The Shield Problem(s)

[Musashi]

I hate to say it... but I'm convinced. I ran a 20 battle control set. The difference in performance between the two units was negligible. I ran my test set and quit after five battles. It was obvious. Suddenly the unit that I zeroed the shield on was winning by 30-50 kills reliably.

Clearly Shield value hurts a unit's performance in melee. I still can't say whether this is because it applies a negative to armor, or because it introduces an extra animation that slows their attack rate however.

For the sake of completeness, this is my control set data:

#############################################
## Control Set                             ##
#############################################
## Test ##   DCK  ##   TSK  ## Win ## Loss ##
#############################################
##      ##        ##        ##     ##      ##      
##  1   ##   119  ##   107  ##  X  ##      ##
##  2   ##   120  ##   111  ##  X  ##      ##
##  3   ##   116  ##   100  ##  X  ##      ##
##  4   ##   100  ##   116  ##     ##  X   ##
##  5   ##   106  ##   119  ##     ##  X   ##
##  6   ##   112  ##   119  ##     ##  X   ##
##  7   ##   119  ##   105  ##  X  ##      ##
##  8   ##   100  ##    97  ##  X  ##      ##
##  9   ##   120  ##   109  ##  X  ##      ##
##  10  ##    96  ##    97  ##     ##  X   ##
##  11  ##   118  ##   108  ##  X  ##      ##
##  12  ##   113  ##   119  ##     ##  X   ##
##  13  ##   115  ##    96  ##  X  ##      ##
##  14  ##   118  ##    97  ##  X  ##      ##
##  15  ##   119  ##   108  ##  X  ##      ##
##  16  ##   120  ##   111  ##  X  ##      ##
##  17  ##   118  ##   108  ##  X  ##      ##
##  18  ##    95  ##   118  ##     ##  X   ##
##  19  ##   112  ##   119  ##     ##  X   ##
##  20  ##   109  ##   119  ##     ##  X   ##
#############################################
## Tot. ##  2245  ##  2183  ##  12 ##   8  ##
#############################################
## Mean ## 112.25 ## 109.15 #################
#############################################
## W/L Ratio   ###############    3:2      ##
#############################################

As you can see it's within the tolerances of "normal distribution" for a 50/50 system.

The first five battles of the test set looked more like 90/50, 100/60, etc. I just threw in the towel.

[Carl]

I may be wrong, but a higher sheild value seems to mean they get the sheild up into a blocking position more often in the animation. unfortuinatly the recovery animation is longer a they have to stumble back a step then lower the sheild. If they don't do that as much they just stumble back, and start hacking again.

May just be me though so don't take my word on it.

[AussieGiant]

I may be wrong, but a higher sheild value seems to mean they get the sheild up into a blocking position more often in the animation. unfortuinatly the recovery animation is longer a they have to stumble back a step then lower the sheild. If they don't do that as much they just stumble back, and start hacking again.

May just be me though so don't take my word on it.

Hi Carl,

I'd say what we have here after looking at Musashi information is the same as the 2handed issue.

There is the "theoretical" concept that is sound, but once implemented into the graphics the end result is not realised.

In this case the result is completely reversed.

[Musashi]

Obviously what we have to determine now is whether or not it's an animation problem or a data inversion problem. I'm going to run another test set. This time I'm going to set their shield to 1 instead of zero. If the battle resutls fall back into a normal distribution pattern then it will be safe to conclude that it is an animation problem.

[Musashi]

Ok, I just ran another 5 battles... It's still giving me one-sided results comparable to my previous test set. This means it's mostly likely not an animation issue. In my personal opinion, the shield value is being subtracted instead of added (or vice versa) in the game's battle calculations. I should really run a test with an inflated shield value to see if I start losing battles, just to confirm it, but I'm lazy.

[Musashi]

Ok, I'm not as lazy as I thought.

Setting the shield value to a whopping 30, I went from winning battles with kills generally in the 100/50 range, to losing battles with kills in the 50/100 range, 5 times in a row, with the worst being a humiliating 45/114 loss.

That pretty much confirms that there's an inverted operation in the battle calculations. Shield value subtracts directly from a unit's defense in combat.

[AussieGiant]

Ok, I'm not as lazy as I thought.

Setting the shield value to a whopping 30, I went from winning battles with kills generally in the 100/50 range, to losing battles with kills in the 50/100 range, 5 times in a row, with the worst being a humiliating 45/114 loss.

That pretty much confirms that there's an inverted operation in the battle calculations. Shield value subtracts directly from a unit's defense in combat.

Nice Musashi.

Hopefully that can be added to the bug list and it is as easy to correct as it sounds. (I hope!!)

Cheers

[Foz]

I added this issue to our buglist here on the 10th, and Sapi recently posted that he updated the buglist front page and shipped the new ones off, so it appears we've done all we can do already toward getting an official fix going.

@Musashi: Thanks for all the work, we needed more evidence illustrating the problem to get some of the skeptics on board. I think your results make it clear that removing a unit's shield points makes that unit less vulnerable in close combat, and not just by a minor amount. This in turn clearly indicates that the shield stat is conferring a penalty on its unit.

I'll be looking forward to any further testing results anyone might want to post

[AussieGiant]

I added this issue to our buglist here on the 10th, and Sapi recently posted that he updated the buglist front page and shipped the new ones off, so it appears we've done all we can do already toward getting an official fix going.

I hope they have time to deal with this "foz".

Have a good weekend all.