[TNS] Unit special abilities

[Nehcrum]

Been some time without updates, so here are some of the models/skins that have recently been tweaked or added to the game. My time being limited, those are not exactly cinematic pics, just a bit of eye-candy to show you we're not dead in the gfx department.

A few questions, maybe not directly related to screenshots but they work to illustrate them.

Lore-accurate Cultists

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

How does chanting really work?
Never quite got the hang on eagles, chanting and screaming abilites.
Warcry I think gives a +10 bonus to attack for 20 seconds after doing it (and it takes 10 seconds to "charge it up") but chanting raises morale or decreases enemy moral?
Do anyone actually use them? Is their morale effect really high enough to be better than another normal combat unit?

Guards of the Tower

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Same thing for these guys and units like them.
Do anyone actually use these unique high-cost, high-stat but low numbers units? I'm thinking of course of units like Guards of the Royal House, Umbar Guard, Guards of the Citadel and the like?
They may be good man for man, but at only half the size of other units and without being twice as good per man? Add to that the difficulty of retraining them (only available on a single place) and that they are trained in cities where you can also train all other faction units including sometimes better units than anywhere else in your realms, or with higher bonuses to experience etc.



And for that matter, does anyone use the special formations available in BI? The shield wall and schiltrom? To me, they seem useless, the shield wall just doesn't seem to work very well and the schiltrom is static and simply means that cavalry can't charge you but also has no need to charge you since you are stuck where you are while the cavalry mops up all other units you may have.
In vanilla RTW the testudo was good and the phalanx was amazing, but these new formations?


And for that matter. The cavalry wedge formation? Does that actually give any benefits?
I've tried both with and without it and can't really see any clear advantages or disadvantages.
Traditionally wedge formations were used to split enemy line formations, but that doesn't really apply to RTW, either that or I'm not just getting it.

[Aradan]

A few questions, maybe not directly related to screenshots but they work to illustrate them.


How does chanting really work?
Never quite got the hang on eagles, chanting and screaming abilities.
Warcry I think gives a +10 bonus to attack for 20 seconds after doing it (and it takes 10 seconds to "charge it up") but chanting raises morale or decreases enemy moral?
Do anyone actually use them? Is their morale effect really high enough to be better than another normal combat unit?

It's impossible to make accurate measurements of morale effects in-game. Chanting increases your own morale and decreases that of the enemy's. I can think of multiple scenarios where being able to simultaneously increase the morale of several of my own units and decrease several of the enemy units' morale would be more useful than having another unit on the field.

Same thing for these guys and units like them.
Do anyone actually use these unique high-cost, high-stat but low numbers units? I'm thinking of course of units like Guards of the Royal House, Umbar Guard, Guards of the Citadel and the like?
They may be good man for man, but at only half the size of other units and without being twice as good per man? Add to that the difficulty of retraining them (only available on a single place) and that they are trained in cities where you can also train all other faction units including sometimes better units than anywhere else in your realms, or with higher bonuses to experience etc.

1. The unique units in DoM are regularly sized. A super elite unit ith the size of a militia unit is actually quite dangerous.
2. Unit sizes in DoM will be different, in that they won't decrease so fast as unit quality increases. So elites will still be smaller than militias, but not by a lot (costs will compensate for this).
3. Even if smaller, elites still produce great value for cost, because when two units fight very rarely are all the soldiers of the larger one engaged in combat. So if a unit outnumbers its enemy 2:1, during combat that generally becomes ~ 1.3:1 (or even 1:1 in narrow places, where local superiority doesn't exist).

And for that matter, does anyone use the special formations available in BI? The shield wall and schiltrom? To me, they seem useless, the shield wall just doesn't seem to work very well and the schiltrom is static and simply means that cavalry can't charge you but also has no need to charge you since you are stuck where you are while the cavalry mops up all other units you may have.
In vanilla RTW the testudo was good and the phalanx was amazing, but these new formations?

If you are defending and are not worried about getting outflanked, shield-wall (+hold position) is great. It makes it really hard for the enemy to get through your lines. Schlithron is kinda useless, unless you are defending, you only have units that can use it and then enemy is cavalry-heavy, in which case your units become almost untouchable. Other than that, meh.

And for that matter. The cavalry wedge formation? Does that actually give any benefits?
I've tried both with and without it and can't really see any clear advantages or disadvantages.
Traditionally wedge formations were used to split enemy line formations, but that doesn't really apply to RTW, either that or I'm not just getting it.

