[EB MP]3.0 Thread - Testing and Updates

[gamegeek2]

Starcraft is nice, its actually a very well balanced game.

As I said.

[vartan]

Do remind me, then, how a man with no shirt and a weapon that costs less than a sword would become expensive at all? Pricing is based on manpower availability and equipment only, nothing else. The Getai had plenty of falx-armed infantry so I can't increase the price. Were I to make the falx pierce armor, it's only logical to extend that to all units equipped with similar two-handed weapons, but the Rhomphaiaphoroi are at an excellent power level that I don't want to modify.

The only thing I could consider would be to artificially boost the armor stat of the Drapanai, but I have done this already, by increasing it to 2 with the excuse that their leather caps afford them some protection, which seemed to be the EB team's reasoning as well. But that's it.

I understand. But I feel that there still remains a sense of a lack of closure on the issue of the falx since the AP removal amongst players (upon reading the forum posts, Hamachi chat, and intuition).

Starcraft is nice, its actually a very well balanced game.

BroodWar is balanced enough, but there are still issues with some maps and with particular factions' unit matchups. "Balance" in the second one makes me go

[-Stormrage-]

I was referring to the second one.

[vartan]

I was referring to the second one.

Take it up in the talk-about-anything section of the forum.

[Vega]

Bastarnae falxmen arent OP, they have 0 armour and die to arrow fire. This is what balance is. Rock paper scissors. Falxmen beat armour but die to arrows clear advantage and disadvantage, but the problem we have is those advantages and disadvantages arent so clear in other units. and the counter to a unit doesnt do much damage to it . I think your problem is you make changes over historical accuracy rather then gameplay.

hahaah storm we got you, you said that archers cant kill no one in this game and that they are useles

[Vega]

If this game is historical then there should not be totaly balance between factions right? Icreasing, decreasing lowing unit number lethalty mass and other stuff dont make game balanced, if gg2 just dont look at other faction, while editing one faction, for example there are no help for sweboz if you editing sweboz and you look at how will now they be vs rome you are wrong, just folow history, i know that you are good history students or whatever, nevermind gg2 space between pedites extraordinari is big very big i think that it should be fixed bcz they cost is not smal, sorry for double post :DDD

[Lazy O]

Learn to type ffs

[Brave Brave Sir Robin]

Hehe, way to fix space between PE until GG2 fixes this? Put them in testudo (lol it looks funny) during deployment and then take them out again. Volia! Closer spacing!

[Brave Brave Sir Robin]

Except I am going to make the better quality Indians cost less than the towered Africans. Did you read the documentation at all? Oh wait, that's long and boring.

I did read the documentation but that was about a month ago so I forgot this part.

[Ludens]

This discussion is getting too heated. Everybody mind the tone, please.

[Lazy O]

What are you talking about? We dont do heated discussions, atleast not here :P

[gamegeek2]

UPDATE: Pontos, Hayasdan, Sauromatae, Pahlava, and Sweboz added. Goidilic and Galatian units also added.

[Brave Brave Sir Robin]

Hooray. Now for Hellenistic factions...

[TheShakAttack]

In defence of restoring AP to Falxmen

I have read the reasoning behind why falxmen have had their AP removed. I completely disagree with these reasons. 2 points have been raised. 1) a falx is not, in fact, armor piercing and 2) it makes falxmen overpowered.

So the points are historic/fact and game-balance based.

I disagree with point 1 because the falx was a very powerful offensive weapon, and the only weapon (in history) that forced the roman army to change armor during campaign. They had to do this to adapt to the devastating cutting force produced by the falx. Though hardly the most reliable of sources, if u look at the wikipedia entry for falx, u will note how devastating it was vs armor, even relatively high quality armor such as Lorica Segmentata. Secondly, i do not understand how a kopis/falcatta (used by various infantry such as Iberian assault, pedites extr.) can be AP, but a falx cannot. it is inconsistent. If u want to give AP only for blunt force weapons, then kopis/falcatta based fighters should also have AP removed.

Regarding the second point, regarding falxmen beingoverpowered.... I cannot comment on how they were being used and how effective they were previously as I have only been playing for a few days. however, you will note that falxmen are very easy to kill- no armor, no sheilds, easily taken down with arrows. They are a specialised unit that can be taken down very easily and cheaply in a specific manner.

