Musketman to Cavalry stats ratio

[Predator145]

You can fight the medieval AI with ancient tech (something you'd have to often do on higher dif) because everything scales percentage wise. Pikes costs 50% more and deliver +50% performance. Then you get to gunpowder units. The musketman costs 2x pikes but gives a 1/3 boost. Yet cavalry costs 1/7 more, gets a 50% attack boost AND +1 movement. And cavalry are musketman's contemporaries, not rifles on the tech tree. The game is completely skewed towards offense. Did the devs think cannon support and the far cheaper relative cost of walls makes muskets balanced? Muskets without cannon support actually die to knights, Med Inf and Lbows in the open considering their cost. It's like fielding 30 s spears vs 20 s archers.

Do you think 60 s is a fair cost considering how early the unit appears? The AI benefits massively from this as it doesn't build them from scratch but upgrades its spears and pikes. The AI doesn't factor in cost or stats of defenders. Having 3 spears in a city is the same as having 3 muskets to it. The unit may be awful cost to stats wise. But any boost in stats is a boon for the rich and upgrade happy AI.

 

[justanick]

And cavalry are musketman's contemporaries, not rifles on the tech tree.

That is debatable. Cavalry is really more a unit of the industrial age than of the middle age. Muskets are at least 3 techs away from cavalry, but only one tech away from longbows.

Yet cavalry costs 1/7 more, gets a 50% attack boost AND +1 movement.

Cavalry surely is a game changer. Maybe a better comparison are longbows and MDI. Such an attacker with 4/4 HP vs. a 4/4 Musket fortified in a city on grasland will lose with 79,871%, while a defending 4/4 Pike would only win with 67,292%.

Do you think 60 s is a fair cost considering how early the unit appears? The AI benefits massively from this as it doesn't build them from scratch but upgrades its spears and pikes.

Which as i recall costs a lot of money, even for AI. So that would slow down research of AI.

If we take both 30 shields for defence 3 of pikes and 80 shields for defence 6 of rifles as fair, then maybe 30+(80-30)*(4-3)/(6-3)=46.67 shields are fair for defence 4 of muskets. Maybe round up to 50 shields to prevent musket becoming too good a deal given how early they appear.

 

[Predator145]

That is debatable. Cavalry is really more a unit of the industrial age than of the middle age. Muskets are at least 3 techs away from cavalry, but only one tech away from longbows.

Cavalry surely is a game changer. Maybe a better comparison are longbows and MDI. Such an attacker with 4/4 HP vs. a 4/4 Musket fortified in a city on grasland will lose with 79,871%, while a defending 4/4 Pike would only win with 67,292%.

Spears have the same odds vs archers and they don't cost 30 shields. I guess relative cheapness of walls higher pop of cities may justify a negative bump in defender's cost to stat ratio, but not that drastic as in stock game when you consider the offender gets 1 extra movement.

Which as i recall costs a lot of money, even for AI. So that would slow down research of AI.


If we take both 30 shields for defence 3 of pikes and 80 shields for defence 6 of rifles as fair, then maybe 30+(80-30)*(4-3)/(6-3)=46.67 shields are fair for defence 4 of muskets. Maybe round up to 50 shields to prevent musket becoming too good a deal given how early they appear.

Techs to get to cav: Feud+Eng+Gun+Chem+Metal+Mil Trad.
Techs to get to rifles: The entire compulsory medieval tree + Nat (something the AI won't trade at a reasonable price)

Spears have the same odds vs archers and they don't cost 30 shields. I guess relative cheapness of walls higher pop of cities may justify a negative bump in defender's cost to stat ratio, but not that drastic as in stock game when you consider the offender gets 1 extra movement.

The Deity and Sid AI has no shortage of cash since it's forced to run 50% slider.

45-50 seems fair if they're moved a bit later on the tech tree.

So my own take so far on this has been to shift muskets to a new tech called "Leadership". With gunpowder you get handgonners and war wagons that have 7 defense instead of the musket's 8. Pikes and the former 2 upgrade to muskets which are renamed "Pike and Shot" costing 50 s. Renaissance cuirassiers (10/6,3) appear at "Tactics" which requires the same amount of beacons to beeline to as stock game Mil Trad. Mil Trad itself comes a bit later and ushers in napoleonic age where the stock game cavalry (12/6/3) faces "line infantry" (6/10/1, 60s). Supporting them is the "grand battery" upgraded from cannons. Overall, this retains stock game flavor and tech curve while encouraging realistic period use of combined arms. Real life Gustav Adolf or Napoleon would never send in their cavalry without artillery support.

The only small gripe is the weakening of the AI's defense in early medieval. I tried to balance by delaying the upgrade for swords. If one wishes to stay even closer to stock game pikes can upgrade to handgonners (which doesn't make sense flavor wise). This will help the ironless AI not be stuck with spears as long. Unfortunately, the AI can't seem to calculate the overall stats of defenders. It doesn't build more spears to compensate if it doesn't have iron or saltpeter.