While wedge does give a slight charge bonus increase, its main purpose is to help cavalry units move through gaps in enemy formations without getting engaged in combat. It's supposed to aid mobility, not power.



Now, whether people generally use those abilities/units, only other players can answer that.

[Nehcrum]

It's impossible to make accurate measurements of morale effects in-game. Chanting increases your own morale and decreases that of the enemy's. I can think of multiple scenarios where being able to simultaneously increase the morale of several of my own units and decrease several of the enemy units' morale would be more useful than having another unit on the field.

Yeah, I could also think of such scenarios.
But I assume that chanting is a local effect rather than one that effects the entire battlefield, so the question is how many units you can actually influence with them. Especially since they are a slow foot unit. And one that gets ripped apart by pretty much anything.

1. The unique units in DoM are regularly sized. A super elite unit ith the size of a militia unit is actually quite dangerous.
2. Unit sizes in DoM will be different, in that they won't decrease so fast as unit quality increases. So elites will still be smaller than militias, but not by a lot (costs will compensate for this).
3. Even if smaller, elites still produce great value for cost, because when two units fight very rarely are all the soldiers of the larger one engaged in combat. So if a unit outnumbers its enemy 2:1, during combat that generally becomes ~ 1.3:1 (or even 1:1 in narrow places, where local superiority doesn't exist).

Yes....except a few problems.
All three unique units I counted up are spear units for some reason.
Meaning their main strength is in fighting cavalry, which tends to penetrate lines due to higher mass and "solve" the problem of only getting the front line into melee contact.
Also, how elite are they really?

Guards of the Kings house might be the best one, in comparison to it's equivalent faction units due to Rohan not really having very good infantry.
But still, they are 17 attack, 27 defense (12-11-4) compared to Shields of the Mark 12 atk, 23 defense (8-10-5). And then SotM has iron weapons, meaning they can get upgraded for an additional point of damage, and has lower experience (meaning easier to lvl up) and takes half the time to recruit (1 turn vs 2) and has twice the amount of men. Add in a weaponsmith and you got 17 atk - 27 def vs 14 atk - 23 def. And add in that both are spear units and as such do best against cavalry, where their stats both gets the same boosts.

And it gets a lot worse when you look at RKs unique unit, the Guards of the citadel. They got 17 atk and 35 def (17-12-6) when recruited from MT at the very start (getting +2 to armour from foundry). Kings spearmen, their rival, since they are a spear unit, gets 15 atk and 31 def (15-10-6) right off the bat from MT, due to +2 to weapons since they are iron. And again, that's a unit that is twice the size in men and takes half the time to recruit.

If you are defending and are not worried about getting outflanked, shield-wall (+hold position) is great. It makes it really hard for the enemy to get through your lines. Schlithron is kinda useless, unless you are defending, you only have units that can use it and then enemy is cavalry-heavy, in which case your units become almost untouchable. Other than that, meh.

Shield wall might work if you got a lot of units using it side by side, never really tested that.
Because they shrink their frontal area so much that any enemy unit will wrap around and envelop them.

And the Schiltron makes them untouchable by melee cavalry, but they are locked in place and can't do anything in return.

So if you got a whole melee cav army vs a whole schiltron spear infantry army, you get a staring contest.
If the non-schiltron army has anything else to use against them, such as infantry or archers, the schiltron is F-ed. Same if the schiltron army has anything except schiltron spear infantry that they'd want the schiltron spear infantry to protect from enemy cavalry attacks.
It just gives me a very Maginot-line feeling, it only works if the enemy does exactly what you want them to do and at the same time making it very clear to the enemy what it is that you want them to do and what they therefore will not do (unless they are complete idiots, which means schiltron can work for the player vs the AI for that very reason).

While wedge does give a slight charge bonus increase, its main purpose is to help cavalry units move through gaps in enemy formations without getting engaged in combat. It's supposed to aid mobility, not power.

Ah.
Well, that is a reason at least.

Just seems an awful gamble to me, trying to squeeze that wedge in between gaps if the unit can't do it in a narrow standard formation (fewer men in the front line and more ranks instead).

Now, whether people generally use those abilities/units, only other players can answer that.

Very true.
We'll have to hope for some other players to give their input and opinions on the matter.
Maybe I'll learn a way to actually use these formations effectively. So far, the only effective use of Schiltron and shield wall that I know of is if you are defending a breach in a wall or an open gate, and putting a unit in that formation just inside to soak up enemy units that has to squeeze through the narrow opening. Something that the old phalanx formation was so devastatingly effective at that I can understand why they removed it just because of that.

