Armour Values

[Randal]

Because the Hastati have a bigger shield (great against missiles) and better armour to boot.

But no, it does not seem as if they are calculated as if they have a breastplate, because Polybian Hastati with a breastplate showing on the model have 9 armour instead of 7.

Which again seems weird, as this puts them just 1 point below a Cohors Reformata (Or other troops with medium-mail armour, I expect.)

And since the Cohors for some reason has a lower defence skill than the Hastati the Cohors has the same defence stat as Polybian Hastati even though the former is armed in chainmail and the second has just a bronze pectoral that would mostly be covered by the shield anyway, which as per Ludens' explanation above shouldn't really have given much of a boost.

I assume that the lower defence skill is because mail armour would encumber the soldiers more? Not quite sure I'd agree with that then since in a formation there wouldn't be much room for dodging and using mobility as a defence. I'd sooner expect the armour to affect stamina, which would in the long run also reduce defence skill as the troops get tired more quickly.

Yeah, it does seem a bit peculiar. Still, most troops do seem to perform roughly how I'd expect them to. And the slow combat makes battles better than almost any total-war game I've played.

(But if I were to tweak EB, I'd definitely switch a few of those armour values around a bit. I'd also make the weapons a bit more similar to eachother. Reduce lethality of longswords, remove AP from most weapons...In antiquity, or most pre-modern warfare, the deciding factor in combat was the coherence, discipline, morale and courage of the troops involved, not whether they had a straight sword or a slightly curved/weighed one that suddenly made them twice as effective against armoured foes, and combat usually saw relatively few casualties until one side broke and ran and was cut down in the pursuit. Making weapons less of a deciding factor might simulate this a bit better, I feel. Well, except the spectacular and unusual weapons we know did have a big impact on battles, like the Sarissa or the Falx.)

Oh, and thanks for the explanation, Ludens. I hadn't considered the redundancy reasoning. It makes quite a lot of sense, though it would have the effect of making the troops more vulnerable to missiles from the rear in-engine. Still, because they couldn't dodge then this does make some sense.

[seienchin]

Off course its completly ahistorical. Even Geasatae have an armour rating^^
But I guess the EB Team had the problem with missile units, which always have Lethality 1 and atacks from the back making armour your only defense, so giving everybody reasonable armour ratings would have made EB more or less like Vanilla. And I am happy they didnt.

[Randal]

There's a good few 'barbarians' and other unarmoured troops with 1 or 0 armour.

Gaesatae -do- wear a helmet. So they're actually better protected than lugoae or gaeroas, lack of pants notwithstanding. Though I do agree with Gamegeek that 4 armour for a helmet seems a bit much.

[SFraser]

You have to look at the actual unit performance to see if the stats make sense.

Take the Botroas versus Hastati example, with an armour rating of 1 the Hastati would be very vulnerable to missiles and individual unit combat. If they were not used en-mass to charge an opponent they would be slaughtered. By contrast this is very much the behaviour shown by the Botroas and actually supported by the offensive statistics. So while the armour value perhaps makes little sense in the context of the armour worn by the Hastati, it may well be the case that it exists purely to produce the desired combat behaviour and performance the unit is supposed to historically show. In this respect the game only has three defensive values to produce the directional defensive capability of a unit. The early scutum for example would be a far greater tool of defence than simply +4 to defence for front and left of a single man, but you would expect instead for the shield to be utilised more like a wall presented on all sides of the unit protecting the troops behind and being for all the world like row upon row of wooden barricades. I would therefore in this example consider the 7 armour rating to represent the defensive effect of each man in a maniple wielding a scutum. A large number of scutums in a maniple would inevitably boost the "armour" rating of the entire unit because of the sheer quantity and size of the shields being carried.

That might not be the reasoning, but the important factor is that the armour value of the Hastati allows them greater defence from multiple angles of attack, and therefore allows them to perform a line holding role.

