Planned Stats for Ancient Era Combat Units

Aeon221

Lord of the Cheese Helmet
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Tech, resource reqs and cost not the same as vanilla, will mess with them later.

Archer Goal: changed from city defense to brittle anti-melee

3 str/1 mv
x100 vs melee


Ax Goal: changed from anti-melee to terrain specialist

4 str/1 mv
Only early unit able to get Guerrilla and Woodsman promotions.
Starts with Guerrilla I and Woodsman I.


Catapult Goal: generally weaker and less effective

str2/mv1
max damage 40% (from 75%)
city defense bombard 4%/turn
It and sword are only units that can get City Raider promo.

Chariot Goal: from anti-ax to anti-archer/siege

4str/1mv
x25 vs archers
flanking


Horse Goal: from general cav to brittle raider/anti-chariot

3str/3mv
x50% vs chariot


Spear Goal: from anti-cav to general infantry

6str/1mv


Sword Goal: more specialized against cities

4str/1mv
base x50 vs cities
it and catapult are only early units that can get CR promo


****
My overall objective is to specialize the units, and move spears into the generalist unit -- based on nothing other than my personal preferences. Ideally, stacks would be spears/archers/chariots for field stuff, swords/catties for city attacks and ax/horse for general burnination -- since ax will be superior to other options in rough terrain, and horses can move three tiles (into area, burn, back to defender).

I don't want a dedicated city defender, because I feel like that's a really boring role and I'd rather people specialized generalists than had a unit whose sole purpose was city sitting.

I was also considering a unit that specialized in first strikes, but it seems like that's either terrible or overwhelming. What are people's opinions on changing Drill progression from one or two first strikes/fs chances per level to 3/1/1/1 first strikes. According to my maths, the second progression gives performance increases equivalent to the Combat promos.

Danke to those that answer.
 
i guess, there is no reason to build Swordsman after your list, because spearmans have the same strength against cities
 
I forgot to mention that city raider was restricted to swordsmen. Initially, they will indeed be about equally good at attacking cities, but the specialist will end up much better after even a single promo. For instance, a sword with City Raider 1 vs a spear in a 60% city has win odds of .20 (4 vs 5.45), while a spear needs Combat 1 and Shock against the same foe to get to the same point. With CR2, the sword pulls away. So, in other words, the sword stays ahead of the spear in city attacking after the first promo, while still being markedly inferior in the field.

Looking at all this again, I'm thinking I overdid it with the axe. They don't need to be that good to be better than the other options in the woods. I think I'd rather just start them with Woodsman and Guerrilla, and restrict both to them, rather than giving them any base stuff.
 
I forgot to mention that city raider was restricted to swordsmen. Initially, they will indeed be about equally good at attacking cities, but the specialist will end up much better after even a single promo. For instance, a sword with City Raider 1 vs a spear in a 60% city has win odds of .20 (4 vs 5.45), while a spear needs Combat 1 and Shock against the same foe to get to the same point. With CR2, the sword pulls away. So, in other words, the sword stays ahead of the spear in city attacking after the first promo, while still being markedly inferior in the field.

Looking at all this again, I'm thinking I overdid it with the axe. They don't need to be that good to be better than the other options in the woods. I think I'd rather just start them with Woodsman and Guerrilla, and restrict both to them, rather than giving them any base stuff.

Huh? Archer fortified in 60% city: 3 STR, + 100% vs. melee, +60% from city, +25% from fortify = 3 + (3 * 1.85) = 8.55

CR 1 swordsman vs. that Archer 4 STR + 50% vs. city innate, +20% vs city (cr1), so the archer loses 70% of his bonus, so it's: 3 + (3 * 1.15) = 6.45.

CR 1 Sword vs. that Archer is 4 vs. 6.45, a ratio of 0.62 or so.


C1 Spear vs. that Archer is 6.6 vs. 8.55, a ratio of 0.7 or so.

C1 spear is better than CR1 sword at attacking the target CR 1 sword is made to attack. Not good.

Give another promotion and there is little change. The sword gets 4 vs 5.7 and the spear gets 6.6 vs. 7.8 for ratios of about 0.7 and 0.85, respectively.

That's right, a Combat 1 spear is about as good against archers in a city as a CR 2 swordsman, along with being a lot better against everything else. No one will ever build swordsmen.

Methinks you did not understand the way combat mods are applied, and how important base STR is, and how poorly percentage modifiers perform vs. enemies who already have super high percentage modifiers, like your crazy +100% vs. melee archer.

+25% against an archer who already has +250% only increases your actual effectiveness by about 10%, since it's subtracted from the defender's modifier...

Also in general: Axeman goes from being too good in the base game to being pretty useless. No one will ever build them now except maybe one as an explorer. Might as well remove the actual scout or explorer since at least this axe can pop defended huts, about the only thing it's good for. Archers are now way too good, and taking a city will become a lot more difficult. 3 move on horses is also preposterous unless you're making roads more effective or increasing mobility of other units. 3 move on horses also removes the axe's worth as a pillager or pillage supporter since nothing will ever catch the horse so they won't need protection. Might I suggest STR 5 for swordsmen as a starting point? They still won't be better generalists than spears, but at least they'll perform better at what is supposed to be their assigned role than spears do...
 
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