[EB] EDU Balance Proposals

[vartan]

Hey, random questions, can we create a new thread for the new balancing system? This thread is about balance proposals and somewhat limiting. I'd like to see and talk about the system.

I think we can just loosely interpret the title of this thread, if that helps. I'm sure the OP won't mind.

[Lazy O]

Does the OP ever mind anything?

[Kival]

I've already made this "proposal" in hamachi but I'll rephrase it here too: Infantry bodyguard should be increased to perhaps 60 men. A unit of 40 men is not of much use in melee and a small cav unit has much more possibilities (charge, running around to give command etc.) than a small infantry unit. In fact all infangry bodyguards were used in melee and are not meant to stay behind. To give them 60 men would be less of a sacrifice for the infantry line which makes sense for the infantry heavy factions. They still would be not so flexible as a cavalry bodyguard but in exchange they would be less of a sacrifice.

[gamegeek2]

Hey, random questions, can we create a new thread for the new balancing system? This thread is about balance proposals and somewhat limiting. I'd like to see and talk about the system.

I would love it if you did so. Post your questions and suggestions there, for 3.0...

[antisocialmunky]

I think you should do it if you want to have the system/suggests in the OP.

[Brave Brave Sir Robin]

I actually have a suggestion that will likely incite some argument. We all know that there has been a lot of complaining about Rome, both by Roman players and the opponents of said faction. The other day when Vega was raging about something, I made up some army comps to try to help him out. Most things were more or less fine, but I did notice one thing.

There is absolutely no reason for a player to select Marian Roman armies. Why? Well the main infantry contingent will be statistically identical to Imperials but they have no access to factional missile units like Imperials do. In fact, the only unit they have which Imperials do not is the Cohorts Evocata which are basically a redundant unit anyway with little use. Since both Marian and Imperial armies lack decent factional heavy cav (ridiculously crappy and overpriced Praetorians not counting), it is difficult for Marians to field a balanced army with the 5 merc limit. In fact, this sort of explains why many Roman players spam cohorts, simply because if they are taking Post-Marian or Imperial armies, they are somewhat forced to. The factional list for Rome is very small in these time periods.

Therefore, my proposal is that Marian Roman armies be given an additional 3 merc limit, up to 8. Historically, Rome relied a lot on auxiliaries which are personified in Imperial armies through the two spear units. However, Marian armies have no such unit while also lacking factional missiles, but still have the same merc limit as Imperials making them much less flexible. I feel as if this would add a bit of diversity to Roman armies and make people more willing to field Marian armies which I have never seen in tournament iirc. Also, the Samnite spearmen should be factional for Polybian Romans as they are for Camillan (this is the way campaign represents it), while the Samnite heavy infantry should be made available in the roster once again.

[-Stormrage-]

I move to give Saba Right of prima nocta, sorry just came back from brave heart, i mean Right of 2 chevron use.

[antisocialmunky]

No.

They only get a Historical I Win Button after Mohammad.

[vartan]

I actually have a suggestion that will likely incite some argument. We all know that there has been a lot of complaining about Rome, both by Roman players and the opponents of said faction. The other day when Vega was raging about something, I made up some army comps to try to help him out. Most things were more or less fine, but I did notice one thing.

There is absolutely no reason for a player to select Marian Roman armies. Why? Well the main infantry contingent will be statistically identical to Imperials but they have no access to factional missile units like Imperials do. In fact, the only unit they have which Imperials do not is the Cohorts Evocata which are basically a redundant unit anyway with little use. Since both Marian and Imperial armies lack decent factional heavy cav (ridiculously crappy and overpriced Praetorians not counting), it is difficult for Marians to field a balanced army with the 5 merc limit. In fact, this sort of explains why many Roman players spam cohorts, simply because if they are taking Post-Marian or Imperial armies, they are somewhat forced to. The factional list for Rome is very small in these time periods.

Therefore, my proposal is that Marian Roman armies be given an additional 3 merc limit, up to 8. Historically, Rome relied a lot on auxiliaries which are personified in Imperial armies through the two spear units. However, Marian armies have no such unit while also lacking factional missiles, but still have the same merc limit as Imperials making them much less flexible. I feel as if this would add a bit of diversity to Roman armies and make people more willing to field Marian armies which I have never seen in tournament iirc. Also, the Samnite spearmen should be factional for Polybian Romans as they are for Camillan (this is the way campaign represents it), while the Samnite heavy infantry should be made available in the roster once again.

