BattleMaster Community
BattleMaster => Development => Topic started by: Foundation on April 11, 2011, 03:23:45 PM
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4. Fix special forces. They suck atm cost per unit and cs/damage output.
I do not find this to be true. Please provide suitable data to support your claim.
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I do not find this to be true. Please provide suitable data to support your claim.
With regards to this I provided Delvin with the information
At best SF deal double damage in rounds (this isnt even every round and has to be a SF bonus) This double damage would make them on par with infantries considering same armor/weapons and gold spent (obviously SF cost more then twice as much per man)
Armor wise SF die just as fast as infantry do no bonus thus they flop they have 1/2 a much men thus 1/2 as much hits and SF in this category are only half as good as infantry thus comes my my ratios.
I doubt I have all the data I used to have but I should still have some. It would be long and hard to read for most people however.
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4. Fix special forces. They suck atm cost per unit and cs/damage output.
Well I think special forces are kinda ok as they are now.
It is true that infantry perform better than sf money wise, but SF, with their very elevated cs/man, can perform different tasks with respect to infantry. What I believe it's wrong is expecting they would be as good as infantry in making up numbers in the average battle.
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Well I think special forces are kinda ok as they are now.
It is true that infantry perform better than sf money wise, but SF, with their very elevated cs/man, can perform different tasks with respect to infantry. What I believe it's wrong is expecting they would be as good as infantry in making up numbers in the average battle.
I would be nice if people focussed more on the post as a whole rather then SF especially since most people see only the large amounts of hits. Combat systems re-vamp is mostly based on settings and fixing defensive attitude which is the point of this not SF. If needed I'll make SF a separate thread.
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I think people need to remember that special forces have unique modifiers for certain damage outputs and for what they take. For instance, Fontan's Close Combat Fighters are known to be really giant pincushions (steep reduction in ranged hits/casualty ratio, but able to soak up huge amounts of melee hits from infantry. They also do incredible amounts of dmg in melee. (Calvary they're just ok against)
For the majority of SF's I don't think it's known how they specialize. Some might do better against fortifications ( a built in siege engine modifier for instance ). Others do incredible damage to fortifications etc.
Don't discount the special modifiers. That's what makes them special.
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I think people need to remember that special forces have unique modifiers for certain damage outputs and for what they take. For instance, Fontan's Close Combat Fighters are known to be really giant pincushions (steep reduction in ranged hits/casualty ratio, but able to soak up huge amounts of melee hits from infantry.
Really? Fascinating.
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The problem is, how do you know what special ability you are getting? I have never used special forces, so forgive me if I sound ignorant, but I have never seen it listed on the recruitment screen that such and such SF has such and such bonus.
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You're not supposed to. It might not make sense since you could ask them...But hey, what do they know, right?
The intention might have been to be observant in battle, and with enough experience, you'd be able to know what they do, sort of. Also, their special abilities don't seem to activate every battle (maybe they forgot their special equipment for that battle).
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I think it would be extremely informative if someone made a study of these special abilities, even the ones that are already known, such as those that Loren mentioned.
Put up on the Wiki a listing of what special abilities have been identified, which centers have which ones, how often they "activate", and what the evidence is that they have activated.
That should provide a really good baseline.
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I know that the Barony of Makar has two special forces. One has a cavalry charge, so I guess they are special cavalry, and the other...ah, I forget. I think the Mystic Monks may have an artillery feature that does extra damage to fortifications, maybe.
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One center I know about provides berserkers. Their damage output increases greatly as the battle progresses.
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I know that the Barony of Makar has two special forces. One has a cavalry charge, so I guess they are special cavalry, and the other...ah, I forget. I think the Mystic Monks may have an artillery feature that does extra damage to fortifications, maybe.
One center I know about provides berserkers. Their damage output increases greatly as the battle progresses.
OK, well, can you document these effects?
It's important to be able to isolate and verify the special abilities. Otherwise it's all just rumours and guesswork.
Also, it would be extremely useful to know just what, precisely, their effects really are.
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OK, well, can you document these effects?
It's important to be able to isolate and verify the special abilities. Otherwise it's all just rumours and guesswork.
Also, it would be extremely useful to know just what, precisely, their effects really are.
During all my years of playing the game, I've witnessed maybe 1 or 2 special abilities for special forces. Documenting these isn't exactly easy since it can take quite a bit of time to land in enough battles to witness them do anything special. Pretty sure Darka has had a SF center for years that has been used and still no one knows what their special thing is.
I've had a SF unit for a while now and the most special thing they do is act like Mixed Infantry in battle. Maybe they're the other kind of special.. ;D
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During all my years of playing the game, I've witnessed maybe 1 or 2 special abilities for special forces. Documenting these isn't exactly easy since it can take quite a bit of time to land in enough battles to witness them do anything special. Pretty sure Darka has had a SF center for years that has been used and still no one knows what their special thing is.
