is it just me or Rhodoks is annoyingly overpowered?

[Yoshi Murasaki]

Well, it's like this.

Rhodoks have the best king.

Their other armor looks good and pleasant to the eye.

They have the best weaponry which is suited to counter-warfare. That's what I like the most. Not who brings the biggest club. I prefer crossbow over bow in the game, great hammer is... amazing (loved it in multiplayer, but now I use it in singleplayer too and it totally rules, AI on good blocks a lot but not anymore hehe and shields don't matter). Pike is great. Glaive is a variation of Guan Dao and Naginata (although I don't like the weapon itself in the game right now).

Playing as Rhodoks gives me best foot combat experience, because I have proper support from behind, but my troops don't block my way (as when playing with Nords). Or, when playing with cavalry as cavalry, I have to 'dig' through my own lines because Mamlukes just overrun everything and I barely have any kills

Their reliance on crossbow reminds me of chinese, whom I like.

I like their architecture. Almerra castle is the closest to Japanese style of castle combat as you can get in this game.

So basically you like the Rhodoks for similar reasons that a football fan likes his football team? Heh.

Yea, football fan is fond of good architecture, high civilization values (chinese, japanese), great-looking clothes (that's why soccer player uniforms are all velvet in nice colors designs), he picked his team because that football club owner excels at ethics (football fans are not hooligans and terrorists, they have a sense of ethics and not bias), football fans pick weaker teams ower stronger ones because they like 'challenge'..


Hmm what else..

 

[Old One-Eye]

Ah, the point flew straight past you.
It kinda boils down to this: "I like them because I like them and rationalize it by finding stuff about them to like." Just like a sports fan. But of course I forgot that you are a super-rational higher being without emotions that apply cold rational logic to everything and are, as such, quite above such mundane activities as football. Playing a fictional faction in an obscure computer game on a multiplayer server is clearly a far superior intellectual choice compared to being a fan of a football team. Or wait, no it isn't.
That was one point.
Another point is that you will rarely find a more critical individual than a football fan who has just lost a game. The manager is an idiot, the team's own players are a disgrace, the stadium is cold, the pitch was a shambles and most of all the referee was a blind and quite probably bribed fool who didn't know the rules. It would of course be completely off to suggest that *****ing and moaning about how completely useless the Rhodoks are on a message board has any similarity whatsoever to a low-brow grunting football fan. Or wait. No, it wouldn't.

 

[Yoshi Murasaki]

Ah, the point flew straight past you.
It kinda boils down to this: "I like them because I like them and rationalize it by finding stuff about them to like." Just like a sports fan.

No, what you wanted to say is this: "Everyone acts like football fan! Do you people know why? Football fan has criteria why he likes something, just like everyone else has criteria why they like something else. So, football fan = equal to others."

Poor.

Playing a fictional faction in an obscure computer game on a multiplayer server is clearly a far superior intellectual choice compared to being a fan of a football team. Or wait, no it isn't.

Poor.

Really, how pathetic can you be? What's next: "Playing a fictional faction of Black in a not-so popular game of chess on a multiplayer yahoo server is not superior intellectual act compared to football cheering."

Please Kettle Black, I know I offended your emotions by denying your football cheerleading intellectual qualities, but that doesn't mean you have to openly display your lack of intellectual capabilities by using "argument" and "logic" such as here.

It would of course be completely off to suggest that *****ing and moaning about how completely useless the Rhodoks are

Except that I don't ***** and moan about how useless Rhodok are - I play them. I don't create threads "omg rhodoks suck". Instead, someone comes on the forum with false claims how Rhodoks are overpowered and I refute it. And in that I use intellectual approach, which is empirism, analysis, comparison, testing, calculation and so on.


Of course, to you who are football fan intellect doesn't mean much. Justice doesn't. Truth doesn't. Emotions do. Emotions are opposite of truth and justice. Love is opposite of justice. So what happens when someone who comes on the forum says "rhodoks are overpowered"? Nothing. You don't care. Why? Because you don't care that someone types untruth. But if I refute it, I'm suddenly *****ing and moaning. Never mind that my words are true. Truth is obsolete. Long live emotions. Yuck.



Edit: But you're right in one thing - I feel like I'm surrounded with football fans here. No different indeed. There are few people here who do calculations and math and contribute, and then there are emotional people who come with "omg I got bolt in my head, I so angry now, my anger clouds my judgement, ergo, crossbowmen overpowered!"

You can say I ***** and moan, but I posted more calculations than 99% of you. I am not the one who goes with "yes yes mr new player, just pump your agility that's good, all is good". I am the one who goes: "look new player, pumping agility and athletics gives you xy% increase in this and that. I personally think it's crap but if you think it matters to you go ahead". That's how I do it.


So, I think it's best to leave you football fans alone so you can blow your vuvuzela and call it music equal to other music.

