Lame cav tactic being employed

Ranting's a good way to let off some steam, but it won't help with the problems. Large units make it a bit more tolerable, but not much - cav are certainly overpowered even at large size. Good players can exploit that imbalance and win against most other players that don't use swarm tactics and don't know all the units / counterunits.

The solutions are difficult to implement, but I haven't lost faith _quite_ yet. It's not far away, though - in the modding efforts, all kinds of illogical and just plain stupid crud has been uncovered in the mechanics and stats. One more unexplainable stat behavior and I'm calling it quits. :tongue:

I haven't given CA any money for Rome (I've loaned the game from a friend who doesn't play online), and never will if they won't support it properly, as seems to be the case right now. I certainly won't buy the expansion - forking out money for bugfixes isn't a very promising trend that I'd like to support.

Now, back to the issue. Cav is overpowered. What should be done? Should anything be done? There's an ongoing modding effort to fix RTW balance (BTW Yuuki & Swoosh, you should be aware of it) and everyone's invited to participate, if only to indicate support for it. If no one's even remotely interested, the effort will certainly die.

I think the MP mod could be more important than ever now that CA will not be addressing the loadgame issue in SP campaign since they don't consider it to be a problem. If they won't address that issue, then I don't see any hope that they'll do anything about MP balance issues nothwithstanding BOFH's attempt to set up a channel for multiplayers to give feedback to CA about it. An MP mod is the last hope for me to get anything out of this game since I won't play RTW v1.2 MP the way it is. I have been working with Mordred to investigate the performance of the phalanx for this balance mod. That's why I'm concerned when I see statements which suggest that phalanx works good enough in RTW v1.2 because, if that's the attitude, then why would I work on a mod that I won't play? I also want to see good balance between offensive and defensive actions in addition to good unit balance.

An important feature of the balance mod is that it will use moddir, so that RTW v1.2 isn't overwritten and will still work which helps a great deal in getting players to use a mod. Ease of installation is also very important. However, most players won't use mods so you have to keep that in mind.

For the purpose of discussion image all players divided into three groups: good, average and weak. My view is that the effectiveness of cav spam should be reduced to the point where a mid-range good player isn't likely to beat a mid-range average player with it. That forces the good players to come up with something more creative than identifying the best cav units and taking a lot of them. Since you can stack units in RTW, it has to handle that as well. Even in the better balanced, MTW/VI v2.01, high era, 10k, flat map, CWC Grand Final my clan played the eventual winning clan and their tactics had little to do with using balanced armies. Individual testing in MTW/VI shows that sword/cav is best, and that's what the winning team used in the CWC 4v4 battles to win.

Due to peculiarities in RTW's 3D battle engine, I don't know if anti-cav performance can be increased very much. If RPS remains weak, then unit balancing has to be done to an even higher degree to get away from a spamming type of gameplay. Simply reducing the effectiveness of cav could lead to other problems such as sword spam or ineffectiveness of flanking. Even so, you might be able to make something that works noticably better than RTW v1.2 without a great deal of work.

I still have a hard time understanding why we end up with so many different results and feedback on cavalry versus whatever else you throw at it. If anything MTW gave a much more consistent feeling on how the game plays; people may or may not like it, but it was somehow more consistent. Now... With RTW, I don't know if we really all play the same game.

I still have the feeling that settings matter a lot; games are vastly different depending on which unit size you play...

For modding that means either trying to balance for all size, in all conditions, knowing that those conditions got a huge impact, and that the "feeling" spread is very large.
To be honest, I don't think it's possible; there would be a need for stat at huge unit size, and another one at small/normal unit size...

Yuuki, given the large gap in people's experience about this game, I got a hard time thinking a mod could do it all for everyone. Even for players who think that the mechanics of 1.2 are ok, and whose experience with phalanx is that they do beat cavalry, there are still some very bothersome problems and modding would help a lot solving them.

I'd suggest moving along with two mods

One for those happy with RTW 1.2 and moving along the lines of;
- readjusting unit cost to rebalance units/ faction
- solve a few bugs (horse archer not shooting, discripancy in units stats)
That would not really change the way RTW 1.2 plays. A 1200 denarii cataphract is still a cataphract and would behave just like a vanilla 1.2 cataphract. A ruban cohort would be more expensive, but still a urban cohort.

