Spearmen take far too long
Printed From: Illyriad
Category: Miscellaneous
Forum Name: Suggestions & Game Enhancements
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URL: http://forum.illyriad.co.uk/forum_posts.asp?TID=1637
Printed Date: 17 Apr 2022 at 13:10
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Topic: Spearmen take far too long
Posted By: col0005
Subject: Spearmen take far too long
Date Posted: 14 Mar 2011 at 05:11
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When looking at the military unit statistics for orcs (best spearmen, poor archers) it can be seen that basic spearmen the archer performs better in every aspect except defense against cavlery, I know spearmen have a lower upkeep so this is resonable however unit production time is exactly the same. Is it just me or is this a significant handicap for the orc race? |
Replies:
Posted By: surferdude
Date Posted: 14 Mar 2011 at 08:03
| They do only use 1 beer; whereas the other races need 1 leather aromour (which needs 1 cow) - so factoring in the time for the resources to make the unit - they are a bit faster and cheaper... |
Posted By: col0005
Date Posted: 15 Mar 2011 at 00:16
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yeah I agree that spearmen are very cheap for orcs however elven archers are equally cheap in terms of resources, I'm not saying that spearmen should be better, but that spearmen should take less time to produce, say 3/4 of the time. Also time to make the resources..... this is only ever a problem for bows and spears when a player is very VERY small. |
Posted By: HonoredMule
Date Posted: 15 Mar 2011 at 15:21
I disagree with this. Unless you are militarily inactive for a very long time, you'll find plenty of cause to produce units 24/7. With a top-level barracks, this does become quite difficult even with top-level common ground and other bottleneck structures. That's before discovering the value of using more specialized (read, homogeneous) armies in larger multi-location battles. (This is a factor even Harmless didn't encounter until the January tournament.) Then factor in sovereignty, and you can have some cities producing a focus unit up to 3x faster in a single city. You can bet your pants then that equipment supply becomes the real issue by a mile. Now, if all you need is bows/spears/gold, then equipment production isn't a problem--which only means you have your huge benefit right there. Because those aren't bottleneck resources, otherwise-focused cities will overproduce and even be able to supply the cities on unit production steroids. |
col0005 wrote:Posted By: col0005
Date Posted: 15 Mar 2011 at 22:33
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true however if i use elves as an example again not ony can you produce a far better unit in the same time with relativley same value resources but elves can make T2 archers for 1 beer 2 bow and 1 leather, as opposed to 1 beer 2 speer 1 leather 1 chain.
So yes they are cheap but elves are cheaper and faster to produce.
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Posted By: HonoredMule
Date Posted: 16 Mar 2011 at 04:04
| I don't get it. Why should the orc advantage be bigger than the elf advantage? |
Posted By: col0005
Date Posted: 16 Mar 2011 at 11:54
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? it shouldn't but it seems that
1.elven archers are equaly cheap to produce
2.about the same value for upkeep
3.take the same time to build
Which is all good, however if you take into account that an archer is a far stronger unit then points 1 & 3 give advantage to elves, where is the orc advantage?
P.s. my alt is elven and actually larger than my orc account so i'm not just wishing for my orc army to be superior, i honestly do see it as unbalanced.
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Posted By: surferdude
Date Posted: 16 Mar 2011 at 12:37
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Arn't they double the upkeep? That's not quite the same value...
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Posted By: Attila the Hun
Date Posted: 16 Mar 2011 at 15:01
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Shhh, See Col0005, this is what happens when you get in to an arguement with honoredMule, he breaks your arguement down in to nothing and leave you feeling like a twit. ------------- It's just a game. :) |
Posted By: Kumomoto
Date Posted: 16 Mar 2011 at 15:04
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Elven Sentinels get a worse defense per gold upkeep than Kobold Cohorts on most values. Therefore, the Orc basic spears are better... At the end of the day, when all is said and done, it's about how many troops that city can support and what their corresponding values are. For the same amount of gold, you can get more defensive value with 2 Kobold Cohorts than you can with one Elven Sentinel... |
Posted By: col0005
Date Posted: 17 Mar 2011 at 01:26
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Ummmm not sure how you do maths but it seems that overall the stats seems relatively equal
2 Kobold Cohort = 18At 26Cv 24Sp 12Ar 24Sw 21.5 Average def
1 Sentinel =20 At 16Cv 23Sp 24Ar 23Sw 21.5 Average def
Now I understand that Cavlery attack will often account for a greater attack percentage and archers are hindered in forests so the lower attack value for spears is fair enough however we are still left with spearmen taking twice as long to produce and are more expensive to produce (2 spearmen to one archer)
Oh and yes i have been rolled a few times by HM but sometimes HM also appears to mis-interpret or neglect to fully address what has been said, I still see little advantage for orcs over elves for larger players while I can see great advantages for the elves.