Now, regarding how to proceed in a manner which addresses both history and balance...a properly made falx (note, NOT a sica) is likely to have been an expensive weapon, maybe u can increase cost to counter this. or delete falxmen altogether and instead, make Rhomphaiaphoroi AP

The alternative suggestion i have, is to decrease their defense skill significantly. this is because (and i shudder to quote wikipedia)....... "The blade was sharpened only on the inside, and was reputed to be devastatingly effective. However, it left its user vulnerable because, being a two-handed weapon, the warrior could not also make use of a shield. It may be imagined that the length of the two-handed falx allowed it to be wielded with great force, the point piercing helmets and the blade splitting shields - it was said to be capable of splitting a shield in two at a single blow" Decreasing defense skill would address this factual point....they are crazy offense units, but will get killed very quickly, even in melee.

So in conclusion, u are factually incorrect re: the falx as a weapon, and the balance question CAN be addressed in different ways which is consistent with history. The falxmen is a highly charismatic unit, due to its previous (at least in original EDU) status as a papercannon. Now its all paper no cannon. This is most unfortunate.

[antisocialmunky]

Well, there's no LS in EB so if that's your metric, then it doesn't need AP because it'll never encounter the super awesome shiny LS.

It seems like the current system is only accounting blunt force trama but GG2 can probably explain better.

[TheShakAttack]

Fair point. I forgot to take that into consideration. Regardless, a falx was still equal to, if not more, a kopis in terms of cutting through armor.

[vartan]

In defence of restoring AP to Falxmen

I have read the reasoning behind why falxmen have had their AP removed. I completely disagree with these reasons. 2 points have been raised. 1) a falx is not, in fact, armor piercing and 2) it makes falxmen overpowered.

So the points are historic/fact and game-balance based.

I disagree with point 1 because the falx was a very powerful offensive weapon, and the only weapon (in history) that forced the roman army to change armor during campaign. They had to do this to adapt to the devastating cutting force produced by the falx. Though hardly the most reliable of sources, if u look at the wikipedia entry for falx, u will note how devastating it was vs armor, even relatively high quality armor such as Lorica Segmentata. Secondly, i do not understand how a kopis/falcatta (used by various infantry such as Iberian assault, pedites extr.) can be AP, but a falx cannot. it is inconsistent. If u want to give AP only for blunt force weapons, then kopis/falcatta based fighters should also have AP removed.

Regarding the second point, regarding falxmen beingoverpowered.... I cannot comment on how they were being used and how effective they were previously as I have only been playing for a few days. however, you will note that falxmen are very easy to kill- no armor, no sheilds, easily taken down with arrows. They are a specialised unit that can be taken down very easily and cheaply in a specific manner.

Now, regarding how to proceed in a manner which addresses both history and balance...a properly made falx (note, NOT a sica) is likely to have been an expensive weapon, maybe u can increase cost to counter this. or delete falxmen altogether and instead, make Rhomphaiaphoroi AP

The alternative suggestion i have, is to decrease their defense skill significantly. this is because (and i shudder to quote wikipedia)....... "The blade was sharpened only on the inside, and was reputed to be devastatingly effective. However, it left its user vulnerable because, being a two-handed weapon, the warrior could not also make use of a shield. It may be imagined that the length of the two-handed falx allowed it to be wielded with great force, the point piercing helmets and the blade splitting shields - it was said to be capable of splitting a shield in two at a single blow" Decreasing defense skill would address this factual point....they are crazy offense units, but will get killed very quickly, even in melee.

So in conclusion, u are factually incorrect re: the falx as a weapon, and the balance question CAN be addressed in different ways which is consistent with history. The falxmen is a highly charismatic unit, due to its previous (at least in original EDU) status as a papercannon. Now its all paper no cannon. This is most unfortunate.

This is pretty good IMHO. Very well reasoned. The most important part (for me, at least) was the fact that one could kill falxmen so easily in such a specific manner. If that is to remain the case (as it probably should) then from a game design standpoint we would do very well to give it an awfully strong polar opposite, namely the AP you argue for in this post. Thanks Shak.

[gamegeek2]

Do recall that the romans placed more armor on themselves to defend against the falx.

[The Celtic Viking]

As opposed to what? Growing thicker skin? No matter how good a weapon is at it, more armour will always be more difficult to cut through than less. The fact that they felt that what they already had was not enough to protect them speaks more for AP than it does against it.