And one for those who wants to change the gameplay;
- slowing down kill speed
- slowing down movement speed
- readjusting cost/ combat stat to rebalance units/ faction
- solve the bugs

I know for sure that I am interested in the 1st mod, and I posted a long time ago to get there.

I also got some interest in the second mod, and that is why I worked along mainly with Crandaeolon and CeltiberoMordred (and other fellow players).
The main reason for looking at a "deeper" mod is mainly related to what was mentionned at start: many different results, and many different feedback. Combat results look very inconsistent, random and chaotic. I am not interested by reducing the speed in and for itself, but I think it's a good way to get more consistent combat results. And that would be a good thing.

A "1.2 friendly" mod can probably be done quickly, and fix a few things that 1.2 lovers are bothered with, but not essentially changing the gameplay.
The other mod, of which Mordred mod is a first step will probably take a much longer time and need lot of brainstorming, testing and feedback.

The main issue, as usual, is how many people would play one mod? What about two?

Louis,

I think the whole discussion about how to counter lame cav tactics is rather pointless. Before I start a game and pick my army I do not know whether I will be faced with an all cav army. The only indication I have is the numbers of soldiers being picked. Which meant in my case more than half the games I played, untill I gave up on mp, were lost before I even started. An utter waste of time. The main reason I gave up was, in fact, the massive waste of time.

Apart from that: a good players who uses the cav spam will always win. It is a far more serious bug than the swipe in MTW.

A mod is not a viable answer: Most modders do not agree with each other, as most players, and therefore there is not going to be one mod accepted by all.

And Louis: I think you are wrong about the killing speed and running speed. Try and keep in mind how fast you get used to something when it comes down to games. When I play MTW now it feels horribly slow.

I think killing/game speed is closely related to the cav spam bug, apart from some others problems. Lower killing speed means a unit holds out longer which gives you time to react, slower running walking/speed gives you more time to react in the first place. An thus cav spam will be less effective or even useless.

To which extend both speeds should decreased is open for discussion, but I seriously doubt whether you can stop spamming by just making some units more expensive.

The game was designed to be played on huge settings. I think it was Fishpants who said that defending the game/killing speed here at .org. And he is right, on huge the problem is less. Unfortunalty the game cannot be played by the vast majority on huge due to a variety of problems. I think the game in principal is ahead of it's time, next generation cpu's will be able to handle it well.

Most play on large settings so lowering both speeds is the most sensible answer, apart from re balancing. Most important is the killing speed.

There are quite a few mods around and with some adjustment they could be a very good alternative. Yet another mod is doomed. And it should be one of the most popular mods if it stands a chance of being accepted by a significant amount of players to be able to survive in mp. So far none have.

A very interesting mod I played a few games with is the Darth Vader Mod. Havent tested it much but it felt extremely good. He did some things no else has tried, the game now feels more natural. Even AI battles have become more enjoyable.

Link: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/index...howtopic=24673

I think this mod is a step in the right direction.

3 impact factors that make a cav spam so effective and can be modified:
-cavalry mass: lower mass means cavalry doesnt push trough infantry so easily
-jump animation: removing this will stop horses jumping over other horses, thereby only letting the frontline get their charge bonus. Also further deduces the "push through" effect.
-horse "radius": I slightly increased the "free space" around each individual horse in Chivalry TW, so you can't "compress" tons of horses on a rediculously small space. That means there are more foot soldiers fighting every horseman.

Horses shouldn't be able to beat medium to heavy infantry units head on. Even tho the best cavalry may be more effecient individual fighters, they should be so small in numbers that they cannot beat good infantry head on.

i saw someone who did that as julii against me in a 4v4, needless to say i show'd him the meaning of "pike-fodder". i only lost about 20 guys :charge:

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Originally Posted by Drake22

i saw someone who did that as julii against me in a 4v4, needless to say i show'd him the meaning of "pike-fodder". i only lost about 20 guys :charge:

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This post is an example of what Swoosh is talking about. It makes it sound like there is no problem. Right now CA's position is that cav is not overpowered, and that unit stacking is not a problem. The weak RPS is going to stay as it is, as are the movement and fighing speeds.

