[Submod] Alternative Battles

[Tribal]

Hey so last time I tried this all units just had 2hp and it made ranged units and javelins absolute useless as units could just tank volleys and not take any losses. Has anything change since then or is it still they same?

[Aper]

Hey so last time I tried this all units just had 2hp and it made ranged units and javelins absolute useless as units could just tank volleys and not take any losses. Has anything change since then or is it still they same?

LOL what? the role of ranged units in this mod is precisely to take away that additional HP and make enemies easier to kill in the ensuing melee. The fact that in this mod the ranged weapons' hit rate is significantly raised in the battle_config.xml file means that even weaker ranged weapons like the infamously useless 7 attack javelin now is actually relevant. In vanilla EBII weaker ranged weapons are a total waste of time and money, except if you do like Quintus always say that is to hit enemies in the back. That is like admitting that they are useless, because everything is effective if you hit the enemy in the back, sorry but this is the sad truth, no offense, just facts.

[QuintusSertorius]

LOL what? the role of ranged units in this mod is precisely to take away that additional HP and make enemies easier to kill in the ensuing melee. The fact that in this mod the ranged weapons' hit rate is significantly raised in the battle_config.xml file means that even weaker ranged weapons like the infamously useless 7 attack javelin now is actually relevant. In vanilla EBII weaker ranged weapons are a total waste of time and money, except if you do like Quintus always say that is to hit enemies in the back. That is like admitting that they are useless, because everything is effective if you hit the enemy in the back, sorry but this is the sad truth, no offense, just facts.

Missiles are most effective when they're not fired into the shields of men who can see them coming. See the battle of Carrhae, where the swarms of arrows fired on the Roman legionaries were not very threatening, rather they forced them to stay on station, in the hot sun, for many hours. Making them too weak to resist the subsequent cavalry action when they tried to flee for cover.

[Aper]

Missiles are most effective when they're not fired into the shields of men who can see them coming. See the battle of Carrhae, where the swarms of arrows fired on the Roman legionaries were not very threatening, rather they forced them to stay on station, in the hot sun, for many hours. Making them too weak to resist the subsequent cavalry action when they tried to flee for cover.

I was thinking of javelins mainly, and particularly about "prec" units that are given 7 attack javelins, which are useful only against very lightly defended skirmishers, and useless as a pre-charge "softener" against comparable units. Even 12 attack longche are often underwhelming. Please, don't come again with the old "you should just flank" answer, we all know that wasn't very common historically, especially from "prec" line infantry. Even when flanking movements occurred, they were performed usually by a very small part of the total force, so if we follow your reasoning 90% of the men carried around a useless weapon "just because", with only the tiny flanking force expecting to use it effectively. Not very likely IMO.

All that while the akontistai rabble, which cost nothing and AFAIK should be just a nuisance to line infantry unless they ambush them, carry deadly 16 attack javelins, third best after the terrifying soliferrum and pilum. In my view, it seems a clear design mistake (again, no offense).

Honestly I don't even understand your denial of a problem that is very easy to fix. Just raise the attack values of line infantry javelins when necessary, so that they can perform their role of shock weapons properly, as I did in my EDU. Not that they should cause massive casualties like the aforementioned metallic javeins, but at least they should have some impact.

Sure, probably both this problem and the ineffective infantry charges could be mitigated if you raised a bit hit values in battle_config, but I see it could badly mess the whole balance of the system.

[QuintusSertorius]

The "shock" value was a Roman (and Iberian) thing, not universal. I had a chat with Ibrahim about it, and his view was:

Well, the gap is easily explained if you remember that we have two different ways of launching the projectile: one with the Ankyle, and one without. Naturally the ones with the ankyle have a higher attack. If he wants the attack to go up, he needs to demonstrate the universal usage of this particular device, with even non-skirmishers. As it is, most sources I'm aware of say they didn't. Here's one such:

https://romanarmy.info/charge1_eleme..._elements.html

I also recommend the work by Mike Bishop on the Pilum.

Obviously these are pilum-related, but the issues present for the pilum were doubtless present for regular javelins.

The pilum and soliferrum get around this by having heavier missiles. Most of the armies here don't have either. And anyway, the role of the jevelin in the hand sof heavy infantry is pretty much to disrupt and suppress the enemy; the decision was invariably by way of the charge.

https://romanarmy.info/fighting1/fighting1.html

Akontistai and other skirmishers don't have this issue, as their equipment and tactical role preclude them engaging in melee: they're meant to chuck javelins at a distance, and can use all means to do so.

Put bluntly: no, there was no mistake, there is none, and there won't be any.

There's not much evidence the ankyle was used by non-skirmishers, or that javelins were used for anything besides disruption. Units like the Thureophoroi were flankers.