I was talking about this with gamegeek2 the other day. Or rather, messaged him about it. One thing you forget is that the Polybian SPQR also needs more mercs. They lack good fire support. So gg2 and I thought of 6 for Polyb/Marian. Now I'm thinking that one extra merc won't cut it.

[antisocialmunky]

We could bump factions up to 10 for Rome since they relied extensively on allies and mercenaries. Carthage and Rome should both have high merc/ally counts.

[gamegeek2]

No.

They only get a Historical I Win Button after Mohammad.

Or when they are EBNOM Nabatu :D (with elite armored cavalry and axe armed agema :D )

[Vega]

We could bump factions up to 10 for Rome since they relied extensively on allies and mercenaries. Carthage and Rome should both have high merc/ally counts.

Munky every word you said is in place :D i think that its true and that increasing mercenary slots for SPQR is good solution, and of course what ACS said fixing Hastati in polybian era as well

[Aper]

Hi all, first congrats for the new Battle System, the EDU really needed some updates and fixes.
My question/proposal: IMHO, it makes little sense that many longsword armed units have an extremely tight formation when all shortswords have an open one... Shouldn't be the opposite?? Why should anyone (I mean people with some cash like Boii warriors or Principes, for example) use a shortsword if not for fighting in closer spaces?? And how can soldurii or milnat use effectively their slashing weapons ammassed like they are?? Thanks

[Burebista]

Hi all, first congrats for the new Battle System, the EDU really needed some updates and fixes.
My question/proposal: IMHO, it makes little sense that many longsword armed units have an extremely tight formation when all shortswords have an open one... Shouldn't be the opposite?? Why should anyone (I mean people with some cash like Boii warriors or Principes, for example) use a shortsword if not for fighting in closer spaces?? And how can soldurii or milnat use effectively their slashing weapons ammassed like they are?? Thanks

Half the answer is the discipline and training the upper tier units get. What i mean is the more disciplined the unit is , the more trained to fight in enclosed space he is

[Aper]

Half the answer is the discipline and training the upper tier units get. What i mean is the more disciplined the unit is , the more trained to fight in enclosed space he is

Sorry man, but the EB system don't work this way: check the hoplites for example, they get more or less the same values, levy or elite, despite the training. And BTW, why should you pick a weapon excellent in slashing to fight in close order, not using it at full effect? pick a gladius hispaniensins instead, like iberian celts did: still an excellent sword, but more adapt to the job.

EDIT: I think, to be more clear, that a width value less than 1 should be reserved for spears and shortsword only.

About shortswords, I felt bagaudas and their kin utterly useless, so I made them skirmishers, raising attack, ammo and range of the javs and removing the "prec" attribute: a sort of ambusher unit, quite effective if used in the right way... what do you think about that?

[Lazy O]

Unless you come on Hamachi, play some games, prove your point, your post makes no sense.

[Kival]

In general I agree with robin's idea.

There is absolutely no reason for a player to select Marian Roman armies. Why? Well the main infantry contingent will be statistically identical to Imperials but they have no access to factional missile units like Imperials do. In fact, the only unit they have which Imperials do not is the Cohorts Evocata which are basically a redundant unit anyway with little use. Since both Marian and Imperial armies lack decent factional heavy cav (ridiculously crappy and overpriced Praetorians not counting), it is difficult for Marians to field a balanced army with the 5 merc limit. In fact, this sort of explains why many Roman players spam cohorts, simply because if they are taking Post-Marian or Imperial armies, they are somewhat forced to. The factional list for Rome is very small in these time periods.

The auxilary cavalry is quite good light cavalry and the preatorian cavalry is not crappy, it's only very expensive.

Therefore, my proposal is that Marian Roman armies be given an additional 3 merc limit, up to 8. Historically, Rome relied a lot on auxiliaries which are personified in Imperial armies through the two spear units. However, Marian armies have no such unit while also lacking factional missiles, but still have the same merc limit as Imperials making them much less flexible. I feel as if this would add a bit of diversity to Roman armies and make people more willing to field Marian armies which I have never seen in tournament iirc. Also, the Samnite spearmen should be factional for Polybian Romans as they are for Camillan (this is the way campaign represents it)

I agree to increase the merc limit for marian armies but I'm not sure with the samnites for the Polybian Romans. After the Hannibal incident the Romans no longer believed in their italian allies and did not use them as allies to the same extent as before. It would make sense to get rid of all italian units in the Polybian Factional units roster and increase their merc limit, too. If you only add the merc units of the camillian era there is no reason to use camillian at all.

while the Samnite heavy infantry should be made available in the roster once again.

Agreed.

