Jump to content

LetswaveaBook

Balancing Advisors
  • Posts

    952
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    8

Posts posted by LetswaveaBook

  1. On 07/05/2021 at 5:42 PM, maroder said:

    Not sure how much this would change. As the CC is still the most defended area, I believe people will just build like this:

    I didn´t mean to do it literally that way, but I would rather say it was in the same spirit. We could for example say that fields generated by a granary are a different type of crops, which is gathered 10% faster and where only 2 citizens can gather per field. In that case it would seriously impact city layout as you cannot place 40 citizens around your CC with this method.

    If you combine it with giving CCs positive auras for buildings, you would give players reasons to do things differently. Ideas for that would be markets near CCs get 5% barter price and blacksmiths near CCs give citizen soldiers produced from the CC a small bonus. That way every player probably wants to build the market and blacksmith near the CC and scarify some farming space.

    I think we need an entire arsenal of tools to supply a change of city layout if we want to do it an a soft way, since placing farms around CCs makes a lot of gameplay sense.

    Recap: I am in favor of adding a second way so players get to chose whether they want to use the granaries or the original fields.

    • Like 1
  2. What do people think of the Empire Earth way to do it? In that game you build a granary and 8 fields spawn around it. That would be different from placing it around the CC. We could have a feature were you could place fields individually or for a reduced price with a granary.

    th?id=OIP.K6ptLs3IjLIQaSmhgrU2UgHaFj%26p

    The transparent grey building in the middle of the fields is the granary.

    • Like 1
  3. I think Yekaterina has said some helpful things, but I suppose execution is your problem.

    When you start the game, be as quick as you can to select your Civic center and train some units. U can use the hotkey z for training women.

    Then put all your units to work.

    When you have done so, select your Civic center and press ctrl+1, now you can access your CC by pressing 1 on your keyboard. It is important to play with one hand on the keyboard and pressing 1 often to see if your CC is idle.

    Also, as mentioned use batch training. In order to do so, select a building and press the shift button. Now you can train units in groups, which is faster. By using the mouse wheel you can vary the batch sizes.

    Pro tip: Don't be a girl who forgets eco upgrades. Don't know where I heard that before.

  4. That is a good question. I always thought you had to order them manually to get fighting en masse. If you don't order them to fight, I suppose they are just collecting resources unless the unit itself is attacked. I don't know that for sure to be honest.

  5. The big difference between most games is the citizen soldier concept. As ValirhAnt said, booming equals turtling.

    What 0ad in my view lacks is units that specialize in either booming, rushing or turtling. Currently citizen soldier infantry fit all of these roles. They are best used for booming, so that is more or less what everyone does.

    And then there is citizen cavalry. They are fast but lack the strength to go toe-to-toe with a good infantry force. If you commit to a cavalry rush and it doesn't work out, you need to pump resources in something that does not work out or give up on all the resources that you invested in your cavalry rush. If you do not want to be confronted with such a dilemma, it is wise not to spend too much resources on your cavalry rush. I think that explains why cavalry rushes are most often limited in number.

  6. I think Seleucids would be the best for beginners.  I consider rushing not a strategy suited to beginners, so I would recommend a civ that has the tools to crack a defense. Seleucids seem to be the best for that. They have pikemen, cavalry archers, cataphracts with more HP, good siege&elephants and their military colonies are nice too. The thing why I would recommend them over Ptolemies is their champion swordsmen which prevents a weakness to rams.

    • Like 3
  7. 56 minutes ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

    I believe that each unit should be oriented to have a role.

    I think this is very true. Right now the bulk of damage is done by ranged units and all melee units are just equal as target dummies/damage sponges, except pikemen who are the superior damage sponges. Ranged units are so dominant that people compare mostly how ranged units fare against each other, whereas they do not consider that skirmishers are far better if there is a meat shield.

    Most units have similar pierce and hack armor. Why have two different types if the armor is mostly the same for most units? I think we should think a little about that and give spearmen/pikemen -2 hack armor to make them vulnerable to sword infantry.

    • Like 2
  8. 8 hours ago, chrstgtr said:

    Moreover, the current alpha still allows spamming—just make more barracks—so it doesn’t to even address the problem you wanted to solve 

    This is the reason why I feel small changes in train rates are no big deal. If the train rates are change a little, people will adjust the amount of barracks they make.

    • Like 1
  9. 35 minutes ago, BreakfastBurrito_007 said:

    I have the feeling that turtley gameplay and endless 4v4s are caused by (see earlier post) unit speeds, stone availability and defenses power.

    In my logic, if units move faster then the time spent traveling to your opponent is less and that would reduce to economic cost of being away from work for some time. I think the main issue is not the speed, rather it is that the unit with most range(=area it can control) is also the most useful. Reducing archer speed to 9.0 will not make a big difference in my view.

