearmen that failed to run away were grossly dangerous to cavalry. Fact of the world, even if their spears were just bayonets atop a musket (which it should be noted was not a very optimal configuration as a spear...).

Although I think you rather exaggerate the in-game effect, it teaches players to respect that.

Also, without the compensation bonus units with either of the spear attributes grossly underperform against infantry - to recognise how grossly nonsensical this is, look no further than the Greek hoplites who for most of their history chiefly fought each other...

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At the same time it was very rarely used as a personal weapon, to be carried along for self-defence.

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Gee, no duh. Might have something to do with the fact that the usual lenght of a fighting-spear was 2-2.5 meters, which is obviously something you're not going to lug around unless you know you're going to need it.
Which rather obviously disqualifies it as an everyday self-protection tool in most contexts, though I'd point out over here long a popular peasant version was a skiing pole with a spearhead on top - I've heard such called "wolf-spears".

Worth noting, though, that foot travelers pretty universally had a fairly robust staff as a walking stick; the techniques used to fight with one are virtually identical to those used when wielding spears two-handed, and it is further worth mentioning that several accredited masters-at-arms such as George Silver thought very highly of it as a tool of "civilian" personal combat...

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...it`s not particularly good in 1v1 combat.

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And you base this claim on what exactly ? Pikes, perhaps ?
From what I understand for example Homer has his heroes engage in their duels primarily with their spears, only resorting to swords when those are lost. Similarly, take the diverse highly warlike inhabitants of northern Europe in Ye Olden Times; while due to economic reasons proper swords were quite rare axes and war-clubs (which some Germanic warriors around Roman times at least seem to have been rather fond of) were ubiquitous enough. Yet despite that, and the fact the heavily forested and generally uncooperative terrain and small "skirmish" scale of most engagements commonly forced the warriors fight a whirling melee in open order (essentially a series of more-or-less duels en masse), spears were the favourite primary weapons by far...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Because spears are uniquely well suited for anti-cavalry work, and the effects of the attributes reflect that ?
*shrug* Spearmen that failed to run away were grossly dangerous to cavalry. Fact of the world, even if their spears were just bayonets atop a musket (which it should be noted was not a very optimal configuration as a spear...).

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Of course! But then, how often enemy infantry IN EB runs away BEFORE cavalry charge hits them? Not very often, eh? Such is the engine of RTW. With current state of affairs, it means, that you can stop enemy hetairoi with most feeble pantodapoi, beacause they will not run away in fear of being trampled. And in melee they have a good chance to prevail, due to spear bonuses combined with innate high attack value. The latter would be ok, if the former actually took place. Hell, in RL any stationary cavalry is as good as dead if mobbed by infantry, spears or not.

But in EB infantry won`t run before the charge and cavalry will fight it stationary. I`m just trying to do something about it :)

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Also, without the compensation bonus units with either of the spear attributes grossly underperform against infantry - to recognise how grossly nonsensical this is, look no further than the Greek hoplites who for most of their history chiefly fought each other...

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You are right. I`m not advocating spears to be made weaker (in fact I don`t expect EB team to work on EB I at all - better speed up the release of the second incarnation :) ). I just don`t like this attack bonus. It skewers autocalc and makes them unusually good vs units with high defense. Better increase thier lethality and, in case of hoplites, reduce radius (slightly, so they still need guard mode to fight in a "shieldwall") :)

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Gee, no duh. Might have something to do with the fact that the usual lenght of a fighting-spear was 2-2.5 meters, which is obviously something you're not going to lug around unless you know you're going to need it.
Which rather obviously disqualifies it as an everyday self-protection tool in most contexts, though I'd point out over here long a popular peasant version was a skiing pole with a spearhead on top - I've heard such called "wolf-spears".

Worth noting, though, that foot travelers pretty universally had a fairly robust staff as a walking stick; the techniques used to fight with one are virtually identical to those used when wielding spears two-handed, and it is further worth mentioning that several accredited masters-at-arms such as George Silver thought very highly of it as a tool of "civilian" personal combat...
And you base this claim on what exactly ? Pikes, perhaps ?
From what I understand for example Homer has his heroes engage in their duels primarily with their spears, only resorting to swords when those are lost. Similarly, take the diverse highly warlike inhabitants of northern Europe in Ye Olden Times; while due to economic reasons proper swords were quite rare axes and war-clubs (which some Germanic warriors around Roman times at least seem to have been rather fond of) were ubiquitous enough. Yet despite that, and the fact the heavily forested and generally uncooperative terrain and small "skirmish" scale of most engagements commonly forced the warriors fight a whirling melee in open order (essentially a series of more-or-less duels en masse), spears were the favourite primary weapons by far...

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But even Homer`s heroes carry swords into the duel! Because spears are to be thrown or broken or made useless by the closeness of the opponent. It`s not safe to rely on spear alone. That = malus to defense if unit is armed with spear only. Or is not really trained to use it`s secondary arm.

Howgh!

Dude. Everybody carried backup sidearms. You can see them included in the skins of many EB units, too. Spears are very good primary weapons, but as mentioned have a bad habit of getting their shafts broken sooner or later (or getting stuck in someone's innards and/or shield more than can be dealt with in the middle of a fight) and like all weapons with good reach run into severe troubles should the combat move to "close in" distances.

Anyone who tried to use a single weapon alone as an all-purpose panacea Darwinised out of the competition right fast.

Watchman, I have an idea, what if attack rating is lowered -4 for all spearmen that are not the pseudo-phalanxes.

So that Mori Gaesum, Iphikates, Alpine, Helvetii, Dacian, thorakitai hopitai, speutagardaz and any other pseudo-phalanx would have a slight advantage in terms of having the higher attack value without having the phalanx formation.

conversely the pseudo-phalanxes could be given a higher attack rating like the high attack rating of the Carthaginian elite spearmen units (don't remember there names:wall:).

Separately,

I also think a radius of 0.3 would be good for the all spearmen. units classified as light stay as default and heavy maybe something between 0.4 and 0.3 so they do not spread out as far when engaging in melee and leaving other stats alone.

Cheers :2thumbsup:

...and screw, say, the Classical Hoplites' ability to fight other infantry, something they were noticeably rather good at...? :inquisitive:

Though, I do intend to continue looking into the radius thingy and how it could be used, picking up from where I was before going AWOL for three months. The infantry vs. infantry tests I did back then looked quite promising (and made the individual soldiers' behaviour in the line of battle rather interesting), but I never got around to seeing what the effects would be for foot versus horse match-ups (and if it would be a good idea to shrink the horses' radii as well)...

