Warriors of chaos

[diadok]

First, i am not a fan of chaos faction. I never play them and all what i want is to destroy them.
But... is there something i missed ? i really don't understand why warriors of chaos (all type of warriors of chaos) are so ridiculiously weak ? there is no glory to kill them.
--> theirs stats = 8 or 9 in attack when a basic soldier get 6 or 7. In defense they get 4.

In warhammer battle they get CC5 F4 E4 I5 ATT2. This should be represented in COW by much more better stats. And they also should get smaller units, 80 soldiers for example (instead of 125).

In my opinion, 12 in ATT and 8 in DEF (+10 armour and 6 shield) should be considered as a minimum for basic warriors of chaos

[Ichon]

Something like that would probably be good idea. High stamina, and more attack than Empire with only slightly lower armor due to 'natural' armor.

[Iguanaonastick]

Chosen Chaos warriors would actually have better armour than Empire soldiers, because theirs is magical Chaos Armour. (In the tabletop rules it's as good as Empire full plate with a few minor advantages, IIRC. Wizards can use it for example.)

Rank and file chaos warriors still have better armour than all but the elite Empire soldiers. (Greatswords and Knights. State regiments in the tabletop game only get light armour.)

[Ichon]

Chosen Chaos warriors would actually have better armour than Empire soldiers, because theirs is magical Chaos Armour. (In the tabletop rules it's as good as Empire full plate with a few minor advantages, IIRC. Wizards can use it for example.)

Rank and file chaos warriors still have better armour than all but the elite Empire soldiers. (Greatswords and Knights. State regiments in the tabletop game only get light armour.)

Regular Chaos warriors with no armor is the ones I meant. The average Chaos should have higher armor. Although I think empire gunpowder should be stronger a bit so play a more important role fighting the better armored chaos warriors.

[Zing]

Well, imperial soldiers are pretty powerful. Dont forget that after you develop your buildings, you would be able to recruit an average swordsmen with +3 to armor and +7 to experience. I dont think any Chaos faction can do that.
Of course in the mod you will need every bit of that advantage, because script throws 10+ stacks at you.

[Reiksfart]

This is one of the many reasons I developed my fantasy battle system over the last 2-3 months, which balances the game based on tabletop rules and stats.

Empire is far too powerful in every official version of CoW, to the point where they no longer need to fully rely upon combined arms to win, which is wrong and not how the Empire are supposed to be.

[Zing]

Although I think empire gunpowder should be stronger a bit so play a more important role fighting the better armored chaos warriors.

That too. Right now, there is almost no difference in casualties between handgunners and crossbowmen. However, crossbowmen are much easier to use - they can fire from deep ranks and dont have to spread out for maximum punch, they can fire from behind their troops, they have skirmish mode. There is no need to use regular handgunners except for roleplay purposes.

[Mr.InTeLeX]

There is no need to use regular handgunners except for roleplay purposes.

Didn't gunpowder based weapons supposed to scare off certain units?

I usually assign 1-2 units of handgunners in my fields army just to scare off the enemies, while using crossbowmen and/or archers for main range damage besides mortar and rocket.

[Iguanaonastick]

Regular chaos warriors with no armour? All chaos warriors wear very heavy armour, graphically and lore-wise.

Do you perhaps mean the Marauders? Those are unarmoured, and indeed shouldn't be better than Empire state troops. They should have a bit higher attack but less equipment and defence, plus less discipline. Still, as they are currently they do tend towards uselessness. (Come to think of it I only now realise that the original poster probably meant marauders too. Oh well.)

As for crossbowmen, in my opinion their main advantage is their longer range. But then I don't use crossbowmen to fire indirectly from behind my lines, it doesn't make sense to me that they could. Plus I want missile troops in -front- of my lines, so they'll foul the enemy's charges at my halberdiers. Chosen chaos knights charging a bunch of retreating handgunners or crossbows will inflict moderate damage on an expendable target, and will leave my infantry in good shape to go on and win the battle. (Join the army Crossbow Corps, they said. See the world, they said.)

[Reiksfart]

Do you perhaps mean the Marauders? Those are unarmoured, and indeed shouldn't be better than Empire state troops.

Not sure if it has changed for 8th edition, but in 7th a marauder unit equipped with light armour, shield and hand weapon is exactly the same as an empire swordsman unit. Exactly the same stats, armour save etc, the only difference being marauders cost 1 more point each. Great weapon equipped marauders should beat any of the infantry state troops 1 on 1, bar greatswords.

Empire are just overpowered in CoW.

[diadok]

Yes, empire is overpowered and there are too many scripted invading fullstacks (of orks and chaos). I prefer fighting less stronger stacks.

[IrishBlood]

i think Holy Pilgrams Real warhammer mod fix's all that?

[Reiksfart]

i think Holy Pilgrams Real warhammer mod fix's all that?

