Jeffrey_Mckill
Regular
A few patches ago they gave most t2 and 3 troops shields to try and counter act archers being overpowered. They also changed formations so that shield units would stand at the front and take all the arrows. On paper this makes sense and isn't a problem, but it brings to light a much larger issue that imo has ruined the game.
The problem i have found is now that you can't take on a 1000 vs 1000 and win only losing <10 men it has made the game incredible grindy. In the old days all you had to do was set up 200 fian champions on a ledge and they would literally mow down 500 men without losing a single man. This may sound overpowered, and it is, but this pretty much meant that once you got your army set up for the first time you pretty much didn't have to grind for troops again. When you go back all you would have to do is find an army and wait for them to wipe to an enemy army then beat them and take all the troops of the friendly army and you would come back with more troops then you left with. This is clearly overpowered by imo it made for a better experience than what we have now.
So people asked for archer nerfs and they got them. How did this effect the meta? Your archer can no longer mow down 500 infantry units because everyone and their mother has a shield and everyone else is standing behind them. So to fight this because your archers wont be able to you have to fall back on your infantry to do it. The only problem with this is no matter how good your infantry are if they go into melee combat vs a sizeable group of infantry they are going to take loses. Even with horse archers on their side and fians behind them while in a ball or in a charge they take downs. in fights where in my group numbered over 700 and fighting an enemy of 1000 i found that almost all dead were infantry. My response to this was my current strategy, don't run any infantry. I found that by running no infantry and by running two large parties of heavy cav units i could have them take turns running over the enemy while the horse archers and normal archers shot them. This strategy works pretty well and i can get out of most fights (even vs khuzaits) losing less than 20 men. However this is still a long way from the less than 5 of the past.
This is where the problem comes in. While 20 man perma dead i don't consider a bad number, it is still far too many. I would also add that because 90% of units are no longer viable because i can't lean on the fians to kill 90% of the enemy, mt recruitment pool has shrunk dramatically. This means that notable recruits provide very little usable troops and even when i beat an army with 500 prisoners and take them, very few of them are actually viable troops. Herein is the problem I believe this game now has. If in every battle i'm going to lose around 20 men, i have to replace those men and because their is now a lot less room for suboptimal troops it narrows the recruitment pool even more. All these things makes the game several time more grindy than it previously was which i have found to be horribly unfun.
This solutions in game i can think of to this problem are running with a bunch of low tier troops and losing 200 men per fight and just going to a village and picking up everyone they have to replaces them. I hate this idea because it devalues building up a good army and largely throws tactics to the wind. I think running like that would make combat extremely boring. The other solution i can think of is similar. Instead of being mostly low tier troops you would have to use the ultimate leader perk to run extra parties in addition to your normal composition. This would essential be the equivalent of the German prison units that would charge the enemy while the good troops stand behind and mow everyone down. I think this is a potentially great idea because it would do the grind of getting new t5s for you and greatly limit the number of t5 troops you have dying. Not only this but it would swell your ranks meaning that you would almost always have more troops than the enemy on the battlefield because the game only allows for 1000 man battles. In other words this would make it so the enemy cant get very many of their troops on the field at one time which would be a big advantage. However there is one big problem. According to bandlord perks, ultimate leader only works if you are not in a kingdom. This is a big draw back but I think it might be worth it. You would lose access to being able to make war and peace at anytime to stop sieges or get yourself out of bad situations as well as not being able to have any policies or vassals but it might be worth it just to get rid of the grind. I am in my own kingdom and it won't let me leave so I been unable to test this one out but I think it is my best bet.
This is all I have been able to come up with. If anyone has a battle strategy and some way to lessen the grind please tell me because grinding village notables is a truly unfun experience. My criteria for a viable strategy would be being able to beat a sizeable army while losing less than 10 t5 troops. If anyone has anything do let me know.
The problem i have found is now that you can't take on a 1000 vs 1000 and win only losing <10 men it has made the game incredible grindy. In the old days all you had to do was set up 200 fian champions on a ledge and they would literally mow down 500 men without losing a single man. This may sound overpowered, and it is, but this pretty much meant that once you got your army set up for the first time you pretty much didn't have to grind for troops again. When you go back all you would have to do is find an army and wait for them to wipe to an enemy army then beat them and take all the troops of the friendly army and you would come back with more troops then you left with. This is clearly overpowered by imo it made for a better experience than what we have now.
So people asked for archer nerfs and they got them. How did this effect the meta? Your archer can no longer mow down 500 infantry units because everyone and their mother has a shield and everyone else is standing behind them. So to fight this because your archers wont be able to you have to fall back on your infantry to do it. The only problem with this is no matter how good your infantry are if they go into melee combat vs a sizeable group of infantry they are going to take loses. Even with horse archers on their side and fians behind them while in a ball or in a charge they take downs. in fights where in my group numbered over 700 and fighting an enemy of 1000 i found that almost all dead were infantry. My response to this was my current strategy, don't run any infantry. I found that by running no infantry and by running two large parties of heavy cav units i could have them take turns running over the enemy while the horse archers and normal archers shot them. This strategy works pretty well and i can get out of most fights (even vs khuzaits) losing less than 20 men. However this is still a long way from the less than 5 of the past.
This is where the problem comes in. While 20 man perma dead i don't consider a bad number, it is still far too many. I would also add that because 90% of units are no longer viable because i can't lean on the fians to kill 90% of the enemy, mt recruitment pool has shrunk dramatically. This means that notable recruits provide very little usable troops and even when i beat an army with 500 prisoners and take them, very few of them are actually viable troops. Herein is the problem I believe this game now has. If in every battle i'm going to lose around 20 men, i have to replace those men and because their is now a lot less room for suboptimal troops it narrows the recruitment pool even more. All these things makes the game several time more grindy than it previously was which i have found to be horribly unfun.
This solutions in game i can think of to this problem are running with a bunch of low tier troops and losing 200 men per fight and just going to a village and picking up everyone they have to replaces them. I hate this idea because it devalues building up a good army and largely throws tactics to the wind. I think running like that would make combat extremely boring. The other solution i can think of is similar. Instead of being mostly low tier troops you would have to use the ultimate leader perk to run extra parties in addition to your normal composition. This would essential be the equivalent of the German prison units that would charge the enemy while the good troops stand behind and mow everyone down. I think this is a potentially great idea because it would do the grind of getting new t5s for you and greatly limit the number of t5 troops you have dying. Not only this but it would swell your ranks meaning that you would almost always have more troops than the enemy on the battlefield because the game only allows for 1000 man battles. In other words this would make it so the enemy cant get very many of their troops on the field at one time which would be a big advantage. However there is one big problem. According to bandlord perks, ultimate leader only works if you are not in a kingdom. This is a big draw back but I think it might be worth it. You would lose access to being able to make war and peace at anytime to stop sieges or get yourself out of bad situations as well as not being able to have any policies or vassals but it might be worth it just to get rid of the grind. I am in my own kingdom and it won't let me leave so I been unable to test this one out but I think it is my best bet.
This is all I have been able to come up with. If anyone has a battle strategy and some way to lessen the grind please tell me because grinding village notables is a truly unfun experience. My criteria for a viable strategy would be being able to beat a sizeable army while losing less than 10 t5 troops. If anyone has anything do let me know.