 

[Ozymandias]

Have a look HERE.

 

[Spoonwood]

Unfortunately, the AI can't seem to calculate the overall stats of defenders. It doesn't build more spears to compensate if it doesn't have iron or saltpeter.

If the AIs built more spears to compensate a lack of iron, I think they become more likely to not build improvements like a bank or build them later. They would have more unit support earlier, and thus less probability of acquiring iron or saltpeter via trading. Also, horses if they lack those. Their offensive unit would get reduced to longbows, and AIs with longbows as their best offensive usually feel extremely easy.

Later on if the AIs built more rifles to compensate for lacking rubber, stock exchanges, power plants, or police stations don't get built or get built later. How would they manage a deal for rubber or acquiring a later game tech like that one that gives them ToW infantry?

The game is skewed towards offense in that the human player moves first, and battles don't happen simultaneously. The turn based nature of the game skews things like that (it's perhaps even more noticeable in my opinion in a game like Inscryption). But, if units have equal default attack and defense and everything else is the same, then the defensive unit has the advantage since defensive units always get some sort of defense from terrain and/or being in a city or metro and walls. If you play always war, spears minimize losses early on over attacking their units with archers, ceteris parbius (e. g. the number of hitpoints is the same). Artillery can get used both offensively and defensively, and that balances out. Zone of control and the free shot of archers, longbows (guerillas too I think), also provides another advantage to the defense. So, I do think that the game designers tried to compensate for the inherent turn based advantage to the offense. It just becomes less noticeable when you the human player play better tactically offensively. That they didn't make the defense powerful enough though to compensate for the initiative advantage that the offense has, might be true. But watching Suede get frustrated that his swords wouldn't kill some aztecs, and the whole spear-tank meme suggests to me that there exists adequate or near adequate power for the defense overall.

 

[Predator145]

If the AIs built more spears to compensate a lack of iron, I think they become more likely to not build improvements like a bank or build them later. They would have more unit support earlier, and thus less probability of acquiring iron or saltpeter via trading. Also, horses if they lack those. Their offensive unit would get reduced to longbows, and AIs with longbows as their best offensive usually feel extremely easy.

Later on if the AIs built more rifles to compensate for lacking rubber, stock exchanges, power plants, or police stations don't get built or get built later. How would they manage a deal for rubber or acquiring a later game tech like that one that gives them ToW infantry?

How much unit support does the AI pay on Deity and Sid? Deity gives them 4 and Sid 8 free units per settlement. I haven't thought about the AI being financially buried by unit support before.

 

[Spoonwood]

According to the editor, the additional free unit support on Deity is 16 and the bonus is 4 for each city.

On Sid it's 24 free unit support, and the bonus is 8 for each city.

I don't know if that's the number of units supported, or the amount of overall additional commerce injected to support units.

 

[Ozymandias]

If the AIs built more spears to compensate a lack of iron, I think they become more likely to not build improvements like a bank or build them later. They would have more unit support earlier, and thus less probability of acquiring iron or saltpeter via trading. Also, horses if they lack those. Their offensive unit would get reduced to longbows, and AIs with longbows as their best offensive usually feel extremely easy.

I addressed this, many moons ago: First HERE, and next OVER HERE. Tom 2050 next really ran with the ball, covering Flag preferences. I have notes, but I've lost the URL ... Although he did do, "Understanding Firaxis Unit Values and Costs," which might or might be helpful.

But watching Suede get frustrated that his swords wouldn't kill some aztecs, and the whole spear-tank meme suggests to me that there exists adequate or near adequate power for the defense overall.

It's built into the Combat Results Table, which I uploaded HERE.

 

[justanick]

According to the editor, the additional free unit support on Deity is 16 and the bonus is 4 for each city.

On Sid it's 24 free unit support, and the bonus is 8 for each city.

I don't know if that's the number of units supported, or the amount of overall additional commerce injected to support units.

Depending on the government type there is an amount of free units and the difficulty setting increases the amount of units a tribe can have without having to pay unit support.

As a republic the additional free unit support is arguably more worth as it saves 2 gtp per unit.

 

[timerover51]

As near as I can tell, the cavalry in the game represents for breechloading rifle-armed cavalry from roughly 1860 to World War One. They would have a major advantage against an infantry unit armed with smoothbore muskets. The musket unit in the game does have it attack value underrated as it is 2 compared to the longbow's 4. As the musket superseded the longbow, it should have the same attack value, so I modified it up to 4. The cavalry still has a substantial edge, but not as great as prior to modifying the game. Even a single-shot breechloading rifle is going to have a substantial edge over a muzzle-loading smoothbore. I give the rifle-armed infantry and the cavalry the same attack values, but give the infantry a higher defense value. Cavalry have the problem of needing horse holders if they dismount, which reduces the effective rifle strength, and generally they did not carry the necessary tools for entrenching. Trenches and cavalry do not really go together.