Investigation of Battle Odds

**Shadar** · 03-02-2005, 06:43

Oaty: Peasants are an absolutely horrible example. They got poor morale so all bigger numbers does is increase the chain-routing effect.

**Kraxis** · 03-03-2005, 00:14

I was suprised to see Peasants are equaled to Militia Hoplites... MH will beat them like a stick beating a rug... Easily.

I don't think the odds are perfect, or even close to it. But it does take into account experience of troops and the commander. That is most obvious in naval battles where I have had odds go in my favour with a single understrength Trireme (three star admiral) going up against three full Triremes (and I won clearly).

**Simetrical** · 03-03-2005, 04:42

Militia hoplites aren't equalled to peasants. They're considered five times as powerful.

Anyway, what we really need to do is modify stats to see if they affect the odds. Just comparing units isn't a good idea, because you're basically changing a whole bunch of variables at once.

-Simetrical

**Kraxis** · 03-03-2005, 05:19

Ahh now I see... I was hugely confused by the setup. Couldn't understand how the same units had different odds at times, yet I couldn't see the difference. It lies in the subtle little spaces and kommas.

**Oaty** · 03-13-2005, 06:56

Battle odds also factors in fatigue. plenty of times while on the march and no casualties I'll see the battle odds keep dropping.

But I take it this is for the prebattle odds ration.

**yogol** · 07-24-2005, 14:28

Does anyone has more information on this ?

**JeromeGrasdyke** · 08-17-2005, 12:32

The battle odds are based on the AI's strength calculation for the armies involved. Essentially this is a number derived per unit via a complex formula which takes into account the number of soldiers, attack, defense, experience, upgrades, morale, and almost everything else which gets fed into the game from the export_descr_unit.txt file. This number is also used in many, many other places, although on the battlefield it is replaced with a more sophisticated calculation which matches unit vs unit.

The battle odds are then rounded to something vaguely readable... the system is not perfect (the factors involved in the battlefield mean that it's only ever going to be an approximation) but it gives you an impression of the AI's best guess as to how the armies match up, which you can use as a guide. Ultimately though, the only "accurate" way is to spy on the enemy army to find out its exact composition and make your own judgement about how it measures up against your forces....

**dismal** · 10-24-2005, 16:24

This may be a stupid question, but where is it possible to see the battle odds directly?

I presume the comments "Defeat is a distinct possibility", etc. reflect a certain range of Battle Odds, but it would be useful to observe the raw number.