[Aradan]

One can test the effective range of Cultists relatively easily: Start a MP battle, get a low morale unit within range of an enemy fear-inspiring unit (enough to visibly lower its morale level) and then move Cultists progressively closer to the 'fearful' unit, until you see its morale increasing. If the average player keeps his units in non-loose groups of 4-5, that's still pretty good in my book.

WRT elite units:
1. GotC have a sec sword. Palace Guard have a sec mace. Shadow Guard are riders. CotBA (Company of the Black Arrow) are longbows. Only Meduseld Guard are spearmen (without secondary weapons).
2. The stats you are presenting here are from TNS. You are correct when arguing that those units are not much good on their own in TNS (their purpose was to be the strongest part of a battleline), but stats will be redone from scratch for DoM.

I'm not arguing that schiltron is the very best ability ever. Just stating that it has its (limited) uses. A starting contest might be just fine for you if you are outnumbered by a cavalry-heavy opponent and the defender (and the lock is ticking in your favour).

WRT wedge: Imagine that the enemy has a relatively thin line (ranks < 5) of spearmen/strong infantry protecting its general/archers/weak units. You can either circle your cavalry all the way around the line to get to them or you can use wedge to have your cavalry break through the spearmen and reach the vulnerable units behind them. The purpose is not to deal damage to the spearmen, just go get through them with as little contact as possible, so you can reach your actual target.



I just want to make clear that I am not defending CA's implementation of those abilities or TNS's unit balance. Both have lots of space for improvement. However I am not jumping on the special ability-hating bandwagon either. They are not meant to be universal boosts that make units unstoppable no matter how they are used. They are situation-specific tools, meant to be utilised under specific circumstances to negate the enemy's advantage or reinforce one's own.

[Nehcrum]

One can test the effective range of Cultists relatively easily: Start a MP battle, get a low morale unit within range of an enemy fear-inspiring unit (enough to visibly lower its morale level) and then move Cultists progressively closer to the 'fearful' unit, until you see its morale increasing. If the average player keeps his units in non-loose groups of 4-5, that's still pretty good in my book.

Hmm, gotta try that.
When you mean visibly lower it's morale level, you mean that little info when you hover over a unit the with eager(commander is with unit) and Fresh etc? Or is there another way?

WRT elite units:
1. GotC have a sec sword. Palace Guard have a sec mace. Shadow Guard are riders. CotBA (Company of the Black Arrow) are longbows. Only Meduseld Guard are spearmen (without secondary weapons).
2. The stats you are presenting here are from TNS. You are correct when arguing that those units are not much good on their own in TNS (their purpose was to be the strongest part of a battleline), but stats will be redone from scratch for DoM.

1. Never seen much use in secondary weapons for infantry, except if the first one is a projectile weapons.
Seems like they seldom switch to it, unless they are on walls.
Or maybe that's just a visual.
Are units clever enough to switch weapons to the one that is the best for the situation if they got two melee weapons? Also, I only took the stats from within the game, didn't bother checking the EDU since that doesn't show the experience and was too lazy to check both EDU and EDB.
And who are Company of the Black Arrow? Are you talking about White Company? Or did you just unwittingly reveal something from DoM? And Shadowguards are riders, just as you point out, they also aren't a unique unit that can only be recruited in a single location and has fewer men than an equivalent "normal" unit and as such has no part in this discussion. Neither do White Company if you meant them, since they are a general unit and therefore follow other rules.

2. Of course I'm presenting stats from TNS.... I'm not part of the development team and you haven't released DoM as far as I know. I can't really argue about stats I don't know in a mod that I have never even seen.

I'm not arguing that schiltron is the very best ability ever. Just stating that it has its (limited) uses. A starting contest might be just fine for you if you are outnumbered by a cavalry-heavy opponent and the defender (and the lock is ticking in your favour).

Heh, yeah, that would be a good situation, I'll give you that.
A pretty specific one though, that probably doesn't happen all that often, unless you aim for it.

WRT wedge: Imagine that the enemy has a relatively thin line (ranks < 5) of spearmen/strong infantry protecting its general/archers/weak units. You can either circle your cavalry all the way around the line to get to them or you can use wedge to have your cavalry break through the spearmen and reach the vulnerable units behind them. The purpose is not to deal damage to the spearmen, just go get through them with as little contact as possible, so you can reach your actual target.