    I do think the strength of defenses is an issue. Without p3 there is no realistic way to take a garrisoned opposing tower.

    • Like 1
  10. On 13/03/2021 at 2:08 PM, Yekaterina said:

    Screenshot_2021-03-13-12-45-22-95.thumb.jpg.958f44434ced98419c0c457dbada7c19.jpg

    If you want to proof that the gamma function for factorials actually works, you will not only get an integral by parts after doing partial integration, but you will even apply a proof by induction on it.

    So those who were think ¨Ah, @#$%¨ actually are a bunch of pussies.

    • Like 2
  11. 1 hour ago, ValihrAnt said:

    The problem stems from citizen soldiers and the fact that they are the best economic and military unit available at the same time.

    I think that this touches the key to the problem. More specifically, ranged infantry is the best military unit and they are good for your boom. If two players are evenly matched, the defender would have the same production and type of units as the attacker, which leaves the defender with an advantage. Going for a major infantry attack is costly on the economy and that´s why in a citizen soldier concept it has no place. I think the solution is not boosting gathering rate of women, but rather there needs to be a better rock-paper-scissor system. Generally speaking, I think the strength of ranged units is a problem in all phases and it results in simplified strategy: which unit should you make early on? Ranged infantry. I believe this offers no options to outstrategize your opponent, as the counters to ranged units all have their limitations. If melee cavalry could defeat ranged infantry, I think the problem would be solved for the civilizations that get melee cavalry in p1 (which is the reason for:)

     

    Because of some recent events, I have to admit that cavalry rushes can be executed effectively if the rushing playing is the better player. But in 1v1s I feel that cavalry rushes only work out if there is a skill difference between the players.

    Women cost only 50 food and can be produced from houses with fertility festival and collect wood at almost the same rate, which makes women better for booming in my view.

    • Like 1
  12. I ran some tests to learn something about the effect of the spread statistic. I measured the performance of 8 units. I was able to determine the distance better than in my previous post, so the numbers differ slightly. The camel archer has spread of 2.0 and the spread for the archers is given in the top row of the table. I also listed the distance of which the units fired, either 30 meters or 60 meter. Finally I looked at some units firing at a single target or firing at 4 targets close to each other.

    So I modded the spread value of the archers and then used these to fill a column in the table. Not every run had the same duration as the others. The time related to a run is correlated to the damage dealt by the camels. Some runs are shorter than other, but in my analysis I will account for that. I made the following table where the numbers in it represent the experience which is correlated to the damage dealt and shots landed. In the brackets, I mentioned the % of damage it dealt compared to the long range variant (so the 51% in the bottom right corner means that archer at long range vs multiple targets did 51% as much damage as the archer at short range vs multiple targets(which did 89)). For the camel (firing at a group of enemies) this value is always around 0.7 as the spread of camels was left constant. These are my test results.

     

    image.png.f03ba49844a8f7c9befb6035f18ab241.png

    -The first observation is that camels(spread 2.0) at 30m range are fairly close to near perfect spread archers. We also see that firing on a group does not give the camels an advantage at short range.

    -The second observation I would like to make as that a camel is fairly close to an unmodded archer except for having 7.0 pierce damage instead of 6.7.

    -The third observation If the archer is firing at a group, its increase in spread will have less effect than when it is firing at a single target.

    -The fourth observation If the spread is increased from 2 to 2.5, the decrease of 30m range damage at a group is proportional to the decrease of 60m range at a group(We both get around 0.7). For a spread increased to values higher than 3.0 the ratio decreases from 0.7 to 0.6. Though the ratio stays the same from 3.0 onwards to 4.5, the absolute values decrease.

    -The fifth observation starting at a spread value of 3, archers are no longer effective at targeting single units, but can still do decently against groups.

     

    An increase of spread from 2 to 2.5 results in a 5.4% nerf at 30m range against an opposing group while it is a 4.1% nerf on long range against an opposing group.

    An increase of spread from 2 to 2.8 results in a 10% nerf at 30m range against an opposing group while it is a 13% nerf on long range against an opposing group.

    An increase of spread from 2 to 3.0 results in a 14% nerf at 30m range against an opposing group while it is a 25% nerf on long range against an opposing group.

    An increase of spread from 2 to 3.5 results in a 21% nerf at 30m range against an opposing group while it is a 33% nerf on long range against an opposing group.

     

    Historically, at long range archers were not effective at targeting single units and were more effective at fire at opposing formations. Also archers at long range did not cause a lot of casualties. Also I think it is lame to have a game where units deal significant damage from long range, while I think that on the 30 meter range their damage can be maintained. If archers deal less damage at long range, I think it would benefit play with early cavalry aggression.