Or rather, messaged him about it. One thing you forget is that the Polybian SPQR also needs more mercs. They lack good fire support. So gg2 and I thought of 6 for Polyb/Marian. Now I'm thinking that one extra merc won't cut it.

I cant's see the reasoning here, other factions lack "good fire support" too and we would not give them more merc becaue of it.

We could bump factions up to 10 for Rome since they relied extensively on allies and mercenaries. Carthage and Rome should both have high merc/ally counts.

I cannot agree for Camillian and Polybian era. At least for Camillian most of the allies are already part of the factional unit list. If we bump up the the mercenary limit up to 10, we need to get rid of the italian units in the factional units list.

[vartan]

Italians could potentially be made 'mercs' if you think about it. Right?

And Aper, Romans used shortswords and they gave themselves more room to fight than is represented in the game. I think the EB team ended up balancing many factors, including the one of spacing, in order to make units perform how they wished. That being said, I don't know if other shortsword folk fought in such large per capita square footage as the Romans, but it shouldn't be much more or less than folk with other swords.

[Aper]

Unless you come on Hamachi, play some games, prove your point, your post makes no sense.

What's to prove? That the winner is right? your post make no sense.
I was proposing a new way to balance swords, making shortswordmen like Dunaminaca or Legionarii for example specialized in close order, tight fighting, while giving some longswordmen like milhnat or Arjos a little more relaxed formation, because their longswords makes them very efficient killers but should reguire a little more space between men in the battleline; most longswordmen like neitos are fine, it's the odd "longsword-wall" of massilian, hypaspistai, milhnat, soldurii, arjos and rycalawre that bothers me, because I think it's not very realistic. Isn't this a valid motivation for a proposal?

I have modified my EDU, partially inspired by the great "Guard mode guide" from SFraser, simply reducing a bit the spacing of shortswordmen line holders (not touched light infantry) and giving them a little soldier radius reduction (that hidden value after mass) to make them fight more cohesively; OTOH I augmented the vanilla 0.85 formation width value of some longswordmen to 1: nothing spectacular, but should make the difference for a smart player...I'm currently testing the whole thing in custom battles.

Sorry if I bothered you, I thought this stuff could be food for thought...

And Aper, Romans used shortswords and they gave themselves more room to fight than is represented in the game. I think the EB team ended up balancing many factors, including the one of spacing, in order to make units perform how they wished. That being said, I don't know if other shortsword folk fought in such large per capita square footage as the Romans, but it shouldn't be much more or less than folk with other swords.

I didn't see your post :)
Well, AFAIK the issue of Legionarii spacing has never been really resolved, because the discussion is based the interpretation of a little ambiguous written source... but their equipment suggest a pendant for a very close combat in quite tight formations, because to take advantage of a gladius over a longer weapon you need to be very close to the enemy, and if you do that without comrades guarding your flanks, you are dead. I remember too of gladiatori instructors teaching the troops how to fight better in some dire situations... well, most gladiators used extremely short weapons in extremely close combat, so...
However, the point is not about the actual spacing of soldiers, that's quite irrelevant if taken out of its contest, but about how to achieve that elusive goal that is formation fighting fort shortswordmen line-holders, I mean that kind of organized combat that is stronger than the simple sum of the individual strenghts.

[Lazy O]

You did not bother me, if I might rephrase, come online so we can test stuff what you say. And all the units you mentioned work better when not in guard mode, and beside Milnaht, use their spears and not their swords. Thing is, if you bugger up formations of these units just on the basis of crappy guard mode you just get the regular longsword assault troop, they loose their uniqueness as ultra heavy line holders.

[gamegeek2]

because to take advantage of a gladius over a longer weapon you need to be very close to the enemy, and if you do that without comrades guarding your flanks, you are dead

Legionaries carry an enormous shield for this precise purpose (and to stop arrows, etc. of course)

[raest]

it's the odd "longsword-wall" of massilian, hypaspistai, milhnat, soldurii, arjos and rycalawre that bothers me, because I think it's not very realistic. Isn't this a valid motivation for a proposal?

you have to remember that most of the units you mentioned (actually, all except for the milnaht) should use the spear as their primary, but they can't because of engine limitations (iirc, that particular spear animation (overhand?) cannot have a secondary weapon, so they switched them up). btw, to the power(s) that be: is there any way to switch the animation/skeleton/whatever for the aforementioned units (and others with the same problem like the various agemas etc..) with the one used by the Tikpanah so that they have spear as their primary and they can finally take a charge head on like they're supposed to? (i'd even take a "yes it's possible, here's a link, but we won't implement this in EBO" type of answer ;))

[Aper]

You did not bother me, if I might rephrase, come online so we can test stuff what you say. And all the units you mentioned work better when not in guard mode, and beside Milnaht, use their spears and not their swords. Thing is, if you bugger up formations of these units just on the basis of crappy guard mode you just get the regular longsword assault troop, they loose their uniqueness as ultra heavy line holders.