Yeah.
And then you get the spearmen charging into your back unless you manage to scatter the target you are aiming for in your initial charge.
Sounds like a very risky move to me.

And "breaking through" a spear unit with cavalry has always struck me as a bad idea. Doesn't spearmen get an additional bonus when "bracing" against a cavalry charge?

I just want to make clear that I am not defending CA's implementation of those abilities or TNS's unit balance. Both have lots of space for improvement. However I am not jumping on the special ability-hating bandwagon either. They are not meant to be universal boosts that make units unstoppable no matter how they are used. They are situation-specific tools, meant to be utilised under specific circumstances to negate the enemy's advantage or reinforce one's own.

Yeah, I'm not accusing you for the faults that belong to CA, and let's face it, there are quite a few of those in RTW.
And I don't hate the special abilities, I just don't see much use for them.
If you want some hate on that, that is when a infantry general gets the battering ram, and due to the rallying command and the drop the ram command both occupy the same slot then you can't do neither....until you smash something with the ram and they finally abandon it.

And overall, these are not accusations, I think the mod is awesome, they are just questions since I'm assuming that you know a lot more than me about the mechanics in the game.

If you want some accusations, I'll add in the stupid move of giving admirals an automatic invisible trait at the end of every turn, meaning once you split a fleet, you can never re-unite it again....
(That one I fixed on my own though)



And to throw in another question, about modding.
How do you set an alliance so that the AI can't break it?
I remember there being one such between Rohan and RK in a earlier version of the mod.
It's just annoying to see how quick RK is to betray Rohan the first chance they get.

[Aradan]

Hmm, gotta try that. When you mean visibly lower it's morale level, you mean that little info when you hover over a unit the with eager(commander is with unit) and Fresh etc? Or is there another way?

Yes, I mean the tooltip.

1. Never seen much use in secondary weapons for infantry, except if the first one is a projectile weapons. Seems like they seldom switch to it, unless they are on walls. Or maybe that's just a visual. Are units clever enough to switch weapons to the one that is the best for the situation if they got two melee weapons? Also, I only took the stats from within the game, didn't bother checking the EDU since that doesn't show the experience and was too lazy to check both EDU and EDB. And who are Company of the Black Arrow? Are you talking about White Company? Or did you just unwittingly reveal something from DoM? And Shadowguards are riders, just as you point out, they also aren't a unique unit that can only be recruited in a single location and has fewer men than an equivalent "normal" unit and as such has no part in this discussion. Neither do White Company if you meant them, since they are a general unit and therefore follow other rules.

CotBA is a unique unit for Dale. In TNS unique units are retrainable only in one settlement, sure, but they have the size of a regular unit, so they are very powerful. It's a fair trade-off, I think. Plus, part of their value is the flavour they add.
Spear unit under the AI do change from spears to secondary weapons after a while actually. It happens regardless of stats, it's the way the engine has been coded (probably trying to help phalanx warfare).

2. Of course I'm presenting stats from TNS.... I'm not part of the development team and you haven't released DoM as far as I know. I can't really argue about stats I don't know in a mod that I have never even seen.

What I'm saying is that you are right saying that elite units in TNS are not very good bang for buck, but we've already decided to change things from how they were in TNS, so we've got you covered.

Heh, yeah, that would be a good situation, I'll give you that. A pretty specific one though, that probably doesn't happen all that often, unless you aim for it.

As I said before, abilities are tools designed to give the upper hand in very specific situations. If you give me a unit without schiltron and one that's identical but can also do schiltron, why not pick the latter? In 1 battle out of 20 its ability just might make the difference.

Yeah. And then you get the spearmen charging into your back unless you manage to scatter the target you are aiming for in your initial charge. Sounds like a very risky move to me.
And "breaking through" a spear unit with cavalry has always struck me as a bad idea. Doesn't spearmen get an additional bonus when "bracing" against a cavalry charge?

Eh, depends on the distance between the two lines. And by breaking through I don't mean it's the best idea to try charging directly into a line of braced spearmen. You should probably aim for a gap between two units or try to break through a non-spear unit... But even if you did charge the spears, you'd actually have smaller casualties when in wedge, because fewer of your soldiers come into contact with the enemy's, due to narrow frontage.
Anyway, this was just an off-the-top-of-my-head example. Moving through enemy units might be the best use of the ability. The principle I mentioned before still applies: limited, situation-specific tool that might just give you the upper hand in 1 out of 20 battles.

