Re: Samurai Warlords patch 0906 - 29 august 2008

[^HUN^]

Just for clarity...
MHC (1100)= MI, leather lamellar armoured horse and rider.
YIHC (1300)= VI, iron lamellar armoured horse and rider.

I always use the new terminology to refer to specific units in order to avoid confusion.

MHC : They seemed to be less effective than they should be in 9.03 and 9.04, but not as bad as they are now. At the moment they can defeat Teppos, Archers and Nodachi. They kill so slowly that even an isolated unit can be saved by a unit of spears sent to help. They are struggling against Japanese cav because they have anti cav of 2, half that of YC. They have more armour but the same defence as YC and are equal in melee. Change melee to 6, but leave the YC stats as they are, or give MHC anti cav 4 and melee of 3 or 4. Mongols need an anti cav cav unit.

Monks : No changes to stats? Something strange has happened then, because there is no unit capable of beating them now(I've not tried them against YIHC)
In 9.04 the Korean Guard (now Yuan Imperial Guard) would defeat them 1 on 1 and be left with around 10, 15 or so men, so it was close. Monks will mince the YIG in 9.06 with a loss of less than 20 men.
The example I gave above, MHC + 2 KS v WM....Just 10 losses for Monks and the 3 Mongol units broken. That is not good. (These are fresh units, not tired, surrounded, etc...except for the Monk who was definitely surrounded)
Do I think they should lose against YIHC? Yes. Exceptions, depleted/tired YIHC or a flank/rear attack ... ie YIHC surprised. Head on charge, by armoured horse and rider, no question about the outcome. I don't mean the Monks should not inflict any damage, but I'd expect them lose.
IF...
Monks are this strong and with the advantage of Japanese cav, it is well within the players' possibilities to choose 4YC, 4WM, some cheap spears and guns/archers. I doubt the Mongols could find anything to match that combination.
OR...
Mongol cav being barely able to match Japanese cav, or losing to it will mean they soon become redundant and Mongol armies will be forced to opt for infantry armies. Even then, they struggle against average Japanese armies. It's a no win situation.
IF...
The better Mongol units (YIHC, MHC, YIG, YIJ) are so ineffective, there is no chance of winning with Mongols. There hasn't been a single Mongol victory with 9.06.

I am still not convinced that A/P is a good addition.

[barocca]

all my tests are on lan, flat large map, fine weather, (test stops instantly if rains), units of equal fatigue,
no other units within 4 tiles either side, no unit within 8 tiles to the rear, (no support)
no routing units anywhere on the field, as soon as a unit wins it's matchup it withdraws from battle,
if a routed unit rallies it is withdrawn from battle, no further test until such units leave the field,
gen of equal class and at back of field facing away,
AT LEAST 30 1v1 matchups between classes for each condition testing (ie WM vs MHC)
test all fatigue levels between complete fresh and quite tired (at least 10 x 1v1 for each)
Both the test PC's are equiv. CPU, Ram and GPU.


in my test WM's won when they and MHC both charged with between 15 and 35 men, (30 1v1 matchups)
when WM alone charge they won with between 25 and 35 men, (30 1v1 matchups)
when WM stood and recieved charge they won with between 25 and 35 men, (30 1v1 matchups)
when charged from rear they won 75% of the matchups, with between 15 and 25 men, (30 1v1 matchups)
MHC did not rout in any fatigue condition until less than 10 men remain.

no cav should walk over a spear/pole unit, such units are a defence against cav rushes and should not reduced in capability. spear/pole units should be crushed by infantry, or weakened by missiles before being charged

no Jap cav can overrun pole units either.


MHC beat JHC, JNC, JYC
YIC beat JHC, JNC, JYC
Keshig beats Hata
MHA beat JHA
JHA beat YHA
JYC beat STL

we can reduce the cost of STC to 600, which more reflects capability,
we can bring YIL back in at 1000, JYC will beat STC
JYC = YIL (when you include the shield for YIL)

I think MHC should be heavier armoured that YIC for the purpose of the mod,
I can make monks crushable by MHC, but am very reluctant to make them crushable by YIC as well
WM's are supposed to be able to stand up to cavalry, the Naginata is an anticav weapon designed to cut the legs from horses as well as men.

i improved the YGuard's and made no changes to the WM's, i have not a clue why you are seeing worse results,
WM's are supposed to be the best infantry on the battlefield. The counter to them is missiles.

Armour Piercing is more dangerous to Japanese troops than to Mongol - Shields are not pierced by AP
it allows us to fine tune a little more

i will think about what you have said about MHC and their speed in killing

[^Glyndwr^]

i have not a clue why you are seeing worse results,

Without going into detailed descriptions all I will add is....
Last nights test games were played under normal battle conditions......
Mongol v Japanese...normal army choices (not testing unit match-ups)...different map each game.
Each game the Mongols were defeated.

Last game played (more for relaxation purposes)...All mongol armies...2 v 2.

