Game mechanics questions for CA

[avatar]

When I am attacking on campaign map the defender withdraws backwards. My general gets a "Doubtful Courage" trait (this has happened more than once). Why? Shouldn't this be the other way around?

[Kraxis]

Is this thread even alive anymore?

Anyway I have a question:

How does one get the chargebonus of the pikes in a phalanx unit? If you charge them in they will use the weaker swords (and thus the weaker charge), and in phalanx they don't run, so it isn't obvious if the chargebonus is added or not (doesn't seem so).

[sunsmountain]

Campaign map

Growth

* What is the slave bonus and how is it caused?
* What is the grain bonus and how is it caused?
* Can these be removed?

Governors

* Which specific triggers are necessary for the game to make a chance roll for (example) 'Mildly Extravagant', exactly? Where can we find these triggers?
* How does this relate to Threshold (in the txt files), for this particular example?
* How can we mod/change the triggers?

[econ21]

sunsmountain, I have some files I downloaded on governor traits and triggers. One of them says they are by someone called Winnie the Pooh and gives a website www.geraldtan.com/rtw

I'll add the slaves and grain questions to the sticky, thanks.

[JeromeGrasdyke]

Ookaaay... that's a lot of questions. I'll have a go at answering some, although I probably won't have time to do them all, and the info probably won't be at hand for some. Here goes:

What is the effect of being heavy or light infantry?

None. This is a tag for the AI production mechanisms which corresponds to unit stats; generally all units with armour ratings above 7 should be considered heavy. The unit category is more important than class.

What bonuses do weapons have against other weapons, eg swords vs spears, long spears vs other spears

The spear bonusses are fed into the stats system in a couple of different ways, via the mounts bonusses (which are direct attack modifiers against units mounted on that particular mount type) and via the 'spear' weapon attribute. Units which are marked with spear gain a +4 combat bonus against cavalry and use the cavalry's charge bonus against them, while cavalry get a -4 attack penalty against them.

What is the difference between "heavy" and "light" weapons?

Again, this is a tag only, used by the sound I believe.

What modifiers or effects do the "special" unit formations have, e.g. phalanx, Cantabrian circle, tetsudo, wedge?

Phalanx formations gain rank bonusses when in formation, while testudo's get large defense bonusses against missile attacks. The Wedge gives an attack bonus based on superior concentration of weight at the point. The Cantabrian circle doesn't give an outright bonus, but gains its benefit from the actual battlefield behaviour.

What exactly makes a unit gain experience? Killing peasants gives less than killing elite units, but what exactly determines this?

Actually, a kill is always considered a kill for xp bonusses, except when the unit is routing (in which case it drops to a 20% chance of counting as a kill). Kills and xp are tracked on a per-soldier basis, and what is displayed is the unit average rounded to the nearest integer. There is a non-linear relationship between kills and xp which resembles a Fibonacci series. Then units which have been engaged in combat in a battle which started with a close to even strength balance may be awarded an extra kill per soldier at the end of combat.

What are the effects of capturing another faction's capital or losing your own capital? Does the location of your faction leader have any effects? (Is it best to keep your faction leader in the capital? Does it matter?)

None (other than what's normal for capturing a city), and no. The movement of the faction leader as used in Medieval caused so many annoyances during play that we decided to drop it.

When I have reinforcements and there is a general present in that army, why does the general rush into battle, instead of staying behind his lines to add morale and to stay alive?

We actually found this to have a whole slew of causes, the most common of which was that often the general's cavalry is the strongest unit in the army (especially early during a campaign). This means he'd generally look at the enemy army and say, "wow, I'm much stronger than any one of these units individually", and hurl himself into combat, expecting the rest of his army to follow... with unfortunate consequences. We've made the general's unit a lot more cautious in the 1.2 patch, but it still occasionally happens.

The one game mechanic question that comes to mind for me, I'd like a detailed run-down of the strategic AI settings (caesar, mao, balanced, fortified, etc.). That would make customizing my game really easier.

This was released onto the forums recently, you should be able to find it if you do a search.

What influences probability of hit in fight?

The most significant factors (in order) are: unit stats, height differential, relative facing, experience, fatigue, scissors-paper-stone, and the general's command bonus. There are a whole slew of special-purpose bonusses, such as ground and mount type, formations and so on as well. Detailing the whole system is well beyond the scope of this post...

