Five troops whose equipment I look at and just ask "why?"

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anoddhermit

anoddhermit

Squire
Old Guard
Been trying to change my army compositions up a bit for variation and these are some troops that are either frustratingly bad, or frustratingly missing things that would make them a consideration over some of the more "obvious" troop picks. They seem like wasted opportunities.

Imperial Palatine Guard: 1 Quiver on a T5 archer that has an empty slot. ??? I will never upgrade into this over the crossbowman.
Sturgian Veteran Bowman: One of the lowest damage bows on a T5 archer. ??? I avoid this entire troop line.
Sturgian Horse Raider: A short axe on a cav unit. ???
Battanian Mounted Skirmisher: No spear, 1 stack of javs, empty slot. ???
Vlandian Voulgier: A one handed sword with no shield, a two hander of about same length, and a swinging polearm. ???

Some of these aren't unusable troops as is, but some are either made not worth using or they would just be more enjoyable troops to use if their equipment made more sense.

There are two ways I can think of tweaking them - either making it more on par with similar troops, or making them funkier but still better troops.

Palatine Guard should get two stacks of arrows OR give them a shield.
Sturgian Veteran Bowman simply needs a better bow, OR slap a two handed axe and heavier armor on them.
Sturgian Horse Raider: Give them a long sword, OR a serious axe like the Rectangular Bitted Axe (+23 length over their current one)
Battanian Mounted Skirmisher: Give them a spear, OR an extra stack of javs.
Vlandian Voulgier: Give them a mace instead of the redundant swords, OR replace the two hander with a shield. (and give Vlandia mounted crossbowmen)

I don't think any of these would put these units over the top in any way. The shield on a shock infantry unit is the only questionable one, but ... this game has Khan's Guards...
 
anoddhermit said:
Imperial Palatine Guard: 1 Quiver on a T5 archer that has an empty slot. ??? I will never upgrade into this over the crossbowman.
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Yeah it's lame, in fact all the emp foot archers have 1 stack, they had 2 originally but got nerfed, but it's basically making sure they lose in a large fight against other ranged, it's a really lame nerf that should be reversed.
 
AngryPanCake said:
do other T5 ranged unit have 2 arrow stacks? I don't think I paid attention so far!
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In terms of damage and projectile count here's what it looks like to evaluate damage output potential:

Bowmen -

Khuzait: 64 x 48 = 3072
Aserai: 66x 46 = 3036
Sturgia: 53 x 40 = 2120
Empire: 69 x 24 = 1656

Crossbowmen -

Vlandia: 105 x 18 = 1890
Empire: 96 x 18 = 1728

Nobles, mercs, bandits -

Battanian Fians: 79 x 64 = 5056
Hired Crossbowman: 102 x 20 = 2040
Forest Bandit: 77 x 40 = 3080

Clearly, there are all kinds of factors to consider - range, accuracy, one shot potential, armor, melee ability all favor crossbowmen (excepting Fians who are heavily armored with strong melee weapons due to noble status). Damage per second will favor archers.

Overall though, the Empire's Palatine Guard is just not bringing enough damage to the table.

(Edit: Accidentally calculated forest bandits with one rather than two quivers at first... forest bandits are the best thing after Fians)
 
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anoddhermit said:
In terms of damage and projectile count here's what it looks like to evaluate damage output potential:

Bowmen -

Khuzait: 64 x 48 = 3072
Aserai: 66x 46 = 3036
Sturgia: 53 x 40 = 2120
Empire: 69 x 24 = 1656

Crossbowmen -

Vlandia: 105 x 18 = 1890
Empire: 96 x 18 = 1728

Nobles, mercs, bandits -

Battanian Fians: 79 x 64 = 5056
Hired Crossbowman: 102 x 20 = 2040
Forest Bandit: 77 x 20 = 1540

Clearly, there are all kinds of factors to consider - range, accuracy, one shot potential, armor, melee ability all favor crossbowmen (excepting Fians who are heavily armored with strong melee weapons due to noble status). Damage per second will favor archers.

Overall though, the Empire's Palatine Guard is closer to bandit tier damage output than it is to other T5 archers.
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Wow, them Fians sounds fantastic on paper!
 
AngryPanCake said:
Wow, them Fians sounds fantastic on paper!
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Yeah they are pretty fantastic in practice as well haha.

They're a unit I don't use anymore 'cause it just feels like cheating. They're the only thing Battania has that's really worth recruiting.. while at the same time... just kind of silly when you doomstack them.

After a certain number of Fians... everything just dies in a shower of sharp wood.
 
