EB with BI

[Xehh II]

What is so special about EB with BI?

[-Praetor-]

More frequent naval invasions, and slightly better AI.

[russia almighty]

Shieldwall looks kinda cool with Lancermen .

[Xehh II]

Shieldwall sounds cool but I get enough navel invasions as it is and the AI is already too good for me.

[Olaf The Great]

Shieldwall sounds cool but I get enough navel invasions as it is and the AI is already too good for me.

You get naval invasions on 1.5

WoW

[mAIOR]

Yeah I got one of those playing as Lusitans in 1.5. Carthage dropped an army in his africal possessions. Not that it mattered tough.

Cheers...

[Tretii]

That's the first time I hear anyone gets naval invasions in 1.5. Anyway, personally I think it's worth installing BI, cos AI is improved. It might even get a little challenging at times. Try it, especially now, with funky converter which allows you to skip all this tedious work adjusting EB to BI.

[Lysander13]

You guys must be lucky because i never was on the wrong end of a naval invasion playing EB with 1.5. It got to the point that i never even concerned myself with it. As soon as i started using BI the difference is completely apparant. Now i actually have to pay attention to possible seaborne invasions from my enemies. This is assuming of course that you play as a faction with provinces that lends itself to naval incursions. Definately worth it if only for the threat of a more active AI as far as naval invasions go; but also with a BI enabled edu you can use cool unit formations like Shield Wall as was mentioned, not to mention swimming units that the AI will use as well and a few other unit formations that are available to the player.

[Xehh II]

What do swimming units do? Do they act like boats?

[Cash Staks]

What do swimming units do? Do they act like boats?

I haven't played with BI(I have BI but I'm just far too lazy to do anthing about it), but I think swimming units can swim across rivers. You know, they don't need a bridge or the shallow water they can walk, erm... swim across. So if this is true, I guess you could stall another army on a bridge and swim some other units across downriver and have a nice little flanking manuever. I personally would rather keep all my units at the bridge.

I could be wrong on all this though...

[jhhowell]

I haven't played with BI(I have BI but I'm just far too lazy to do anthing about it), but I think swimming units can swim across rivers. You know, they don't need a bridge or the shallow water they can walk, erm... swim across. So if this is true, I guess you could stall another army on a bridge and swim some other units across downriver and have a nice little flanking manuever. I personally would rather keep all my units at the bridge.

I could be wrong on all this though...

That's correct, though they're not as useful as that sounds. The problem is that units with the "swim" ability for all practical purposes cannot use bridges at all (I suspect one could carefully set them to a narrow formation and micromanage them over a bridge, but that defeats the purpose - the whole point of a bridge is to cross swiftly). Also, as you'd expect swimming is incredibly tiring. I believe Exhausted = death in the water, swimmers repulsed in a crossing won't reach their own side of the river in most cases before drowning due to exhaustion.

In theory they can be useful as described, make an unopposed crossing far from the bridge, rest for a good long time, then start the bridge bloodbath while bringing in your swimmer force as flankers. In practice I would have deleted the ability from my ERE light cavalry if I'd known how at the time, in order to allow those guys to charge across the bridge at the end of the battle and slaughter routing Huns. I have no idea whether any EB-BI units are better off with the swim ability than without.

[Conqueror]

Swimming allows light units to cross the river (during a bridge/ford battle) at any point. Mostly this means that if you're defending a bridge, you won't be able to just concentrate all your units on one end; you'll need to station some of your troops along the riverbanks to guard against swimmers. Otherwise they will be able to flank your defenders.

Countering swimming units is easy though, as it takes them a while to get across, they'll be very vulnerable to missile fire while in the water, and they will be tired/exhausted by the time they hit the opposite bank. And then there's the fact that they'd be emerging from the water in a disorderly formation and attacking uphill.

[bovi]

Also, once they break due to exhaustion from swimming, they'll perish as they try to swim back over the river. Outstanding. A "feature" that should have been postponed until they got it right.

[Lysander13]

Also, once they break due to exhaustion from swimming, they'll perish as they try to swim back over the river. Outstanding. A "feature" that should have been postponed until they got it right.

That's funny...and unfortunately very true. But surely in theory the AI having swimming units to attempt to flank your forces on the other side of a river bank sounds good. **Sighs** But as bovi said they didn't get it quite right.

[pezhetairoi]

Just a moment of confusion here, can we play EB on the BI platform yet? I'm really not clear on this because I'm still playing on the original RTW.exe instead of the BI.exe. Am I missing a hell lot, or has all this not yet been implemented?