[Brave Brave Sir Robin]

As opposed to what? Growing thicker skin? No matter how good a weapon is at it, more armour will always be more difficult to cut through than less. The fact that they felt that what they already had was not enough to protect them speaks more for AP than it does against it.

Aww, I wanted to post something quite similar.

I agree with TCV. In effect, you are saying that more armor would not be helpful against the little clubs that the Illyrian Pirates use, since clearly, more armor cannot help you against the game's AP weapons.

As to why the Romans added more armor to defend against falxes, I feel it may actually have to do with protecting against blows which had already been blocked by the scutum. Because the blade of a falx curves inwards, it is entirely possible that blows which were caught on the end of a Roman shield would end up causing damage anyway by means of the sharp point of the blade reaching around behind the shield and cutting into the shield arm, neck, shoulder or any other area that the legionary thought he could protect by bringing his shield up to defend. A clean shot with a falx onto someones forearm would likely not be stopped by a bracer anyway. Even if the metal was thick enough to resist the blow, which is doubtful, chances are the blade would simply run down towards the hand and lop that off, or up to the elbow. Glancing blows can't count in this discussion since a glancing blow with an axe or kopis is easily brushed aside as well by a small amount of armor as well. So I feel that this is the reason why more armor was added. Plenty of other weapons the Romans faced were capable of lopping off limbs and yet they did not add more armor. However, the scutum did not defend completely against the curving blade of the falx and this may very well be why the additional armor was needed.

[Burebista]

Do recall that the romans placed more armor on themselves to defend against the falx.

As far as i read , RomeTW engine considers an AP attack as an attack that negates 50 % of the Armour of an unit , not all( dunno about shields too).

Example : a unit with 10 armour 4 shield and 10 defence skill will have 24 total defence. Against an AP attack he will have only 19 defence.

Thus AP is affected by the ammount of extra armour , but it far from ignores it.

IMHO using the no AP/high attack/high lethality/hardy system for falxes leads to a weapon very efficient against lightly armoured units but very inneficient against heavily armoured ones.
Thus what am i bringing them in battle for? to kill skirmishers and archers which they are vulnerable to?

But if you use the AP/medium attack/high lethality the unit gets better cost effectiveness against highly armoured/low skill units seeing how armour tends to be expensive in EB.
Also it makes them brutally effective against other units who rely on AP , especially kopis/falcatae.

[antisocialmunky]

The Romans IIRC reinforced their helmets, ditched the LS, and added padding. They also added segmented sleeves so they wouldn't lose as many arms as well as greaves because having legs is a useful thing.

But as Burebista said, they were actually quite vulnerable before to cheap celtic swordsmen and other things.

[TheShakAttack]

The Romans IIRC reinforced their helmets, ditched the LS, and added padding. They also added segmented sleeves so they wouldn't lose as many arms as well as greaves because having legs is a useful thing.

But as Burebista said, they were actually quite vulnerable before to cheap celtic swordsmen and other things.

I agree completely. The falx neccesitated the response of adding addition armor during Dacian Conflict. Other weapons the roman army had encountered previously were not as noted for their AP capacity. To the extent that greaves and forearm guards were not part of stardard equipment.

I also agree with Robin that part of the reason for greaves and forearmguards (technical name escapes me) is likey to have been due to the curved nature of the falx which might have been able to (in a sense) “reach around” a scutum due to a falx's curved nature. However, this is not the point I will focus on right now.

A key fact is that the helmet needed to be reinforced. Therefore, one might safely assume that the previous helmet in use was not sufficiently strong. Further, Roman Armor was noted to be of very high quality.

In EBO, we play against “standard” armor, not the “reinforced” armor Trajan’s army was forced to adpot. The falx was clearly very effective against the “standard” armor of Trajan’s troops and therefore it should be reflected in game.

One might try to argue that adding more armor and/or reinforcing it stopped the AP quality of the falx (the fact that it could pierce “standard” armor does not matter) and therefore the falx should not be AP. In which event it is hard to see why an axe or a kopis is AP. Im sure you can reinforce armor to decrease effectiveness of those weapons as well. Further, as far as I know, Rome encountered many armies who used the kopis/falcatta and axe, but nowhere near the same fear is expressed with regard to these weapons as is with the falx (though it may be that this is because Trajan wished for this to happen for publicity reasons).

