How to render archers more attractive?

[Qgqqqqq]

While I disagree with some of the ideas your implying (notably that unit variation in stacks is encouraged/possible) I agree with what you seem to be saying.
Honestly id be satisfied with a unit that's just clearly superior on tile/city defence on a hammer by hammer ratio - so that they're situationally useful rather then useless.
I don't see the need to craft an entirely new idea.

[On an unrelated note (yes my conversations are crossing over ) why do you consider high withdraw horse units so overpowered? Playing with them in the sg I was rather unimpressed really - presuming non hippus you need what two promos to get to 65% withdraw? That requires a big investment.
And once you're there they're still not THAT good - even 85% isn't fabulous seeing as the enemy is still alive at the end.]

 

[Kiech]

Our horses couldn't kill much alone, this is true. They DID help lower the opposing stack's defense, but we could have just made mages or catapults instead.

 

[Calavente]

I didn't imply that unit variation is encouraged

for horses ? why do I consider them OP ?
-very high mobility which is a force in itself, easily compensating the lack in raw str, and becomes really dangerous with commando (and obscene on level 1 raider units)

-they act as collateral of sort
said collateral is quickly replaced (whereas warriorpults die much more often, do less damage and are much harder to replace once dead as they often take 3 times as long to reach the front)

and add this to HA that they don't care about FS...


so, you are telling me that in a SG you WON using only iron chariots and HA that those are not OP ?
after orcs and sidar you used ONLY mounted units.

you didn't really have any mages nor catapults nor AV priests nor OO or FoL priests to do collateral damages.
most of those chariots / HA had at least one or 2 levels in withdrawal.
and THAT made you win...

the same number of champions (not ogres, just iron champs) would not have allowed you to win this cheaply IMO.
you'll have needed to have mages/priests to do collaterals, it would have taken much more turns to take the ennemies down, which would have had more time to churn out reinforcements... thus costing you more units.

each withdrawing unit is a unit that didn't die and got 1xp in the process!!! the corresponding champion that died, would have had to be build anew, with 0xp, far from the front.

I expect that you are kidding ?


in some way you are right, they are not AS OP as a IceIII archmage or a Chalid, but still....eeek.

 

[Tasunke]

For me, I see Archer with +25% vs melee -25% vs city attack and +50% vs city defense as the ultimate defender and NOT an anti-melee unit.

Do they lose any strength defending a city? Not really. Those defending a city WONT GET ANY XP unless you are in a bloody war in which case maybe the old archer would have been slightly better xD

Archers defend as 5 str vs hunters and horses, and 6 str vs melee (when inside a city)

archers attack out at 4 str vs hunters and horses and at 5 str vs melee.

Melee as they are can still be considered the primary attacker, but upping Axe and Champ city attack by 10% (making axe 20% and champ 10%) wouldn't be so bad in my opinion. Would make the archer's slight SLIGHT bonus vs melee even more usable.

Making cover require Combat 2 wouldn't be so bad really ... horses would still be the counter but it would make melee units less so.


Earlier we were discussing a system of promotion-based loose rock paper scissors ... without a spearman unit I feel that I should go back to that system (of having Formation being taken earlier).

Honestly? Yes if you are playing the hippus and the other person is playing something else, at least you now have a choice. Do they take all formation promos like a dumbass? Then kill them with axes. Do they not take any formation promos? Then kill them with horses.

Honestly allowing the different MARTIAL tiers more accessable within a shorter timefram would give more interesting decisions to the player.

Current Archer is 5 defense +25% city defense, for a 6.25 city defense. While not opposed to leaving the archer unchanged, making them 4 str +50% city defese makes them 6 str. With full fortification that goes up to 7 str. IF we gave them the defender promotion for free, then full fortification would go up to 8 str.

Walls in base are +25% defense. In my mod they are +40% defense. This would put them up to (assuming no defender promotion and 7 str with ful fortification bonus) 8.6 str defending.

A bronze warrior defends with a natural '5' a bronze axeman defends with a natural '5', an original archer defends with a natural 6.25

Perhaps moving archers to 4 str +75% city defense is the answer then? I would prefer 4 str +50% defense +25% melee, but that is due to the recon penalties for city attack and the fact that walls have been increased. @45 hammers (same as axes, cheaper than hunters and horsemen) I feel that this is sufficient.

Yet, in my mod, I think it will be more interesting to see the performance of the original first, before I do any changes.

Therefore I will only do my building changes (in order to give archers more of a chance) and to see what interesting strategies people use archers for, rather than to first change the archer. If they are still underutilized after my building changes, then I will talk more on my (and our) idealistic view of the archer.

 

[Kiech]

Maybe instead of a bonus vs warriors, the archer could just target them like marksman does?

Anyways, you are on the right track Tasunke. See what effect the building charge has first, you have already made the cost adjustments.

 

[Calavente]

after reading all that, while I still prefer to push them more toward a skirmisher + fortified defender (collateral + withdrawal + increased Def strike + Defender-like promotion,

Lacking that (as thought OP by some) I think I could go toward :

4str, +25% inside cultural borders (attack&def), + 25% CD, -25%CA, collateral, defensive strike

making them 5str attack inside borders, 4str outside 6str defense in cities.
thus, archers are as strong as bronze axes inside your own culture, and even better as they do collateral in attack, are as strong as iron axes in city defense and do defensive strikes.
and mainly, inside borders, archers are 1str stronger than bronze warriors, both in counter-attack and in city-defense.

