thinking about archers

[daladinn]

so i got to thinking of the various mechanics that we have in play currently and how we can make archers live up to what they should be. what i am listing is what i feel are "cut&paste" changes.

1- change the archery range to no longer give +2 xp. instead with a mechanic similar to the sacrifice mechanic give the archer the "training" promo whenever its in a city with an archery range.

2- i am forgetting the name of the 2nd archery range thats provided with longbow men. but to allow this building to provide "advanced training".

3- copy and paste the caster xp method to effect archers with the training promotions. where training = channeling 1 , and advanced training = channeling 2. i am leaving off the channeling 3 equivalent because of the power of the T4 archers (i don't feel they need it).

4- make longbow men require a level 3 unit and T4 archers to be level 6.

5- archer advancement under this fashion should be about half the rate as the casters. this could be modified , but i expect half to be a good number.

6- add a new leader trait "protectionist". this increases the rate of archer "training" xp similar to arcane does to casting units. again i think about half value is a good baseline.

7- sureshot had things right combining the warfare line with the archery line and re-balancing tech costs. giving this more thought it follows logically since all your metals are available via the foot tree that the "warfare" promos be available in the archery tree. thus allowing cross training to a better degree.

my other suggestion that has nothing to do with the above , but i like the feel a bit more is to remove the bronzeworking tech requirement from and to replace this with construction. i also can not really understand the requirement of ironworking for longbows (it has no justification).


thats all , and thanks again.

 

[Cadaveres]

I totally agree with the "training" mechanic.

However, I would rather leave it just for bowyers and leave archery range as is. Also I would try to difference a bit more the mechanics between arcane units and archery units. I would make it the same rate than the arcane line. However, only non-fortified archers would get the advancement. This way you have to choose whether you want a strong defended city or archers that keep on training and are not so ready for war.


Also, another interesting improvement would be that city walls affect archers in a different way than the rest of the units. An archer is obviously more useful at defending cities with walls than a melee unit (they can shoot arrows from the towers). City walls giving double defense bonus to archers than to any other type of unit would make this work.


Regarding Sureshot's modmod, I agree that the technologies for melee units are by far more useful than the archery branch. However, instead of powering up the archery line I would separate the melee line in two lines (lowering research points for each technology):
- melee line: ¿axe forging? (for axemen) - elite weaponry (for champions)
- mining line: bronze working - iron working - mithril working

I also agree with removing the iron requirement for longbowmen.

Anyway... these are my two cents, do whatever you want because I really madly LOVE this mod as it is and as it improves over time...

 

[Deon]

However, instead of powering up the archery line I would separate the melee line in two lines (lowering research points for each technology):
- melee line: ¿axe forging? (for axemen) - elite weaponry (for champions)
- mining line: bronze working - iron working - mithril working

It seems a nice idea. I already proposed it HerE along with other archer ideas.

* Different materials? First way to balance/empower archery units, make them not tied to melee group and something preferable is to rid of "bronze" and "iron" bows (I don't like it). Maybe we should have "exceptional", "composite", and "enchanted" bows or something like this instead of bronze/iron/mithril, and these upgrades will be obtained through the archery tech-tree as you progress, and also require no resources, only special building in town, let's call it "master fletcher".
* Different tech-tree for materials? Another option is to separate melee tech tree from crafting materials. This way you'll develop +weapons and all unit types don't mess up with archery.

But I think we should wait for the Morale stat, because after it's implemented the whole combat mechanism will be different.

 

[Calavente]

this thread kinda makes a double with cuteunit's one , don't you think ?

I say that as I don't think it is easier to make comments and write ideas in both threads.. maybe mix the two ??

 

[Deon]

I agree. Moderators? Pleeease!

 

[Meserach]

I keep thinking that giving archers the ability to attack adjacent squares without moving has potential. No more long ranged than that (they aren't magi), but this way they could perhaps do collateral damage to attackers before they actually had to defend properly.

You could either implement this as a quasi-spell (click a button, get summoned unit "hail of arrows" which has strength equal to the archer's attack, does collateral damage and has a move of 1, only usable from within city or fort) or, you could give archers 100% withdrawal chance if they were attacking from a city or fort (is that even possible to code, knowing where the attacker attacked FROM?)

 

[Uberness]

7- sureshot had things right combining the warfare line with the archery line and re-balancing tech costs. giving this more thought it follows logically since all your metals are available via the foot tree that the "warfare" promos be available in the archery tree. thus allowing cross training to a better degree.

I like that idea, also the training ability so that they don't need to go roaming outside the city to get better.

 

[Deon]

(is that even possible to code, knowing where the attacker attacked FROM?)

It would be nice... Because I'd like to have some bonus to combat when attacking from hill to flatland, not only the reverse penalty.