Yeah, I'm not accusing you for the faults that belong to CA, and let's face it, there are quite a few of those in RTW. And I don't hate the special abilities, I just don't see much use for them. If you want some hate on that, that is when a infantry general gets the battering ram, and due to the rallying command and the drop the ram command both occupy the same slot then you can't do neither....until you smash something with the ram and they finally abandon it.

That was not very brilliant on CA's part... As for the abilities, I don't find them particularly useful either, but they are not bad to have. Unless the AI uses them badly and gets slaughtered because of that, which is where they become a negative. I would actually like players' feedback here. Have they seen the AI misuse abilities? If yes, which, how often and how seriously? And the same questions but for good usage.

And overall, these are not accusations, I think the mod is awesome, they are just questions since I'm assuming that you know a lot more than me about the mechanics in the game.
If you want some accusations, I'll add in the stupid move of giving admirals an automatic invisible trait at the end of every turn, meaning once you split a fleet, you can never re-unite it again....(That one I fixed on my own though)

That was stupid. It's been fixed for DoM.

And to throw in another question, about modding. How do you set an alliance so that the AI can't break it? I remember there being one such between Rohan and RK in a earlier version of the mod. It's just annoying to see how quick RK is to betray Rohan the first chance they get.

If you're really interested and planning to implement this in your game now, send me a PM. I am going to release a modding guide with every trick used to achieve all DoM's various unique mechanics (there are a lot), but until DoM is released I'd like to keep certain things under wraps and keep the mod's unique features list intact.

[Nehcrum]

Yes, I mean the tooltip.


CotBA is a unique unit for Dale. In TNS unique units are retrainable only in one settlement, sure, but they have the size of a regular unit, so they are very powerful. It's a fair trade-off, I think. Plus, part of their value is the flavour they add.
Spear unit under the AI do change from spears to secondary weapons after a while actually. It happens regardless of stats, it's the way the engine has been coded (probably trying to help phalanx warfare).

I don't play the random battles, only full campaigns, so I've never seen the CotBA.
And no, in TNS the unique units do not have the size of a regular unit, see above.
At large unit sizes, guards of the kings house has 40 men, shield of the mark has 80.
Guards of the citadel got 30 men, kings spearmen are 60 and men-at-arms are 50.
They're about half the size of a regular unit.

As for switching weapons, that sort of supports my comment about units having dual melee weapons.
If they always switch after a while, that means that spearmen with swords as secondary will be at a disadvantage against cavalry when that happens. And if they are fighting infantry, that switch will benefit them, but it'll take a while for them to do it, in which they suffer.
So instead of a pure anti-cav unit with some toughness against infantry they now become half-assed at against both cavalry and infantry.
Jack of all trades and master of none and all that.

The only place I see a benefit is for cavalry, where they can use the spears for higher charge bonus and then draw their swords which usually have higher damage but lower charge bonus for when they get stuck in melee.

What I'm saying is that you are right saying that elite units in TNS are not very good bang for buck, but we've already decided to change things from how they were in TNS, so we've got you covered.

See, I'm talking TNS because that's what I'm playing whileou are talking DoM because that's what you are working on. A discussion that doesn't really benefit either of us. You don't like looking back at something old and I can't look at the new because it isn't out.
That will be solved once DoM does come out.....
But I started getting tired of waiting two years ago or something, when it was said it would be released "very soon" and "probably within the month".
I seem to remember even asking if there was any point in starting up a new campaign in TNS or if I might as well wait for DoM because I probably won't be able to finish playing the campaign before having to start a new on in the new mod.

As I said before, abilities are tools designed to give the upper hand in very specific situations. If you give me a unit without schiltron and one that's identical but can also do schiltron, why not pick the latter? In 1 battle out of 20 its ability just might make the difference.


Eh, depends on the distance between the two lines. And by breaking through I don't mean it's the best idea to try charging directly into a line of braced spearmen. You should probably aim for a gap between two units or try to break through a non-spear unit... But even if you did charge the spears, you'd actually have smaller casualties when in wedge, because fewer of your soldiers come into contact with the enemy's, due to narrow frontage.
Anyway, this was just an off-the-top-of-my-head example. Moving through enemy units might be the best use of the ability. The principle I mentioned before still applies: limited, situation-specific tool that might just give you the upper hand in 1 out of 20 battles.

