Swordsman buff - Why were unique units not buffed as well?

[kamex]

I assume it was done by accident, then again the overall game balance is appalling so I also wouldn't be surprised...

*cough* Scythia *cough* Norway

 

[Pietato]

Norway and Japan are not upper tier civs, though. They are the worst 2 in the game.

 

[Pietato]

At the very least they need to buff the Spearman (and Hoplite).

 

[Wingednosering]

This is just bizarre. I don't understand how they forget to alter the UUs to match. This actually changed the balance of the entire game because the combat in Civ VI usually boils down to keeping a small army around from beginning to end with promotions and upgrades.

I've also noticed that barbarians have stopped spamming horses and switched to spamming swordsmen.

Additionally, this doesn't actually fix any of the combat balance issues in the game. Ideally most of the game should follow this rock-paper-scissors formula:

Archer > Melee > Anti-cav > Cav > Archer
(Support units, bombards, air and navy fall outside of this obviously)

Swordsmen can now beat Crossbowmen in some cases. Anti-cav was already useless and this made them even worse by comparison. The line is more like:

Melee > Archer (dominant in ancient, gets worse as you go) > Cav > Anti-cav (with no cyclical loop)

 

[MadDjinn]

Personally I'd get rid of the swords bonus vs spears. There's no reason for it generally as spears are consistently lower combat strength anyways.

Also, archers should not be in the Rock Paper Scissors comparisons. They should be thought of as a support unit that can get wrecked if you don't protect it, but have just enough ability to harm an equal level melee unit.

 

[Wingednosering]

I respectfully disagree. I think archers are integral. They're available throughout the entire game (sooner than cav or anti-cav), they take up military space rather than support space and they can defend themselves, which no other support unit can do (unless you count air as support). They also don't buff any other units. Nothing about them lines them up with military engineers, siege towers or battering rams.

They also can't see through rough terrain, which means in a lot of situations you need to use them at melee range, which severely limits their usefulness.

 

[MadDjinn]

I respectfully disagree. I think archers are integral. They're available throughout the entire game (sooner than cav or anti-cav), they take up military space rather than support space and they can defend themselves, which no other support unit can do (unless you count air as support). They also don't buff any other units. Nothing about them lines them up with military engineers, siege towers or battering rams.

They also can't see through rough terrain, which means in a lot of situations you need to use them at melee range, which severely limits their usefulness.

well, what you really ( should ) have is:

Heavy Cav -> fort busting, wounded smashing, line break creating. slightly faster than melee
Light Cav -> faster, pillager, flanker, anti-siege, eventual formation speed booster
Heavy Melee -> generic 'specialty' promotions holder, damage dealer, line mover
Light Melee -> anti cav, Line holder, space filler, support unit protector, gap filler.

Archers -> Pure DPS, no downsides if other units in front.
Siege -> same as per archers, but against cities mostly.

and stuff.

So, what you really have is a Rock Papers Lizard Scissors Spock problem. Then someone drops a bomb.

This is why Archers have low combat strength compared to every melee unit. You are meant to protect them, not front line them and give a lot of damage without taking any back.

Longer term game design changes would preferably drop the anti-spear bonuses from the heavy melee line and add more bonus for the Light Melee in fortified positions. I'd also get rid of the generic anti-cav bonus and make it a 'get bonus to anti-cav for each level of fortification' of the light melee.

Light Cav needs much less combat strength, at least on the horseman unit. It's not there to be the front line smasher, so shouldn't be equal to the heavy melee.

also, no cav should be able to fortify. And.. There's something about rough terrain and cav that strikes me as wrong. Either give cav a massive combat strength reduction (probably just light cav) or do something about the mass movement issue.

 

[Wingednosering]

well, what you really ( should ) have is:

Heavy Cav -> fort busting, wounded smashing, line break creating. slightly faster than melee
Light Cav -> faster, pillager, flanker, anti-siege, eventual formation speed booster
Heavy Melee -> generic 'specialty' promotions holder, damage dealer, line mover
Light Melee -> anti cav, Line holder, space filler, support unit protector, gap filler.

Archers -> Pure DPS, no downsides if other units in front.
Siege -> same as per archers, but against cities mostly.

and stuff.

So, what you really have is a Rock Papers Lizard Scissors Spock problem. Then someone drops a bomb.

This is why Archers have low combat strength compared to every melee unit. You are meant to protect them, not front line them and give a lot of damage without taking any back.

Longer term game design changes would preferably drop the anti-spear bonuses from the heavy melee line and add more bonus for the Light Melee in fortified positions. I'd also get rid of the generic anti-cav bonus and make it a 'get bonus to anti-cav for each level of fortification' of the light melee.

Light Cav needs much less combat strength, at least on the horseman unit. It's not there to be the front line smasher, so shouldn't be equal to the heavy melee.

also, no cav should be able to fortify. And.. There's something about rough terrain and cav that strikes me as wrong. Either give cav a massive combat strength reduction (probably just light cav) or do something about the mass movement issue.

The problem is that those classifications assume you can harrass, out maneuver, or rely on ranged attack all enemies equally. Flanking/harrassment is null and void in a lot of cases because combat is so quick.

Passageways are often far too narrow and too littered with forests, jungles and hills for ranged units to shine the way they should or for maneuvering or pushing back a line to be feasible.

In a game environment, it usually makes more sense to give everything a weakness and a strength so that everything is worth using.

Obviously even if combat were perfectly balanced, factors outside of combat would still topple the whole thing a bit.

Example: Swordsman become more common because they happen to fall in a good locaion on the tech tree.

This is turn causes archers to become more desirable because they counter the swordsman spam.

Making every unit useful in at least one niche sotuation would be a good start. Right now planes are somewhat lackluster, naval combat is overly simple and anti-cav serves absolutely no purpose.

 

[gettingfat]

In this game archers and the following ranged units are always useful. I always weaken the enemy's units first with them before finishing with melee units.

The double attack promotion is also potent when applied to the ranged units, as one doesn't have to be afraid of the units getting too injured from attacking twice, and they can more easily find the second prey because of the bigger range covered.