I would like to know (if this isn't anwered already) the effects of armor vs defense skill and shields.

Armour is applied as a modifier to attacks from any facing, while defense is a parry-style bonus on the front and right flank, and the shield bonus applies front and left flank. Missile weapons ignore defense.

Is "Provincial campaign" going to be in the patch?

No, as you've probably already seen. It was intended as a mechanism for showing multiple campaigns other than the Imperial Campaign or the Sons of Mars, and I believe it still works as such. Any subfolders in data/world/maps/campaign/custom will get searched for extra campaign maps, and if they contain a valid campaign it will activate the Provincial Campaign menu. From this menu you can pick a campaign, which then leads to the 'pick-a-faction' menu, and so on. Could be quite useful for modders ;)

How does one get the chargebonus of the pikes in a phalanx unit? If you charge them in they will use the weaker swords (and thus the weaker charge), and in phalanx they don't run, so it isn't obvious if the chargebonus is added or not (doesn't seem so).

Pike units cannot charge while using pikes, and so cannot receive a charge bonus.

What is the slave bonus and how is it caused? What is the grain bonus and how is it caused? Can these be removed?

The slave population growth bonus, like the grain one, is caused by resources on the map. If you enslave a city, it generates a slave resource, and any cities connected to that province by completed road links (city-to-city) benefit from one growth pip's bonus. This is cumulative per resource in the road network - 2 cities taken with Enslavement connect to a third city by road, that third city should show *two* pips of slave growth. This is part of what makes Egypt such an economic powerhouse - the Nile delta contains two grain resources, and so as soon as the Egyptians start building roads to connect all their cities, the overall population starts to rise quite quickly... And no, the bonusses cannot be removed.

Well, I hope that's been useful to you guys.

[therother]

Well, I hope that's been useful to you guys.

Well, I think I can speak for everyone when I say thanks for taking the time to answer all those questions. Very much appreciated!

[Tamur]

Well, I think I can speak for everyone when I say thanks for taking the time to answer all those questions. Very much appreciated!

Yes goodness, that must have taken a good long while. Thank you Jerome!

[therother]

The one game mechanic question that comes to mind for me, I'd like a detailed run-down of the strategic AI settings (caesar, mao, balanced, fortified, etc.). That would make customizing my game really easier.

This was released onto the forums recently, you should be able to find it if you do a search.

The search is offline for the foreseeable future, so here is the list:

These control a set of AI production personalities, which contribute a bias towards building and training (but not retraining or repairing). This bias is fairly small compared to game-generated factors such as "the enemy is attacking me with lots of cavalry, build me some spearmen". Explaining the weighting system which drives the production AI in full is beyond the scope of this document as it would take several days to write.

So in short, the building construction personalities are these: (ranked highest to lowest - therother)

balanced - biases towards growth, taxable income, trade level bonuses (roads), walls and xp bonus buildings

religious - biases towards growth, loyalty, taxable income, farming, walls and law

trader - biases towards growth, trade level, trade base, weapon upgrades, games, races and xp bonus buildings

comfort - biases towards growth, farming, games, races, xp bonus and happiness

bureaucrat - biases towards taxable income, growth, pop health, trade, walls, improved bodyguards and law

craftsman - biases towards walls, races, taxable income, weapon upgrades, xp bonuses, mines, health and growth

sailor - biases towards sea trade, taxable income, walls, growth, trade

fortified - biases towards walls, taxable income, growth, loyalty, defenses, bodyguards and law

These biases are towards building properties, rather than buildings themselves. The game does not know what a "Blacksmith" is, for example, it only knows that it is a building which provides a weapon upgrade, and hence a Craftsman AI would be more likely to build it than another AI personality type.

