Bugs & Feedback

[Magnar]

Just to state out, I'm not complaining, I'm reporting issues, which in my point of view, are errors/bugs.

The Spartan unit limit does not work properly:
I've had 11 spartan hoplites (which was the maximum as the recruitment list said.) I've transferred 1 spartan hoplite to another army which was completly destroyed. Now I cannot recruit the spartan hoplites again, as it is still locked saying I've reached the maximum count of units.
I do not use any other mods which is related to recruitments. I use the bullgod unit icons mod, and the rtw music mod.
Why is this limit is necessary for the spartan units? I' dont think it is realistic, especially that macedon has so strong sarissa phalanx units that they kill the spartans in minutes.
So in my opinion either unlock the number of recruitable spartans, or lower the power of macedon (and other) phalanx units because they are overpowered.

Phalanx overpower and weak cavalry charge:
Another solution for the phalanx overpower would be to increase the charge damage of cavalry from the back. As right now it is just 5-10 men with the spartan citizen cavalry (don't know the exact name).
This makes the cavalry unusable, as they die like flies even from a not frontal assult!

Archers overpowered and/or overused:
Let me state that it seems to me that the archers are nearly well balanced, except it makes very annoying that when a cavarly charges into them, it only kills a few men (on unarmored archers!!) and it takes a lot of time to kill them with cavarly. Therefore the archers - as the always run away - are an ultimate killing machines!

Stamina:
The stamina seems right on Infantry units. It might takes a little too much time to regain their strenght, but it is still okay.
But the stamina of the cavalry units are horrible. Horses don't tire just from charging into a unit and then running away. They tire out like infantry, but they should have at least twice the stamina as an infatry unit! Like this, they get another disadvantage - next to the weak charge - that when they tire out they are so slower than a fit archer unit. So they own the horses, like running away and shooting and repeat tactics.

Other errors:
The AI always creates archers like 80% ranged unit and only 20% of melee units. In real, they of course would deal some damage until the hoplites reaches them, but not like the half of the set of 1 general 11 spartan hoplites 4 cavalry and 4 javelin units. I get serious damages just fighting with archers. These are armored units, and these archers were much weaker. Right now its like they are using an English Longbow, or nearly a crossbow. The armor and shields are no saving againts them.

Also the AI always recruits the horse runners and nearly nothing else. Krete, Rhodos, Aitolian league etc, just recruit horse runners in 90% of a unit stack, and 10% other.

Re: Spartan recruitment limit. It will be removed with the hotfix (just fixed it now). Thanks for pointing that out.

Re: Pike phalanx, we are looking at further tweaks to it with this next hotfix update. But spartan cavalry are fairly week cavalry and more skirmishers than anything else.

Re: AI Armies, the hotfix has changed the AI recruitment and hopefully improves the armies that the AI creates. We will need to test more to see if it has actually worked though.

Thanks for the feedback.

[billydilly]

Hi, some things I have noticed while playing as Rome.

- Researching "Manipular Organization" I get +0% ammo.
- I encountered a Dahae general called (NAMELESS)
- Everyone wants a Non-aggression Pact or a Defensive Alliance ... and lots of gold in turn.
- The Raeti offered to be my client state without a war, the were allied with the Helvetii and Nori.

[Balbor]

AI recruitment only work if the AI is able to recruit all the unit types available in an army set otherwise it gets confused, also available money effects it as well. Horse runners are cheap so if it cannot afford to recruit anything else it will recruit them. Greek armies should comprised of mainly hoplites but early into the campaign they should be fazed out and replaced by Pike and/or light infantry (Thureophoroi)

[AuburnAlumni]

So far I'm enjoying it immensely. The major issues I see so far are...

1. AI army composition is "jacked up". I'm fighting Persia right now and they have 2 armies that are 90% slingers.

2. I'm the Seleucid Empire and very few nations are declaring war on me. The majority of local nations are all offering me non aggression, trade agreements, and alliances like crazy. I think that needs to be toned down.