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Originally Posted by PraetorFigus

conversely the pseudo-phalanxes could be given a higher attack rating like the high attack rating of the Carthaginian elite spearmen units (don't remember there names:wall:).

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What about this option? In a KH campaign, Carthage is spamming these two units, the armies are getting lots of chevrons so the attack is unusually high on top of their default value.

https://www.europabarbarorum.com/i/u...ican_pikes.gifhttps://www.europabarbarorum.com/i/u...ed_libypho.gif :whip: :furious3:

Ekdromoi, Akontistai, Sphendonetai, Toxotai and Haploi are not enough to keep Emporion and Massalia that rebelled to me after Carthage took spain and parts of gaul! :wall:

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Originally Posted by Watchman

...and screw, say, the Classical Hoplites' ability to fight other infantry, something they were noticeably rather good at...? :inquisitive:

Though, I do intend to continue looking into the radius thingy and how it could be used, picking up from where I was before going AWOL for three months. The infantry vs. infantry tests I did back then looked quite promising (and made the individual soldiers' behaviour in the line of battle rather interesting), but I never got around to seeing what the effects would be for foot versus horse match-ups (and if it would be a good idea to shrink the horses' radii as well)...

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I understand the concern with lowering the attack for hoplites, I was under the impression that Classical Hoplites were on the decline through the EB period so it could have been historically feasible to have them slightly less effective, I've been playing KH and Seleukids most recently and the units still earn significant experience points.

If not then maybe for the pseudo-phalanxes with 0.3 radius and higher attack value then they would be more effective.

As for cavalry, they should also benefit from a lower radius.

When spearmen have the -4 attack, cavalry last a little longer in melee, but still need to be managed in battle, the AI seemed to better manage them because I've noticed that the cavalry stay engaged in melee until the charge bonus ends and they disengage and recharge! so with vanilla EB stats, cavalry gets chewed up faster then with the -4 attack, which was another reason I proposed a -4 for spearmen.

light_spear still gives +8 defense, so cavalry still takes losses either way, just the AI seems to do better with cavalry.

I forgot to include cavalry when I was bringing up adjusting radius in the other post.

Cheers:2thumbsup:

i'd like to suggest this simple solution:

1. keep light_spear
2. remove the +4 attack that spear units currently have
3. add the spear_bonus_4 attribute (this applies only vs cav)
4. leave all lethality values as they are

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Originally Posted by mcantu

i'd like to suggest this simple solution:

1. keep light_spear
2. remove the +4 attack that spear units currently have
3. add the spear_bonus_4 attribute (this applies only vs cav)
4. leave all lethality values as they are

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What do u mean with "spear_bonus_4"? I thougt there are only the attributes pike, spear and light spear. oO

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Originally Posted by PraetorFigus

I understand the concern with lowering the attack for hoplites, I was under the impression that Classical Hoplites were on the decline through the EB period so it could have been historically feasible to have them slightly less effective, I've been playing KH and Seleukids most recently and the units still earn significant experience points.

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I see where you are coming from, but that is not how units are statted in EB. Unit stats are based on their equipment and training, in as far as can be determined. If you are going to include modifiers based on which units ended up popular or discarded, you throw the entire system of. I truly doubt that hoplite training decrease during EB's time-frame. Not when they suddenly found themselves having to compete with these new-fangled phalangites and legionaries.

Still, in EB they are surprisingly strong for their price/MIC level.

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Originally Posted by Woreczko

Of course! But then, how often enemy infantry IN EB runs away BEFORE cavalry charge hits them? Not very often, eh? Such is the engine of RTW. With current state of affairs, it means, that you can stop enemy hetairoi with most feeble pantodapoi, beacause they will not run away in fear of being trampled. And in melee they have a good chance to prevail, due to spear bonuses combined with innate high attack value. The latter would be ok, if the former actually took place. Hell, in RL any stationary cavalry is as good as dead if mobbed by infantry, spears or not.

But in EB infantry won`t run before the charge and cavalry will fight it stationary. I`m just trying to do something about it :)

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I am not sure if I understand your solution. The problem is morale, not attack factor. Hetairoi are difficult enough to kill even with quality spear troops. Yes, light infantry is too strong against cavalry, but the same argument could be made for peltast in open formation. Lowering morale is not an option, and altering the combat stats of either light infantry or cavalry will affect combat performance with other units as well.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by mcantu

i'd like to suggest this simple solution:

1. keep light_spear
2. remove the +4 attack that spear units currently have
3. add the spear_bonus_4 attribute (this applies only vs cav)
4. leave all lethality values as they are

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That'd still screw the spearmen against other infantry, though. Which makes no sense when considering how popular primary weapons spears were with warriors who primarily fought other infantry (hoplites, the proto-Germanics...).

You'd arguably then be better off just taking "light_spear" entirely out and giving the relevant units a mount_effect bonus.

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Originally Posted by PraetorFigus

I understand the concern with lowering the attack for hoplites, I was under the impression that Classical Hoplites were on the decline through the EB period so it could have been historically feasible to have them slightly less effective, I've been playing KH and Seleukids most recently and the units still earn significant experience points.

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Eh. Recall that the hoplite tactics and fighting methods were, at the core, very simple - as befited their longtime primary users, the part-time "Sunday soldier" citizen-militia of the Greek city-states, who could devote only so much time and effort into practice.
For that, they were also pretty effective.
The around only thing that could "decline" about them would be not having much meaningful training *at all*, as is the case of the Hoplitai Haploi and the like - but the Hoplitai unit, as well as its mercenary version, represent reasonably competent troops, be they now citizen militia or professionals who make their living selling their spears.

Also, even if we accepted the argument in the individual case of the hoplites on those grounds, that'd help us very little with all the other spear-carrying infantry, such as "barbarian" line spearmen or the Thureophoroi-type "Hellenistic legionaries" who weren't in anything like decay in the period. Or those sword-and-spear elite troops like Hypaspistai, whose training by default is topnotch.

Why are spear units screwed with the same "normal" attack values as sword and axe units? Increase the def value by 4 to counter the negative effects of "light_spear" and everything is fine. oO I don't know why ur arguing against these changes, watchman. :inquisitive:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by mcantu

i'd like to suggest this simple solution:

1. keep light_spear
2. remove the +4 attack that spear units currently have
3. add the spear_bonus_4 attribute (this applies only vs cav)
4. leave all lethality values as they are

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Sounds a great idea, apart from why the cavalry bonus?