It's not something we can test until we decide to change the EDU: thing is, I wanted to know if my reasoning and modifications seemed reasonable to you, before doing that.

About weapons, the problem is that I think units with 2 melee weapons don't work very well, they are known to be buggy: I wrote in another thread "longsword/spear works wonder... to frustrate you: making a unit that receive charges with swords and fights in melee with spears accomplish what? That the unit get slaughtered by cavalry charges and switches to low lethality spears when it's time to do the real kill" so removing the spears and make them pure swordsmen maybe it's not that bad, their high attack and high lethality longsword should perform well vs. cavalry too.

Legionaries carry an enormous shield for this precise purpose (and to stop arrows, etc. of course)

your shield will protect you from the enemy in front of you, not from his comrades on the flanks: you need to be well covered by your friends to attack with a short weapon a line of enemies and not be hit by flank attacks.

you have to remember that most of the units you mentioned (actually, all except for the milnaht) should use the spear as their primary, but they can't because of engine limitations (iirc, that particular spear animation (overhand?) cannot have a secondary weapon, so they switched them up). btw, to the power(s) that be: is there any way to switch the animation/skeleton/whatever for the aforementioned units (and others with the same problem like the various agemas etc..) with the one used by the Tikpanah so that they have spear as their primary and they can finally take a charge head on like they're supposed to? (i'd even take a "yes it's possible, here's a link, but we won't implement this in EBO" type of answer ;))

not through the EDU, and it will be probably a real PITA even with the right tools...

[The Celtic Viking]

Just how far away from each other do you think the legionaries are from each other as is? Here's a picture:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

This is not too loose an order to not be able to protect yourself well, not the least with those shields.

[vartan]

Thanks for the visual TCV. That's why they need to be spaced apart further. This may solve some of the problems with the guard feature of RTW being improper at times (units not tiring quickly enough, having strange bonuses to their defense).

[Aper]

Just how far away from each other do you think the legionaries are from each other as is? Here's a picture:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

This is not too loose an order to not be able to protect yourself well, not the least with those shields.

Sorry but you are missing the point. I never stated anything like that: I was writing about the relative formation values of different armed line-holders, that make apparently not much sense, to me at least. Visually, no in-game heavy infantry seems much different in spacing from the others. But we know the slightly tighter formation of some units like hoplitai, that you can see only in stats, makes some difference on the outcomes; the same can be said about soldier radius tweaks: it's a fine balance, not something immediately evident, and more interesting because of that.

EDIT:

Thanks for the visual TCV. That's why they need to be spaced apart further. This may solve some of the problems with the guard feature of RTW being improper at times (units not tiring quickly enough, having strange bonuses to their defense).

I don't exactly know what you mean with "improper", but high mass, highly trained units should behave exactly like that in guard mode IMHO: they tire slowly because the enemy cannot push them and forcing them to move, so the only soldiers consuming stamina are the ones in the first row that are actually fighting; they do not die because they present a very ordered and solid first line, never giving the enemy a chance to land a side attack.

However I'll run some tests with shortsword units to collect some evidence that the stuff I'm saying works with shortswords too, not only for hoplitai.

[antisocialmunky]

Guard mode isn't that bad anymore now that units don't usually get very close to exhausted until the game is already won. You might want to edit front/back ranks to be closer because otherwise the whole unit may tire with only a few units fighting. If you make units closer front/back but loser side-to-side then they are less prone to do silly things.

[vartan]

Guard mode isn't that bad anymore now that units don't usually get very close to exhausted until the game is already won. You might want to edit front/back ranks to be closer because otherwise the whole unit may tire with only a few units fighting. If you make units closer front/back but loser side-to-side then they are less prone to do silly things.

Units get tired just as quickly if not faster. What game are you talking about? As a general statement, I agree with your spacing idea, if in fact it ties in to how fatigue works in this silly game of ours.

[antisocialmunky]

GG2 gave almost every line unit 'good stamina' instead of just barbs.

[Brave Brave Sir Robin]

GG2 gave almost every line unit 'good stamina' instead of just barbs.

Why do you keep insisting this? Thorakitai and Neitos are two and I can't think of any others that received a bonus. Please give specific examples.