I'm just comparing these formations that may be of use in 1/20 battles under certain conditions with the formations in Vanilla RTW that was of use in pretty much every battle. The Testudo and Phalanx was formations that greatly increased the power of the unit.
Dunlands tribal pikemen are a pretty sorry lot without the phalanx.

That was not very brilliant on CA's part... As for the abilities, I don't find them particularly useful either, but they are not bad to have. Unless the AI uses them badly and gets slaughtered because of that, which is where they become a negative. I would actually like players' feedback here. Have they seen the AI misuse abilities? If yes, which, how often and how seriously? And the same questions but for good usage.

I have seen the AI use Schiltrom once, and in a very stupid way.
The only unit in TNS that has Schiltrom is the Dunland elite Pikemen BTW. Anyways, he formed up two schiltroms against my cavalry army, which might seem like a good move.
Except I was Rohan and my cavalry is almost exclusively Riddermark Bowmen.....
As their names suggest, they have bows.
I mopped up his other units and then had my cavalry archers surround his schiltroms and then turned on fire at will.

My losses? Whatever few cavalry fell for thrown javelins by dunlendish axemen and tribal spearmen. His losses? Everything he had, not a single man made it off that field alive.

Maybe if I'd run out of arrows he might've had a chance with that tactic.
But those two elite pikemen units could have done a lot of damage on my cavalry units if they'd been used to protect his other units, making it much harder for me to panic them with simultaneous charges from several directions.

That was stupid. It's been fixed for DoM.

Yup, I'm greatly looking forward to DoM.
When will it be released?
Before the summer is over?
Before christmas? And by that I mean christmas this year....

Once upon a time I was greatly enthusiastic about it, but that kind of cooled off after the first year of delays or so.

I've been hearing a lot of "fixed for DoM" and various improvements and cool things.
But the term vaporware comes to mind.

Or possibly Duke Nukem Forever.

When and if it comes out, I'll probably be very happy, but the forums activity has dropped a lot over the years, and I can't help but think that the two are connected.

I'm enthusiastic enough to look in on this forum every now and then hoping to finally see the release.....



But until that happens, I'm still playing TNS, which is still my favourite out of all the Total War games and mods, including the original vanilla versions.

If you're really interested and planning to implement this in your game now, send me a PM. I am going to release a modding guide with every trick used to achieve all DoM's various unique mechanics (there are a lot), but until DoM is released I'd like to keep certain things under wraps and keep the mod's unique features list intact.

sent


I'm playing around with modding TNS and re-playing it and trying different things and difficulties.
So tips on things that can be done would be nice.
I'm not really into advanced stuff but work with the .txt files, EDU, EDB, traits, ancillaries and the campaign strat files.
I've toyed a bit with other files too, just to find out what they do but seen no real reason to change anything in them that would improve the game (fixing the accuracy "problem" on catapults with fire ammo so that they are pin point accurate is fun, but kinda overpowered).

Another fun thing is to disable agents. Meaning no spies, assassins or diplomats, and remove the entire diplomacy failure and focus entirely on warfare

[Feanaro Curufinwe]

Yup, I'm greatly looking forward to DoM.
When will it be released?
Before the summer is over?
Before christmas? And by that I mean christmas this year....

Once upon a time I was greatly enthusiastic about it, but that kind of cooled off after the first year of delays or so.

DoM is never early. Nor is it late. It arrives precisely when Aradan means it to.

[Aradan]

I don't play the random battles, only full campaigns, so I've never seen the CotBA.
And no, in TNS the unique units do not have the size of a regular unit, see above.
At large unit sizes, guards of the kings house has 40 men, shield of the mark has 80.
Guards of the citadel got 30 men, kings spearmen are 60 and men-at-arms are 50.
They're about half the size of a regular unit.

I meant to write DoM there, not TNS. Unique units in DoM are regular-sized.

As for switching weapons, that sort of supports my comment about units having dual melee weapons.
If they always switch after a while, that means that spearmen with swords as secondary will be at a disadvantage against cavalry when that happens. And if they are fighting infantry, that switch will benefit them, but it'll take a while for them to do it, in which they suffer.
So instead of a pure anti-cav unit with some toughness against infantry they now become half-assed at against both cavalry and infantry.
Jack of all trades and master of none and all that.

The only place I see a benefit is for cavalry, where they can use the spears for higher charge bonus and then draw their swords which usually have higher damage but lower charge bonus for when they get stuck in melee.