     

    I think an increase of spread to 3.0 would serve these purposes best. Because I consider the results of that to be quite hefty, I would suggest giving the archer a 10% attack boost, resulting in a 30m nerf of 5% against groups and a 18% nerf at 60m range against groups. It also means that archers become now only feasible in large groups and would thus struggle early on.

     

    If you read all of this, what do you think is the perfect spread value for archers?

    • Like 4
    • Thanks 1
  13. I ran some tests to learn something about the effect of the spread statistic. I measured the performance of 6 units.

    The first one is a camel archer at short range.

    The second one is a archer at short range.

    The third one is a archer at short range firing at multiple opponents.

    The fourth one is a camel archer at long range.

    The fifth one is a archer at long range.

    The sixth one is a archer at long range firing at multiple opponents.

    The camel archer is the control group with static stats. For the archers I tweaked the spread statistic. I made the following table where the numbers in it represent the experience which is correlated to the damage dealt and shots landed. In the brackets, I mentioned the % of damage it dealt compared to the long range variant (so the 38% in the bottom right corner means that archer at long range vs multiple targets did 38% as much damage as the archer at short range vs multiple targets). For the camel this value is always around 0.6 as the spread of camels was left constant.

     

     

     

    spread

     

     

     

     

    0.1

    2.5

    3

    3.5

    4

    4.5

    Camel short

    126

    133

    140

    155

    133

    144

    archer short

    125

    108

    102

    96

    67

    66

    archer short, multiple targets

    125

    125

    125

    125

    100

    100

    Camel long

    78

    80

    84

    94

    80

    84

    archer long

    123(98.4%)
     

    49(45.4%)

    42(42.2%)

    38(38.6%)

    24(35.8%)

    20(30.3%)

    archer long, multiple targets

    123(98.4%)

    75(60%)

    62(49.6%)

    57(45.6%)

    43(43%)
     

    38(38%)

     

    The first observation is that camels(2.0 spread) at short range are fairly close to near 0.1 spread archers. In reality they are archers with 2.0 spread and +5% damage, so the shift in spread of 2.0 to 0.1 is equivalent to about 4% damage for the short range.

    The second observation is that archers at long range seem to drop of more compared to the short version if the spread increases.

    The third observation is that if the spread increases, the relative advantage of the archer with multiple targets also increased compared to the archer shooting on only 1.

     

    I hope that some players will be able to make some other insightful observations, but I will leave it at that. Now I will explain what I think should be good for the game. I think at long range, ranged units should be mainly a nuisance and bad at targeting individual units. So for the option of 4.5 spread, this means that it drops in 30% in terms of effective DPS on short range. To counter such, the Archer could be given 20% more pierce damage. This would mean that if archers now deal 100*1.2 damage in the same period as the camel (similar to the archer with 0.1 spread ) deals 144. So at short range it is a 15% nerf (provided that the archers are shooting at multiple targets.). On long range it would seem like a nerf of 47% (compared to the long camel shooting at multiple targets, this statistic is not in the table).

    If we chose a spread of 2.5 and no additional attack increase, we would get a short range nerf of  about 5% provided the archer shoots at multiple opponents. For the long range the nerf will be 6.5% (compared to the camel shooting at multiple targets, this statistic is not in the table)

     

    To be honest. I messed up my test results by having the short archer firing at multiple opponents was advanced rank and had better accuracy than the others. I will need to update the table, but I will do so tomorrow.

     

     

                 
                 
                 
                 
                 
                 
                 
                 

    88121138_speadtestforspread4_0.63801cc4ff25c1802139df3e418b4344

    • Thanks 1
  14. I think archers are the best civilian ranged infantry. However I think the gap is not as big as you might think. With a 10% decrease in damage output they could be fine, that is what I am thinking. On top of that I would like to see a buff for spear cavalry so they can function as a counter to ranged unit.

     

    The main advantage is that archers have long range. If the spread would be increased such that their damage at max range is reduced, I think that would help balance. That would create a situation where you can do damage from a safe distance, but it won´t be much unless the enemy decides to get close.

    • Like 1
  15. 3 hours ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

    Siege towers should be stopped with cavalry and slingers or with catapults(ballista).

    I think siege towers don't need to be stopped. Siege towers often were very slow if not stationary. In game we use siege towers on the battlefield as a mobile archer carrier and I think that is the core of the problem, especially the mobile part. If they were very slow, we could use siege(rams) against them.

    However this tread is about elephants.

    4 hours ago, alre said:

    ranged units, and skitmishers in particular, are already the best counter for elephants at now. I don't think there's need for a hard bonus. 

    Even though ranged units are the best option, they are still not great. If we compare an Asian elephant to champion infantry, we see that they elephant has less than 3 times the cost and pop requirement. In return you get 3 times the hack damage and a ton of crush damage. On the defensive side you get over 4 times the hit points and better armor, totaling at about 5 times the durability. I think that the elephant seems to be the better deal in that regard and it should be priced accordingly.