I think when you get down to unit statistics, you cannot afford to try and equate armour worn to armour value or shields wielded to shield value, but instead must look for the statistics that generate the required combat behaviour effects. If unarmoured Hastati require a relatively high armour value in EB to actually produce the documented and known combat behaviour, then I would certainly do so rather than take statistical realism too far and destroy combat behaviour realism.

The final point is that perfect representation in the statistics would require that the fundamental game mechanics of combat are themselves realistic to the point where realistic values produce realistic outcomes. As things stand, while there may be discrepancies in values, and unarmoured units having armour values, the actual final result on the battlefield is something I am very happy with and it "looks right" to me in combat.

[Randal]

That is the second explanation I considered, and I agree that it actually would make a lot of sense to balance units according to their historical performance rather than just to what armour they are wearing.

But Ludens' explanation seems to contradict this, stating that the team uses a formula, with some few exceptions. Perhaps Hastati indeed are one such exception.

(Though in that case I would still wonder at post-Marian legionaries being weaker than Polybian legionaries, if anything I was under the distinct impression that the professionalisation of the Roman Army increased its fighting potential rather than decreased.)

[SFraser]

There certainly are some unusual discrepancies.

As for your other point I wouldn't know how the EB team go about defining the values, but I would say in my experience that the fighting performance and behaviour of most units fits the decription rather than the individual statistics fitting the appearance of the unit. Camillan Hastati versus Botroas is an excellent example of how slightly confusing statistics individually produce an excellent variety of behaviour that perfectly suits the unit description and historical information given. I'm not saying that is the premise from the outset, but I would expect some "creative license" with statistics in order to produce the desired effect.

I think what is important is the effect of the statistics themselves rather than what they are supposed to represent in terms direct equation to equipment. An unarmoured unit like Milnaht or even Gaesatae that is supposed to be immense in close melee is not going to fare particularly well in close melee when they have zero for their armour statistic. According to EB the Jugundiz with no shirt have an armour of 0, Botroas with no shirt have an armour of 1, Milnaht with no shirt but helmet have an armour of 5, Bataroas with shirt and helmet have armour of 6 and Drwdae in their chainmail have an armour of 10.

Like others have said I don't think wearing a helmet warrants +5 armour when a chain shirt does the same, but I don't think the differences can be rationalised in this way. It is a similar issue with shields, does a cheap wooden buckler used by slingers honestly give half the protection of a scutum? In terms of pure defensive value, surely something like a scutum should be giving a higher protection value than any other piece of equipment in the game? What would you rather bring to the battlefield, a massive and well designed human sized board of reinforced wood held at arms length, or go naked but for a helmet?

The nature of large shields like the scutum is that they are "almost" omni directional in that you can "hide" behind them, and in large groups they present pretty much a wooden wall with sharp objects sticking out from the gaps. The game doesn't account for this, so omni-directional combat ability of soldiers + styles + equipment must be factored into the armour rating or defense skill etc.

I wouldn't go around thinking of armour equalling the actual armour worn, but the defense capability of the unit from multiple directions. Likewise when wielding a scutum, a high shield value would only work in two directions for a single man and would not represent the actual capability of an entire unit wielding scutums.

I could be totally off the mark here, but if I was involved in something like EB I would be considering the weaknesses in the combat engine for representing abilities on the field of battle, in order to produce a more realistic end result. You don't want your Hastati with their wooden walls dying like flies because they are engaged from the front and being pelted by slingers from the rear, so only ten men turn to face the slingers and their ingame scutums offer no protection to the other hundred men not yet engaged and completely oblivious to the death being chucked at them.

When this happens ingame currently, the armour value of the Hastati is actually higher than the value of the shield, so the unarmoured Hastati are actually better defended than if they had 0 for all stats and had a shield facing the slingers (not entireally true due to AP + shield boni but you get the point). I think this is a clear example of how the shield itself is not directly represented by the shield value, but is abstracted for the units defence as a whole. Ofcourse this will result in imperfect consequences in other contexts, but the fundamental game mechanics themselves are not perfect.

In future I would like see more variables or "bonuses" involved in equipment and defence values, for example different shield sizes taken into account (light and heavy for example) and providing additional defence to the unit as a whole, but that kind of thing is for the future.