I've had a SF unit for a while now and the most special thing they do is act like Mixed Infantry in battle. Maybe they're the other kind of special.. ;D
I'd really appreciate any documented occurrences of these "special abilities". 8)
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I used Carelia's 95/95/100 for a short while. They appear to be better in larger frays, doing more damage the more combat that is around them. Character died before I could really look at it more closely.
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This makes me extremely interested in trying to document the SF in Coria, which are 95/95. That should prove interesting I believe... Maybe I'll spend some time on it soon.
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I'd really appreciate any documented occurrences of these "special abilities". 8)
Well, here's one example of the silly things they do: http://www.lilwolf.biz/bm/monster_battle_apr26.html (http://www.lilwolf.biz/bm/monster_battle_apr26.html)
Troop setting for me was front, defensive, line. The SF is range 4 so the monsters were within their range and they chose to move forward. What any sensible unit would have done is a) fire at the monsters b) hold their position and wait for a better shot. Moving forward is just utterly silly since it means you'll get to close combat faster and have less time to do ranged damage. You'll note the actual archer unit did the sensible thing and just fired at the monsters when they were at the edge of their range and hoped for at least a few hits.
I'd understand the unit moving forward if they were set aggressive or even normal, but not while defensive.
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Well, here's one example of the silly things they do: http://www.lilwolf.biz/bm/monster_battle_apr26.html (http://www.lilwolf.biz/bm/monster_battle_apr26.html)
Troop setting for me was front, defensive, line. The SF is range 4 so the monsters were within their range and they chose to move forward. What any sensible unit would have done is a) fire at the monsters b) hold their position and wait for a better shot. Moving forward is just utterly silly since it means you'll get to close combat faster and have less time to do ranged damage. You'll note the actual archer unit did the sensible thing and just fired at the monsters when they were at the edge of their range and hoped for at least a few hits.
I'd understand the unit moving forward if they were set aggressive or even normal, but not while defensive.
That isn't a SF problem. The problem here is that ranged SF seem to use Mixed Infantry AI
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That isn't a SF problem. The problem here is that ranged SF seem to use Mixed Infantry AI
This is correct. All unit types with ranged attacks that are not archers use the same AI.
And it needs work ;)
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I know that the Barony of Makar has two special forces. One has a cavalry charge, so I guess they are special cavalry, and the other...ah, I forget. I think the Mystic Monks may have an artillery feature that does extra damage to fortifications, maybe.
The Barony has in fact three special forces and I know about the two oldest ones and have a pretty good knowledge about their special powers.
Icegate has two centers, Behexed artillery and Mystic monks.
Fiddleford has a new center with for me unknown powers.
Mystic monks are pure melee with increased attack values and what looks like a charge they are hard to wipe as well, their special perk is that they do not get penalties when scaling high walls and siege engines only slows them down ;D
Behexed Artillery is mixed infantry with a range of 5 rows, they sometimes do devastating damage on range but always hit hard in melee.
My experiment with mixing the two above has showed some interesting results with the range dropping from 5 rows to 1 row but they still seam to keep their original strengths. Are we really supposed to be able to mix different kind of sf forces?
For those of you who doesnt know I can tell you that both centers produce troops with 99/99 in armour/weapons but they require a small fortune from the recruiting viking so its not for the common noble. The effects the troops have on the battlefield seam to be heavily depending on their position and stance...
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Battle reports and solid proof rather than speculation and experience would be greatly appreciated.
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Battle reports and solid proof rather than speculation and experience would be greatly appreciated.
You realize you're asking, "please show me how I can make the SF of Makar a waste of money by circumventing their abilities?"
At least, that's how I would treat this if I was in CE.
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You realize you're asking, "please show me how I can make the SF of Makar a waste of money by circumventing their abilities?"
At least, that's how I would treat this if I was in CE.
Um, no. Please don't be so insulting.
We are asking, OOC, for people to being cataloguing and proving the various special abilities of special forces. That will allow us to make a comprehensive list of these special abilities, and understand how best to use them, in all cases.
If you choose not to participate, that only means that your chosen special forces center will not be represented, and if there are any particular secrets to its special abilities, they will remain hidden, unusable by any but those lucky few who just happen to stumble upon them.
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You realize you're asking, "please show me how I can make the SF of Makar a waste of money by circumventing their abilities?"
At least, that's how I would treat this if I was in CE.
Note that I don't play on Atamara at all. :)
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... how exactly do you tell a sf doing something extraordinary if it's something mundane (which sounds rather contradictory) like extra dmg from doing a normal action?
things like climbing walls are simple.. it's either special.. or bugged.