[barocca]

i have not sat down and watched them today, too busy, but i recall from watching them the day after that you can spot when mistakes were made that contribued to the result, or when one player or another made a good tactical decision that swayed the rest of the battel in their favour,

in the snow marcus and i maneuvered round into your withdrawal zone, then, when the snow was quite heavy, korean archers were left too far forward on your left (my right),
i was able to launch a devestating raid into them with the most unlikely of assault cav...

in another the MHC that were hiding in trees got worn down (fatigue) by 2 yari cav, 2 ha's and a nag cav, the YIHcav took on the remains of the nag, the remains of the ha's and a unit of ashi-foot (even ashi are bad for cav health) and the yihcav all but exhausted itself wiping those units out.

i also recall spotting skirmishers being deployed in column, instead of in line,

there were occaisions were we could not figure out why you were holding fire with your xbows,

occaisions were one of us exposed a flank (WIDE OPEN) yet you did not charge...
(hand my hand in my mouth once when marcus did that while mongol cav were a tile or 2 (at most IIRC) away from his line),

we were pooping during the snowy battle trying to figure out WHERE the hell your cav were, it was only when i watched replay i realised you had bugger all - if you had come swarming in with your inf during the blizzard (just before i raided the missile line) AND demonstrated on both flanks with a single measly unit of cav on each then we would have held back men from mellee to deal with a flank assault by cav that did not exist...
Thats why we were being so bloody conservative, we could not figure out where in heavens name your cav were hiding...i half expected them to come charging in from from off the map...
for example,
if you watch THAT replay you will see a point when Marcus suddenly sends cav behind my line onto my right flank...that was because of the single unit of song tribal that we had not been able to see suddenly loomed out of the blizzard and we thought you were scouting for the end of the line and were about to come in behind with the damn freakin' missing cav that we were sure you must have somewhere... a mongol army with bugger all cav, impossible, it's got to be out there...
but it wasn't

in the end WE charged because i had long since run out of arrows and was almost out of bullets,
and i wanted some bullets left to be fired during mellee
(in case you wonderd why sam archers joined in the charge...)




i dont want to make any steamroller units, i dont mind making nemesis units, but if we pump up MHC too far they will become a steamroller, the same way WM's were in STW/WEMI.
nothing should be killing quickly, Cav's power is hitting infantry ill prepared.

Perhaps give MHC another +1 anticav, and allow stomp WM's, (stomp= WM -3 att v MHC & MHC +1 att v WM)
(note - this also gives WM +1/+1 anticav - still LESS than half of ashi bonus vs cav)
(the number are additions/subtractions to the current stats for MHC and WM)

or give MHC +1 mellee and +1 anticav and leave WM's as is.

still thinking...
EDIT -
(still VERY reluctant to let YIHC also get monk-stomp ability, muchly prefer MHC to be THE nemesis for WM)

[^HUN^]

There were limited cav in that battle because they can't hack it and we knew they couldn't. A charge during the blizzard would have been to no avail, Mongol inf would be easily repelled, which we knew.
The Song crossbows would not stand for long under fire, they rout at 40 men whether winning or losing any missile exchange.
Monks ARE steamrollering .. cav, inf, anything. There is no need to pick spears as anti cav because Monks fill that role and Japanese cav as well. Bring back YIL, yes OK, but please do something with MHC and YIG.
When I suggested removing YIL, it was because they were doing a better job than MHC and that would mean MHC (a beautiful MI unit) would soon become a rare sight.

I'm not looking for a MHC bludgeon type unit running around killing anything, in the same way I didn't want MHA to be overpowered against JCA; better, yes but you pay for that with the extra 100 koku that it costs. Mongol cav should be a threat, the infantry isn't good enough OR selecting infantry that IS good enough means that the player has to give up the powerful cav to do so.

[barocca]

ok,
looking at the numbers
yari sams vs Cav have 5att/10def,
monks have only 5att/4def, but when we count AP then (vs MHC) WM's become 9att/4def,
that att factor will be different for each unit it faces, it depends on the armour of the defender.

we want WM's to be susceptible to cavalry,
even if they can take a charge they need to be cut downable?

we could give WM's +1 defence against cav and a -4 attacking cav,
so against MHC they become (WM = 5att/5def), against YIHC (WM = 4att/5def), against MHA (WM = 3att/5def),
the decreasing number are because the less armour a unit has the less effect AP has,




EDIT -
why do song crossobws rout at 40?
song xbow = ashi xbow = port teppo (only diff is port teppo has gun),
port teppo dont rout at 40.
?

[^HUN^]

I told Marcus about Song crossbows because he had found they were beating Japanese Teppo. I tested their ability in 9.06. Sometimes they were doing better in the missile trade off, but in every test they began to waver at around 40+ men. A few more losses and they take to their heels. One time Japanese Teppo were down to 37 and they still began to waver at 46 men, at 42 they were gone. Marcus found exactly the same, it's odd isn't it?