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Posted By: lokifeyson
Date Posted: 17 Mar 2011 at 02:03
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col0005, has my full backing on this :) i just want to know when i get my race bonus....like the elves mana bonus on spells (or do i already have a bonus i don't see....) -------------  |
Posted By: HonoredMule
Date Posted: 17 Mar 2011 at 16:06
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That awesome defense against cavalry IS the big advantage for larger Orc players. All advantages are situationally specific, and this particular one is specific to players with lots of preparation time defending cavalry-friendly squares (possibly including towns on plains). Also, you're neglecting the equipment cost. Trueshot take 1 leather and 2 bows, 2 Kobolds take only 2 spears. I'm ignoring the beer as extraneous, but the truth is, so are the bows/spears as well as being in balance. The killer difference is 0 reliance on livestock-derived equipment. A city producing Kobold Cohorts 24/7 will produce an equipment surplus sufficient to keep another city producing even the most expensive units 24/7. If you threw in shorter production times, such a city would be ridiculously over-capable. It should be enough that a well-planned city doesn't need any kind of equipment sovereignty boosts and could instead focus sovereignty entirely on enhancing spearman production. I've mentioned before that cities can get up to 3x the unit production rate on a specialized unit, but Kobold Cohorts are the only ones that could be produced at that rate without equipment supply issues. At worst, you could donate spears and beer from another city which is no doubt capable of significant overproduction of that equipment which isn't even used for otherwise-focused cities. I have 50k+ beer, spears, and bows at all my cities simply because it makes no sense to stop producing but neither do I have need of all that I can produce. |
Posted By: col0005
Date Posted: 17 Mar 2011 at 23:05
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Honoured Mule as I said "sometimes HM also appears to mis-interpret or neglect to fully address what has been said"
The comparison was between kobolds and Sentinels so the build cost is 2 spears to 1 bow so the advantage goes to elves(yet again), if you look at T2 it is even more of an elven advantage
Orc 2 spear 1 chain 1 leather (for a slightly less valuabe unit)
Elves 2 bow 1 leather.
Also spearmen are very weak against archers which is good for game balance but because of this you cant say that cavlery defence counters all the production advantages of elven archers as well as the higher attack value.
By you argument elves can over produce archers as they are cheaper to produce AND faster to build (based on getting equivelent upkeep and as my previous post suggest equivelent value)
Ok maybe I was being a bit drastic in saying there is no large advantage, but each unit has it's own situational advantage. If your required to defend a mountain then archers are the best option, and you don't need the long production time. Also a plains square can easily be attacked by archers as well so having a combination would be advisable
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Posted By: Tordenkaffen
Date Posted: 17 Mar 2011 at 23:20
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Wheather or not Illyriad is balanced is beyond me. Tho for the sake of making a point; when I started out playing I chose Elf and Orc without knowing what that precisely entailed (my own fault and I dont complain). I would just have to say that I feel somewhat let down or dissappointed that the most warloving race in the game isn't more destructive. I would sooner argue that orcs should have more/bigger impediments in their way when working towards sieging cities or other structured assaults, than having mediocre units (other than the spearman who functions poorly in assaults/aggression). Also I was surprised to see the elves have such a powerful unit as their archers (tho I expected they would have an advantage with bows). I do feel however that if combat magic is added at some point, and elves gain on that in combat, you might want to consider lowering the attack value of the archers a little bit. Anyway, just my 2 cents |
Posted By: GM Stormcrow
Date Posted: 18 Mar 2011 at 00:12
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Just want to say that we (the dev team and the content balancing team) are following this thread with interest. It's a tough area and some of us feel that whilst there are obvious and promoted advantages to particular races (eg the Elves get a 5% magic bonus), there are also non-obvious bonuses - and especially - penalties to races as well. An example of which (staying with the Elves) is the fact that they don't require plate, which initally seems like a bonus, but rapidly becomes a penalty. We argue regularly and passionately about it and what, if anything, we should do to change things. Much of our thoughts and wishes are tempered by imminent releases such as the full implementation of Trade v2 - where the ability to buy units on the open market will change the military landscape dramatically. There are also other imminent releases whereby one race or the other will be "buffed" in specific areas. We have general design principles for each race to which we try and adhere, and I'll have a think about whether we should publically release these general design principles - some of which are obvious, and some of which are potentially less so. But please keep discussing these balance issues, as we really are interested in what you have to say. Bear in mind that the people who speak the loudest and longest aren't necessarily the people to whom we pay attention; a well argued case with counter-arguments has more effect than a loudly argued case. Regards, SC |
Posted By: The_Dude
Date Posted: 18 Mar 2011 at 00:21
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"Bear in mind that the people who speak the loudest and longest aren't necessarily the people to whom we pay attention; a well argued case with counter-arguments has more effect than a loudly argued case."