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... how exactly do you tell a sf doing something extraordinary if it's something mundane (which sounds rather contradictory) like extra dmg from doing a normal action?
things like climbing walls are simple.. it's either special.. or bugged.
Sometimes you just notice odd patterns. Some of the SF in Astrum for example appear to have the afore-mentioned cavalry charge ability. They hit like a ton of bricks in the first round of melee, but their damage output drops sharply thereafter, something like a 40-60% drop if I remember - and such a steep drop cannot be explained by casualties. You tend to notice that kind of thing when it happens to your unit.
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...because people never imagine patterns, right? Especially when they aren't actually keeping data...
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...because people never imagine patterns, right? Especially when they aren't actually keeping data...
No need to be snippy here. I was not offering hard evidence. I was simply using an anecdote to point out that the way you can determine whether your unit is doing something special is to look for unusual patterns. Yes, if you want hard evidence you need empirical data to analyze for those patterns. For those of us who aren't actively collecting mountains of battle reports for this purpose, a hunch will have to suffice. You lead a unit for long enough, you tend to pick up on patterns, real or imagined.
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What I find most annoying is that you have to spend an huge amount of time and effort to find out what makes your special forces special. It's something very few people are willing to do and that just leaves special forces as an expensive curiosity.
The game code clearly knows how the unit is special so it's beyond me why the game can't just say to the units owner what the forces can do. Finding out how you make the unit do their special thing would probably be challenge enough.
But alas, the games obsessive love for secrecy will probably win over this sentiment.
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I don't think it should be made publicly available. It could spread to your realm's enemies, or to rivals within your realm?
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I don't think it should be made publicly available. It could spread to your realm's enemies, or to rivals within your realm?
And just how useful is it if it's also a secret to everyone in your own realm? Not useful at all is the answer.
I agree with Lilwolf, it makes no sense for SF special abilities to be completely opaque to the person leading them. Realistically, how are you *not* going to know what your unit can do? If they're more effective against fortifications, it's probably because they're lugging around cannons, bombs or other specialized siege equipment. Not exactly secret.
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And just how useful is it if it's also a secret to everyone in your own realm? Not useful at all is the answer.
I agree with Lilwolf, it makes no sense for SF special abilities to be completely opaque to the person leading them. Realistically, how are you *not* going to know what your unit can do? If they're more effective against fortifications, it's probably because they're lugging around cannons, bombs or other specialized siege equipment. Not exactly secret.
Well, it would be useful if, let's say, you're the only person in your realm knowing how they work :)
Although I suppose the real advantage would be rather slim. I think the compromise offered in the other topic might be okay: adding some flavour text giving a hint about their 'specialty'. Perhaps even during the construction of the RC. Kind of lameif you call your unit the Keplerstan Paladins if they are good at climbing fortifications... ::)
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What if there's another explanation for why your SF 'specialty' is secret? Just a thought.
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I really don't like the SF ability secrecy either. If your SF have a range of 5 that is really obvious what their special ability is. The cost is significantly higher than non-SF. The only real benefit I can see is that an SF unit will be smaller and less likely to be targeted than a huge infantry unit, but it might put out similar damage.
Also, isn't mixing SF a bad thing? What is the reasoning behind hiding their special ability? This game is supposed to be light weight. How is gathering dozens of battle reports and spending hours studying them in order to /maybe/ figure out what their special ability is light weight?
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The game is lightweight in that you don't need to know what the special ability is in order to profit from it. It can help at the level of strategy, but as a troopleader it's not needed.
All units have special abilities. Certain units like police work, others don't. You figure that out by observation, if you care to figure it out.
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Well, all I can hope for is that Skyndarbau's SF's specialty isn't civil work. Seeing that he's a cavalier ;) btw, maybe I should change my name on here. Having the same name as user and for a character seems... wrong.
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What if there's another explanation for why your SF 'specialty' is secret? Just a thought.
Would you care to elaborate, or are you just being intentionally vague?
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Would you care to elaborate, or are you just being intentionally vague?
Intentionally vague, but in the "we're bound to not say something outright but trying to hint" way. As I said on the other thread, dev team is currently discussing how much information to release on this, but until a firm conclusion is reached no one can say anything beyond vague hints. We recognize this is annoying, hence why discussions are going on about how to change what information the playerbase gets.
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Intentionally vague, but in the "we're bound to not say something outright but trying to hint" way. As I said on the other thread, dev team is currently discussing how much information to release on this, but until a firm conclusion is reached no one can say anything beyond vague hints. We recognize this is annoying, hence why discussions are going on about how to change what information the playerbase gets.
Thank you for the clarification.