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Originally Posted by Watchman

That'd still screw the spearmen against other infantry, though......

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No, it wouldn't. They are screwed up WITH the artificial +4 attack that was left in to compensate for something that no longer needs compensation.

Light_Spear gives -4 defence NOT attack (for the last time, sick and tired of stating this), By adding 4 to attack in EB 1.2, all spear units kill much faster than was originally intended. By reducing all spear/phalanx units by 4 attack, restores the balance, it doesn't negate it. All light_spear units already have an inherent +8 defence vs cavalry, Infantry units don't. Any old spear unit will make mincemeat of cavalry pretty quickly as it is. The better ones hardly even blink.

Here's a paste from an earlier post of mine in this thread, re a Hoplitai:-

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Thats a basic 14 attack against anything and 23 Def against other "Spear", 19 Def vs Inf and 31 Def vs Cavalry, and only 1367mnai to recruit, and 342 upkeep. Compare that to any Sword or Axe, and you need an Elite to get anywhere near 14 attack, with twice the upkeep and recruitment cost. So take away the +4 attack vs everything, and you have what is a well balanced low/medium cost allround unit. Good Def, and reasonable attack.

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I have play tested this simple change for over (at a quick estimate) 250+ hrs now. It works.

EDIT: As Laza points out, the only question is whether or not to give light_spear some extra defence. But then they become too strong vs Cavalry to my mind...and the thought of giving yet more defence to phalanx units is too horrible to contemplate..

For one thing, that's not the remedy that has been proposed here. For another, based on the practical tests I did with the two spear attributes, I'm not very convinced "light_spear" actually penalises defense against infantry - as mentioned, the test units with "spear" both killed enemies and died themselves at a clearly faster rate. Granted this could also be a side effect of the absurd "push" ability the attribute gives, but that doesn't alter the result.

On another note, *I* don't recall finding spearmen with the bonus overpowered. Generally the results of spear-vs-nonspear have been about exactly what I'd expect.

The phalanxes, for the record, use a different scale for their pike values than other units.

Point taken with the hoplites. I'm glad we are keeping this discussion civil. :beam: (No pun or sarcasm intended)

At this point I won't argue for -4 attack, but the testing has shown me some interesting stuff I didn't really notice before.

the AI will charge cavalry into infantry and then disengage and recharge to use the charge bonus, with the vanilla stats they get chewed up and subsequent charges are thus depleted and less effective even the eastern heavy cavalry, so they'd be routing often unless they're a FM with lots of chevrons.

So I think something should be done to help cavalry a bit more so the AI can utilize them better in battle.

I'm going to be testing to see how cavalry performs with a modified radius.

Separately,

Watchman, you've mentioned before about a formula for stating units, I was wondering if you could explain a bit how attack is determined? I'm curious about the phalanx units why some are 17, 18?

I bring this up because some of the factions begin to spam elite armies (like the two units I had in the earlier post) and steam roll across the map.

Thanks:2thumbsup:

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Originally Posted by Drewski

EDIT: As Laza points out, the only question is whether or not to give light_spear some extra defence. But then they become too strong vs Cavalry to my mind...and the thought of giving yet more defence to phalanx units is too horrible to contemplate..

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Just reduce the shield ability by 3 points for levy/native and medium phalanx and 2 points for the elite guys and everything is fine. :yes: I cant imagine why the EB team gives phalanx units 10 shield points thanks to their ability while hoplites with their giant shields and shield wall formation have only 4 points.

Their defskill gets penalised in return; helps screw them in the flanks. Also, that veritable forest of long pointy things they're holding makes for a really annoying thicked for missiles to get through without getting entangled, apparently.

I did say they had some special considerations going, no ?

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Originally Posted by Laza

Just reduce the shield ability by 3 points for levy/native and medium phalanx and 2 points for the elite guys and everything is fine. :yes: I cant imagine why the EB team gives phalanx units 10 shield points thanks to their ability while hoplites with their giant shields and shield wall formation have only 4 points.

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By Coincidence, I already did that (see one of the posts above)...works well, whoever's idea it was :beam:

In my opinion the best solution would be to remove the +4 attack and remove light_spear altogether and use anti-cav bonuses, . The problem is that light_spear gives a significant penalty against sword infantry and a significant bonus against cavalry, although the exact numbers are uncertain. So no matter what the attack and defense of a spear unit is statted to it will always have a huge difference in performance between fighting sword infantry and cavalry. If a light_spear unit is statted to fight equally with sword infantry it will absolutely destroy cavalry, and if it is statted to fight equally with cavalry it will lose miserably to sword infantry.

If anti-cav bonuses can be given in different amounts that is even better. The range of a spear is a certainly an advantage against cavalry but it isn't the only advantage. As Watchman has pointed out multiple times before, the most crucial point is that the infantry are trained and determined to stand and fight in close formation. So some trash skirmisher that just happens to use a very short spear as a melee weapon would get no bonus or only a small one. Dense spear infantry like hoplitai or triarii would get a moderate bonus. And eastern spear infantry like Sparabara that actually are specialized against cavalry would get a high bonus, which would make up in part for their abysmal stats.

The advantage of this system is that it allows spearmen to have their attack standardized with the sword infantry, which will prevent less experienced players from constantly jumping to the conclusion that spearmen are too strong against sword infantry, when in fact they are quite equal.

And then what do you do with the units that carry *both* spear and some kind of sword, axe or w/e ?

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Originally Posted by Watchman

And then what do you do with the units that carry *both* spear and some kind of sword, axe or w/e ?

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what i've done with the RTR stats is to give spears the spear_bonus_x (where x is any even number from 4 to 12) attribute. this way the spear attack bonus applies only to that weapon and not to any sword/axe/javelin the unit may have. i leave the light_spear attribute for non-phalanx units, as i believe the defense penalty makes sense and i like the pushing effect

At Watchman:
I think the infantry with 2 different melee weapons should get the bonus against cavalry because you would assume that they would use spears against cavalry, even though the engine often causes them to use the wrong weapon, especially if the sword is the primary weapon and the spear is secondary. Even for spear primary infantry that switch to swords after being knocked down it makes sense, since you could imagine the second and third rows of the formation stabbing at the cavalry with spears after the first row switched to swords.

