What's the purpose of Champions?

[Kjertesvein]

Hi guys. First of all love the changes to governors. I have some thoughts on the champions.

So Governors have loads of utility that goes into how a city functions while the Spy does a great job scouting and killing important people. But when I think of Champions I don't see what I'm suppose to do.

• First of all Exp isn't a very strong stat, because you loose exp once you have to replenish your units. It also takes a long time to build up. It would be more productive to invest into revive Axel Roses' music career.
• The active agent stance is really weak -> Reducing province happiness doesn't really have a strong effect.
• Which means you are reduced to take risks during agent missions. To rely on active missions to kill spies or manipulate is bad. In the short run you run out of money, and in the long run he will be out of the game. His skill upgrades are really weird in my opinion, what are you suppose to upgrade?

Spy:

• I love spies, because they provide the same army movement speed as champions. (6%, 12%, 18%).
• Strong Cunnig abilities as assassin or reducing enemy army (poison).
• Doesn't have to go on agent mission to be effective, you can just scout, which you don't waste early gold and is in the game all the time.

Governors:

• Very strong at evading enemy agents.
• Best army support with replenishment, upkeep reduction, culture conversion, and loads of public order buffs (4x 2 PO, 4 PO, 6 PO).
• Amplifies specialized provinces: food, trade&industry, culture or standard tax rate.
• Good global stats with empire maintenance, trade and research.

Here are the stats for agents.

My 2 cents. Prove me wrong or perhaps suggest how you would love to see champions changed.

~Wi

[Ivan_Moscavich]

The experience gain from champions is more in effect to mitigate the loss from replenishment, not to train your troops into super men over the course of ten turns like it used to. It was changed to be like that on purpose, and I don't see the problem with actually having to commit your troops to combat to get them more experienced.
I mean, it is a wargame after all.

As for experience not being a huge stat? The difference between three bronze and one silver chevron in most cases I've seen is several points of a stat. That's the difference between hard and very hard difficulty levels as far as AI stat buffs are concerned.
Experience also raises morale significantly, letting units stay in the fight longer. It's a pretty big deal, I'm not sure where you're getting that it's not.

Other than that, their main utility is to enhance the movement range of your armies. Spies do it as well, but your spies should be exploring and using poison on enemy armies and cities, not stuck in armies.

In essence, champions are the best to put in armies BECAUSE the other agents are better used outside of armies.

Also, Governors were specifically made resistant to evading enemy agents because of their focus towards province management. And the army support skills are getting nerfed hard to ensure they're being used as provincial managers rather than ways to reduce army upkeep.

[hruher]

The experience gain from champions is more in effect to mitigate the loss from replenishment, not to train your troops into super men over the course of ten turns like it used to. It was changed to be like that on purpose, and I don't see the problem with actually having to commit your troops to combat to get them more experienced.
I mean, it is a wargame after all.

As for experience not being a huge stat? The difference between three bronze and one silver chevron in most cases I've seen is several points of a stat. That's the difference between hard and very hard difficulty levels as far as AI stat buffs are concerned.
Experience also raises morale significantly, letting units stay in the fight longer. It's a pretty big deal, I'm not sure where you're getting that it's not.

Other than that, their main utility is to enhance the movement range of your armies. Spies do it as well, but your spies should be exploring and using poison on enemy armies and cities, not stuck in armies.

In essence, champions are the best to put in armies BECAUSE the other agents are better used outside of armies.

Also, Governors were specifically made resistant to evading enemy agents because of their focus towards province management. And the army support skills are getting nerfed hard to ensure they're being used as provincial managers rather than ways to reduce army upkeep.

+1

[KAM 2150]

I actually think that unit experience and champions have TOO big impact of balance and making this game walk in a park.

[Augustusng]

I actually think that unit experience and champions have TOO big impact of balance and making this game walk in a park.

Yep, I agree with Kam. By the late game, it's hard not to have veteran armies that steamroll anything the AI can muster (especially with a champion/general giving them more XP).

[Ivan_Moscavich]

I actually think that unit experience and champions have TOO big impact of balance and making this game walk in a park.

