MTW2 MP balance issues

[Cheetah]

Lets start a discussion on balance issues. Though I have the game I got no time to play MP as yet, but I have heards some rumours about spanish musketeers, weak spearmen etc.

Please post only well identified issues with specific units, also please give examples.

[Fenix7]

We can start with unit sizes. If I quote |Heerbann|_Di3Hard

I played some games with the Elite clan together. They used small units if they played 3vs3. In my opinion, these size is too litte.

Due the lag issues this might be better solution atm, but I prefer normal unit size. Even if there is no lag I would not go above the normal unit scale.

[NihilisticCow]

What do people feel about basic archers (i.e. not armour piercing/crossbows)? In a game I've had 4 peasant archers shooting their entire ammo into the back (though not always, the engagement kept turning) of dismounted feudal knights and had about 7-12 kills a piece... just seems a bit too weak to me, I know they're very basic archers, but surely they should do a bit more damage?

Most people seem to agree that muskets etc. are too strong.

[Monarch]

Peasant archers are peasants, so if you liken them to their infantry counterpart then really you'd have to say they should be very weak.

I hope in a patch they make Spanish Musketeers more expensive, and tweak w/e other balancing in late era because I've played a couple of 1v1 late eras today, HRE (me) Vs Venice which I won a close victory and HRE Vs England (me) which I lost, both were very enjoyable, theres just something about the gunpowder which I really like, however I admit High era is best due to balancing.

[Fenix7]

I usualy play 10k matches and I almost don't use any upgreads on this florin level.

Regarding era's it seems to me that hight (we could add early too) era is the only one more or less nicely balanced. This are first impressions so far.

[t1master]

i've noticed archers/xbows outrunning my heavy cav. even if they're heavy they should still get caught by cav. could be operator error, but i usually can catch a unit of arrows even with gothic knights or camels in vi...

[RTKBarrett]

Hey Paolai, havent seen u in the lobby yet :D

[Paolai]

Hey Paolai, havent seen u in the lobby yet :D

me too havent see you yet


Barret and Cow, plz help me here!
People are understanding littel by little that I am right, but maybe they need also other voices cause you are both nice and talented players. I am sure also you have my same feelings about the imbalances that I have mentioned. Lets try to have a better game.

[RTKBarrett]

As long as palamedes is aware of these threads im sure he can make his voice heard and the patch can take care of ure worries ;-)

[Paolai]

ok lets wait and hope then.

[NihilisticCow]

Personally I don't see it as important what happened in history, no one knows that much, one persons fact is anothers fiction. The nobility that fought on horseback wanted all the glory, whether they actually gained it or not, so it was recorded that way.

In the game one stationary specialised anti cavalry unit (that doesn't fair that well against infantry) should not be wiped out by one head on charge from one heavy cavalry unit. Otherwise there isn't much point taking anything apart from cavalry and I'd rather have a more interesting game.

The other issues that I think are important were as Paolai mentioned:

Pikes are too strong vs Swords.
Not quite as major, but why should so cheap units beat so expensive infantry so easily head on? Yes I know how to beat them and phalanxes in RTW, but I never felt them that ideal either...

Musks are too strong.
Simple one that most people agree with.

Archers are too weak.
I assume Paolai means the same as me; I'm not referring to crossbows that are quite effective, but the standard non armour piercing units. At the moment, there isn't an advantage to taking them over crossbows given a choice. Archers fire a little quicker than crossbows, but do lower damage and have no armour piercing so they're so much weaker against armour, so all that happens is they run out of ammo after not killing much, even through shooting in the back. I think their attack should be boosted by a couple of points, so the basic damage is the same as an equivalent crossbow (who of course will still have armour piercing, so will get big bonuses against armour). After all why would an arrow hurt an unarmoured unit any less than a crossbow? I think this should give standard archers a slight advantage over crossbows in a shootout with their slightly faster rate of fire, so it's not such a simple choice which one to get. Also it would help to kill horse archers a bit quicker, so make cantabrian a bit more of a necessity.

[Darkarbiter]

Personally I don't see it as important what happened in history, no one knows that much, one persons fact is anothers fiction. The nobility that fought on horseback wanted all the glory, whether they actually gained it or not, so it was recorded that way.

In the game one stationary specialised anti cavalry unit (that doesn't fair that well against infantry) should not be wiped out by one head on charge from one heavy cavalry unit. Otherwise there isn't much point taking anything apart from cavalry and I'd rather have a more interesting game.

The other issues that I think are important were as Paolai mentioned:

Pikes are too strong vs Swords.
Not quite as major, but why should so cheap units beat so expensive infantry so easily head on? Yes I know how to beat them and phalanxes in RTW, but I never felt them that ideal either...

Musks are too strong.
Simple one that most people agree with.

Archers are too weak.
I assume Paolai means the same as me; I'm not referring to crossbows that are quite effective, but the standard non armour piercing units. At the moment, there isn't an advantage to taking them over crossbows given a choice. Archers fire a little quicker than crossbows, but do lower damage and have no armour piercing so they're so much weaker against armour, so all that happens is they run out of ammo after not killing much, even through shooting in the back. I think their attack should be boosted by a couple of points, so the basic damage is the same as an equivalent crossbow (who of course will still have armour piercing, so will get big bonuses against armour). After all why would an arrow hurt an unarmoured unit any less than a crossbow? I think this should give standard archers a slight advantage over crossbows in a shootout with their slightly faster rate of fire, so it's not such a simple choice which one to get. Also it would help to kill horse archers a bit quicker, so make cantabrian a bit more of a necessity.

Thats one of the problems with RTW code :(. Heres an example... say a unit has 10 armour and 10 sheild. A crossbowben firing from the front needs to worry about 15 ranged defence. While an archer needs to worry about 20. A crossbowmen firing from the back only needs to worry about 5 and a archer still needs to worry about 10. Making this better requires a lot of balancing.

[NihilisticCow]

Thats one of the problems with RTW code :(. Heres an example... say a unit has 10 armour and 10 sheild. A crossbowben firing from the front needs to worry about 15 ranged defence. While an archer needs to worry about 20. A crossbowmen firing from the back only needs to worry about 5 and a archer still needs to worry about 10. Making this better requires a lot of balancing.

Yes, but that's against armour, I was suggesting the increase in archer attack so that they're a better unit to use against unarmoured units, such as other archers/crossbows.

[RTKBarrett]

And once again the world proves that nothing is impossible...