Holy Cow - Armor Upgrades

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

I just noticed that armor upgrades for units affect how they appear.

Upgraded my Viking Raiders from nothing to light mail. Then I did a double take to see that they actually looked different.

[Rilder]

Yea I knoticed that too, really cool feature they put in

[BlackAxe3001]

Heck yeah! That's like the best part of the armor upgrades! I still wish peasants could be clad in full plate though, that would be pretty funny looking.

[sapi]

They look good, but they're broken.

An upgrade to full plate has the same effect as an upgrade to, say, light mail should have :(

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

Really. That's disappointing. Is there a mod fix yet?

[Musashi]

No... and it may not be possible either.

[lobo76]

They look good, but they're broken.

An upgrade to full plate has the same effect as an upgrade to, say, light mail should have :(

do you mean the LOOK is the same or the DEFENSE gained is the same? I don't mind it looking the same, as long as my soldier get better protection.

[Kazakh]

He means the defense... but i think it's a feature rather than a bug.
Usually you can upgrade to full plate only if you already have partial plate (it wouldn't make sense to upgrade archers or other 'fast' non-armoured untis to heavy armor), right? There's no big difference between partial and full plate, like there is no big difference between light and heavy mail, hence the same increment of only 1 point. But some units like militia pikemen that starting with no armor can upgrade all the way up to partial plate get +3 armor...

[akodo]

That sounds pretty reasonable. If a heavy swordsmen unit has 11 armor and spear militia 2, than its logical that one level of upgrade shall give them one point of armor, never mind if its light mail or full plate.

[sapi]

But that's not how the game works it, you see.

For example, militiamen (with padded armour) have 3 defense from armour, and peasants have 0. Now, it's logical that upgrading peasants to padded armour would give them +3 defense to bring them equal to the militiamen, but it only gives +1.

Thus, you can be up to some form of mail in looks when the unit has only gained armour equivalent to padded leather.

[Kazakh]

It's a simple rule, the first upgrade gives you +1 armor, the second +2 and so on.. to make things simple. Maybe it's a balancing issue, at CA they thought peasants should never be as good as militia. If you think that's not realistic, let's say peasants get smaller and simpler padded armors. Anyway that's only my opinion, i'd like to see a mod about that.

[pevergreen]

Ive heard its possible, but no one has been bothered to go through and manually change each one
eg
Spanish_town_milita 0 1 2 3
Spanish_spear_milita 0 1 2 3

It would take a long time.

[Musashi]

It's not possible, because the line that would allow it can't be uncommented without crashing the game.

In other words, the engine won't support it.

At least, not unless someone finds a workaround.

[Lorenzo_H]

I have the Heavy Armourer or whatever the one that costs 10000 florins is called, but it still apears that my soldiers only get a bronze armour symbol. Why is this?

[General Zhukov]

I have the Heavy Armourer or whatever the one that costs 10000 florins is called, but it still apears that my soldiers only get a bronze armour symbol. Why is this?

Some units that already have heavy plate can only be upgraded once or twice more by the high level armorer.

[Quillan]

Not every unit can have the same number of armor upgrades. The number each can have is determined by the files. Most can have 1, some can have 2, and a very few can have 3. It can be a rather drastic difference, too. Spanish Tercio Pikemen can have 2 armor upgrades. The second should put them in half-plate for an armor rating of 6; it actually gives them a 2. But as Musashi said, people found the line that shows what the armor should be with the upgrades, and it's commented out. Removing the semicolon in front of the line causes the game to crash. I don't know if it's an unfinished feature or something they just couldn't get working and left in the files.

[Vladimir]

...Now, it's logical that upgrading peasants to padded armour would give them +3 defense to bring them equal to the militiamen, but it only gives +1.

No . It's not D&D. You wouldn't throw equal quality leather armor on a peasant that you would on a militiaman.

[Snoil The Mighty]

I would expect that the reason the defenses still vary a bit is that the defense number is supposed to reflect the fact that defense is also imparted by training, weapon type and so on. So I don't have a problem with militia and peasants both wearing leather armor and still having different defense numbers for gameplay purposes, just as a for-instance.

[Eltharon]

Well, take italian militia (4 armor, excluding shield). They have padded. Now take Pikemen with plate armor. The pikemen have 3 armor. A unit that starts with no armor can have max armor upgrades and it still wont be higher then leather armed militia. Thats the problem.

[dopp]

Defense skill is separate from armor. The armor is clearly intended to be consistent; padded is always 4, light mail is always 5 and so on. Just scan the units file, it's consistent all the way through. It's not D&D, but partial plate for a peasant shouldn't be poorer than mere padded armor for a militiaman (3 vs 4).

Most armor levels are just +1 so it's usually not a big problem, but the first armor level, padded, is 4 compared to 0 for unarmored. Thus any unit which starts unarmored is gimped compared to units which are recruited with armor. This includes most "modern" units, militia, peasants and many Muslim units. The idea is that they start off useless but you can upgrade their performance through their armor, but now you can't do so effectively because the feature has been disabled. Hence the complaint that pikemen in partial plate are not noticably tougher than before is actually quite true; they only have a fraction of the armor they should be getting if they "followed the rules consistently" (3 instead of 7).

Quickfix: give all unarmored units 3 points of armor. The first upgrade will then give them 4 points, the second 5 and so on, bringing them more in line with the armored units. They'll be a little tougher than they 'should be' to begin with, but since even the AI rapidly builds leather tanners to upgrade them it won't be noticable after the first 10 turns or so.