[Bootsiuv]

Just a moment of confusion here, can we play EB on the BI platform yet? I'm really not clear on this because I'm still playing on the original RTW.exe instead of the BI.exe. Am I missing a hell lot, or has all this not yet been implemented?

There is an unofficial mod by ferromancer here

EB with BI isn't supported by EB officially though, and never will be, if I'm not mistaken (which isn't a big deal AFAIK, aside from naval invasions, it really doesn't offer much).

[pezhetairoi]

I have installed it ;) Thanks!

[Cash Staks]

Thanks for the bits of extra information on the swimming ability. I guess I'm not really missing out on that much in that department. It is a pity that CA didn't get it to work.

In a sort of different vein, are the sheildwall and schiltrom(sp.) formations something to write home about? I know everyone says the slightly improved AI and naval invasions make a better campaign, but are these new formations anything to get excited about?

[jhhowell]

In a sort of different vein, are the sheildwall and schiltrom(sp.) formations something to write home about? I know everyone says the slightly improved AI and naval invasions make a better campaign, but are these new formations anything to get excited about?

Shieldwall is awesome, schiltrom is not very useful. For EB purposes, including shieldwall would introduce significant unit balance issues. For example, classical hoplites seem like a logical unit to have shieldwall. Assuming they're presently balanced, adding shieldwall would make them way too powerful (quite possibly better than thorakitai, Bactrian Agema, etc.). There might be a minimod where someone has figured this stuff out.

[mcantu]

The good thing about a unit with shieldwall is that they will push themselves between the spears of a phalanx....

[Bootsiuv]

Unfortunately, because shieldwall gives a defensive bonus, it does imbalance certain units....and I know the team has spent countless hours balancing units in EB.

That being said, Ferromancer's minimod gives you the option of just porting EB to BI without adding the formations features. I would strongly recommend just using Ferromancer's minimod to port EB to BI without changing the EDU's. You won't get his slinger fix, but that can't be that hard to fix yourself (I'm uncertain of how at the moment, but I do intend to find out how and fix it myself).

[mcantu]

Unfortunately, because shieldwall gives a defensive bonus, it does imbalance certain units....and I know the team has spent countless hours balancing units in EB.

That being said, Ferromancer's minimod gives you the option of just porting EB to BI without adding the formations features. I would strongly recommend just using Ferromancer's minimod to port EB to BI without changing the EDU's. You won't get his slinger fix, but that can't be that hard to fix yourself (I'm uncertain of how at the moment, but I do intend to find out how and fix it myself).

Well the whole point of a shieldwall is that it protects you more...so a defensive bonus would be expected

[Bootsiuv]

But then it overpowers certain units, causing them to perform in an ahistorical manner....regular hoplites should not be able to take out elite successor phalanx.

Play with it if you want, I just don't want to lose any of the work the team has done....they made the units the way they are for a reason, and I'm quite happy with unit balance as it is.

[mcantu]

btw, units with phalanx activated also get a defensive bonus...

[Ferromancer]

But then it overpowers certain units, causing them to perform in an ahistorical manner....regular hoplites should not be able to take out elite successor phalanx.

Play with it if you want, I just don't want to lose any of the work the team has done....they made the units the way they are for a reason, and I'm quite happy with unit balance as it is.

I believe it also reduces attack at the same time as increasing defense. From my experience it doesn't unbalance the game at all, it just gives an extra dimension to strategy. The AI will sometimes use it too.

[Bootsiuv]

Yes, but the reduction in attack doesn't play a part if you don't attack on the field.

Just engage the enemy and press stop....they'll go from using their attack stats to their defense stats.

Well, regardless if I decide to do shieldwall or not, I'm just glad someone has finally made the process so neat and tidy. ;)

[jhhowell]

I believe it also reduces attack at the same time as increasing defense. From my experience it doesn't unbalance the game at all, it just gives an extra dimension to strategy. The AI will sometimes use it too.

I don't believe there's an attack reduction. Shieldwalls are very powerful on the attack as well as in defensive roles. For example, Frankish Sword Heerbanns fare surprisingly well when they charge Comitatenses (I did quite a few 1-on-1 custom battles a while back to check on a problem I was having with another mod). If shieldwall was -attack/+defense you'd expect the Comitatenses to win handily, if perhaps a bit slowly. Instead it's close to even, perhaps a slight Frankish edge, and both units score substantial casualties on the other. I believe that's consistent with a significant defense bonus with no change in attack.