Unit experience

[Gatto]

Hail!

I have currently a campaign with the Reunited Kingdom at Decidedly Tookish/Decidedly Tookish (to avoid any stat advantage to either side on the battlemap and a betrayal of Rohan). My impression so far is that the campaign itself is challenging but battles are way too easy for Gondorian Armies. Adunabar troops offer a slightly higher resistance, while Haradrian ones, even with much greater numbers as always, are quickly routed with minimal casualties. It is not a question of raising unit's morale since it is only realistic that a company doesn't fight to the last man like happens in other great (historical) mods. So I would like to propose this:

I) To give only an initial experience of 1 to veterans (King's Spearmen, Men at Arms, King's Horsemen, Rangers) and of 2 to elites (Bodyguard, Guards of the Citadel, Elves)
II) To use forges only as requirements for barracks (gondorian weapons quality is already comprised in their base stats)
III) To greatly reduce (about of a third) archer attack except for elves and White Company to make Longbownen less devastating and Militia Archers a skirmishing force, also to slightly reduce javelin attack
IV) To replace Gondorian Swordsmen with Militia Swordsmen with the same armor of Militia Lancers and Gondorian Horsemen with light Rohan Auxilia Cavalry fast and capable of throwing javelins but lacking of melee efficacity
V) To give Reunited Kingdom leaders except the Royal family and the ones coming from Dol Armroth Guards of the Citadel as bodyguards, to represent Gondor's difficulty of fielding cavalry in large numbers

I) II) III) for all factions.

Thanks

[Aradan]

I) The balance system of FATW is done in a way that represents elite units with experience already stacked on them; which is actually what it should be like. An elite soldier is a soldier with experience and has little more to improve. It doesn't make sense to see an already highly trained and experienced unit such as Guards of the Citadel having 1 experience. he is supposed to be already trained and battle-hardened.

II) The first barracks already have the first level smith as prerequisite. If we make it any harder than that, the AI is not able to keep up. Plus it doesn't make sense, as the troops produced in the second tier barracks use the same quality of arms as the one in the first tier. Furthermore, the upgrades system has been made so that when full upgrades are reached (and upgrades exist only fir iron weapons) these are equal to steel weapons,which are used by high tier units. High quality weaponry is already factored in the availability of upgrades and also in the unit's prices.

III) We will be tweaking our formations to make the AI handle it's missile troops better, but if missile troops are still overwhelmingly good and the majority of our fans believes they are too good, we will take missile attacks down - that however will be done on a per projectile type (ie all units' damage with iron arrows will be decreased by the same amount, and steel arrows by the same amount etc) and not on a per unit basis.

IV) Faction rosters ain't gonna change, until not in this way, as they are based on both lore and design plans.

V) The Guards of the Citadel were a very small, elite force with very specific duties - they were strictly used to Guard the Citadel of Minas Tirith. They were not used a bodyguards at any time, and it would be highly unrealistic if they could suddenly appear as a general's bodyguard somewhere in Rhun.

*) The unit balance will be reviewed (it has already since the last patch) regarding the value of morale, so that low-morale units will be a bit cheaper and high-morale units will be more expensive.

Thanks for your suggestions and intentions to improve the mod.