At mcantu:
I'm confused about your description of spear_bonus_x. Isn't it already possible to give different attack values to primary and secondary weapons? Or is it possible to give a bonus that takes into account both the weapon being used and the enemy being attacked?

Does mount_effect also protect against charges? I am no expert on unit stats, but IIRC the spear and light_spear attributes allow the spearbearer to deflect the cavalries charge value back onto the cavalry. If you replace that with a melee-based bonus, frontal hit-and-run attacks on spearmen become a feasible strategy, which would be highly unrealistic.

Not really, seeing as how it was pretty much the only option left for most cavalry that had to try dealing with close-order infantry frontally. Better than trying to slug it out static, after all.

Anyway, yeah, there's that part of the weapon attributes. And the push effect, for what it's worth. And the little detail that unless you go and severely modify the related bits of the statting system, the spears with the "light_spear" attribute and related modifiers stripped off end up exactly identical to the xiphos-class swords stat-wise...

Also mcantu ? Several millenias' worth of spearmen from around the world gnash their teeth at you. :stare:

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Not really, seeing as how it was pretty much the only option left for most cavalry that had to try dealing with close-order infantry frontally. Better than trying to slug it out static, after all.

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I am not sure if it's realistic for prodromoi to charge into formed spearmen and suffer only minor casualties (charge value is not deflected and the spearmen can only get two or three strikes at the cavalry), retreat, reform and charge again. Charging frontally into spearmen should be a highly risky enterprise.

Realistically, they wouldn't be capable of physically pressing home anyway on account of the horses hitting the brakes before such an obstacle, and would have to content themselves with putting in a few stabs with their sharp flagpoles before wheeling off and attacking again. Far as I know such repeated charges were the universal standard for most close-combat cavalry for dealing with formed heavy infantry.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Also mcantu ? Several millenias' worth of spearmen from around the world gnash their teeth at you. :stare:

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wait, what? what did i miss? :inquisitive:

i think my method is very fair to spear units while still leaving some distinction between them and sword units.

and someone mentioned the charge deflection...that only works with the spear and light_spear attributes and the spear unit has to braced for the charge (the unit status will say 'ready'). part of the cav units charge bonus will be reflected back at them...

It also kicks common sense and historical perspective in the teeth. Put this way: if spears were that bad against other infantry, all those tribal warriors and whatnot who primarily (or solely) fought enemies on foot would not have used them, but instead made themselves good solid clubs to smash skulls and break limbs with. Even cheaper than spears actually, as you don't even need worked stone or refined metal for the business end, and quite lethal enough when applied with the appropriate gusto...
Nevermind now axes.

well light_spear doesnt affect the attack scores at all; only the parrying portion of defense skill. so if a spear and a sword unit both have the same attack score, the only penalty the spear unit will have is a -4 to his chance to parry an attack (separate from lethality/attack speed factors) which i feel is resonable seeing as how a spear wielded one-handed is less manouverable than a sword. then, giving the spear spear_bonus_4 gives it +4 vs cav only without affecting the balance vs sword units.

See above. Also, for anyone carrying a shield, *that* is his primary means of defense.

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Realistically, they wouldn't be capable of physically pressing home anyway on account of the horses hitting the brakes before such an obstacle, and would have to content themselves with putting in a few stabs with their sharp flagpoles before wheeling off and attacking again. Far as I know such repeated charges were the universal standard for most close-combat cavalry for dealing with formed heavy infantry.

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I am not sure what you are getting at. You mean that charging formed heavy infantry would be equally (in)effective against spearmen and non-spearmen?

Not quite. Even Roman Legionaries with their little pig-sticker swords became nearly frontally cavalry-immune by the simple expedient of closing ranks; spears add the extra fun of a long pointy thing for a careless or slow-witted horse (or rider) to get skewered on prejecting out of that solid mass, and of course their sheer lenght is quite useful for negating the "high ground" advantage a man on horseback has over a footslogger.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Drewski

Mini Mod To Balance All Spear and Phalanx Units

All I've done is remove the erroneous +4 attack from Spears and Pikes.

Copy over the EDU in C:.....\EB\sp game edu backup to make it work for your current Campaign NOT the EDU in EB\DATA as the game reads from the backup file.

Attachment 60

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As i pointed out in the other thread, that link is down, can you re-up this?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Twigvest

As i pointed out in the other thread, that link is down, can you re-up this?

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Here you go

Edited original link too.

Drewski, after install yuor EDU file NO shield_wall ability and swim ability in Europa Barbarorum with Barbarian Invasion.
Sorry for my english.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Drapezhnik

Drewski, after install yuor EDU file NO shield_wall ability and swim ability in Europa Barbarorum with Barbarian Invasion.
Sorry for my english.

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Oh, sorry that happened. Unfortunately, I don't have BI version of RTW myself, so can't really say why you lost those abilities. If you need the original EB EDU file, here it is Attachment 185

Well unless your modded EDU included those abilities - and by the sounds of it, that's a no - then quite obviously units in-game aren't going to get them...
I'd recommend applying WinMerge to the issue.

O.K. I adapted this Mini Mod for Europa Barbarorum with Barbarian Invasion. Here it is http://www.filefront.com/14084091/export_descr_unit.txt

Hi all, nothing very useful to add to the discussion, but Ive just come back to EB (played V1.0 a bit 18 months ago as Casse and then moved to the awesome and underrated Getai) and was looking through the export_descr_unit to see whats changed in 1.2.

Well I did a melee only (no javelins, synchronised frontal charge) custom battle (grassy flatland, 1 exp, 1 blacksmith upgrade) between Kluddobro (675 mnai cost, 200 0.1 lethality swordsmen) vs Imannae (675 mnai, 200 0.13 lethality light_spear/skirmishers).

Imannae beat them comfortably, they look fantastic value units once they get some experience (fast, top stamina, 6 long-range javelins) and I still fail to see the point of swordsmen with 0.1 lethality.
Balroae (like Imannae except 2 points better) likewise owned some significantly more expensive Midlander Champions, losers again with piddly 0.1 shortswords. They had better stamina but I dont believe this was decisive.

So on my very light testing Id say 0.1 lethality swordsmen are pointless (especially without ap) but I dont yet know how light_spears stack up against others.

Sorry not much help but just glad to be back playing EB!