[antisocialmunky]

Actually, I would imagine that the helmet reinforcements were more due to the fact that the falx defeats energy redirection due to its tendency to 'hook' so you could probably jack up a helmet quite a bit through blunt force. Also note that they were strengthening the helmet with a simple brace rather than making it thicker and they added armor only to unarmored bits so it would counter the falx. So my feeling is that it was very good at getting a 'bite' and piercing tearing.

Kopis/Falcatta are swords that have heavy tips made to transfer impact and cut. Likewise, axes are smashing weapons with a blade unless you're referring to one of those Eastern dagger axes which are basically made for piercing..

[vartan]

Do recall that the romans placed more armor on themselves to defend against the falx.

You can't have a Roman have more armour against the falx and less against other units. And the Romans putting on more armour doesn't prove the non-AP-ness of the falx.

[antisocialmunky]

So... you put on armor on places that are not armored to defend from stuff that can easily defeat armor?

[TheShakAttack]

So... you put on armor on places that are not armored to defend from stuff that can easily defeat armor?

Obviously yes...if that's the best you can do.

[TheShakAttack]

Actually, I would imagine that the helmet reinforcements were more due to the fact that the falx defeats energy redirection due to its tendency to 'hook' so you could probably jack up a helmet quite a bit through blunt force.

If that is indeed why they did it (I am not an expert), then logic follows that if maces are AP, falx, though its ability to generate blunt force to the head, is also AP? (not that this is the thrust of my entire argument).

[gamegeek2]

If that is indeed why they did it (I am not an expert), then logic follows that if maces are AP, falx, though its ability to generate blunt force to the head, is also AP? (not that this is the thrust of my entire argument).

ASM and I are, if I understand correctly, pointing out the flaw in your position.

Adding armor to the arm does nothing against a mace because a heavy mace will break your arm regardless of what you are wearing. Same with a war-hammer or pole-axe. By its design the falx is excellent for attacking where armor can't be found, namely at the neck and arms. So rather you attack where the armor is not, rather than blow through it. This is the only way in which I see the falx getting AP, in its ability to hit where the armor isn't, but other weapons were doing that too; most slashing weapons were used to cut off limbs (typically unarmored), as slashing at the chest is simply less efficient than stabbing there. They were simply less good at it because you had far less control than you did with a falx. Thus we have falxes with higher attack, but which get worse as armor gets better, just like every other weapon.

[TheShakAttack]

I remain unconvinced by your argument. I have to emphasise, I am not a weapons expert, and you may well be right. However, the fact is, everything i have read about the falx (including the wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falx) indicates it was a weapon which could cut into shields and armor (see quote above). If anyone could direct me to a source which backsup your argument, I will be much obliged. I might be laboring under a popular misconception.

Out of curiosity, why does Bastarnae retain AP while drapanai dont if you are advancing the historical/fact based argument that the falx was not AP?

PS. here are some futher links from very superficial research (google). Unfortunately only game sites feel the need to discuss the falx, lol.

http://wildfiregames.com/0ad/page.php?p=9989

"In combat the Dacians fielded a ferocious weapon of such brutality that the Romans were forced to issue extra armor to their troops to counter it. This was of course the legendary Dacian falx. Bearing an obvious resemblance to the earlier Thracian weapon, the falx was of similar construction: a two-handed sword with a down-sloping curved iron blade. Again, roughly 3-feet long, the falx featured a heavier blade than the rhomphaia, along with a sturdier haft. In combat the Dacians would swing the weapon with such power that it was able to cut through Roman shields and wound the man behind. Decapitations and amputations occurred with such astounding regularity that the Romans made subtle modifications to the standard legionnaire’s equipment. Helmets and shields were reinforced, while soldiers were issued greaves and manica to give them greater protection when facing the falxmen. Thanks in part to the devastating power of the falx the Roman Imperial Italic line of helmets came into production. "

http://rtw.heavengames.com/history/g...Truth_Fantasy/

"It was one of the few weapons encountered by the Romans which caused them to modify their current equipment. Upon facing falxmen for the first time, the Romans were terrified to see the weapon slice through helmets, or chop off arms with a single blow. The next time the Romans went on the warpath, they had bronze crosses reinforcing their helmets, and metal plates covering their shoulders and lower legs."