In STWmod for MTW/VI, a yari spear unit costs 400 and frontally beats the best heavy cavalry unit which costs 1200. The cav is 2x faster than the spear, and the spear is 2x stronger than the cav. Stacking units results in a combat penalty. The relationship of these units is quite close to what LongJohn made them in original STW. The cavalry is still extremely dangerous in this mod.

"The one thing I have noticed from STW to RTW strategy discussions is the change of focus.

STW: Focus was on position, angles of attack, specific map strategies for MP games, and specific unit strengths/weaknesses and how to overcome single-unit majority rush tactics.

MTW: Focus became more army selection oriented, game mechanics (tricks), and more general in nature (no specific map strategies), plus more general discussion on unit strengths/weaknesses and what army to choose to overcome single-unit majority rush tactics.

RTW: Focus is mostly on army selection, and game mechanics (tricks) and no discussion on how to overcome single-unit majority rush tactics.

Does anybody notice, how the increase in the number of units available has been inversely proportional to the amount of strategy possible? Every game in the TW series has meant less variables to consider when fighting battles. More emphasis on choosing the overpowered units, and using what I think are cheesy game mechanic bugs (Such as the "Fire At Will" trick to force your pavs to shoot faster than the enemy's pavs.) You never hear RTW discussions on angles of attack, breaking a defensive line by opening a hole in the enemies' defenses by attacking a weakened unit, etc . . . Why? Because the whole game has been simplified, with a focus on the 3-D engine instead of the more complicated and time-consuming process of unit balancing, battle computation complexity, and terrain usage.

I stated the very first week RTW was released that I felt the graphics/gameplay equation was a zero sum game, where advances to one area, ultimately were compensated by decreases in the other. An increase in RTW graphic resolution/3-D had led to a decrease in the complexity of the battle computations so that games would be playable online. It has been denied by almost everyone, and most vocally, but I am afraid this discussion is proof that my feelings were correct.

I still believe the reason we have never heard ANYTHING on how the battles are computed (which was discussed in detail, and given much press, for STW/MTW) is because the wonderful graphics engine was offset by an extreme simplification of the battle computations. If you ask for this information, they ignore it like an ugly stepchild.

The game, for me, was DOA (Dead On Arrival). Too many changes, for change's sake, and too little thought given to the MP lobby and gameplay. I am hopeful the SEGA/CA deal will focus on what made the original games great and not go in for glitz over gameplay."


I don't know about MTW/STW but i agree with you on RTW. it's more about which troops you have then how you use them. I think this illsurtates the problem quite well*

"...........First it requires you to purchase (based on a 25K denarii budget) 9 units of Cataphracts, 3 units of Silver Shield Pikemen, 3 units of Silver Shield Legionaries, and 5 units of Onagers. For upgrades, your first priority is the Cataphracts. Upgrade their attack and defense first. And remember that often times, giving a unit two bars of valor is cheaper and more effective than giving them +2 Defense and +2 Attack. I upgrade them so that 6 units of Catas get +2 attack and the other 3 get +3. I'll often boost their defense to either gold or silver for all of them. The general shouldn't be the strongest unit, three units other than him should have the +3 attack improvement. Next improve your Legions' attacks, and finally your Pikemens' defenses..........."





*Infact, IMHO, it illustrates the problem as well as a worker at the panama canal walking around with a wheel barrow on his head illustrated the problem there.

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Originally Posted by mongoose

"The one thing I have noticed from STW to RTW strategy discussions is the change of focus.

STW: Focus was on position, angles of attack, specific map strategies for MP games, and specific unit strengths/weaknesses and how to overcome single-unit majority rush tactics.

MTW: Focus became more army selection oriented, game mechanics (tricks), and more general in nature (no specific map strategies), plus more general discussion on unit strengths/weaknesses and what army to choose to overcome single-unit majority rush tactics.

RTW: Focus is mostly on army selection, and game mechanics (tricks) and no discussion on how to overcome single-unit majority rush tactics.