Open the export_descr_units file. Bring up the 'replace' function and search for:

stat_pri_armour 0

Replace that with:

stat_pri_armour 3

This should give all unarmored units in the game 3 points of armor. Now do a search for:

armour_ug_levels 0

Change the stat_pri_armour back to 0 for any unit that doesn't have values following that line, because it can't be upgraded in the first place. This includes merc units like Swiss Pikemen, all ships, light African soldiers and so on.

Run the modded file. The changes should appear ingame immediately.

Edit: Pikemen go up only to heavy mail, not partial plate. A lot of 'modern' units wear breastplates for their heavy mail upgrade.

[Spark]

On a side note regarding defense rating and armor rating;

The way I understand it is that a person getting attacked from the front gets to use his full defense rating (armor+skill+shield), whereas an attack to the shield side checks armor+shield, an attack to the non-shield side checks armor+skill for defense rating, and an attack to the back only checks armor rating.

i.e. unit with 5 armor, 4 skill, 3 shield (total defense: 12) would get 12 defense from the front, 9 from the left (shield side), 8 from the right (weapon side) and 5 from the back.


So if you have a unit not using a shield, does the "skill" defense rating apply to both left and right hand sides, or do you just get a 0 for attacks to the left side?

i.e. unit with 7 armor, 5 skill (total defense: 12) would get 12 defense from the front, 12 from the right, 12 from the left, and 7 from the back? Or would you just get 7 defense from the left side?

(p.s. this is from the last page of the FAUST linked here)

[holycow]

Hey, stop using my name in vain.

Holymoly.

[econ21]

Most armor levels are just +1 so it's usually not a big problem, but the first armor level, padded, is 4 compared to 0 for unarmored. Thus any unit which starts unarmored is gimped compared to units which are recruited with armor.

I rather like your workaround, but the gimping unarmoured troops (that remain unarmoured) is a feature, not a bug, IMO. Giving unarmoured troops armour 3 rather than armour 0 will considerably weaken the effect of armour compared to what CA intended. I remember being taken about in MTW at how much of an advantage having some armour was. But if you think about it, it's not unreasonable - apparently, even Medieval padded armour offered pretty good protection (e.g. against missiles) and so chainmail was often worn over a thick undercoat.

I would rather CA fix the gimping of unarmoured troops that get armour upgrades properly by making incremental padded armour give you +4, not +1; and so on for later upgrades etc.

[Musashi]

The most glaring problem to me, is the Pike Militia, who get partial plate, and like 2 or 3 defense.

[Husar]

Well, the upgrades for militia are somewhat noticable in my opinion, they stand attacks a lot better with armour I think.
What I still couldn't figure out is how to get my generals beyond partial plate, even in the late period, they still use that feudal look with partial plate(bronze upgrade), while in custom battle, there are plate generals available.

[dopp]

The thing is, I only gave +3 armor to those troops that had the potential to be upgraded. Stuff like Swiss merc pikemen and African warriors that can never, ever be upgraded I left alone. The leather tanner takes 2 turns to build and is extremely high on the AI's building list, so after the first 30 turns or so of any campaign all those unarmored militia will often be fully upgraded.

The difference between 3 points of armor after upgrades and 6 points is very great. Incoming damage is cut by at least 30%, making units such as pikemen and musketeers much more resilient, rather than constantly getting beaten up by relatively low-tech units like Italian Spear and Crossbow Militia just because the latter come equipped with padded armor (and can upgrade to heavy mail too).

It would of course be best if CA would either fix the armor upgrades or tell us why it's set up that way. It's a real pity because I really like the graphics and the upgrade system. They put so much effort into the armor levels, why did they fail to implement the actual gameplay effects?

Btw, pikemen and most militia do not get partial plate, they wear the equivalent of heavy mail, which in their case is usually a breastplate with maybe those "legplates" attached. If you compare their upgraded armor graphics with say chivalric knights, you will see that their limbs are usually unarmored, whereas the knights have mail or plate on their arms and legs. Demi-lancers also wear breastplates but no other armor, thus they only count as wearing heavy mail. If you upgrade their armor to partial plate, you get those three-quarter "lobster suits" instead, with armor protecting the arms and legs.

[katank]

Partial plate should block missiles the same whether it's on a knight or a peasant. Any difference in training is attributable to defense skill.

dopp, I like your fix. However, leather tanner is still not perfectly widespread and you do see unupgraded units running around with more armor than they should. Also, doesn't it mess up balance between unupgradable and unupgraded units in terms of cost?

[Quillan]

What the game engine considers "Partial plate" is what I've always known as plate & mail. Venetian heavy infantry starts off in half plate, steel cuirass (front and back) plus a visored helm, but no arm or leg protection. Upgrading them with the "partial plate" level changes their in game representation. They no longer wear the visored helm, it looks more like a mail coif. But they are also wearing a full mail hauberk with a surcoat or tabard over it, steel plate greaves, vambraces, gauntlets and boots. The overall protection level would be considerably higher. Technically, the first upgrade for Tercio pike was light mail, I think, and heavy mail was the second. The first one showed them in the same basic setup sword & buckler men had, colored clothing with slashed in it where the mail would show through. The second was half plate, the helm and cuirass, though they did have tasses hanging down to protect the upper thighs. I don't have a problem with that part of it.

Where I have the problem is the same place Dopp has with it. It's half plate! It should give an armor rating of 5, and instead it gets a 2. That's a massive difference, especially when facing missile fire, and the casualty rate is significantly higher as a result.

[Lorenzo_H]

I now have an Advanced Plate upgrade, but still it appears not to be any better. Why????

[dopp]

Because no unit in the game can upgrade from full plate to advanced plate. Late general's bodyguards were the only ones, but you can't get them. You just wasted your money.