Edit: Tested with Drewski's minimod and it certainly balances better, a fairly subtle difference but a fair one IMO. Before Batacorii would win average victories over Botroas 0.225 swordsmen, now Botros win close or average victories.
Have only tested light_spear units though.

Of interest might be this passage:

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Your servant has also heard that in military strategy and tactics three things are important. First there is the nature of the ground, second the training of the troops, and third the advantageous use of weapons.

According to the Ping Fa, where there are waterways fifteen feet wide, chariots cannot pass. Where rocks are piled up among the mountain forests, and rivers circulate between hills covered with woods and thickets; there the infantry arm comes into its own. Here two chariots or two horsemen do not equal one foot soldier. Where there are rolling hills, wide open spaces and flat plains, there chariots and cavalry find their use, and ten foot soldiers are not as good as one horseman. Flat places intersected with gorges, and abrupt declivities affording wide outlooks - commanding positions such as these should be held by archers and crossbowmen. Here a hundred men armed with hand-to-hand weapons are not equal to one archer. When two forces oppose one another on a plain covered with short grasses they are free to manoeuvre back and forth, and then the long halberd is the right weapon. Three men with swords and shields are not as effective as one so armed. Among reeds and rushes and thickets of bamboo, where the undergrowth is rich and abundant, short spears are needed. Two men with long halberds are not as good there as one with a spear. But among winding ways and dangerous precipices the sword and shield are to be preferred, and three archers or crossbowmen will not do as well as one swordsman...

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Excerpt from a memorial by Chhao Tsho to the emperor of Han, 169 BC

Of course, you could argue that a crossbow could be worth three halberds on an open field, and indeed it was. We could also glance at how much China was better than the rest of the world at 169 BC, using halberds, crossbows and iron lamellar cuirasses - A little more and they would invent the blast furnace - While the Romani and Greeks had linen, leather and bronze combined with self bows and shortswords. The best Greek crossbow was only a toy.

Iron mail.
Longswords.
Composite bows.
Highly advanced artillery.
And, oh, IIRC the Chinese had only rather recently gotten onto the iron bandwagon, almost a millenia or half after western Eurasia.
And the western Eurasians had *abandoned* lamellar a few centuries earlier presumably for no other reason than not having liked it and junk.
:dizzy2:
lol fail, or troll

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Iron mail.

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Known but not adopted by the Chinese.

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Composite bows.

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Do you really want to get me started into Nomadic Cavalry and styles employed by the Chinese?

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Longswords.

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Huh, so the Romans did not use longswords in a large scale. Either because they found to tactical application to it, or because they "didn't know it"... You know where my money is.

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Highly advanced artillery.

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LOLWUT?

Teh Wiki, your fastest source evah, knows it:

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The Chinese also developed catapults and siege crossbows very early. The earliest documented occurrence of ancient siege artillery pieces in China was the levered principled traction catapult and an 8 feet (2.4 m) high siege crossbow from the Mozi (Mo Jing), a Mohist text written during the 3rd - 4th century B.C by followers of Mozi who founded the Mohist school of thought during the late Spring and Autumn Period and the early Warring States period. Much of what we now know of the siege technology of the time came to us from Books 14 and 15 (Chapters 52 to 71) on siege warfare from the Mo Jing. Recorded and preserved on bamboo strips, much of the text is unfortunately extremely corrupted now. However, despite the heavy fragmentation, Mohist diligence and attention to details which set Mo Jing apart from other works, ensured that highly descriptive details of the workings of mechanical devices like Cloud Ladders, Rotating Arcuballistas and Levered Catapults, records of siege techniques and usage of siege weaponry can still be found.[1]

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Militar...ary_technology

Don't get me started on fortress work: Moh-Ti also wrote about highly advanced defensive fortifications.

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And, oh, IIRC the Chinese had only rather recently gotten onto the iron bandwagon, almost a millenia or half after western Eurasia.

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Don't know it... Where is the source?

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And the western Eurasians had *abandoned* lamellar a few centuries earlier presumably for no other reason than not having liked it and junk.

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Lamellar junk...? LOL I know who the troll is. The Romans adopted a fairly similar armour with the Segmentata, and it was still inferior to your average lamellar cuirass, which BTW did not reach Europe yet unless you could provide your source again.

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Iron mail.
Longswords.
Composite bows.
Highly advanced artillery.
And, oh, IIRC the Chinese had only rather recently gotten onto the iron bandwagon, almost a millenia or half after western Eurasia.
And the western Eurasians had *abandoned* lamellar a few centuries earlier presumably for no other reason than not having liked it and junk.
:dizzy2:
lol fail, or troll

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These two apply properly to China. The east and the steppe are missile dominated after all. This is probably the reason for lamellar as well, which is technically different from and superior to scale. Further down the passage, there is an interesting and revealing exposition of the merits of the Huns vs the Han armies and tactics.

In anycase, spear use is corroborated. We can see from the Romans themselves that they are unwilling to engage the phalanx in frontal assault.

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These two apply properly to China. The east and the steppe are missile dominated after all.

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Yep, and indeed the use of longswords and mail was a matter of taste after all. The East properly rather equipped its warriors with as much lamellar and scale they could get as late as the Middle Ages and beyond, lamellar being far more protective. And of course better forged, since we all know that Han mettallurgy was superior.

Not to sound like a sinophile but these indeed are basic historical facts. More so the siege engines, which were being widely employed since the beginning of the Warring States period - Which also saw armies with millions of men in them, if my readings are correct.

In comparison during the V century Greek poleis lacked even decent siege engines, judging by the facts of the day. The Romans favoured ladders until very late too - That someone can argue that post-Warring States China "did not" have such technology betrays ignorance of these facts, and which a reading of Moh-Ti alone and the abundant Warring States literature on war and fortifications debunks neatly.

You cannot compare the greeks and romans against the seres. They have wholy different circumstances thrown at them back then, and thus their development are geared towards the specific foes they face.

As a pastoral society constantly faced with raids from nomads from the west and north. They are at a disadvantage when it comes to archery. But utilizing the industrial capability of a settled society, they can mount a composite bow with a heavy draw weight onto a stock and mechanism. That way, even the average citizen farmer can rain powerful missles accuratly against a far better trained HA, with just basic drilling and training when not in the fields.

It's not a matter of 'who is better', it is simply adapting to each's scenario accordingly. Who would be stupid enough to invent heavy mail and big shields with short sword to go against a bunch of HA?