Does anybody notice, how the increase in the number of units available has been inversely proportional to the amount of strategy possible? Every game in the TW series has meant less variables to consider when fighting battles. More emphasis on choosing the overpowered units, and using what I think are cheesy game mechanic bugs (Such as the "Fire At Will" trick to force your pavs to shoot faster than the enemy's pavs.) You never hear RTW discussions on angles of attack, breaking a defensive line by opening a hole in the enemies' defenses by attacking a weakened unit, etc . . . Why? Because the whole game has been simplified, with a focus on the 3-D engine instead of the more complicated and time-consuming process of unit balancing, battle computation complexity, and terrain usage.

I stated the very first week RTW was released that I felt the graphics/gameplay equation was a zero sum game, where advances to one area, ultimately were compensated by decreases in the other. An increase in RTW graphic resolution/3-D had led to a decrease in the complexity of the battle computations so that games would be playable online. It has been denied by almost everyone, and most vocally, but I am afraid this discussion is proof that my feelings were correct.

I still believe the reason we have never heard ANYTHING on how the battles are computed (which was discussed in detail, and given much press, for STW/MTW) is because the wonderful graphics engine was offset by an extreme simplification of the battle computations. If you ask for this information, they ignore it like an ugly stepchild.

The game, for me, was DOA (Dead On Arrival). Too many changes, for change's sake, and too little thought given to the MP lobby and gameplay. I am hopeful the SEGA/CA deal will focus on what made the original games great and not go in for glitz over gameplay."


I don't know about MTW/STW but i agree with you on RTW. it's more about which troops you have then how you use them. I think this illsurtates the problem quite well*

"...........First it requires you to purchase (based on a 25K denarii budget) 9 units of Cataphracts, 3 units of Silver Shield Pikemen, 3 units of Silver Shield Legionaries, and 5 units of Onagers. For upgrades, your first priority is the Cataphracts. Upgrade their attack and defense first. And remember that often times, giving a unit two bars of valor is cheaper and more effective than giving them +2 Defense and +2 Attack. I upgrade them so that 6 units of Catas get +2 attack and the other 3 get +3. I'll often boost their defense to either gold or silver for all of them. The general shouldn't be the strongest unit, three units other than him should have the +3 attack improvement. Next improve your Legions' attacks, and finally your Pikemens' defenses..........."
.

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Hmmmm, I've heard this before. Or is it 'Deja Vu'?

........Orda

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Originally Posted by mongoose

Does anybody notice, how the increase in the number of units available has been inversely proportional to the amount of strategy possible? Every game in the TW series has meant less variables to consider when fighting battles. More emphasis on choosing the overpowered units, and using what I think are cheesy game mechanic bugs (Such as the "Fire At Will" trick to force your pavs to shoot faster than the enemy's pavs.)

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Actually, the game engine has become more complex with each installment. However, that works against a player understanding why things happen in the battle. You can't make intelligent command decisions when you don't know the rules that govern unit behavior. It's so complex now that you cannot figure out how the game works even by doing controlled tests. Also, parameters in the game engine have been altered by people at CA who don't understand the full consequences of those changes on the gameplay. I suspect that key programmers have left CA quite a while ago. This would also explain why we haven't gotten the kind details about the game engine that we've gotten in the past games.

More unit types is touted as an enhancement, but that will not improve the gameplay unless they are balanced. Everytime they add more units, the gameplay deteriorates because the units aren't balanced well enough. We got good balance in Samurai Wars for MTW/VI by going to 14 unit types, giving them the stats they had in original STW and then spending 3 months fine tuning those stats for the MTW/VI engine. That's 4 players who each had 4 years of experience playing Total War working for 3 months with the assistance of feedback from dozens of players, many of them long time verterans, on MP battles to get the 14 units balanced to the point where players can't exploit unit imbalance. Now we have excellent team battles, angles of attack, RPS style matchups with 3 simultaneously functioning RPS systems, opening holes in battlelines, intelligent targetting with ranged units, ranged effectiveness that makes corner camping a bad tactic, the need to protect ranged units from cavalry, effective flanking, fatigue working better because the pace of the battles is back to 15 to 20 minutes on average, fighting times and movement speeds that allow sufficient time to coordinate all 16 units and no need for rules which limit the purchase of certain unit types.