[Randal]

If it works like you describe it would be a good system, I agree. You make good points.

However, AP weapons would rather confuse this issue. I already feel that they are far too effective in EB compared to our historical reports. (Is there any evidence, any ancient source that ascribed victory to an army's use of falcatas instead of gladii?) If armour values were meant as a more generic representation of a unit's melee-capacity, giving every unit with a curved sword or club the ability to halve this value would rather send historical balance flying out of the window.

[Duguntz]

randal : "(Is there any evidence, any ancient source that ascribed victory to an army's use of falcatas instead of gladii?)"

Yes, in Dacia, the roman had to modify their armour because they were being butchered by the rhompaia (or falx?) and it's curved blade and thus went to battle with their lorica segmentata complemented by a manica (inspired by the gladiators) worn on the sword arm... we can clearly see the depictions on the trajan column, between the two conflicts of dacia...

[Apázlinemjó]

(Though in that case I would still wonder at post-Marian legionaries being weaker than Polybian legionaries, if anything I was under the distinct impression that the professionalisation of the Roman Army increased its fighting potential rather than decreased.)

Actually the Reformata legionaries aren't really weaker, as their moral (one of the most important factor in the stats) and soldiers/unit rate are higher than the Polybian Principes' and Hastati's. Also let's not forget that the Triarii maniples were the "cream" in the earlier armies, so they are a different story.

[gamegeek2]

That is the second explanation I considered, and I agree that it actually would make a lot of sense to balance units according to their historical performance rather than just to what armour they are wearing.

But Ludens' explanation seems to contradict this, stating that the team uses a formula, with some few exceptions. Perhaps Hastati indeed are one such exception.

As a member of the team, I can attest that they do use a formula, though exceptions are made for some units (namely barbarians).

I think what is important is the effect of the statistics themselves rather than what they are supposed to represent in terms direct equation to equipment. An unarmoured unit like Milnaht or even Gaesatae that is supposed to be immense in close melee is not going to fare particularly well in close melee when they have zero for their armour statistic. According to EB the Jugundiz with no shirt have an armour of 0, Botroas with no shirt have an armour of 1, Milnaht with no shirt but helmet have an armour of 5, Bataroas with shirt and helmet have armour of 6 and Drwdae in their chainmail have an armour of 10.

Barbarian melee units are given a +1 bonus to armour automatically.

In EB, shields have pretty low values compared to their historical effectiveness. Have you ever tried mock-fighting with a big shield, like a hoplon or scutum? The thing is invaluable protection. To represent this, AtB will give shields much greater effectiveness. Hopla will have a shield stat of 6, Thureoi 5 - much better than the 4 and 3 we see in-game.

Head-blows are by far the most lethal, but some of the hardest to carry out when you have a shield (a stab at the torso or slash towards the neck or limbs is much more practical) - plus, the other guy can just raise his shield to block. Against horsemen, a helmet is more effective because they would be striking down at you.

Also, I find falcatae and kopeis underpowered. They are much more lethal than the .11 lethality would suggest - definitely more lethal than a mace, which has .165 lethality. AtB will assign lethality based on how likely a hit from a weapon is to KILL you. Disabling isn't quite killing, though it's pretty good, but there's no way to represent disabling in the RTW system, so instead it will count towards lethality, but significantly less.

[athanaric]

Also, I find falcatae and kopeis underpowered. They are much more lethal than the .11 lethality would suggest - definitely more lethal than a mace, which has .165 lethality. AtB will assign lethality based on how likely a hit from a weapon is to KILL you. Disabling isn't quite killing, though it's pretty good, but there's no way to represent disabling in the RTW system, so instead it will count towards lethality, but significantly less.

Indeed, I think they should have stats more similar to maces - somewhat lower attack, but bigger lethality than other short/medium length swords.

[Zradha Pahlavan]

Why is it that basic Celtic shirtless spearmen have an armor value of 1 while similarly equipped Nubian or Garamantine spearmen have an armor value of 0?