Anyone done any more testing and got views on wether Drewski's mod is "balancing"? I felt it was, I just cant see what the point of shortswordsmen is.

Ive just started a new campaign without it, due to lack of "peer review" support for the light_spear fix, so I guess it must be better off as it is, Im too lazy to have done any more testing lol

Does this count for units like the Celtic short swordsman? I imagine it being hard to reach a person with a spear using a tiny "dagger." Also, what about the secondary sword of phalanxes?:dizzy2:

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Originally Posted by satalexton

You cannot compare the greeks and romans against the seres. They have wholy different circumstances thrown at them back then, and thus their development are geared towards the specific foes they face.

As a pastoral society constantly faced with raids from nomads from the west and north. They are at a disadvantage when it comes to archery. But utilizing the industrial capability of a settled society, they can mount a composite bow with a heavy draw weight onto a stock and mechanism. That way, even the average citizen farmer can rain powerful missles accuratly against a far better trained HA, with just basic drilling and training when not in the fields.

It's not a matter of 'who is better', it is simply adapting to each's scenario accordingly. Who would be stupid enough to invent heavy mail and big shields with short sword to go against a bunch of HA?

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Exactly.
Survival of the fittest. The one who can adopt to his surroundings the best.
The greeks and roman had no heavy artillery in the EB frame, because they didnt need them. Nobody had them and they slowed the already slow hellenic style armies down.
The siege of syracus on the other hand shows, that the greek had the knowledge to easily build siege equipment. The romans started to do so, when the circumstances were right. Like the legions around the limes, with their torsion weapons.

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Originally Posted by A Terribly Harmful Name

Known but not adopted by the Chinese.
Do you really want to get me started into Nomadic Cavalry and styles employed by the Chinese?

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They did have both around EB's time period.

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Originally Posted by A Very Super Market

After Kublai Khan died, the empire quickly broke up into pieces, and disintegrated shortly afterwards. Only the vast imperialist domains of various European powers can be called great empires.

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Most of the empires under Mongol control kept their territory intact (abet fractured) and lasted about 200 years. Most Imperialistic European empires lasted less than 100 years.

If the Mongols were bad administrators, then whatever the Europeans were doing was far worse.

Sorry to revive such a dead thread but the downloadable files being unavalaible, i'm trying to understand what was done here to recreate my own modified EDU:

What was changed exactly? "light_spear" attribute entirely removed, or 4 attack power removed from the base AP?

Thanks.

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Originally Posted by siegfriedfr

Sorry to revive such a dead thread but the downloadable files being unavalaible, i'm trying to understand what was done here to recreate my own modified EDU:

What was changed exactly? "light_spear" attribute entirely removed, or 4 attack power removed from the base AP?

Thanks.

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All I did was take 4 attack away from all units with the "light-spear" attr., which in EB includes phalanx units too.

I've personally done masses and masses of individual tweaking since, as taking 4 away, isn't that much more balanced than it was originally. (It's still better imo). For instance the low levy units (e.g. levy hoplites, levy Celt spear) are ridiculously overpowered with the default EB attack, and taking 4 off them makes them perform more realistically against mid level swordsmen, for example. However, mid and elite spearmen aren't quite as good as they should be with 4 attack taken away, and a lot need a sliding "tweak" scale.

So there you go ;)

Yes i've been editing my EDU and i tought that a flat out removal of 4 attack on medium/elite hoplite was crippling compared to other units. So i've done -4 for untrained, -2 for trained and -1 for highly trained.

What other tweaks have you been doing?

Thanks for the answer!

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Originally Posted by siegfriedfr

Yes i've been editing my EDU and i tought that a flat out removal of 4 attack on medium/elite hoplite was crippling compared to other units. So i've done -4 for untrained, -2 for trained and -1 for highly trained.

What other tweaks have you been doing?

Thanks for the answer!

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That's quite similar to how I have them (even though I've taken each and every unit on individual merits, with cost also taken into consideration). I tend to forget some of the minor tweaks. The other main one, is taking the 5 shield away from Phalanx units (which gets doubled in phalanx mode, to make them almost impervious to missiles). It's a tiny little shield too if you look ! I have basic phalanx with 2 shield value, and elites 3. Works ok for me, playing as phalanx based nations, and against them.

I also remember making Balearic and Rhodian Slingers slightly better (something like 5 extra stones each, and an extra point of attack), to show their elite status, and making Spartans slightly better (36 men base and an extra point of attack)- the Spartans I just wanted to be the best hoplitai ;)

hi everybody, I've just read the whole discussion between drewski and watchman about which weapong would perform the best... It was really enjoyable, let me tell you both :)
anyway I wanted to know if the shieldwall ability (additioned by the BI.exe) compensates this lack of defense, or I-don't-know-what-it-is that everybody is praising-complaining about...

As far as I know, this attack bonus to the spearmen was given due the fact that a proper phalanx (or hoplitic) formation couldn't be properly represented in the RTW engine, then, in my humble opinion, the reduction of this base attack would be legitimated


Another thing, the other day I was making 1v1 units fight just out of fun, myself always using the praetorian cohort... anyway, what make me astonished was that the elite heavy spearmen for the seleukids BEAT THE SH1T OUT OF my pretorians... is it that normal? I mean is used them in a flat, desertic map, with no advantages for any sides apart form the numbers (pretorians' got 83 soldiers, against 63 of the spearmen, if I remember correctly) another thing, my praetorians were on guard mode! is it normal?

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Originally Posted by Metaluis90

hi everybody, I've just read the whole discussion between drewski and watchman about which weapong would perform the best... It was really enjoyable, let me tell you both :)
anyway I wanted to know if the shieldwall ability (additioned by the BI.exe) compensates this lack of defense, or I-don't-know-what-it-is that everybody is praising-complaining about...

As far as I know, this attack bonus to the spearmen was given due the fact that a proper phalanx (or hoplitic) formation couldn't be properly represented in the RTW engine, then, in my humble opinion, the reduction of this base attack would be legitimated


Another thing, the other day I was making 1v1 units fight just out of fun, myself always using the praetorian cohort... anyway, what make me astonished was that the elite heavy spearmen for the seleukids BEAT THE SH1T OUT OF my pretorians... is it that normal? I mean is used them in a flat, desertic map, with no advantages for any sides apart form the numbers (pretorians' got 83 soldiers, against 63 of the spearmen, if I remember correctly) another thing, my praetorians were on guard mode! is it normal?