I know you guys turned it down once before.

Perhaps change it even lower?

[zonks40]

I actually think that unit experience and champions have TOO big impact of balance and making this game walk in a park.

I agree, my head to head opponent and I have a house rule, no champions training armies, no buildings that give chevrons on recruitment, we want it so that the units gain experience only from combat, and when you see one of your units with a single silver chevron, you know that it has seen plenty of action.
One thing that destroys this is the fact that a unit can see action in many battles and gain a silver chevron, then a new unit becomes available, straight from training with no experience in combat at all, and they are superior to the veterans.

The AI is just not smart enough to take advantage of all the bonuses that can be heaped on units, so it only makes it easier for the player, which in turn eventually induces boredom.

[Ritterlichvon86]

I actually think that unit experience and champions have TOO big impact of balance and making this game walk in a park.

I share this sentiment.

Unit experience should only be gained through battle, and never by simple sitting around with continuos training - which is already part of recruiting a unit anyway. The unit has reached its maximum potential at the sandsacks, and can now only progress further by actually entering the ring.

[Ivan_Moscavich]

Is it possible to apply a global -exp to every unit per turn? The problem as I see it is that as players we rarely lose an entire army so we end up with armies of 3 gold chevron units by endgame, even if that army has been sitting in a peaceful province for the last 50 years.

Global xp decay would go a long long way towards balancing late game player armies and be fairly realistic since a unit that is out of combat and experiencing soldier turnover should slowly lose its combat experience. Also then the champion exists more to let you pick an army that treadswater in terms of XP rather than lets you pick an idle army you want to turn into supermen.

Having experienced troops cause a public order penalty is non-sensical.

I share this sentiment.

Unit experience should only be gained through battle, and never by simple sitting around with continuos training - which is already part of recruiting a unit anyway. The unit has reached its maximum potential at the sandsacks, and can now only progress further by actually entering the ring.

I actually disagree with you (for once?). The exp bonus from champions does a wonderful job in mitigating exp loss from replenishment.

I view them sort of like the NCOs of modern armies. They help get the new troops adjusted into a unit, as well as providing a solid and reliable experienced veteran that the new troops can learn some things about the unit and warfare from that they might not learn during camp training.

I think it should be reduced some, but definitely not eliminated.

[Creslin49]

Having experienced troops cause a public order penalty is non-sensical.



I actually disagree with you (for once?). The exp bonus from champions does a wonderful job in mitigating exp loss from replenishment.

I view them sort of like the NCOs of modern armies. They help get the new troops adjusted into a unit, as well as providing a solid and reliable experienced veteran that the new troops can learn some things about the unit and warfare from that they might not learn during camp training.

I think it should be reduced some, but definitely not eliminated.

I wasn't saying have them give a public order penalty, I was saying that all troops should have experience decay so over time it drops by say -20 per turn, which would mitigate the benefits of champions somewhat and simulate the fact that your army sitting in sicily with 3 gold chevrons but no training (from a champ) or combat experience isn't still going to be a veteran unit after 30 years of turn over.

[Ivan_Moscavich]

I wasn't saying have them give a public order penalty, I was saying that all troops should have experience decay so over time it drops by say -20 per turn, which would mitigate the benefits of champions somewhat and simulate the fact that your army sitting in sicily with 3 gold chevrons but no training (from a champ) or combat experience isn't still going to be a veteran unit after 30 years of turn over.

That seems unnecessary. Why would you leave your most elite troops doing nothing in a province far from combat in the first place?

There's a pretty decent rate of sapping experience from replenishment as is.

I've had one full legion with the exact same troops (sans one replacement when a unit of hastate died on the walls during a siege), and the max they are at is three silver chevrons after 114 turns.

Of course I am playing on 12 turns per year, so a lot of 4 turn periods yielded little combat due to winter movement reduction, but that is still a substantial amount of time in the field.

Each unit is averaging several hundred kills per battle as well, so there is no shortage of performance.