What about a long, loud, well-argued case? (a sub-specialty of mine) :):)
I make myself laugh!
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Posted By: HonoredMule
Date Posted: 18 Mar 2011 at 00:29
My bad. I think you'll find, however, that bows attacking spears on plains will not find favor. Bows are terrible on plains whether attacking or defending, while spears are at their best there. Elven Trueshot are the only bowmen I'd ever use in attack, but never on plains. Conversely, Kobold Cohorts perform quite decently attacking mountains (though not as well as bows defend them) and seem to attack in forests better than would logically be expected. But in general, nothing comes close to orc spearmen for defense against cavalry, whatever the terrain or unit tier. Since cavalry in general are the strongest attackers in the game, having the best counter is quite noteworthy. And the Trueshot's 2 leather cost is no trifling matter. It takes very considerable sovereignty boost for a Trueshot-producing city to be self-sufficient. None of my cities could achieve it with 24/7 bowman production (though I believe it is possible with the right balance of food, livestock, and leather sovereignty). |
Posted By: HonoredMule
Date Posted: 18 Mar 2011 at 00:30
| And just to clarify, spears do well on plains attacking as well as defending (though they're still stronger as defending units). |
Posted By: col0005
Date Posted: 18 Mar 2011 at 01:01
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???? 2 leather? A trueshot takes 1 leather, Where as a T2 orc spearmen takes 1 leather AND 1 chain.
I admit that my examples are more based on what is said in the game rather than what i've experienced. Archers aren't mentioned for plains where as it say's spearmen prefer cover.
I assumed that the archer defence of 12 (2 kobolds) would be defeated by the archer attack of 20 (1 sentinel)
So would 200 kobolds defending plains easily defeat 100 attacking archers?
P.s. For equivelent upkeep Elven archers are still cheaper and much faster to produce which is a huge advantage in an extended campaign
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Posted By: HonoredMule
Date Posted: 18 Mar 2011 at 01:17
Ok, I'll just shut up until I have more time to pay proper attention to the numbers. 
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Posted By: col0005
Date Posted: 18 Mar 2011 at 01:24
| Hey that time I wasn't Challenging you (apart from the leather bit), if you've observed differently to what the game suggest, through combat report statistics, I'll have to take you word for it. |
Posted By: HonoredMule
Date Posted: 18 Mar 2011 at 02:32
No worries, I understood you. I'm just owning up to my repeated factual discrepancies on the numeric front.  I tend to be too lazy to (re)analyze such things with proper rigor these days.
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Posted By: Kumomoto
Date Posted: 18 Mar 2011 at 15:05
Col-- You're missing by far the largest point here. Two Cohorts will always be better in 3 out of 5 areas of combat than one Sentinel (the two exceptions being attack and defense against bows). And for a defensive troop type, by far the most important areas of combat are defense against Cavalry and defense against Swordsmen, both of which are better in two Cohorts than one Sentinel. (and that is not calculating any combat mechanism advantages for having two troops over one troop, which I cannot calculate, not knowing the ins and outs of the combat resolution algorithms).
People simply don't attack with spears and bows for obvious reasons. Therefore, if you want a true comparison of the value of the Cohort to the Sentinel, you need to average the Def. vs. Cav. + Def. vs. Sword for 2 Cohorts vs. the same for one Sentinel. And what you find is that that average is 25 for the Orcs vs. 19.5 for the Elves. The Orcs have a 28% advantage.
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Posted By: col0005
Date Posted: 19 Mar 2011 at 05:18
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True. however the question is how often will you be able to have 2 cohorts to one sentinel. In events like the month long tournament most of the squares were captured and re-captured which means that armies were entirely destroyed. Therefore after this point the orc will always be at a major disadvantage as it will take twice as long to replenish the troops, add to this a much slower travel time and i'd say that the elven advantage far outweighs the orc advantage. Plus if a mistake is made and archers end up trying to capture the square the low defence of spearmen against archers will really come into play. Finally i'd also like to point out again that archers are CHEAP if sov makes it so that equiping your troops becomes a problem then that would suggest that elven players would attack with archers becuase they are very fast, fast to produce and cost very little to produce. The questin is what do you generally find more important; upkeep value, production time, or resource cost. |
Posted By: col0005
Date Posted: 19 Mar 2011 at 05:33
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Actually if you base attack value on production time sentinels actually beat all basic infantry apart from dwarves: 10/8.33=1.2 1.2*20 = 24 attack value so i'm not sure i believe that attacking with archers isn't worth it.