Personally I think it would add to the attraction of Special Forces and make them more interesting if there was some type of indication as to what it was that made them "special". The idea of SF having unique abilities is intriguing, and adds not only to their value, but to their symbolic nature as among the best troops the realm has to offer. Someone else might have a 90/90 SF center just like yours, but maybe your SF are Berserkers, while his are a heavily armored phalanx. It creates the possibility of having a truly unique center.
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Well said :)
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All units have special abilities. Certain units like police work, others don't. You figure that out by observation, if you care to figure it out.
Two of my characters currently have units that like to loot. ;D
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My SF unit's special ability is awesome training, it's up to 77%!
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Honestly, it sounds as if they Devs are trying to say that SF do *not* have special abilities, though perhaps they simply emulate another unit type (infantry, MI, or cavalry).
If that's not the case, then shame on them for asking for proof that requires lots of effort and special circumstances to collect just to prove a point. Actually, that works both ways. I know that you might be bound not to reveal bits of how the game works, but it's just being jerks when you compensate by demanding the impossible of people, as if it was no big deal. Most of these suggestions are impossible to disprove, and pretty near impossible to prove if they are true, because of how little we know on how they work.
Further, I believe the wiki actually says that they have special abilities. Or did, at some point, if it doesn't still. Somewhere.
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Honestly, it sounds as if they Devs are trying to say that SF do *not* have special abilities, though perhaps they simply emulate another unit type (infantry, MI, or cavalry).
If that's not the case, then shame on them for asking for proof that requires lots of effort and special circumstances to collect just to prove a point. Actually, that works both ways. I know that you might be bound not to reveal bits of how the game works, but it's just being jerks when you compensate by demanding the impossible of people, as if it was no big deal. Most of these suggestions are impossible to disprove, and pretty near impossible to prove if they are true, because of how little we know on how they work.
Further, I believe the wiki actually says that they have special abilities. Or did, at some point, if it doesn't still. Somewhere.
Older SF centers--those in Makar, specifically, have proven special abilities. To use Makar as an example, some of the men have a charge ability--I guess you could call that cavalry, sure. But the others will act like they have siege towers--no other unit in the game does that.
What is unknown is if there are newer SF centers that have abilities.
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should sf and mi have ammo count? (for each battle)
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should sf and mi have ammo count? (for each battle)
Well, a battle lasts rarely over 10 turns, and I think any ranged unit has at least 10 arrows.
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was thinking more like romans who chuck their 1 or 2 spears and then whip their swords out.
this won't involve archers.
if there's ammo count, would it help getting better ai?
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was thinking more like romans who chuck their 1 or 2 spears and then whip their swords out.
this won't involve archers.
if there's ammo count, would it help getting better ai?
Not really. The devs aren't saying better AI isn't needed, just that nobody has had the time to sort it out yet.
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Not really. The devs aren't saying better AI isn't needed, just that nobody has had the time to sort it out yet.
Actually I think he means that wouldn't an ammo count be a way to improve the AI.
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Actually I think he means that wouldn't an ammo count be a way to improve the AI.
Its no use knowing I've got 3 spears left if my men have still decided to charge without throwing any of them :)
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Maybe, if there was an ammo count, they would have to use all the ammo before going into melee.
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I don't see a reason why archers would have to use up all their ammo before engaging in melee. If someone is standing in front of an archer attacking him with a sword I doubt he'll continue firing.
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they don't have to chuck it before moving it.. but they certainly can't sit around waiting to chuck stuff if they haven't got any to chuck.
it's not infrequent for mi to shoot and then move back and forth when the enemy is engaged in melee (with someone else).
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they don't have to chuck it before moving it.. but they certainly can't sit around waiting to chuck stuff if they haven't got any to chuck.
it's not infrequent for mi to shoot and then move back and forth when the enemy is engaged in melee (with someone else).
This is one of the few things I haven't seen my MI units do.
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We don't really model the different types of possible MI. It's possible they could have a short bow, a quiver of arrows, and a short sword. Or maybe they carry a pair of javelins and a dagger, or an arbalest, etc. Who knows? But I think that modeling down to that level is beyond the scope of the combat system.
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here's a weird one... i have some 5 ranged sf... 95% cohesion, 96% training, dug in. def.
1st round, they shoot
2nd round, they move closer (the infantry and undead move towards each other and enter melee)
3rd round, they step backwards
4th round, they hold fire
5th round, they shoot
6th round, they shoot then melee
7th round, melee
8th round, melee
... shouldn't they have stayed dug in, instead moving forward and back? admittedly i screwed up and had the sf in 1 position further back than planned - had planned on being in front of the infantry to get a 2 on 1 at some point.
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i had intend all mi to have limited ammo. i guess really a matter of doctrine rather than equipment.. shoot no more than a couple of times then just melee.