 

[yugop]

I'm a rhodok fan, and I like them because I like them. And if you don't like them, you suck, period . Anyway I rest my case as in other rhodok related threads : they are not broken, but are really weak if you only use rhodok troops as a player-controlled party. Crossbows are nice (and it's pretty fun winning siege attacks without actually having to break through the walls ), but other than that, they don't have anything standing out : poor equip, poor stats, and strong disadvantage due to the AI. So if you want to play as them, mods are a must .

When controlled by the CPU, they can be annoying in siege however, since they tend to bolt-spam you instead of your troops. On open field, they are weaker than any other faction.

And Yoshi, seriously

 

[Dark Elf]

Seriously, you can talk much about how 100 Mamelukes will kill all the 100 Rhodok elite army.
But 100 Mamelukes army is a thing that happens only to player, while 100 Rhodok Sharpshooters and/or Sergeants is something that is granted to their lords by God/Fate/Game/Yoshi's Fake Balance.

Ai can field all elite army if they never undefeated in long time. It easy to see at khergit army because their lord often can run from their pursuer, several time i see khergit lord who field only khergit lancer and khergit master horse archer.  So in theory if sultan hakim who can lead 300+ army can avoid losing a battle for along time, he will have 100 mameluke in his army.

 

[hruza]

Ah, the point flew straight past you.
It kinda boils down to this: "I like them because I like them and rationalize it by finding stuff about them to like." Just like a sports fan. But of course I forgot that you are a super-rational higher being without emotions that apply cold rational logic to everything and are, as such, quite above such mundane activities as football. Playing a fictional faction in an obscure computer game on a multiplayer server is clearly a far superior intellectual choice compared to being a fan of a football team. Or wait, no it isn't.
That was one point.
Another point is that you will rarely find a more critical individual than a football fan who has just lost a game. The manager is an idiot, the team's own players are a disgrace, the stadium is cold, the pitch was a shambles and most of all the referee was a blind and quite probably bribed fool who didn't know the rules. It would of course be completely off to suggest that *****ing and moaning about how completely useless the Rhodoks are on a message board has any similarity whatsoever to a low-brow grunting football fan. Or wait. No, it wouldn't.

Heheh, nice one KB

 

[Old One-Eye]

Except that I don't ***** and moan about how useless Rhodok are - I play them. I don't create threads "omg rhodoks suck".

This is fun! A choice selection of your scientific, unbiased, unemotional analysis of Rhodok lack of capabilities and the überness of horse archers and mamlukes follows:

***
On a serious note, Rhodoks and Nords are not balanced in any way and yes - it is a problem. Not everyone likes or wants to play with all-Mamluke party, but just because they don't doesn't mean they should be heavily penalized. 

But keep in mind this: when the player is horse archer, that's like super-easy instant-win gameplay style.

And I'm probably the only one who thinks that Rhodoks are not that much better in siege.

If AI actually fought battles the way they fight when player is around, which usually means "Charge!" and troops actually fighting, Rhodoks would not exists after Month1 of anyones game, followed by Nords shortly after.

Thread title: How many Veteran Spearmen does it take to kill 1 Mamluke?

Exactly, you can always keep daydreaming about charging spearmen teehee and how spearmen are good against cavalry teehee. I mean, why let harsh reality stop you?  Onward my mental spearmen!

Saying "Hey Rhodoks have cool ranged and good infantry line" is horrible - because Rhodoks have dreadful infantry line, their entire infantry line (except Sergeants) is worse than Looters, not to even compare to other faction infantry. And you're not going to use Sergeants because you're going to use all-sharpshooter army - everything else is pointless. You either play all-ranged style or go with some other faction. 

Do you really plan on using spearmen as a Rhodok? Really? The entire troop line is utter trash worse than Looters, and Sergeants would be "ok" if it wasn't for the fact that any other faction has a unit that 1 on 1 would beat Sergeant with ease. 

Spearmen are completely useless, either way. I laugh when I fight Spearmen deserters. Sergeants are decent only because they don't use spears but why bother with them when you can go with sharpshooters anyway.
***

And certainly you do post numbers and quite possibly has assembled more Excel-sheets with test results than all of us combined, I have no problem with granting you that Yoshi. Well done! I just happen to find your denegrating remarks on how everyone else is so horrifyingly emotional while you are this super-rational logical supreme being completely hilarious. It's like reading Dr McCoy pretending to be Mr Spock. As my pointing out this to you clearly upsets you I shall (probably) discontinue that practise as I don't want you to get too emotional.

 

[vota dc]

I just discovered that if you delete shield and short weapons from rhodok infantry the rhodok will be overpowered. For some reasons they can even kill swadian knight with 1:1 ratio in custom battle withous formations and they are quite decent against other infantries (of course they will be weak against archers).