I even have a champion with max level training, and a training passive buff from the champion recruitment, as well as the training exp buff from the general.

Again, they are still only at a max of three silver chevrons after 114 turns of continuous existence.


For 12 turns per year at least, the current numbers are actually pretty much perfect I'd say.

[Kjertesvein]

I didn't get much of a response to how to use Champions other than sitting passively in an army to produce exp.

I actually think that unit experience and champions have TOO big impact of balance and making this game walk in a park.

Has it crossed the teams mind to overhaul the Champions much the same way a dignitary deal with a city? Allow the Champion to specialize into different Army Traditions? I think it would allow for more counter play, choices and interactivity. As DarrenTotalWar said on today's stream "I never use my Champions for these missions. He get's wounded and I have to send him half way across the map. "

~Wille

[Hoplitus]

Yep indeed exp has a great impact. And as AI is often to incompetent to preserve its troops, high exp units on the player side can cause imbalance.

But to aswer your question: I not only use them to train troops in my vanguard legions but also to stabilize PO in freshly conquered provinces. While the army goes into patrol mode after the territory is cleared of enemies, the champion can leave the army and use military favour (or whatever the passive ability is called) to increase PO too.
The increased movement-range also has been mentioned here. +18% is the max and thats huge I think.
Also champions are the best characters to use on enemy's spies/champions/govenors (to make them defect or assasinate them).

In my opinion they are very strong characters because of their versatility!

[Kjertesvein]

So how do you guys upgrade these champions? What is the standard path? What is not so good?

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/...=sharing#gid=3

I no longer use Champions in armies, but I used to do it like this: Champion (Zeal) -> Warfare (subvert army/town) ->Militancy (exp) and max that. Then I would take several Authority points to give my General free abilites in battle to the point he had about 12 Authority. It was really helpful to be able to use late game abilities during the mid game. If I had something left I would put it into movement speed.

~Wille

[Augustusng]

So how do you guys upgrade these champions? What is the standard path? What is not so good?

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/...=sharing#gid=3

~Wille

The zeal traits, specifically Champion, Warfare, then Militancy are the best for a champion attached to an army - especially since the champion adds his own zeal to the general's. Additionally, when you recruit the champion, look for a useful background trait.

If you're not using the champion with an army, any of the options are probably good, depending on what you need. Maybe the authority and cunning traits if you want to disrupt an enemy province.

[Kjertesvein]

The zeal traits, specifically Champion, Warfare, then Militancy are the best for a champion attached to an army - especially since the champion adds his own zeal to the general's. Additionally, when you recruit the champion, look for a useful background trait.

If you're not using the champion with an army, any of the options are probably good, depending on what you need. Maybe the authority and cunning traits if you want to disrupt an enemy province.

Thanks for the tip. I sometimes forget how powerful those upgraded backround traits can be. ^^

I have no idea which of the disrupt upgrades to choose. Some of them seem to do the same thing, but different upgrades. :S I'm really confused about that.

~Wille

[RollingWave]

Also, champion's stance in your OWN territory is very helpful (increasing public order, can easily go up beyond +10)

[loony]

Yep, champions are useful for training: playing as sparta, see my standard army here: http://cloud-4.steamusercontent.com/...2693EC72BB030/
It had a champion since i could recruit my first one.

The AI disregards all that and therefore autoresolve are so misleading. Another similar army, of a bit lower quality than the previous had a large battle (siege + reinforcing stack), the AI sallied, here is the result: http://cloud-4.steamusercontent.com/...8963B732C5C5C/

Exp and weapon upgrades are huge. I am almost sorry i used them.... I play on VH/H to mitigate my advantages somewhat though

[geala]

I also think that champions are strong but not too strong in my opinion. I often face AI stacks with silver chevron units idling around, so I don't have problems with training my own units. Perhaps there could be only a few champions with unit training abilities? The thought that only actual warfare should give experience is not very convincing to me. In reality training was (and is) very important for soldiers and the experience in game not only rises capabilities that could only be formed in actual fights.

[MA1984]

Hi,
Where in file can I change experience loss from replenishment?