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Glad you found it of interest :)

Those Elite Selec Spearmen (I'm guessing you mean the Basilikou) have full mail body armour (19 armour in game) and 34 total defence (ouch). They have a much better attack too than the Praets, who don't have an AP weapon, and only .13 lethality. Those Basilikou will beat the stuffing out of just about anything. So no real suprise there..

I slightly read something about that in their unit description... they are stated as the best assault unit of the world (or something like that) but is the difference between units that different? I mean you are not talking about a standard legionary, we are talking about the pretorians, the elite of the elite of the roman empire. I mean, I really dont want to look like a roman fanboy, altough i do love the history of this civilization... but has the difference must be that overwhelming? When I stopped that battle the basilikou got 40 of their men, while the pretorians only 20 or less, in big unit scale

out of topic, I got a problem downloading both your mod and BI.exe mod made by Drapezhnik!
when i want to download yours, it says that there's a missing file, or the file cannot be find (in the mozilla browser, translated to English "File not found") and in Drapezhnik's one, Filefront says there is a unexpected error, or something like that... If only you could reupload the file, i would really appreciate it :)

In other words drewski, can you post your current Edu please? :)

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Originally Posted by siegfriedfr

In other words drewski, can you post your current Edu please? :)

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I can do that no problem, but make a copy of yours before overwriting, as {see above posts} : loads of little tweaks here and there. I don't have the basic original "-4 off all light_spear" anymore, it was on my old PC, and I had a dedicated gaming machine custom made in April (which is still very nice ;))

Uploaded my current EDU to filefront here

hey, thanks a lot man! I'll now install it using the suggestion of Watchman for winmerge

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Originally Posted by Drewski

I can do that no problem, but make a copy of yours before overwriting, as {see above posts} : loads of little tweaks here and there. I don't have the basic original "-4 off all light_spear" anymore, it was on my old PC, and I had a dedicated gaming machine custom made in April (which is still very nice ;))

Uploaded my current EDU to filefront here

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Thanks!

Whay did you remove 1 attack to horse archers units tho? Too powerful?

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Originally Posted by siegfriedfr

Thanks!

Whay did you remove 1 attack to horse archers units tho? Too powerful?

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My way of thinking was this:- the horse archers and geographically local troops had basically the same weapon. I know that the HAs were extremely good at firing while moving, but you won't ever convince me that they were just as accurate, as a well trained man firing from a stationary base, i.e. foot archers. Missile attack in RTW really means accuracy, as all missiles have a lethality of 100% if they strike their target. Therefore I made HA have 1 less missile attack.

They are still completely nasty to use or face ;)

Oh btw , I just remembered I replaced Casse Bodyguards with Rycalawre instead, just found the Chariots too frustrating/annoying.

I did warn you of quite a few odd changes here and there....:laugh4:

would you mind to enlist those changes, Drewski? :)

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Originally Posted by Metaluis90

I slightly read something about that in their unit description... they are stated as the best assault unit of the world (or something like that) but is the difference between units that different? I mean you are not talking about a standard legionary, we are talking about the pretorians, the elite of the elite of the roman empire. I mean, I really dont want to look like a roman fanboy, altough i do love the history of this civilization... but has the difference must be that overwhelming? When I stopped that battle the basilikou got 40 of their men, while the pretorians only 20 or less, in big unit scale

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Praetorians are far from the elite soldiers in this game. TAB's should slaughter them. I would think Carthage has at least 3 units capable of beating them (Elite Liby Phonecians, Iberian Assault, Sacred Band), Arche 3 as well (TAB's, Hypaspistai, Peltastai Makedonikai), I would think Solduros, Carnutes, and Gaesatae would beat them, maybe even Neitos. In fact there are probably about 20 better units, maybe more.

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Originally Posted by Metaluis90

would you mind to enlist those changes, Drewski? :)

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I'm sorry, I didn't keep a list (since ithe edu is just for me)....I think I've metioned most of them. There may be some other very minor tweaks I've forgotten.

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Originally Posted by Drewski

I'm sorry, I didn't keep a list (since ithe edu is just for me)....I think I've metioned most of them. There may be some other very minor tweaks I've forgotten.

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Drewski, After this fix most spear/swords have similar atk value but most sword have twice the lethality (0.13 vs 0.225) making swords clearly superior. Whats your opinion on this?

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Originally Posted by siegfriedfr

Drewski, After this fix most spear/swords have similar atk value but most sword have twice the lethality (0.13 vs 0.225) making swords clearly superior. Whats your opinion on this?

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It's only the Celtic longsword that has that lethality, all the Spanish/Roman/Hellenic/Punic/Various shortswords are somewhere around .13 lethality. Plus all the spears get a big boost vs mounted. I didn't change anything to do with lethality....

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Originally Posted by Brave Brave Sir Robin

Praetorians are far from the elite soldiers in this game. TAB's should slaughter them. I would think Carthage has at least 3 units capable of beating them (Elite Liby Phonecians, Iberian Assault, Sacred Band), Arche 3 as well (TAB's, Hypaspistai, Peltastai Makedonikai), I would think Solduros, Carnutes, and Gaesatae would beat them, maybe even Neitos. In fact there are probably about 20 better units, maybe more.

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yes, I also tried pretorians vs gaesatae, and the celts would have beaten them, if I hadn't use guard mode.

So if pretorians are far from the elite of the elite of the game, where does their strenght lies? in their stamina?

Hello all, this is a great discussion to say the least.

Well I am making a Mod based on EB (customizing my experience mainly), and I run in to this issue as well while trying to balance units to my liking so I run a search to see and found many threads about this Spear issue.

Anyhow my final solution as of now is to give

"Spear, Light_Spear" attributes to units with Phalanx and Long Pikes, this way they get both defense +8 and attack +8 against cavalry , while they get Attack and defense -4 against infantry.

Non phalanx and units I left to "Light_spear" and added "Spear_bonus_4", this way they get +8 defense bonus against cavalry, -4 defense against infanrty, and +4 attack against cavalry, and since they have short spears compared to the Phalanx units, but still get some bonus compared to non spear infantry vs cavalry.

The idea being that "Cavalry > Infantry > Spearmen > Cavalry".

Run some tests so far it looks good and thus I did not have to fiddle with attack and defense ratings. And accoding to EDU definitions there does not seem to be any conflicts with combining "Spear, Long_Pike, Light_spear" attributes.