[Aper]

The "shock" value was a Roman (and Iberian) thing, not universal. I had a chat with Ibrahim about it, and his view was:



There's not much evidence the ankyle was used by non-skirmishers, or that javelins were used for anything besides disruption. Units like the Thureophoroi were flankers.

"Disruption" doesn't translate into anything in gameplay terms, except maybe "create some gaps in the enemy line" = "kill some enemies" = raise the damn attack or hit rate values.
Ankyle or not, I don't think skirmisher javelins should be almost at pilum level of power, and, for example, batoroi javelins be totally useless except when thrown in the back. This doesn't seem to be in accord with history or realism and it's just bad gameplay IMHO. Anyway it's your mod, if you are fine with that, I will not complain any further. Ceterum censeo, thanks for the mod.

[QuintusSertorius]

"Disruption" doesn't translate into anything in gameplay terms, except maybe "create some gaps in the enemy line" = "kill some enemies" = raise the damn attack or hit rate values.
Ankyle or not, I don't think skirmisher javelins should be almost at pilum level of power, and, for example, batoroi javelins be totally useless except when thrown in the back. This doesn't seem to be in accord with history or realism and it's just bad gameplay IMHO. Anyway it's your mod, if you are fine with that, I will not complain any further. Ceterum censeo, thanks for the mod.

Skirmisher javelins are not at "pilum level of power", the attack rating in the EDU is not the only property that matters for missiles. There are also values in the descr_projectiles which have a host of other impacts besides, which means those javelins are nowhere near as effect as pila.

[Aper]

Skirmisher javelins are not at "pilum level of power", the attack rating in the EDU is not the only property that matters for missiles. There are also values in the descr_projectiles which have a host of other impacts besides, which means those javelins are nowhere near as effect as pila.

I didn't look at your descr_projectile file yet, but now I see a couple of very unusual things:
1) Why heavier javelins have lower mass values than lighter javelins? In other mods is obviously the opposite for apparently good reasons.
2) Why the soliferreum and the pilum have the damage_to_troops attribute, usually exclusive to siege weapons, again for apparently obvious reasons?

And there's a couple of questions I'd like to ask on the matter, since I'm already bothering you . Do "radius" and "velocity" parameters affect battle performance in your experience, or are they purely cosmetic? Thank you.

[QuintusSertorius]

I didn't look at your descr_projectile file yet, but now I see a couple of very unusual things:
1) Why heavier javelins have lower mass values than lighter javelins? In other mods is obviously the opposite for apparently good reasons.
2) Why the soliferreum and the pilum have the damage_to_troops attribute, usually exclusive to siege weapons, again for apparently obvious reasons?

And there's a couple of questions I'd like to ask on the matter, since I'm already bothering you . Do "radius" and "velocity" parameters affect battle performance in your experience, or are they purely cosmetic? Thank you.

From the expert:

1-because the higher the mass, the less deadly the projectile
2-because to use damage would mean it also affects buildings? I recall some experiments on the subject as well, when the idea came for testing the concept of fire-javelins (Trarco mentioned the idea).

yes, radius and velocity matter; the former because the wider projectiles strike more men across the line, and the latter because in combination with the accuracy (in the same file) and accuracy in that xml file affect how many missiles actually hit people.

If you want a dramatic example, set a unit to an attack of 30, range 200, accuracy (in descr_projectile) of 0.32. Once done, compare the effect when the velocity is 85 meters, to that when it's 185 meters.

Essentially, mass is inverse in the descr_projectiles, one of those vagaries of the game.

And the elements of that file (which define the properties of a projectile) matter more than the number in the EDU alone.

[Aper]

Thanks for the guide, very interesting stuff. What I find odd is that I remember Point Blank claimed that higher projectile mass aid in armor penetration, and never said anything about the lower lethality. Some time ago in his Real combat mod he ditched the ap attribute for ranged weapons, raised projectile mass according to projectile quality, and apparently he saw no drawbacks . Maybe the lower casualties are less apparent because in his mod hit rates are higher? It's all so damn complicated.

About point 2, so damage to troops is a leftover from the time when you were testing if fire-javelins could affect buildings, but now it has no effect? I quote from the guide you linked:

"I wonder what the "damage" attribute does and more importantly "damage_to_troops". I tried giving arrows "damage_to_troops 100", but it doesn't seem to increase the casaulties. In fact I have an impression that my archers did worse.

"Damage" is even weirder. It gives damage against buildings, but it decreases damage against troops.

Just why did CA make such a complicated and strange file.


Please if anyone knows, post what you know - especially about these two attributes."

"Thank you

To make things simple, you don,t have to bother with those attributes unless you plan to do siege weapon's projectiles in which case those ones are very important. If you want to play with ranged unit projectile (archer, crossbowmen notably), just ignore these lines and tweak the values in the Export_Descr_Unit."