3. In battle mode, I don't think there is enough damage dealt when charging an enemy unit from behind. Both infantry and calvary units don't tend to deal a lot of damage when attacking a unit from the rear. An enemy triarii unit was attacked from the rear by a Spartan hoplite unit and wasn't even shaken after 5 solid minutes of being attacked from both sides.

4. Archers rule the world. Mercenary Persian Archers are essentially ancient machine gunners right now. I've had battles where my Archers have taken out 500-600 enemy troops by themselves.

Those are my major points of emphasis. Otherwise I'm really enjoying it. It's a refreshing battle change from DEI.

[Jepp]

I get a rebellion in my city. So an unit of rebels is created. (its one unit of horsemen) and they immediately attack the settlement. With absolulte no change of winning

its bit funny. if you have time.. maybe look into it?

thanks

[LAKEDAIMON]

As Rome I was defending against Veneti Ariminum and the equites horse garrison unit does not have horses.....

[Galba]

Just started a randon campaing with Aetolians with the new Hotfix and the faction description is still the same of New Carthage;
Barcid faction leader has no name;
Fighting a first battle against Athens and my hamippoi light cavalry has not a single horse at all;

[Magnar]

Just started a randon campaing with Aetolians with the new Hotfix and the faction description is still the same of New Carthage;
Barcid faction leader has no name;
Fighting a first battle against Athens and my hamippoi light cavalry has not a single horse at all;

Please put hotfix related bugs in the next update thread in future.

We haven't got to faction descriptions yet and it wont be done in the hotfix.

The hammippoi are not a cavalry units. They are a cavalry support unit. Historically they would run behind the cavalry and support them.

[Roach]

Here's a quick read on what the hamippoi were historically.

They are super light infantry trained specifically for killing cavalry. They are best paired with your own cavalry and used to flank and kill enemy cavalry.

[Galba]

Please put hotfix related bugs in the next update thread in future.

We haven't got to faction descriptions yet and it wont be done in the hotfix.

The hammippoi are not a cavalry units. They are a cavalry support unit. Historically they would run behind the cavalry and support them.

Ohh sorry for that!
And regarding hammippoi I just took a guess they were cavalry units due the horse at the unit's card;

[Galba]

Here's a quick read on what the hamippoi were historically.

They are super light infantry trained specifically for killing cavalry. They are best paired with your own cavalry and used to flank and kill enemy cavalry.

Gotcha!!

[La Tene]

Custom battle HOTFIX great stuff.

AP damage vs: this is a failed attempt!

Suggestion: Reach: 1,2,3,4,5
IE: axes, swords, spears, long spears, pikes - this replaces BVL
BVI totally removed and instead this should be reflected in melee stats: axe troops have bad melee defense great attack, swords good melee attack good defense, spears decent attack great defense, pikes poor attack excellent defense.

[Magnar]

Custom battle HOTFIX great stuff.

AP damage vs: this is a failed attempt!

Suggestion: Reach: 1,2,3,4,5
IE: axes, swords, spears, long spears, pikes - this replaces BVL
BVI totally removed and instead this should be reflected in melee stats: axe troops have bad melee defense great attack, swords good melee attack good defense, spears decent attack great defense, pikes poor attack excellent defense.

From my tests, I could see no noticeable difference between different reach values.

BV is the same as AP but limited to those unit types.

We have removed AP damage and transferred it to BV instead. This makes for a more diverse system.

The type of weapon already plays a large part in our unit stats but not so simple as you have suggest. We have calculated swing/thrust speeds, mass, length and a number of other variables to determine the impact a weapon will have on a unit stats. It also takes into account a units armour and shield, with shorter weapons benefiting more from shields and armour than longer weapons.

Why do you say failed attempt?