I've seen AI spear infantry use swords to charge and then (appropriately) switch to spears... You'd rather we removed all sec weapons from melee units?

See, I'm talking TNS because that's what I'm playing whileou are talking DoM because that's what you are working on. A discussion that doesn't really benefit either of us. You don't like looking back at something old and I can't look at the new because it isn't out.
That will be solved once DoM does come out.....

It does benefit me. I have not yet done DoM balancing, so any feedback based on TNS will be used to improve DoM.
That aside, you are posting in a thread dedicated to DoM. So naturally I'm replying withtin the context of "here's how DoM will be different". If you're interested in giving feedback on TNS and/or changing TNS without referncing DoM, I should split this into its own thread, so we're both on the same page.

I'm just comparing these formations that may be of use in 1/20 battles under certain conditions with the formations in Vanilla RTW that was of use in pretty much every battle. The Testudo and Phalanx was formations that greatly increased the power of the unit.
Dunlands tribal pikemen are a pretty sorry lot without the phalanx.

Phalanx tends to be OP though. The special ability is actually the unit's main identity, rather than an extra thing. Anyway, we'll seriously consider using RTW formations too, if the engine can handle it.

I have seen the AI use Schiltrom once, and in a very stupid way. The only unit in TNS that has Schiltrom is the Dunland elite Pikemen BTW. Anyways, he formed up two schiltroms against my cavalry army, which might seem like a good move. Except I was Rohan and my cavalry is almost exclusively Riddermark Bowmen..... As their names suggest, they have bows. I mopped up his other units and then had my cavalry archers surround his schiltroms and then turned on fire at will.

My losses? Whatever few cavalry fell for thrown javelins by dunlendish axemen and tribal spearmen. His losses? Everything he had, not a single man made it off that field alive.

Maybe if I'd run out of arrows he might've had a chance with that tactic. But those two elite pikemen units could have done a lot of damage on my cavalry units if they'd been used to protect his other units, making it much harder for me to panic them with simultaneous charges from several directions.

I see. -1 for schiltron then. If feedback like this is consistent, we'll seriously consider removing it.

But I started getting tired of waiting two years ago or something, when it was said it would be released "very soon" and "probably within the month".
I seem to remember even asking if there was any point in starting up a new campaign in TNS or if I might as well wait for DoM because I probably won't be able to finish playing the campaign before having to start a new on in the new mod.

Yup, I'm greatly looking forward to DoM. When will it be released? Before the summer is over? Before christmas? And by that I mean christmas this year....
Once upon a time I was greatly enthusiastic about it, but that kind of cooled off after the first year of delays or so.
I've been hearing a lot of "fixed for DoM" and various improvements and cool things. But the term vaporware comes to mind.
Or possibly Duke Nukem Forever.
When and if it comes out, I'll probably be very happy, but the forums activity has dropped a lot over the years, and I can't help but think that the two are connected.
I'm enthusiastic enough to look in on this forum every now and then hoping to finally see the release.....

But until that happens, I'm still playing TNS, which is still my favourite out of all the Total War games and mods, including the original vanilla versions.

We aim to release this year. If real-life gets in the way though, there's gonna be a delay, because this is something we do for free in our free time. If people are not longer interested when it's released, so be it. This is not a job, we're doing it because we want to.

sent

I'll reply there then.

[Thangaror]

But I assume that chanting is a local effect rather than one that effects the entire battlefield, so the question is how many units you can actually influence with them. Especially since they are a slow foot unit. And one that gets ripped apart by pretty much anything.

The effect of Cultists is quite noticeable when your army has a bunch of Orcs. For the high-morale units, the moral boost is barely noticeable.

Shield wall might work if you got a lot of units using it side by side, never really tested that.
Because they shrink their frontal area so much that any enemy unit will wrap around and envelop them.

Shield wall is excellent, and gives a great advantage, however you will need a second line of infantry which guards the flanks, and, after the first line is engaged, circles around the enemy's units and charges in their rear. Playing RK I'm making heavy use of shield wall.

Wedge is a bit difficult. It's not that useful against a single unit, but if you order the riders to charge the second line, they will break right through the unit in the front and utterly smash it to pieces. Of course this is quite suicidal if spearmen are involved.
My impression is, wedge increases the mass of the first units because the riders in the rear are pressing forward, too.