Just thought to share this in case its useful to anyone.

I've read through the thread, but I still don't understand--have we confirmed whether or not the modifier is intended from a Team Member?

Im really not sure about this. Looking at it some levy greek hoplites have better attack and defence than some mercenary Galatian shortswordsmen which doesnt seem quite right. Im just on the fence about nerfing spearmen unless they were really intended to have this nerf. I dont want them to become too ineffective, but I want that elite groop of swordsman in good armour to be better than my levy phalanx in actual battle skill if they get past the spearwall

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Originally Posted by ninja51

Im really not sure about this. Looking at it some levy greek hoplites have better attack and defence than some mercenary Galatian shortswordsmen which doesnt seem quite right. Im just on the fence about nerfing spearmen unless they were really intended to have this nerf. I dont want them to become too ineffective, but I want that elite groop of swordsman in good armour to be better than my levy phalanx in actual battle skill if they get past the spearwall

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I'd argue it's shortswordmen in general which should be buffed, rather than spearmen nerfed. Most longsword infantry will do very well against spearmen.

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Originally Posted by ninja51

I dont want them to become too ineffective, but I want that elite groop of swordsman in good armour to be better than my levy phalanx in actual battle skill if they get past the spearwall

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I agree absolutely, and that makes me wonder: should spearmen get a bonus, even against cavalry, after the charge, once battle is joined and more or less a stationary affair?

Im just looking for someone to say yes or no about this. Are spear units incorrectly too powerfull? I dont want them to be unnecissarily too weak but I do want swordsmen to be actual contenders not the bums that they are. I suppose it doesnt matter though, threads a year old the files uploaded are gone, and I doubt ill get a real answer

I, too, reduced the attack value of all spearmen ( -4 ).
From all the games i´ve played since then i can say the following:
- The Phalangitai units aren´t really concerned, except their ability to fight AI FM, which are rediculously strong anyway ( last time a FM of Epirotes just cut his way through my Deuteroi phalanx, routing 2 units with a little support from Thureophoroi ).
- The Hoplitai Haploi perform now as they should, imo; but the Classical Hoplites suck a lot against sword infantry, especially against "ap" units. I think, one should give them at least 2 attack back ( though, they are still quite cool against horsemen ). On the other hand i use BI.exe and therefore "shieldwall" - if you do, let them as they are, because otherwise they are simply unbreakable/unstopable.
- I haven´t tried the elite units like Agema Ordeton etc. - but since this guys are quite tought anyway, and they can make shieldwall, too, they might be ok.
- Ippikrates Hoplites are normaly underpowered, so to compensate the loss of attack value, and also to make them usefull, i´ve improved their stamina to "very hardy" - now they are quite ok.

That would be all for now, i´ll post some more observations when i have something usefull to say again.

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Originally Posted by vollorix

I, too, reduced the attack value of all spearmen ( -4 ).
From all the games i´ve played since then i can say the following:
- The Phalangitai units aren´t really concerned, except their ability to fight AI FM, which are rediculously strong anyway ( last time a FM of Epirotes just cut his way through my Deuteroi phalanx, routing 2 units with a little support from Thureophoroi ).
- The Hoplitai Haploi perform now as they should, imo; but the Classical Hoplites suck a lot against sword infantry, especially against "ap" units. I think, one should give them at least 2 attack back ( though, they are still quite cool against horsemen ). On the other hand i use BI.exe and therefore "shieldwall" - if you do, let them as they are, because otherwise they are simply unbreakable/unstopable.
- I haven´t tried the elite units like Agema Ordeton etc. - but since this guys are quite tought anyway, and they can make shieldwall, too, they might be ok.
- Ippikrates Hoplites are normaly underpowered, so to compensate the loss of attack value, and also to make them usefull, i´ve improved their stamina to "very hardy" - now they are quite ok.

That would be all for now, i´ll post some more observations when i have something usefull to say again.

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Been awhile since this thread goto started, but since I was one of the primary plantiffs, here's my most recent take on things.....

-4 across the board is imbalanced. So what I did some time back, was introduce a sliding scale, dependant on the units cost, training and supposed abilities.

Levy spearman -4 attack in virtually everycase (same with almost all Archers that have spears as secondary).E.g. Levy Hoplites should be a garrison/peacekeeping force. They should not be line infantry ever. Look at any "suprisingly good unit" thread and Levy Hoplites are right up there. Well take away the 4 attack and they perform very normally, as should be.

The middle spear units, -3 attack, the better ones -2 attack. Phalanx units have double shield value when in phalax mode, so giving them 5 shield (when its a tiny little thing as well) is ridiculous. Normal Phalanx therefore have a "2" shield and Elite Phalanx have "3" shield, in addition to the above modifiers. This makes them slightly susceptible to missile file (instead of impervious as before), but still tough as nails from the front. Autocalc is seemingly unaffected.

These honestly work very well in SP mode (never tried) MP. My last huge campaign was as KH (all spear), current is Mak, having some superb proper mixed full stack action vs a strong AS atm.

I changed my EDU a lot over the last years to improve balance. I don't really like the idea of reducing the spear attack, at least not in EB on rtw.exe where you don't have the spear_bonus attributes. Heavy cavalry can already beat spearmen cost effective-wise with repeated charges, reducing their attack makes them even weaker. The problem aren't to strong spearmen but too weak shortsword units. Longsword wielding warriors perform relative good against spearmen only shortswords suck against both of the others. So what I did was to give more lethality to the shortswords (1.0->1.3 and 1.3->1.5) and sometimes extra attack or defence points to single units who were completely underpowered, like pontic thorakitai. Falcata and kopis now have 1.4 lethality instead of 1.1 but one attack reduced (similar to clubs I think), it's hard to balance them because of the overpowered ap-attribute but I think they work better now.
I did some other changes too, longswordmen got +1 defence skills, cavalry +1 or +2 defence and heavily improved secondary weapons (+20% lethality mostly in additions to the changed swordsword lethality). Phalangitai got reduced shield defence (3 for levies, 4 for the others) and -1 armor (the team said they already did this but as far as I understand the armor system I couldn't see difference to non-phalanx-units) and lowered secondary attack but gave some more defence skill.

I tested a lot in costum battles and played several months with different factions and the balance is way better but far from perfect since that's not possible in the RTW engine especially not without the extra attributes of BI.