[KAM 2150]

Yes, in regular melee reach does not do much but...it does for pike phalanx. For example pike phalanx with reach of 2.5m will get destroyed, but pike phalanx with reach of 3.5 will do good, while pike phalanx with reach of 5 will be almost impossible to penetrate from the front. Although that depends on your stat system, but that is how it worked during my tests for DeI battle overhaul (which already put few grey hairs on my head).

[Magnar]

Yes, in regular melee reach does not do much but...it does for pike phalanx. For example pike phalanx with reach of 2.5m will get destroyed, but pike phalanx with reach of 3.5 will do good, while pike phalanx with reach of 5 will be almost impossible to penetrate from the front. Although that depends on your stat system, but that is how it worked during my tests for DeI battle overhaul (which already put few grey hairs on my head).

Lucky we added weapon reach even with our assumption that it did nothing

Glad to hear that it does something... and now it doesnt need to be changed hehe.

Yeah a battle overhaul can definitely be quite ... intensive. Even if you dont go as crazy with it as we did its still enough to do ones head in.

Best of luck with your stat overhaul and thanks for the info.

[Gülredy]

I've downloaded the hotfix, and tried out the mod with this.
I think the mod already advanced a lot. The recruit system of other factions are much better.
But I still have some bugs to report, and also I have some suggestions:

Bugs: (playing as sparta)
1. Aetolian League, does not recruit its units. It has an army. Athen defeated it and since 20 turs it does not have an army at all!
Probably they don't have any generals to recruit.

2. Aetolian League is "unattackable" by other factions. As I said, Athen defeated its last army, then they left the city of Larissa alone.
They become my defensive allies, and I was in war with macedon and epirus. They both had 2 full unit stacks and they and they were at a very bad
relationship with this Aetolia, but they did not attack even as they did not had any armies.

3. Krete still recruits like 90% of missile units. Which would be okay with archers and with around 50-60% of missile unit per army, but they are recruiting slingers and akontistai.


Suggestion
1. To counter the great damage of missile units (which is okay but fustrating a bit) there should be at least a "loose" formation for every unit to counter the archers.
OR the missile units should be still rebalanced. Because right now, 17 slingers and Akontistai beats up 12 level 2 spartan units + a general, 5 units of cavalry + 4 units of the best javelin units sparata has.
This seems unrealistic, as some peasants with stones beat up a highly trained and armored units.

2. What is the purpose of these "horse runners" unit? For example for sparta, it would be much better to have some Spartan youths instead of these unusable units.

3. Perioikoi, Neodamodeis are useless as they are heavy hoplite units. It makes no reason (except if short on cash) to recruit them. It would be good and it would provide a more tactical recuitment system, if there would be some light hoplites, medium and heavy units. Light units would have the most stamina and would be much quicker, but would have much lower armor, and slightly less damage as the medium units, and much less as the heavy units.
Of course it cannot fit for every case, but something like this would make sense, and infantry could be used to flank much better, and could counter archers aswell.

Extra:
I've seen in a lot of mods they remove the abilites from units a lot. I know its because the AI does not use them, but I think its a very good idea to have this loose formations as some more tactical formations too, as it makes the game much more realistic!



Thanks for your work! Keep it, as this mod have a lot of potential, as it is already a very good mod!

[Roach]

Thanks for the bug info & feedback

2) The hamippoi (horse runners) are cheap anti-cav units. Here's a quick read on how they were used. Sparta's citizen cav was worse than most, so they can actually make good use of these units. Pair them with your cav, engage the enemy cav with your cav and then flank with the hamippoi.

3) We create historical rosters, so if you look closely that any one hoplite unit contains heavy and medium soldiers in it just like in real life. The "ekdromoi" hoplites that you may know from vanilla were historically just the interior ranks of a regular hoplite formation. The soldiers on the front rows had the heaviest armour so were the slowest, and if skirmishers needed to be chased away the young men wearing little armour would run out from the phalanx to do that job, but they did not exist as units of their own. One of the beautiful things about the dense hoplite phalanx is that it fights with the stats of heavy infantry even when a portion of the phalanx is wearing no armour.