I don't know. Real combat has so many different specs, there is going to be many differences between troops which should perform similarly. A fantasy battler like me (ex-not played it for 15 years) would not agree with the balance, since real combat coding is down to the coders opinion and preferences.

My submod (click on right side sig) is using my Fantasy Battle ruleset, developed over several months which is as close to tabletop as I've seen. Using full stats, special rules etc from Warhammer Fantasy Battle converted to the Med2 engine. See for yourself when I release it. Still more models to make and the campaign to work on.

[Iguanaonastick]

Empire infantry is definitely overpowered, though I'd argue that in the tabletop game the marauders are slightly less effective than state troops because they come on larger bases and don't get detachments. (This is simulated in the mod by the Empire getting tighter formation and abilities like shield-wall, since you can't really implement the detachment rule.)

On the other hand, I'd argue that halberdiers are underpowered in the tabletop game. There's a reason that armies in the historical period the Empire is based on armed almost all their infantry with a polearm of some kind. This is true in the lore too: halberdiers are supposedly the most numerous and important state-troops fielded by the Empire. You wouldn't know it from looking at the armies people use though.

Edit: My final point may be out-dated. It was true in 6th and 7th edition, but 8th edition has switched the balance in favour of halberdiers somewhat, making them comparable in effectiveness to swordsmen. That's something of a tangent though.

[diadok]

Do you work on the stabilized version of Gigantus ?

[Reiksfart]

I have an EDU mostly complete for 1.44, but that was just for development and testing purposes. I was using Gigantus version.

My submod is for 1.5 and I would hope by the time I'm ready to release we will have a stable mod with an English translation.


Back on topic; If I remember right, knights of chaos are also too weak compared to how they should be in original CoW. Empire Knights should no way be able to go toe to toe/hoof to hoof with them (for long), they are outmatched, even with their plate vs heavy armour. Give Chaos knights the lances they should be using (I intend to) and it's even more of a one sided battle.

[Iguanaonastick]

The ones in the mod are probably based on the 6th/7th edition chaos knights that had strength 5 but no lances.

[Reiksfart]

I'm corrected once again, they have no lance option. I'm using 7th edition books for my mod, I don't know what made me think they had a lance upgrade option. Possibly all the pics of chaos knights I've seen using lances. Must be another edition.

Anyway, in my search through all my army book pdf's for chaos to find a lance option I realized I was missing one book; Warriors of Chaos. I had been using Hordes of Chaos which covers all the non-beastmen mortal followers, but downloaded WoC to take a look. I prefer the rules for warriors, knights and chosen in WoC, they're even more beastly. Chaos armour for regular warriors and knights, magic weapons for knights, while chosen are foot only but have an incredible WS6. I coded warriors, warrior halberds and knights then played a quick battle against them using Reikland. All I can say is combined arms will be even more important than ever for Empire. Really tough battles ahead.

[Iguanaonastick]

In the warhammer tabletop game units like that are balanced by their point-cost. Chaos armies are notoriously tiny unless they consist of marauders.

In this game however, everybody has full stacks regardless of upkeep. If chaos warriors are very expensive in gold a player might have fewer full stacks, but those he does probably will still include a lot of chaos warriors which might make battles overly easy.

How do you intend to balance this? My first thought would be unit-size. If chaos warriors are amazingly strong but come in units of 25-30 instead of 50 (normal unit size) you'd get the correct feel from the lore (marauder hordes led by a core of elite Chaos warriors) and the tabletop game where Chaos Warriors tend to be fielded in units of no more than 15 while Empire state troops typically come in blocks of 25-30.

[Reiksfart]

I have a points cost system which determines unit sizes:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

I'm using huge unit sizes for those who prefer larger battles, like me. For anyone who prefers smaller they can change the in game settings down to large, normal or small. Much easier than the other way around as most mods do; smaller in EDU and force everyone who want larger to code it in themselves.

As with everything in the entire system, I switch and change parts to find the right balance, and that would include points value vs unit size. Currently warriors of chaos are at 190 troops and chosen foot at 150, which may be too high for balance sake, but I've yet to play a campaign. Too many small units can be easily overwhelmed in med2, so there's a fine line between sticking to lore/tabletop and gameplay. It won't be rushed out though, if it feels or plays wrong or is too hard changes can be made.

I also have a system to determine unit build times and refresh times based on the units points costs, whether they are core, special or rare and I've also included exceptions for some factions and troops. Orcs & goblins having a minus 1 refresh and build time, all undead have a build time of 1, dwarves, high elves and dark elves add 1 refresh time across the board, plus their better units have even further recruitment penalties. Wooden artillery also has a minus build time, while experimental empire artillery increases.

It's a full system covering everything, which will need testing and refining once I have a playable campaign.

What I'm trying to achieve is a balanced but very challenging battle on the battle map, with a balanced auto resolve for the AI vs AI, while also limiting special and rare units in a way other than giving them far smaller units.