 

[Old One-Eye]

At least, they're far more effective without shields and the short 1-hander they will use too often. I'm doing the same and don't think they become overpowered, but definitely better. I've been looking at ways to balance them by letting one tier get shields and another just pikes and long polearms.

 

[vota dc]

IMHO you must choose between all polearms and all short weapons and shield because all factions need a weakness. With all polearms they are weak against archer, decent against infantry and strong against cavalry (they are a lot stronger than polearm + shield because they use spears in a versatile way and they don't suffer damage penalty), but if you have both polearms troops and meele troops they even counter infantry and archers.
Rhodok is supposed to be the ranged + anticavalry faction.

 

[Old One-Eye]

I know, it's a good point. But the way I figure it is if you let Trained Spearmen get 1H+shield and Veteran Spearmen get pikes without shield (and then sergeants get what they already have) they would kinda balance each other out and force an opposing player to use combined arms to take them out. A Rhodok player could also put Trained Spearmen and Sergeants in one group and Veterans in another and use them as the situation requires. I'm not at all certain that it would imbalance the game.

Btw, the most horrible unit in the game award goes to Sarranid Veteran Footman. Decent equipment but 1 ironflesh and 1 Ride is hardly characteristics that encourage you to use them as infantry. They have 0 athletics while normal Footman has 2, which makes them the slowest third-tier unit in the game, both on the world map and in combat. Light infantry is hard enough to use in Warband without that kind of handicap. There are several units in Warband that are clearly designed to perform a certain task but have been edited into being something else and then forgotten. Another example is the Desert Bandit that has PD3 and PT 0 with a higher chance to spawn with jarids than bows. Jarids have PT 2 which means that a Desert Bandit using jarids from a horse will hit his target once in every other blue moon if they even manage to fire at all. So why not give them javelins instead and change stats to PD 2 and PT 1? Camp Defenders and Huntress can get shortbows but they rarely, if ever, will since they don't have PD. Solution: give Huntress a Hunting Bow, give Camp Defender PD 1. The units can now function as they should. Which is not at all making them omgOP!!!

So I'm basically looking at all units and edit them to at least be able to perform what they are intended to. Since this is for (personal) single-player use there is no need to worry about making all units in all factions exactly the same. It's simple. Sarranids has light infantry. What does light infantry do? Move fast and die fast. Then make it so. Rhodoks? ****loads of crossbows firing and polearms to hinder cavalry from reaching the crossbows. Then make it so.

 

[vota dc]

Sarranid infantry already move fast: they have the mounted tag. With both archer and infantry with that tag sarranid armies will be very fast. So I suggest to give both riding and athletic because I suppose they will use riding on map (not sure about).

The reason I "fear" a shield infantry for rhodok is that you have already sharpshooter that can protect you from arrows with their border shields: your only handicap are that they won't shoot when they protect and that they will be inferior in meele against other infantries, and that is an incentive to use your "new" pure spearmen. Plus you will have another faction without a classic infantry and the rhodok will be more unique without shielded infantry.

 

[Old One-Eye]

Only Sarranid Guard and Master Archer has the "Mounted" tag, not the lower tiers. Both have Ride 1, Athletics 5 and 3. AFAIK map speed is not calculated through the personal encumbrance of the unit. Ie a Swadian Sergeant with lots of heavy gear and Athletics 4 moves as quickly as a foot unit with light or no armor with Athletics 4 on the map. So Vet Footmen slows you down as much as pure recruits.

Rhodoks have one great singular drawback that I feel justifies the inclusion of both pikemen and board shield infantry - no cavalry. Also, no missile equipped infantry (like the Nords). And let's be honest here, a  third tier unit with a short 1H + shield isn't going to save the day for a Rhodok army. They're still cannon fodder that just have a possibility of protecting some pikemen from enemy fire and to engage other low-level infantry. Rhodoks would still need to achieve their victory through superior ranged firepower. It would also be weird if a crossbow-based army completely lacked a counter to ranged enemy fire.

Edited to add:
Mercenary Swordsman, Hired Blade, Swadian Sergeant and Sharpshooter, Vaegir Guard (but NOT Marksman) also has the Mounted flag so the Sarranids are hardly alone in getting their top tier foot units calculated as Mounted. No Rhodok or Nord units has this flag. Merc Swordsman has 0 Athletics, 3 Ride btw. Which would make him move well on the world map and really slow in combat.

 

[vota dc]

Well if they can beat low tier infantry and block arrows then you can use sharpshooter. The reason you may need this unit is that you have one slot for type of troops so you can't have two groups of sharpshooters one that fire and one that block.
A good unit for this role would be something with 10 shield, 0 athletics, low powerstrike, good armor and bad weapon.

 

[Old One-Eye]

Actually I don't want to alter their stats in any way, nor adding new specialist troops, just make the existing troops do what they're supposed to do reasonably well. So a Rhodok army would, on the whole, perform closer to its capability by having more effective pikemen.