NB: with this setting, archers str scales less favorably than bronze axe with additional %modifier : combat promo, other promo, terrain defense as they have a small base str, so bronze axes still get a slight advantage which IMO can compensate the other perks of "new" archers even in your home territory;
-->a lvl1 bronze axe is better than a lvl1 archer (5+20%= 6 instead of 4+45% = 5.8), even in home territory....
however for defending cities :
not counting the 25%fortification : a lvl6 axe is needed (combat5) : str 10 versus combat5 archer : str 10 ...
with innate 25%fortification defense, an combatIV axe is better than a combat IV archer (10.25 vs 10.2)..
then with culture defense... (20%) combat III bronze axe becomes a better defender than combat III archer (10.25 vs 10.2)
..etc not counting defensive strike or possible collateral/withdrawal ...etc

however outside your borders, archers are "just" better than axes or bronze warrior in open terrain, and worse than both against cities (25%-45% difference) and plainly worse than bronze or iron axe.

listening to Qgqqqq I would think that exchanging the collateral for an innate +15%withdrawal / opening the flanking I promotion would still be nice and would not cut into the catapult niche (collateral) nor the horse niche (withdrawal... but no move left after the attack) : 50% withdraw with flanking I and defensive promotion.
I'm not sure such a "new" archer would still be prefered versus axes or horses but at least a "builder civ" could get a very long way using only them in order to defend the empire against anything save huge arcane/priest-led SoD

and if with we take firearrows to +1str, +50% vs cities,
an archers with firearrows become better than bronze axes anywhere.... *(save for scaling with promotions, see above)
(5+25% +withdraw or collateral against cities), but less good than iron axes or enchanted blade bronze axes.

thus the equilibrium is met.


in the same way, iron-longbows (6+2) with firearrows (+1) would be better than iron champs (6+2) everywhere ... but not mithril champs or enchanted blade iron champ.

(if longbow lose the metal promotion they would need a base 7str IMO / same as ranger... or at least 6str (same as HA) + something... ... collateral ? +withdrawal? something else ? +20%str ? never-ending defensive strike (giving blitz should give this effect) ? ... those are F..ing longbows FFS! you don't charge against a wall of longbows.. you'll die if you try... that's worse than attacking a legion's shield wall !


then there is a need to balance with horses : but movement and vs archers or vs FS is already good.
and with recon ...
actual recon are also balanced : less str in home territory or city defense, equal str out of territory, better str against cities.. (-20% instead of -25%) + they get the %animal.. and the +1 move

... my further 0.2.

 

[BvBPL]

What about the marksmen? Wouldn't somebody think of the marksmen?

Seriously, I'm curious what people think of the marksman. Does he need improving? What about lowering the level minimum?

 

[Tasunke]

I've mentioned marksmen several times.

I think 2 move, and req level 4 should be the necessary buffs.

 

[BvBPL]

There's a lot of good, dense stuff in this thread. I hope I can be forgiven for skimming a bit.

 

[Tasunke]

but of course. I had hoped that instead of defense you would have analyzed my changes

 

[Qgqqqqq]

Tasunke, WW22 has started...like 48 hours ago.

 

[BvBPL]

but of course. I had hoped that instead of defense you would have analyzed my changes

I like the lower level requirement and the movement. However, while it can be relatively difficult for archery units to hit levels four or six, it isn't so hard w/ assasin units, which are an alternative source of marksmen. As such, the marksman will be more likely to come from assasins, which may make it little more than a shadow w/ strong defensive capabilities. I don't know, maybe that's what they are now.

 

[Tasunke]

Yes, Markmen are just another upgrade option for assassins. The lower level requirement will make it better for archers while the extra move will make it more attractive to assassin builds. (especially since mobility2 cannot be taken by archery class units)

One alternative option, I suppose, would be to completely remove the level requirement.

Either way it would not matter ... currently only assassins can reach the lv6 requirement. So maybe remove the level req and give +1 movement. The best advantage to both unitclasses I suppose.

Marksman used to be a niche unit, now anyone with the tech are guaranteed 4 of them.

 

[SergiuSS]

maybe by adding them a barrage ability like in magister and other modmods will make archers a bit more usefull max20% outside city and whit +5%/combat promotion, you can add some bonuses to this if the archer is in a city,and withdraw to be available only if the unit has at least one movement left and consumes all movement points in the process so no more unlimited withdraw or running after combat
Whit this I imagine stacks of archers will be nice but still needing something else to finish the kill

 

[A Moon]

Marksman used to be a niche unit, now anyone with the tech are guaranteed 4 of them.

On the other hand, how many civs (With the maybe exception of the Lljos) will ever bother to research Precision? It doesn't really have much going for it.

 

[Tasunke]

On the other hand, how many civs (With the maybe exception of the Lljos) will ever bother to research Precision? It doesn't really have much going for it.

Same thing could be said for any tier4 tech. XD

just because something is inaccessible in most games doesn't mean it shouldn't be fixed

 

[A Moon]

I think it's the tech itself that needs a bit of fixing.

 

[Tasunke]

Rage? Warhorses?

maybe its just because I play EitB and ETMP ... but in those mods Precision is a bit cheaper and also gives a free Great General to the first person to reach it.

 

[A Moon]

Warhorses gives Shadowriders at least, and they're cool. Rage is something for people chilling in the disciple area. Although I never bother with it, because I find berserkers so disgustingly ugly, as their art-style clashes with almost every single civ. Stupid stripy trousers. Eugh.

 

[Calavente]

I'm starting to work on it...

A I wrong in assuming that the order of the <DDD> <DDD> is not important and that I can assemble all the one I want together ?
or should I really always place icombat before ifirststrike ???

OR would someone propose me a better way to open xml Sheets than notepad ? (like to open it in a spreadsheet... )

pretty please .