[Magnar]

I've downloaded the hotfix, and tried out the mod with this.
I think the mod already advanced a lot. The recruit system of other factions are much better.
But I still have some bugs to report, and also I have some suggestions:

Bugs: (playing as sparta)
1. Aetolian League, does not recruit its units. It has an army. Athen defeated it and since 20 turs it does not have an army at all!
Probably they don't have any generals to recruit.

2. Aetolian League is "unattackable" by other factions. As I said, Athen defeated its last army, then they left the city of Larissa alone.
They become my defensive allies, and I was in war with macedon and epirus. They both had 2 full unit stacks and they and they were at a very bad
relationship with this Aetolia, but they did not attack even as they did not had any armies.

3. Krete still recruits like 90% of missile units. Which would be okay with archers and with around 50-60% of missile unit per army, but they are recruiting slingers and akontistai.


Suggestion
1. To counter the great damage of missile units (which is okay but fustrating a bit) there should be at least a "loose" formation for every unit to counter the archers.
OR the missile units should be still rebalanced. Because right now, 17 slingers and Akontistai beats up 12 level 2 spartan units + a general, 5 units of cavalry + 4 units of the best javelin units sparata has.
This seems unrealistic, as some peasants with stones beat up a highly trained and armored units.

3. Perioikoi, Neodamodeis are useless as they are heavy hoplite units. It makes no reason (except if short on cash) to recruit them. It would be good and it would provide a more tactical recuitment system, if there would be some light hoplites, medium and heavy units. Light units would have the most stamina and would be much quicker, but would have much lower armor, and slightly less damage as the medium units, and much less as the heavy units.
Of course it cannot fit for every case, but something like this would make sense, and infantry could be used to flank much better, and could counter archers aswell.

Cheers for the feedback mate.

Will take a look at the aetolian league and look at implementing a new army template for Crete and Rodos.

The Periokoi, Neodamodeis and Spariatoi hoplites are slightly different. The Neodamodeis is slightly faster than the Periokoi which is slightly faster than the Spariatoi when running. The difference between the Neodamodeis and Spariatoi is a little under 10% running speed.

[Magnar]

1. Aetolian League, does not recruit its units. It has an army. Athen defeated it and since 20 turs it does not have an army at all!
Probably they don't have any generals to recruit.

Cheers for pointing that out. Ive found the cause and it will be fixed in a future version of the hotfix.

[La Tene]

Ah. Thanks for the info and ya I recognize you guys have a sophisticated system for grading weapons use-age. What I mean by fail and I know that was brash, is that for the user it isn't very intuitive given that many will not know what AP means and, well I'll be honest and just point out that AP'ing doesn't have anything to do with cavalry unless they are cataracts. In all truth, BVL and BVI is in fact an intuitive approach to weapons stats though it is tacky. Spears would certainly produce a bonus vs fast moving large animals because they allow the warrior to stay at a bit of a distance which is needed more so than when it comes to infantry. When it comes to infantry vs infantry the sword or ax can be a more deadly weapon once the soldier has been able to penetrate the defensive reach of the spear. Sorry for the lecture but I'm arguing that a stat that directly represents a "bonus" is in fact a realistic one. My Reach suggestion was actually meant to specifically target BVL as a means for not using the tacky "bonus" statement in the stats. When it comes to infantry vs infantry the three melee values should be sufficient for reflecting effectiveness though a straight Armor Piercing value might be a good addition I would suppose.

There's a lot I don't know about the mechanics you guys are dealing with but I can say that if I were to see a Reach stat I would easily assume it would help me against animals on the battle field. PS: Spears certainly should have a bonus vs elephants...? They allow the soldier to keep distance from those swinging tusks and tree trunk boots. Anyway I'm gonna head in to a campaign, very excited.