I'm setting up to play MP for the first time soon, and kinda looking forward to figuring out a way to beat up a cav blob :) I would say, from my admittedly less experienced viewpoint, that the key is having a few very strong defensive units to take the charge, and as long as you can hold the cav blob for a little while, flanking will destroy them (since more massed cav means more kills per second for flankers, and no worries about defending against additional units). Maybe an infantry blob is the answer in defense? Maybe not quite in the same unit space, but partially overlapping, so the front is wide enough to avoid flanking? Then flank with a phalanx, if you have enough time, cav if you don't, and watch 'em squirm :) In my experience with cav, they really lose their manueverability advantage once the first charge hits home, especially if there are tons of them all together getting in the way of each other, so I would expect even if your front breaks they won't be able to turn around/escape through the hole.

to prevent cav spamming in most of our games our clan restrict cav to a max of 10 units, even if they are a cav based civ (you really dont need anymore if you know what you are doing) people moan of coarse this is why i then pick a cav based civ and only use 10 units of cav mixed with a few archers and throw away inf, and give them a sound whooping

(i dont want to offend anyone but i beleave anyone who needs to use 20 units of cav to win a battle, dont deserve to play the game)

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Originally Posted by Imorthorn

i then pick a cav based civ and only use 10 units of cav mixed with a few archers and throw away inf, and give them a sound whooping

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You shouldn't be able to win that way. It demonstrates how unbalanced the game is. No infantry, and you are going around whooping people.

This is one of few ways to win overpowered cavalry spam army Yuki.

For example MTW had different problems, which people like to exploit right? It is always something.

I hope that this BI expansion pack will be good. If not, this will be the last product I will bought from CA and I'm not the only one who will react like this.

There is many companies, issuing patches almost every day to improve game problems their customers have.

I simply can't understand why someone has policy for one patch only, etc.

I don't won't to criticize, but this is the normal sense of marketing. If you won't to be good you need to do almost everything for the customer.

I apologyze for going off topic, but this I had to mention.

VorCid

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Originally Posted by VorCid

For example MTW had different problems, which people like to exploit right? It is always something.

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True, but there are qualitative differences in how good or bad something is. You can show by objective measurment that the RTW gameplay is less balanced than MTW. Without upgrading units you can demonstrate that cav beats phalanx frontally. That didn't happen in MTW. What happened to the rock, paper, scissors in RTW?

Also, you have 25% more units to control and they move 50% faster in RTW. That doesn't improve the gameplay if tactical maneuver of all the units in the army in a coordinated manner according to a strategic plan is supposed to be the method of achieving victory.

I think it's interesting to note that there're obviously two kinds of players.

The first kind is happy to play a game just because it's new and shiny.
The don't want a "realistic" representation of ancient battles, they want quick fun.
Having to learn a game, let alone tactics is asking too much of these with too short attention spans.
But, they apparently rule the fields of MP with ridiculous "blobs" or "swarms".

The second type bought this game because he enjoyed the other Total War games
and is expecting similar gameplay, including a representation of ancient warfare.
These players expect minor bugs and glitches, yes, but certainly are not prepared to
face "blob"-armies.

For these two type of players it's absolutely pointless and time-wasting to even
consider to play against each other.
Therefore, I say that a mod doesn't need to be for all players.
If you could make a mod known to a small community that plays regularly
it would be good start. Other players would then recognize that there are
games played they can't join and would download a mod if they are intersted
to join those games.
Those that aren't interested can play vanilla,
while those that want a different gameplay play the mod.
The community will be splitted but that seems the case already?

I'm just offering my opinion here. Keep in mind that I haven't played a single game
of R:TW Multiplayer.

:bow:

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Originally Posted by R'as al Ghul

If you could make a mod known to a small community that plays regularly
it would be good start.

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There are easily exploitable characteristics in the RTW battle engine that cannot be corrected with a mod. Since CA is stonewalling on these gameplay issues, I see no reason for optimism concerning improved gameplay in the add-on.

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Originally Posted by Puzz3D

You shouldn't be able to win that way. It demonstrates how unbalanced the game is. No infantry, and you are going around whooping people.