Voulgiers are pretty decent though, they are almost like menavliatons, except for that real weird redundancy of having two "side" weapons if you consider their voulge their main one. Other than removing the extra melee weapon and their crappy scarf, they are still decent, though a clear downgrade from menavliatons, which are imo somewhat of a downgrade from veteran falxmen. They could totally do with a little change.
 
anoddhermit said:
In terms of damage and projectile count here's what it looks like to evaluate damage output potential:

Bowmen -

Khuzait: 64 x 48 = 3072
Aserai: 66x 46 = 3036
Sturgia: 53 x 40 = 2120
Empire: 69 x 24 = 1656

Crossbowmen -

Vlandia: 105 x 18 = 1890
Empire: 96 x 18 = 1728

Nobles, mercs, bandits -

Battanian Fians: 79 x 64 = 5056
Hired Crossbowman: 102 x 20 = 2040
Forest Bandit: 77 x 20 = 1540

Clearly, there are all kinds of factors to consider - range, accuracy, one shot potential, armor, melee ability all favor crossbowmen (excepting Fians who are heavily armored with strong melee weapons due to noble status). Damage per second will favor archers.

Overall though, the Empire's Palatine Guard is closer to bandit tier damage output than it is to other T5 archers.
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Palatines usually do pretty well though, as they've got one of the better bows. They are also fairly well armored. But yes I do agree every Tier 3 and onwards Empire Archer should have a 2nd quiver. For a Faction so Archer heavy they should at least have the ammunition to win a prolonged fight.

Sturgia's archer line is terrible. The first two archer units seem to have like no range. Assume that's cause of their terrible bows.
 
Who needs Sturgian veteran bowmen, just use forest bandits, almost the same everything but half the cost, great job on balancing TW
 
Flesson19 said:
Who needs Sturgian veteran bowmen, just use forest bandits, almost the same everything but half the cost, great job on balancing TW
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Sturgia Bow: 52 damage
Forest Bandit Bow: 76 damage

(The speed and accuracy difference is minimal, as is the skill difference which is in the Bandit's favor.)

I would say Forest Bandits are both substantially better archers and lower cost (8vs12, not quite half, with a roguery perk it's 7vs12 though). Granting forest archers are ~slightly harder to get, but... also you don't have to buy them and they're not as location specific.

Not to mention... winning battles faster and with fewer losses due to not having terrible archers is super cost efficient on its own...


Empire has the worst archer but at least it has... the worst crossbowmen and the worst horse archer too? ... I guess they're paying for versatility?

Sturgia has the second worst and it's all they've got.


Overall though, it seems like forest bandits (and hired crossbows) are better (in terms of wage : damage output) than using faction specific troops in general if you can amass them. Especially if you have a few perks reducing their wages.
 
De Re Militari mod. But it requires Realistic Battle Mod to run. No issues in my e1.7.1. installation.
 
I mean, why would Mongolia equip their armed forces with T-62 tanks, when there are plainly better tanks out there... they're 60 year old designs...

Analogy being, from a plausibility perspective... that there are going to be different capabilities and equipment used by different kingdoms.

*shrug*
 
Been away for a very long time so I haven't been up-to-date with how everything works in the game. Do unit stats still work like in Warband, as in, each faction troop has a base stat, and a level. At each new game start, the troops gets additional attribute points assigned to them based on their level e.g. a level 5 troop with 12 total attribute points will have has 20 + 5 total points, with 25 - 12 = 13 points allocated randomly to their default stats.

So one can potentially get some really wacky stats like troops having very high INT and CHA but low in STR and AGI, since INT and CHA don't matter to troops at all.

Otherwise, I'd agree that bandit troops should not have higher damage potential then faction high-tier troops. At best mid tier, and if that, just barely. Not even Sea Raiders in warband had higher base stats and level than Nord Warriors -- something of an equivelant for faction troops when it comes to battlefield role and purpose.
 
anoddhermit said:
Empire has the worst archer but at least it has... the worst crossbowmen and the worst horse archer too? ... I guess they're paying for versatility?
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They have the best shield infantry unit, (legionary) and the second best shock infantry (elite menavliaton, only second to the veteran falxman).

I will also take this opportunity to express my continued annoyance that menavlions in this game are used as some kind of stupid glaive instead of the pikes they actually were IRL.
 
five bucks said:
They have the best shield infantry unit, (legionary) and the second best shock infantry (elite menavliaton, only second to the veteran falxman).

I will also take this opportunity to express my continued annoyance that menavlions in this game are used as some kind of stupid glaive instead of the pikes they actually were IRL.
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It works out. Pikes are not as devastating as glaives are in BL.
 
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