These are then combined with a troop production personality, as follows:

smith - exactly level

mao - biased towards mass troops, light infantry

genghis - biased towards missile cavalry and light cavalry

stalin - biased towards heavy infantry, mass troops and artillery

napoleon - biased towards a mix of light and heavy infantry, light cavalry

henry - biased towards heavy and light cavalry, missile infantry

Caesar - biased towards heavy infantry, light cavalry, siege artillery

The same system as for the buildings applies. Troop category and class are combined at the time the unit database is loaded to give a unit production type, and the likelihood of the AI choosing to produce a given unit type which can be produced is then modified by the unit type weighting. There is also a random element in the choosing of which building or troop type to produce next, so the effect of the bias is a statistical thing. Another factor that is applied over the top which may obscure the bias is a tendency towards producing troop mixtures (according to what is already in the garrison) and a weighting according to unit strength.

The two sets of types can be freely combined; for example, although Fortified Caesar does not appear in the list of options currently used by the vanilla RTW game, it is a valid combination.

[Jay Tee]

So the strategic AI settings only determine what kind of buildings/unit types are most likely to be produced? In this link http://www.twcenter.net/forums/inde...showtopic=11196 it is suggested that they also determine behaviour of the faction (e.g. Genghis is very aggressive, Ceasar uses lot of enslavements). Is this not true?

[Kraxis]

Totally nice Jerome. Cool with some direct info.

What bonuses do weapons have against other weapons, eg swords vs spears, long spears vs other spears

The spear bonusses are fed into the stats system in a couple of different ways, via the mounts bonusses (which are direct attack modifiers against units mounted on that particular mount type) and via the 'spear' weapon attribute. Units which are marked with spear gain a +4 combat bonus against cavalry and use the cavalry's charge bonus against them, while cavalry get a -4 attack penalty against them.

Interesting... I seem to notice a lot of penetration of spearformations by cavalry, especially by the better chargers. Light Lancers are good candidates for this as they have weak defense and a strong charge. Yet they do not get wiped out by the anti-charge bonus, which one would expect if they recieved the charge right back. Is it because the charge is only handled in regards of the first line of cavalry? Then after them the other riders can ride down any spear?

What exactly makes a unit gain experience? Killing peasants gives less than killing elite units, but what exactly determines this?

Actually, a kill is always considered a kill for xp bonusses, except when the unit is routing (in which case it drops to a 20% chance of counting as a kill). Kills and xp are tracked on a per-soldier basis, and what is displayed is the unit average rounded to the nearest integer. There is a non-linear relationship between kills and xp which resembles a Fibonacci series. Then units which have been engaged in combat in a battle which started with a close to even strength balance may be awarded an extra kill per soldier at the end of combat.

All units are equal... How about the officers in certain units, such as in the Triarii. I think it was mentioned that they had 2 HP (all officers), so it would only be reasonable they gave 2 XP and generals even more.

I would like to know (if this isn't anwered already) the effects of armor vs defense skill and shields.

Armour is applied as a modifier to attacks from any facing, while defense is a parry-style bonus on the front and right flank, and the shield bonus applies front and left flank. Missile weapons ignore defense.

Hmmm... Very good to know. I thought defense was allround defensive ability that just didn't give the protection against missiles. So a very experienced unit that does not carry any shields (Cilician Pirates for instance) should be as bad at protecting itself from the rear or the left as a green one?

How does one get the chargebonus of the pikes in a phalanx unit? If you charge them in they will use the weaker swords (and thus the weaker charge), and in phalanx they don't run, so it isn't obvious if the chargebonus is added or not (doesn't seem so).

Pike units cannot charge while using pikes, and so cannot receive a charge bonus.

Ok. That was pretty much what I figured, but then I wonder why they get a bonus at all. I mean some poor fellow has been forced to balance or add something that was not to be used.

[Red Harvest]

I have the same question about defensive skill...does it only apply to the right side? Or is it only when the soldier also has a shield? My assumption would be that it would only apply to when the unit has a shield. But then again, I would also think that high defensive skill would "stack" with shield defense on the shielded side. If it doesn't add to defense on that side then I need to consider scaling shield to higher values based on skill level of the troops--rather than just shield characteristics.

Second part...does defensive skill matter at all for rear attacks? What I noticed when reducing elephant armour and adding defensive skill (in 1.1) is that they became very vulnerable to melee attack--particularly by cav, even when I nerfed the cav to have a negative mount effect that was as large as their attack and charge combined! I had expected them to become more vulnerable to missiles, but still hold up well in melee. My first guess is that defensive skill falls by 1/2 or more when attacked from the rear.