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what I ment by "throw away" was i would use hillmen or some other cheap form of infrantry

sorry for any confussion

People are trying to make out that MTW was a wonderful MP experience. This was not so, there were bugs in MTW too.

....and lest we forget....Spear units were pathetic

......Orda

Imorthorn, the tactic you describe is a Cav Spam army and you have CoH in your signature??

.....Orda

OMGZ1!!!!1!! I OWND U WIT TEH CAV ARMIEEE11!!!11!!!!!111! I HVE TRAINER!!111!1 YOu SuXORRRzzzZ!!111!!!!!!!!!!!111!!


What's the point, if you want to win 100% of your battles why not play against the AI? ~;)

How else exactly can people play as Parthia for example, without taking a force consisting of considerable cavalry numbers? The infantry that you take is not expected to kill that many, but to just bog down your enemy. So they will be just "throw away" units. A cavalry spam army is more an army consisting primarily of melee cavalry units, not just cavalry in general for cavalry factions. This does depend on how the missile cavalry is used though.

I regard these kind of mixed melee and missile cavalry armies with a concrete infantry component as perfectly within the CoH as they are playing an army that would correspond with a faction's expected army. It would be unfair to state that people cannot use horse archers because they are cavalry so would make the player a cavalry spammer.

The rules I like to play are a limit of 5 maximum melee cavalry and 5 max missile cavalry, which I think allows for this opportunity while limiting spamming as much as possible (though it can be abused).

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There are easily exploitable characteristics in the RTW battle engine that cannot be corrected with a mod.

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I can't agree becaus Adherbal is doing a great job with Chivalry TW mod for RTW. This mod will be enjoyable to play and I do belive that MTW/VI and even STW players will be statisfied with it, when they will try it.

Imagine. All those 550 signatures raised for the petition. If all those people would simply install this mod, we have community as many would like to see.
This will never happen thought.

I would be glad if at least majority who don't play RTW, would try Chivalry TW mod on it. You will not be dissapointed.

There is also one more mod with shogun theme in development. There is quit few possibilities, but people are tired of TW. Some are too lazy and even if one their reaction might change something, this is simply too much for them.

I'm looking foward for Chivalry TW mod second era.

Me too. Look's good so far ~:thumb:

Are there actually many people now playing the Chivalry mod online? I installed it a while a go, but never actually found anyone to play it against, so eventually uninstalled it again....

no, we currently organise games through the forum or MSN. There was quite some activity the first 3-4 days after the release of last beta, but it didn't sustain. There are currently about 8 people playing the mod frequently, which definitly helps improving the balance though.

I hope that with the next beta - which will be huge and finally include a working SP campaign - it'll attract enough people to get games going for atleast a week or two. All we need is a couple of people playing so that when new players look for a game online then can find one easily. If they don't then they will probably not try again, which will mean the community will diminish again.

If only there was a way to convince everyone who was slightly/very disappointed in RTW to give this mod a try for atleast a couple of days after next beta release...
We'd have a MP TW game that is controlled by the MP community itself for the first time (next to the Samurai Mod, but I fear the time of the MTW engine is over for a lot of us)

PS: If anyone wants a game of ChivTW add adherbal_barca@hotmail.com to you MSN contacts and just ask.

PPS: latest screenshots

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Originally Posted by Orda Khan

Imorthorn, the tactic you describe is a Cav Spam army and you have CoH in your signature??

.....Orda

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That is a bit unfair for you to to claim that, maybe i didnt explain it clearly enough, just read what NiNilist says he explains it better then i could

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Originally Posted by NINihilist

How else exactly can people play as Parthia for example, without taking a force consisting of considerable cavalry numbers? The infantry that you take is not expected to kill that many, but to just bog down your enemy. So they will be just "throw away" units. A cavalry spam army is more an army consisting primarily of melee cavalry units, not just cavalry in general for cavalry factions. This does depend on how the missile cavalry is used though.

I regard these kind of mixed melee and missile cavalry armies with a concrete infantry component as perfectly within the CoH as they are playing an army that would correspond with a faction's expected army. It would be unfair to state that people cannot use horse archers because they are cavalry so would make the player a cavalry spammer.

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