Your description of the way A/P is implemented is the reason I don't like it. From a balancing point it's far more difficult because of unknown variables caused by armoured and non armoured units. For example, the att stat is lowered against MHA, that means the stat for MHA has to be such that it will lose, (HA should lose against Monks) which may adversely affect MHA against units they should defeat easily, a knock on effect. A/P is just another equation in a mix that is already difficult enough to balance.

For the sake of gameplay I'd prefer to see polearm units as very strong against inf, capable of holding up cav but not defeating them, which leaves spears as the anti cav unit.

[^Marcus Cornelius^]

I did some other tests on heavy infantry.
3 WM vs 3 YIJ: to simulate a sort of "standard" infantry melee match up.
With some micro managemnt YIJ can match and beat W M. In some cases with 10-15 survivors per unit.
But you must put them in 2 or 3 ranks to hope they are able to shoot all their javelins before H2H in an hold position. And that is not easy in confusion and rush of a final melee and when you got not the space to deploy it in 2 or 3 ranks nor time to micromanage. Too much difficult to get all potential from YJI in a normal MP battle. That is way on the battlefield WM seem to be so powerful against them IMO. They are quite easy and simple to use. You cannot mistake in using them and you need not time to micromanage.
So IMO or you give YIJ same price of WM (1000) or you increase WM price to 1100 or 1200 (better choice for me).

About cavalry IMO maybe a "cheap" solution could be to give 600 price to STL or increase their power against cav, not just like YC but nearer, to have them worth the price.

About foot missile I couldnt say more than "they rout too easily" ... but I could not test them long in a normal MP battle.

About mounted missiles I cannot say anything. I didnt use them yet.

Marcus

[barocca]

i did not spot that somewhere in the hands of previous tinkerer's of the mod the xbow morale has been drastically lowered, 4 full points below teppo - that will be fixed.


MHA's have an AP axe, they are meant to have that, they are meant to be an effective anti armoured unit, meaning deadly to armoured cav and foot. (a useful secondary role for them)


the Jian are not meant to beat WM's in any type of charge and mash,
WM's are supposed to be the hardest to beat Infantry Unit. The Japanese ace in the hole.
but you are supposed to be able to micromanage Jian to be able to beat them. the point is not to commit Jian to attack WM's until you can make an opportunity to utilise all the jian's capabilities.
- this could be take a unit of Yaun Guard (Pole)-(who also have AP ability) and draw them in a thin line across front of Yuan-Jian, then let Y-Jian throw javs over the YGP's heads and THEN Y-Jian join the melee, and if you can get them into the flank so much the better. (3WM vs 1YGP & 2Y-Jian)


anyway crossbow morale will be improved,
(and Song x-bows win vs Ashi x-bows in a shootout -> 7 times out of 8 )

[^Glyndwr^]

Hello,
I did some single players tests on shootout.
1 Mongol Crossbow vs 1 Japanese Teppo.
Crossbow always wins.

This was from a post (25 Aug) in the patch 09.04 topic. At that time CrossBows were out shooting Teppo.
Now ^HUN^ reports them as routing when down to about 40+ men in the patch 09.06?

So something has changed between 09.04 and 09.06?

If CrossBows were brought in line with Port Teppo perhaps that would be a fairer match-up?

Just my 2 cents worth.

[barocca]

port teppo morale and jap teppo morale is same,
xbow morale WILL BE made to same,
xbow h2h is already 1 point better on attack and defence, (not that they stay around much for h2h)

no changes at all made to xbows between 04 and 06,
no changes at all made to teppo's between 04 and 06,
suggest that discrepency is a result of our improved "rules" for lan matchup testing

(just know I am going to live to regret reminding you about Mongol Horse Archer's Armour Pierce ability...)

[barocca]

AT THIS STAGE

the next version includes the following changes

-mongol heavy cav - activated shield, cav +2 (no mellee) - anti-cav attack now +3
-monk vs cav is now -4A +2D
-STC from 800k down to 600k
-YIL (reactivated) from 900k up to 1000k
-activated Ashi-Xbow with small (+1) NON-melee shield (formed)
-resorted formation tasking for sams
-resorted unit order (when selecting armies)
-adjusted scale for korean spear and skirm
-all xbows and merc teppo morale to zero (up from -2/-4)
-NEW review panel and battle card icons for
Mongol Heavy Cavalry
Mongol Horse Archers



Will need your opinion on the Select Panel and Battle Card icons, is the format i used for the new (in next upload) MHC and MHA acceptable, if so then i can make them as i get time for all mongol units,
and will remake the japanese ones so they have the same background for army select panel.
(i hate the fuzzy cream outline around the current set - it's not the original set i made for the mod)


unless anyone has anything else that can be done in under 90 minutes i will upload around lunchtime Friday UK time

[^HUN^]

Only thing I can think of that may be do-able in 90 mins......Change Beta 8 to Beta 9 in the menu screen?

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