Drill is worthless

[3141592]

I know I already posted this exact same thing in the shadow changelog thread, but it immediately got buried and I think it's important, so here it goes again.

Even with blitz drill is no strong enough to warrant going down that path. A unit with drill four will lose to a comparable unit with combat four a vast majority of the time and it is even more unbalanced at the lower levels. Drill is good for swatting weak units, but by just swatting weak units is hard to gain enough experience to be able to swat weak units

Playing around in the world builder, when one warrior has combat one the other warrior has to have drill four to break even.

I would recommend making drill one +2 first strike, drill two +2 first strike, drill three +3 first strike, and drill four +3 first strike. Not +x first strike chances, just strait out +x first strikes, the first strike chances are just annoying. Obviously some balance testing would be needed, but drill has to be improved or there is no point in getting it.

So, what do you guys think, should drill be boasted up as all other promotions in FFH were, or is there a reason it is so weak?

 

[Demus]

as far as i know, drill was never ment to use versus units of the same strenght. it's ment to reduce damage taken by fighting multiple weaker units (looking at the combat odds). having 10 first strikes would be very overpowered AFAIK

 

[DeaExMachina]

I've always considered Drill to be something to invest in after a few Combat promotions. It makes a unit exponentially stronger the stronger the base unit is because of all the extra attacks. So I definitely go down the line but only after a couple of Combat promotions first.

Blitz however is something I don't go for unless I have nothing else to go for. I've found that unless its on a Hero the blitzing unit is so damage he almost never gets a second attack anyways. Though things are certainly going to be different with how promotions have been weakened. No more safety in 99% combat odds for heroes.

 

[westamastaflash]

Drill is great, especially for units on the defensive - they can take more attackers down!

 

[kenken244]

Drill has much less importance with units with lower combat strength. on really high strenght units, enough first strikes can possibly kill something before combat even begins because more damage is dealt per strike, while on lower strength units there are so many rounds in combat it dosnt do much

 

[3141592]

Even for a defensive position combat four and march allow you to heal really fast and allow you to counterattack while still being able to heal and allows you to take out the tougher units as well.

 

[Assassin]

Maybe drill not kill unit, but it can make important damage to enemy unit, when you can take it down with another unit.
Now, after playing several years civ3, civ4 and ffh(yes, i count it out of civ4) i understand how important drill really is.

 

[miracle]

For me drill in FFH is weaker the in vanilla civ, compared to other promotions.

In vanilla civ combat I and drill I for the equal fresh units give compared total power, with little bonus to combat I, but in FFH combat I is must stronger then drill I for equal units, so drill is only usefull for really strong units againist weak ones...

 

[westamastaflash]

perhaps drill III/4 should give immunity to fear?

 

[MacGyverInSpace]

Drill is also good for suicide catapults when you want to take a chunk out of a powerful stack defender way above any units in your league. Good for countering archer defenders first strikes. But thats probably playing the Charlemagne scenario talking.

 

[TheJopa]

Drill is now required for Blitz.
I don't think it is completely useless but it does need a bit of a boost, at least Drill 1 and maybe Drill 2.
How do first strikes actually work? Does first strike mean there will ALWAYS be at least some damage done to the other unit?

 

[Nikis-Knight]

Yes, but some drill promotions say "first strike chance". I'm not sure if the chance is 50% or what exctly. The first two promotions could use another FS chance or so, imo.

err, uh, I mean what they said

 

[eerr]

first strikes gives chances to damage the other unit "first", without that unit being able to retaliate,in extreme cases without being damaged at all itself.
other advantages-
can kill while defending vs units with 100% withdrawl
(first strikes can't be withdrawn from)
resist seige effects, and reduce damage to other units
(reduces collateral, not sure the exact effect)

perhaps drill could leave the unit with a % of the strength it lost? up to 25% maybe, then it will have huge synergy with blitz, without increasing it's initial effectiveness

drill with the goal of blitz would be very very disirable

 

[BeefontheBone]

Nope. It's quite simple once you understand the way the combat system functions - combat works in rounds (the result of each of which is printed to the combat log). The units' strengths (modified by promotions, abilities, terrain defence etc etc) are compared, and a random number generated to determine which wins the round - if the modified strengths are equal it's a 50-50 shot, if one unit has twice the modified strength of the other it has a 66% chance of winning the round, and so on. The winner then does damage to the loser which is also dependent on its strength, reducing its hitpoints (which start at 100). If the loser is at 0 it dies, else another round is fought (barring withdrawals). This continues until one unit emerges victorious.
If one unit has more first strikes than the other at the start of combat, that many rounds are fought in which the first striking unit cannot take any damage, regardless of whether it wins the round or not - free shots at the enemy, effectively. This explains why they're of little use if you're much weaker than your opponent - a couple of free shots doesn't mean much if you've only got a 5% chance of hitting the enemy. However, for a unit with some strength advantage, they can be extremely useful - if your overall odds of winning a round are, say, 66%, you're likely to take less damage if you get a first strike or two in, because you get to kill the enemy unit more quickly. For a single mano a mano combat Drill is worse than Combat, yes, but if you're likely to be fighting a number of combats against units somewhat but not massively weaker than you - an archer defending a city against a horde of barbarian orcs and goblins, for instance - they can make all the difference to your overall survivability.

 

[Arqane]

Yes, but some drill promotions say "first strike chance". I'm not sure if the chance is 50% or what exctly. The first two promotions could use another FS chance or so, imo.

err, uh, I mean what they said

Chance for first strike is 50% (forgot where it's referenced, but I know it is). So with Drill I-IV, you have 3-6 First Strikes, which means 4.5 actual First Strikes on average. Since Combat I-V is double strength in FfH, Drill could probably use some buffing, as well. At least, I'd make it (+1, +1, +2, +2) First Strikes, meaning Drill IV would always give you 6 First Strikes. It's no more powerful than a lucky roll currently, but still much more likely to be useful.

 

[westamastaflash]

I agree with Aragane - they buffed the combat promos, why not the drill promos too?

 

[MagisterCultuum]

perhaps drill III/4 should give immunity to fear?

I don't like the idea of making the units automatically immune to fear, but I think these promotions would be awesome if tied in to the the yet-to-be-added Morale mechanic. Each level would boost the unit's morale, and higher morale would mean a higher chance to overcome Fear.

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

In principle, since all the promotions were strengthened, so should drill. The question is, of course, how. Giving a lot of first strikes may not be the best idea, because then high strength hero units with lots of drill promotions will be practically invincible (do you really want the 4 horsemen to have 11 first strikes?)? But if this is then balanced by "immune to first strike", then it becomes lame. That, or maybe it gives mounted units a purpose, but then horse archers are too weak and the others are limited to 3 units, which makes a dogpile impossible against a very strong unit.

In a nutshell, I have no ideas that make any sense. This is a difficult question.

As for blitz, I'm not too sure why it's left to the end of the tech tree. The combat system doesn't really favour using strong units to repeatedly attack weak units anyway. Designers would know, but is it because vampires will really abuse blitz?

 

[TheJopa]

In vanilla BtS it also gives protection from collateral damage.

Maybe remove drill IV and boost Drill 1-3 so you only need 3 promotions to reach same amount of 1st strikes?

 

[westamastaflash]

Perhaps adding a 10% withdrawal chance to each level of drill?