  16. In this topic I would solely discuss the simple economic effect of starting with a worker elephant. Once we understand this fully we can expand to discussing more complex matters.

    There was a topic earlier were worker elephants were criticized. I ran a few test to compare Maurya(M) boom with Seleucid(S) boom. To reduce randomness, I imposed a few rules to play by:

    1. Don't use extra berries, extra hunt(only chickens) or wicker baskets technology.

    2. Start by building a farmstead and a house.

    3. Aim to get fertility festival early.

    4. Don't build a second worker elephant.

    5. Map mainland, biome autumn.

    6. Aim to start training infantry at the CC around minute 5, before that make only women.

    7. Only collect only food/wood

    8: End the game after 11 minutes(In practice this was most often a few seconds later)

    Note that several of these rules benefit Sele more than Maurya.

    Here are my results the games played first are on top,

    civ (trained units) (trained infantry) (food collected) (wood collected)

    M 147 45 8501 8836

    S 158 14 9286 8426

    S 139 38 8153 8805

    S 154 56 8905 9849

    M 145 35 8390 9915

    M 169 31 10009 10223

    M 168 44 9175 10239

    M 155 46 8663 9061

    M 163 35 9553 9063

    M 152 35 9045 9405

    S 151 52 8368 9325

    S 138 42 7979 9011  (I blame this result on unfavourable map gen.)

    S 151 48 9348 9050

    I am rated around 1700 and the results show that I was unable to get the first 3 trials right. The fist Maurya boom was an under-performance(getting fertility festival to early) and I have figured out what the issue is. In the fist Sele trial I mode only women, which is not representative. And the second one was an under-performance(getting fertility festival to early) again, since I was unfamiliar with Seleucid. The 12th game seems like an under-performance, but I think it had to do with unfavourable map gen(starting wood far from the CC). I think it is a fair point to say that with a worker elephant maurya are better to at dealing with unfavourable map gens.

    The conclusions are that Maurya seem to collect a little more. On the other hand these results might seem the cause because I tend to get more cheap units (women) as Maurya and less expensive units(Infantry). This seems natural as Maurya have the small houses and Sele gets the barracks for 200 wood. In most games I would not get the ability to place a 4th barracks foundation before 9 minutes, so running out of stone was not an issue for these results. It should be mentioned that at the end of the trials, Maurya still had their stone, while Sele spend theirs.

    My initial hypothesis was that Maurya would completely outboom Sele. Considering the results, in most cases, the difference seems to be rather moderate. I don't think the starting elephant is the reason why Maurya is considered OP, rather I think it is one of the contributing factors.

    There are some tests I would like to : namely see what Maurya would be if you start without an elephant(i.e. deleting it at the start) and then training one or more during the game. I would also like to try to get results on the Maurya boom without the restrictions imposed here.

     

    • Like 3
    • Thanks 1
  17. I like the idea that you come with suggestions as the buildings really help to make civilization unique. I have to would like to see the change for the Cothon. The pillar of akhoska seems fairly situational anyway :(

    For the Lighthouse I think it is enough to give them speed only for merchant and fishing ships. For military ships it might be to much.

    For the Theatron my suggestion is: Reduce stone cost to 200, make them available in p2 and give them territory root.

    I once opened a tread on the apartment building and trying out the polling system. However that suggestion was disliked without giving any explanation in the comment of the dislikes.

    • Like 2
  18. 4 hours ago, Edwarf said:

    Taxes : Every unit gives a metal trickle.

    Hmm, champion units are already at your militairy service and instead of getting paid, they pay taxes. Citizen soldiers spent all day chopping wood and give all wood they chop to their overlord and in addition to that they are expected to pay taxes. I knew there should have been some cruel tyrants though...

    If this game was like the stronghold series, where peasants would spawn for free, eat your food, drink your beer and pray at your churches then taxes would be justified.

    • Like 2
    • Haha 1
  19. On 21/04/2021 at 5:11 PM, alre said:

    Considering the striking difference in price, simply being an otherwise unavaiable kind of citizen soldiers is not enough of a difference to justify any mercenary unit. I hope mercenaries get a strong rework in a25, at that point having both citizen and mercenary versions of the same unit could actually make real sense.

    I hope that they don´t give them automatic rank 2, since that would be a hell of a difference. +1 armor (equivalent to +10%HP),+25% HP and +20% attack. I would hope that instead the are given a smaller bonus like only +20% HP instead of promotion.

     

    On 19/04/2021 at 11:24 PM, Player of 0AD said:

    Why not 1 pyramid, 1 second pyramid, 1 third pyramid and 1 forth pyramid? ; )

    Well, stand up and walk to the window. Why don´t the neighbors have 4 pyramids in their backyard? because pyramids are expensive.

    • Haha 2
×
×
  • Create New...