Darth Mod 7 - Elephants

[FEARLESS]

Think the mod was excellent until I came up against elephants. They are practically indestructible. I have even done test with a dozen units of archers firing flame arrows -no effect may kill a couple but they certainly don't panic. just charge at me and desimate everything. Wish I new where to go to make the necessary changes to their specifications. Will be an uninstall if I can't get help. Will go back to the Darth mod 5.8.

[Lusted]

Moved to the DarthMod sub forum, as you are likely to get more help here.

[wipeout140]

Think the mod was excellent until I came up against elephants. They are practically indestructible. I have even done test with a dozen units of archers firing flame arrows -no effect may kill a couple but they certainly don't panic. just charge at me and desimate everything. Wish I new where to go to make the necessary changes to their specifications. Will be an uninstall if I can't get help. Will go back to the Darth mod 5.8.

Look at it and have ago myself also i will look at the code

[DARTH VADER]

Will look to it again.

[Grand Duke Vytautas]

Talking about eles here's what I noticed from my short experience as Seleucids in DM 7.0.3:
1. Yep they're difficult to rout, my unit of elephants was repeadetly attacked by fire arrows from some 3 Egiptian bowmen, yet eles didn't rout
2. Phalanx and pikemen can hold eles from the front - is this intentional, historic or ahistoric? Imo they should bang through phalanx center with few casualties maybe have harder time with pikemen.
3. Units fly way high (I laugh every time I see that ) when hit by eles.

Well I didnt have much battles with eles, mostly 2 units in army, but I can say they are a little overpowered, especially when flanking they send up units flying high into the sky lol

[DARTH VADER]

The long pikes should hold elephants away....they should not be so dumb to penetrate a thick spear wall. But hold not kill. Only peltasts have the best ability to kill easily elephants with their javelins. But will look to balance.
The launch to space issue is smthg that I have managed to fix as much as possible. The light uints are tossed away more, the heavy more realistically. I have seen other mods that had settings for elephants to send infantry units to orbit....

[Pietrak]

Darth, I think that there are too many elephants per 1 unit. how 1 unit of War Elephants managed to kill my 3 Triarii units, even when surrounded by me? they are either overpowerd or there is too many of them.

[Byzantium]

I have had no problem with Selucid elephants at all.I usually play as Parthia and their horse archers will decimate a unit of elephants no problem,fire or not.
The only time i will have problems is if the AI holds its elephants in reserve so to speak at the rear or protects them with archers.If this happens i have to keep my infantry mobile so as not to present an inviting front for them to charge and i have to tempt them out to the flanks using my horse archers.
To be honest i dont view them as being unbalanced stat wise,they are awesome in the right situations as are most units.They are in no way overpowered imo.
I'd be careful of making them too weak,they are after all pretty limited in lots of situations.

[Pietrak]

destroying Elephatns with a Partian army is one thing, but with a Roman army... it's different.

[DARTH VADER]

No..I am positive that I have done the correct balance. You must use your peltasts/velites etc to kill them in combination with heavy infantry spearmen.
You must hold them with your mass of infantry (Warning mass is important ...that means you must use a lot of men to hold a powerful charge of heavy elephants.)Then the skirmishers can volley their effective javelins at them from the rear of your troops or flanks.
The magnificent creatures will die or rout easily...but will take a lot with them...quite historical.
In DarthMod straightforward tactics is not an option.
If you do not have skirmishers in your army do not expect to win them easily or even not at all.

Remember that in history 200 elephants could terrorize and win thousands of troops.
So 48 elephants against 500 men is a balance that is fragile in favour of the elephants.
They are extremelly expensive to built and rare so when they exist they should prove their worthyness....end

[Byzantium]

I understand what your saying Pietrak but in there lies the beauty of RTW and Darthmod.There is no one tactic between factions.He is advocating a solid formation with skirmishes for your Roman army where as i recommend mobility.Its all about having the right tools for the job and using what you have.
Luckily for me they dont pose a problem but put me up against Egyptian chariot archers and heavy chariots and they put the fear of God into me.They are most certainly to me what elephants are to you trust me.
I'm not saying their a pushover because there not.They are rightly feared and respected for what they are capable of in the right circumstances which is a good thing imo.

Good luck against those Nellies

[FEARLESS]

Thankyou for all your help with the elephant issue. Though disappointed that units of flaming arrows didn't do swat to the elephants your right with the light infantry peltast. Methinks now that if I am to wage war on nations with the possibility of elephants I had better arm myself with foot and mounted peltast otherwise I am in for a severe kicking........and I mean severe. We have been warned by the man himself DV.

[Pietrak]

Well, you guys have a point my army fighting the Carthaginians hardly had any skirmishers, but I managed to kill 6 War Elephants units in over 3 battles, only with my Principes and Triarii i noticed that for romans, Cavalary Auxila is the elephant killer. but it was the first time in RTW, when it gave me a challange. i shipped 1 full stack to Carthage, took the city from a full stack, then retained my units, shipped a garrison, and marched west. in the same time, my other army was fighting further south. my march west was eventually halted - i got attacked by full stack after full stack... after 4 battles i had only 600 men left - I lost the fifth battle in the south, my army was beaten of (because of the elephants). but after several days of battleing, Carthage is pushed back into Spain at last but in this there is one issue, Darth: if the carthaginians attacked with 4 stacks at one time, I would get routed. i managed to kill almost 9 000 Carthaginians, because they kept attacking one after one.

[DARTH VADER]

I will lower their morale a bit (So they can get afraid more easily) and their charge to decrease super tossing in light troops

[Pietrak]

That's a good idea, Darth. maybe now they will sometimes run amok and stomp Carthagininas into the ground

[Bardo]

Missile units with "thrown" attribute have an incredible high bonus versus elephants, better than "armour piercing".
This is something I recently discovered, so it's possible many people don't know.
I thought that velites were better vs elephants because of "mount bonus" (archers have mount penalties vs elephants). But "mount effect" doesn't seem to affect missile fire, what makes the difference is the "thrown" attribute.
This way, all missile units with "thrown" (javelin animation while firing) are good to kill elephants, and better if they have "armour piecing".

[DARTH VADER]

It is not the thrown but the blade attribute....give archers blade than simple and you will see them killing everything

[Bardo]

"Thrown" has a big effect for sure, we tested it for LOTR-TW where all monsters are elephant based.
But it's good to know this blade/simple effect, I didn't know that these attributes were important.

EDIT: I have seen EDU and it seems that LOTR-TW mod manager also knew this blade/simple effect.

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[DARTH VADER]

Oh yes..very important. Watch my files how I use them to get ideas.

[FEARLESS]

Hi Darth when will there be a small patch for the elephant issue as it is spoiling my game with the selucids. Just try to make a stand with roughly 2000 heavy phalanx against 10 elephants. Total waste of time. The phalanxs' were decimated not even a hint of panic by the elephants against all those spears. Basically if you aint got peltast your F--ked. I used to enjoy elepants panicing and charging back into their own lines but we appear to have lost that. I have had several large battles with selucid heavy elephants and I now know the outcome before the battle starts. Even if the peltast take down half they just keep coming and once the throwing spears are exhausted it's the same old problem. Playing Darth Mod 7.0.3. Give me back my chances of victory.