[Stark1]

Dunland used schiltron a lot in my campaigns as RK. As I expand slowly they were able to develop and start fielding a lot of elite pikemen. And in battles they were putting them in schiltron almost always.

And to it was pretty annoying (meaning that it made my campaign harder). Since I usually take one or two armies to conquer something (I don't like retraining mid-campaign) low casulties are a must for me. To achieve that I need to avoid slogging matches and rout enemy rather quickly. With those bloody schiltrons that wasn't possible, I had to treat damn things as landmines and manouver around them while routing the rest of Dunlendish army.

After that I had to assault them with my infantry, since my archers were usually spent routing the rest of army, and I had more casulties than I liked doing that. So they did make my campaign harder, but not in a way that I was afraid of loosing battles - if that was human vs. human battle I doubt he would use schiltrons, but since AI will never be that smart it using schiltrons is probably the easiest way to make things hard on me, even if it is just a minor nuissance.

I hope this isn't too incomprensible.

[Casual Tactician]

@Aradan: In TNS it can happen - playing e.g RK - that one does not have the possibility to fight against Trolls, Mumakil and other special units of the "evil" factions, due to the way the recruitment works. Afaik it depends on luck/chance that an "evil" faction builds a building (in one of the viable regions) necessary for these special units.

Will the mechanics of DoM make sure, that special units of enemy factions (eg. Trolls, Mumakil...), are deployed by one's enemy (in every campaign started)?

[Aradan]

Trolls more so than Mumakil, but yes, the AI will have access to such units on different terms so that it will recruit them more often.

[Basileos Predator]

That is sure a great news.

[Nehcrum]

Trolls more so than Mumakil, but yes, the AI will have access to such units on different terms so that it will recruit them more often.

"Different terms?"

They can build stuff without needing the same requirements? Either in pre-req buildings or certain province resources?

[Aradan]

Yes; it depends on what we want to do. We can have clones of units that cost less than their 'parent' units and/or are available in different buildings/different provinces, which would only be available to the AI and not the player. But we're generally going to keep such things to a minimum and use them only where necessary.

[Casual Tactician]

Trolls more so than Mumakil, but yes, the AI will have access to such units on different terms so that it will recruit them more often.

That sounds encouraging, but it leaves me to believe, that it might happen, that one plays a whole campaign as eg. RK and still may not encounter Trolls, Mumakil or Warg-Riders.

I consider a RK campaign - in thus the enemy doesn't field Trolls, Mumakil, etc. ... - as a failed campaign, as that's (= Trolls, Mumakil...) what I expect to fight. We really all wan't to see these beasts and monsters, Aradan! Please make them happen in every campaign?!?

@ "It will recruit them more often" - That, in my opinion isn't enough, I really want to encounter those in every campaign.


EDIT: Sorry for being demanding - your mod is really the best mod for RTW to come... and I'm a total EB fan-boy! But I have to say, that DoM will be the best RTW mod ever, IMHO! Even better than EB!

EDIT2: I forgot; your Viking Invasion is one of my favourite most mods ever.

[Aradan]

You seem pretty confident speaking for every FATW player when you say "we all want this and that"...

The hardest unit to get access to are Mumakil. Atm they are available (for the player) in 3 provinces of Harad, they require the highest provincial development level and also a specific City Specialisation bldg. Feel free to propose an alternative recruitment plan.

[Casual Tactician]

You seem pretty confident speaking for every FATW player when you say "we all want this and that"....

I'm only speaking for myself here. Sry.

The hardest unit to get access to are Mumakil. Atm they are available (for the player) in 3 provinces of Harad, they require the highest provincial development level and also a specific City Specialisation bldg. Feel free to propose an alternative recruitment plan.

I'm not arguing the recruitment for human players, but the possibity that playing as eg. RK one might not encounter Trolls, Mumakil... at all; and that is not any fun.

If I recall corect, it's not sure that (in TNS) eg. AI-Harad will field Mumakil - as there are only a few provoinces that enable recruitment of Mumakil, and in these provinces the AI would have to build a certain building, which is simply pure chance --> in TNS it's not sure to encounter Trolls, Mumakil etc.

[Aradan]

Yep, I know what you're saying. And I'm sincerely asking: how would you set up Mumakil recruitment for the AI, in order to make its appearance more common? Which constraints that the player faces would you relax? Would you make the unit available without the SB? Would you make it available everywhere in Harad, even far away from the provinces where Mumakil supposedly live?