Oh and GM's, if your still interested in this thread would it be possible give a yeah or nay to if actual numbers make a difference or if total power is the only factor
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Posted By: HonoredMule
Date Posted: 19 Mar 2011 at 15:32
| If you base attack value on production time, you shouldn't be using basic units at all. Cohorts are the only T1 units worth building by a player with access to all the T2 units. Sentinels beating Cohorts on attack isn't very noteworthy when both units lose to better choices in each respective race. |
Posted By: GM Stormcrow
Date Posted: 19 Mar 2011 at 16:11
I'm not 100% sure I actually understand this question. Any chance you could illustrate it with 2 scenarios and ask me to confirm which one is the case? Depending on what the question precisely is, I might be able to answer it :) Regards, SC |
Posted By: col0005
Date Posted: 19 Mar 2011 at 22:30
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Sorry SC, I was refering to Kumomoto's post. I was asking if numbers make a difference. Ie would
50 swordsmen of attack 25 perform better than
25 swordsmen of attack 50
HM basing attack value on production time works for T2 as well
11.666/10=1.16666 1.166666*32=37.3 which again beats all infantry but dwarves, so if you loose a square in a tournament then the best unit to re-capture is caverly, then dwarvern infantry, then elven archers. Then infantry of other races.
Given that the T2 cav require 4 livestock where as trueshots only requre 1 i'd say this is extreamly good value and so players are likely to get attacked by archers
Furthermore Orc spearmen have a defence of 11 against archers but 33 against cav, 18 against swords; therefore if a defence is primarily spearmen then archers would probbabbly be by far the best option to attack with.
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Posted By: GM Stormcrow
Date Posted: 19 Mar 2011 at 22:47
Ah OK, I get what you're asking. From a combat resolution perspective, given the same unit type, commander, terrain etc: 1. 50 units of attack strength 25 perform identically to 2. 25 units of attack strength 50 However, the casualty resolution algorithm does have small variances based on troop numbers. These are especially obvious at the "small-number"/percentage-end, largely due to rounding. For example (assuming identical situations): 1. 10 troops of strength 15 who take 50% casualties will have lost 5 troops (as 50% of 10 is 5) 2. 3 troops of strength 50 (same strength) who take 50% casualties will have lost 2 troops (as 50% of 3 is 1.5, but you can't lose half a troop; you would lose 2, and so would actually take 66.6% casualties). There are, in certain circumstances, some other benefits to having more units than less, even if the strengths are identical - such as running into a killing rune. Regards, SC |
Posted By: Tordenkaffen
Date Posted: 20 Mar 2011 at 00:05
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Had an idea: Maybe the problem with orcs isnt that they are too weak, merely the place their combat strength has been placed. This ultimately boils down to a discussion of how you picture an orc. Like an ironclad defender who carefully dons his armor before combat, or simply a creature who (shortly after leaving the womb) readily uproots the nearest tree, kills a cow and makes a loincloth and stands ready for battle. What if you made the fangs a lot faster and a little stronger but made sacrifices in their defense - that would make it more orcish in my mind - shock and awe agressive tactics. But I have little knowledge about this other than in theory, and would like to hear what others think. Toodles |
Posted By: HonoredMule
Date Posted: 20 Mar 2011 at 00:35
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I always thought of orcs as being warlike but not necessarily effective fighters. They're brutes, with their strength in physical stature and numbers. I would expect a single skilled human warrior to beat a single orc. It is the horde that makes them formidable. However I do agree that thinking of orcs as a defensive race is strange. Dwarves should have the strong spearmen, and orcs the infantry specialization. I know that still doesn't make much sense at a low level, because we think of dwarves as axemen/warriors and not spear-bearers. But at a more abastract level, they do make better defenders than attackers since they cannot run quickly but are solidly built and can more easily take cover. |
Posted By: Thexion
Date Posted: 20 Mar 2011 at 07:21
| According descriptions Orcs seem to be all around good attackers in illyriad Best in spear, second in ranged, second in infantry, third in cavalry but almost as good as elves only elven t1 is 2 points better than orc T1. T2 cavalry is the same with elves. |
Posted By: Kumomoto
Date Posted: 21 Mar 2011 at 15:03
Which, in combination with their ability to most rapidly build the largest defensive armies makes me believe that the Devs probably aren't very far off in terms of game balance...
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Posted By: col0005
Date Posted: 21 Mar 2011 at 22:56
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Kumomoto, orcs can't rapidly build a large defensive army. Quite the opposite. If an orc army entirely consists of spearmen then they are very obviously the slowest race to build their army. Elves can build up their defensive army the quickest and cheaply, not really how most people imagine it should work.
It'd be hard to balance out but it would be cool if orcs were badly nerfed but took less than half the time to build. However this would be almost impossible to balance as players would just have a standing army in one account and have the fast buildning orc barracks in another.
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