 

[Calavente]

well I pretty sure it is possible to code : see forest III promo.. and treetop defense or maybe ambush... or whatchamacallit ... there was a promo in BTS or FfH that counts where you are attacking from.

even better way to do it : when in city or in fort, the city/fort gives at each begining of turns... (see my post in the other thread) +1 attackstr + 20% withdrawal to archery and siege units: then the promotion stay with the unit for the length of the turn.
thus you can't cheat by making your archer go through a city before attacking, but if it was in the city from the turn before, it would be buffed to attack pillagers.
(but I'd rather Have what I proposed on the other thread = work as the fort-mod of vanilla but only for archers.)

 

[it-ogo]

Can not estimate Sureshot tech tree changes but archery now is definitely hardly usable. Even with Ljosalfar (dexterous, Hero) I prefer to go first through recon line (FoL, poisoned Blade, now fawns) rather then archery. If you play more-less challenging difficulty you should rush some perspective tech path. Archery - Bawyers is not promising from that point of view.

Maybe make Archery cheaper and independent of Hunting somehow?

Suggestions on weapon promos (cumulative):
Composite (provided by Ivory) +1 str +1 first strike chance
... (provided by Silk) + 1 str +1 first strike chance
... maybe something with pearls for very-very specific situations?
... maybe something with razorweed?
... maybe something with fruit of Iggdrasyl?

BTW poisoned metal blade is something very-very tricky and as I know never was used widely (shame on Shakespear!), while poisoned arrow was something quite common.

 

[Mithrus]

Perhaps add a new resource "yew trees" or similar that would only be in forests (duh) and represents a source of higher quality wood for better bows. For completeness, maybe add the equivalent of copper/iron resources in various woods. I would think the equivalent to mithril would be some sort of composite material, I like the ivory suggestion above. Hmm, maybe have the dragon bones be the required resource, granted this won't be available for most games then.

Having said this, I can see some rationale behind the metal promos, as having a stone/bone tip vs copper/bronze vs iron vs mithril would make penetration a bit easier with the harder material. Perhaps instead of a straight +1 str for the metals archers should get a smaller +% bonus, say +5%/+10%/+20% for copper/iron/mithril.

 

[Cuteunit]

Splitting the Mining from the Melee trees would be brilliantly smart. Great idea. Bronze and Beyond is simply a must right now even if you want to do something else, like go Recon line for assassins or you're elves and want to build flurries someday, or something.

Part of the balance from Vanilla that's missing here too is that right now archers come at the SAME TIME as axemen, and cost the same, while in Vanilla archers come earlier and are cheaper.

 

[onedreamer]

Honestly I'm not much fond of the free xp for archers. And besides, to be efficient Archers need to have protection from collateral damage, not just xp.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

The "yew trees" idea got me thinking: Would it be possible to make units require certain terrains/features (either in the city radius or in the civ's cultural borders) to build? Or to make the build times shorter with these terrains/features? or to give free promotions based of the terrain/features near where a unit was built?

That would be very thematic, allowing forests to be needed in order to get the wood for ships or for bows. It would also allow for some very unique new units. Unfourtunately, I don't think that any of that is possible (at least without either SDK changes or some massive, extremely slow python coding), but it would be pretty cool

 

[Goodgimp]

Part of the balance from Vanilla that's missing here too is that right now archers come at the SAME TIME as axemen, and cost the same, while in Vanilla archers come earlier and are cheaper.

Archers are stronger here, though. A Civ archer has 3str, while an Axe has 5. Archers in FFH have 5Str on defense (which is all you used them for in Civ anyway).

The problem as I see it is you don't have access to City Garrison in that line, which Sureshot addresses.

If you could get Archers immediately with City Garrison, they would be quite the formidable defense force. I'd still like to see a boost past this point, though, maybe loading them up with first strikes to simulate the pelting the attackers before they get in melee range (and hence why you would want to use Cavalry to hit archers).

 

[Meserach]

First Strikes are mostly useful for preventing swarms of cheaper units from getting lucky hits on you in battles that you're going to win anyway. As such, they're pretty neat for defenders. An extra first strike or two would make archers more effective on the defence in a more flavourful way than just boosting their strength.

However, the root problem is that defence is boring in Civ. Defensive units just sit there getting attacked until they either die or don't, and if you're getting attacked a LOT you're probably losing the game anyway. Going on the offence is usually the only way to win a war, and certainly sitting there fighting off attackers and trying to use you economic advantage (far less war weariness, no extra unit support costs) to outpace your opponent is a) rarely effective and b) pretty dull in the actual execution.

 

[eerr]

what if archers can randomly get the marksman promotion while in a city(based on level)?