Mercenary cavalry: The Macedonian case.

[LetswaveaBook]

Today I played a 1v1 game with valihr(Spartans) as Macedon. I went for a build similar to the Carthaginian mercenary rush. We concluded in the end that this type of mercenary rush is OP as well, when executed properly.  Any thoughts on how Macedons mercenary cavalry is balanced?

My thoughts were to increase cavalry usefulness for A26 and to nerf mercenary cavalry such that almost every faction can do a p2 cavalry rush. The mercenaries would be balanced such that they are just a minor advantage.

I link the game in the attachment.

2021-11-01_0001.zip

[Dizaka]

The skrimisher cav coming from the 200 wood 50 stone stable?

The only reason I can see them as OP is b/c spear cav protect it and hence the skrim cav level up faster to l3.

BTW, I think Roman Allied cav used to be mercenaries.  Wonder why they aren't since a25.

Meh, can't watch replay.  Some lines need to be deleted to be compatible with vanilla a25 0ad.  Don't know which ones.

Edited November 1, 2021 by Dizaka

[Player of 0AD]

1 hour ago, Dizaka said:

BTW, I think Roman Allied cav used to be mercenaries.  Wonder why they aren't since a25.

 

Nope. I play since a23, and they always have been normal citizens.

[Dizaka]

27 minutes ago, Player of 0AD said:

Nope. I play since a23, and they always have been normal citizens.

They definitely cost 10 metal though.

[Gurken Khan]

7 minutes ago, Dizaka said:

They definitely cost 10 metal though.

No?

[Dizaka]

45 minutes ago, Gurken Khan said:

No?

Cost* is, both, the present and past tenses.  I meant the past tense.

Not sure what alpha that screenshot is from.  I am referring to a23 or before.  I remember not using roman scrim cav as they cost 10 metal and metal was too precious to waste.  I tried loading an a23 client but couldn't b/c it got auto updated.

Edited November 2, 2021 by Dizaka

[Player of 0AD]

57 minutes ago, Dizaka said:

They definitely cost 10 metal though.

That would be citizen sword cav

[Dizaka]

3 minutes ago, Player of 0AD said:

That would be citizen sword cav

Sword cav always cost +10 metal. 

For some reason I remember Roman Scrim Cav costing +10 metal too.  I used to play Rome a lot too, but haven't touched them with a 10 foot pole since a24.  I wish I had earlier client to double check.

Edited November 2, 2021 by Dizaka

[alre]

 

On 28/09/2021 at 9:01 AM, alre said:

- nerf sword cav slightly. even CS is OP

- raise cost of melee mercs, ranged units have a very low increase in value with rank, melee units are much better when they rank up instead

- consider reducing stats increases for cav, as they rank up easier than melee infantry. compare to ranged units, that don't have any stat upgrade

- consider making mercenaries not making experience. this would make them more expendable and different from CS. more a game experience proposal than a balancing one.

I stand by what I already said about carthaginian sword cav rush.

[faction02]

Outside of balancing the strength of mercenaries, I don't get how their prices are determined to start with. Mercenaries benefit from a discount on their cost that do not seem to be justified:

 

 - for slingers or swordmen, the wood cost is substituted for mineral at a 1-to-1 rate, all infantry CS costs 100 resources whereas their mercenary equivalent costs only 60. The argument that "mercenaries cost metal which is harder to get" doesn't seem to be a good argument from that perspective. For almost the same price, you can get 2 CS slingers (100 food, 40 wood, 60mineral) or 1 women + 1 CS + 1 mercenary infantry (100 food, 50 wood, 60 mineral);

 

 - on the non-economic role of mercenaries, any additional cavalry units trained in phase2 has no economic role in practice since coral are already setup and hunt is usually gone. So no clue why mercenary cavalry (80 metal) should be that cheap relative to their citizen  (100food+50wood/40wood&10metal) equivalent. Mercenary cavalry are stronger, faster to train, and the embassy is even cheaper than the stable. In late game, many of the CS infantry trained won't ever collect resources neither, so this specificity would stop being relevant for infantry too;

 

 - with current metal setup on the map, the argument that "metal is scarce" doesn't seem to be very strong argument neither. I won't talk about low wood maps, where you can consider instant resign against a mercenary civilization with the advantage that a 100% metal cost gives;

 

 - if we compare the current early rush mercenary build to the fanatic one, fanatics need about twice the training time (20seconds) of mercenary cavalry (11 seconds), and they cost 80 food and 60 wood extra with respect to a mercenary cavalry. One fanatic costs 80food+60wood+80metal whereas 1 mercenary sword cav+1 CS skirmisher cav would cost 100 food+50 wood+80 metal (and the fanatic can't even build stuffs!!);

 

  - A cavalry swordman costs 100food, 40wood & 10 metal whereas the stronger mercenary equivalent costs only 80 metal. Anytime you can get 70 metal for less than 100food+40wood at the market, you have a substantial advantage. The first player to get a market can get his first 5 mercenary sword cavalries by simply selling 500 food for 400 metal... these 500 foods would only cover the food part of the cost of the 5 citizen sword cavalry.

Edited November 2, 2021 by faction02

[faction02]

12 hours ago, Dizaka said:

Sword cav always cost +10 metal. 

For some reason I remember Roman Scrim Cav costing +10 metal too.  I used to play Rome a lot too, but haven't touched them with a 10 foot pole since a24.  I wish I had earlier client to double check.

I would guess you used to play Macedonians a lot too  but mercenary skirm cav cost 25 metal back in a23.

Spoiler

Edited November 2, 2021 by faction02

[chrstgtr]

1 hour ago, faction02 said:

Outside of balancing the strength of mercenaries, I don't get how their prices are determined to start with. Mercenaries benefit from a discount on their cost that do not seem to be justified:

 

I think this is the root of the problem with mercs. It is an extremely easy eco to manage (just one in a concentrated area--so you don't have to build multiple storehouses and only have to upgrade one eco tech) and the units cost less.

In previous alphas mercs could start at level 2, but they were not considered OP, which suggests the problem is the cost--not the level

Edited November 2, 2021 by chrstgtr

[LetswaveaBook]

18 hours ago, Dizaka said:

Meh, can't watch replay.  Some lines need to be deleted to be compatible with vanilla a25 0ad.  Don't know which ones.

It requires feldmap.

[Dizaka]

4 hours ago, faction02 said:

I would guess you used to play Macedonians a lot too  but mercenary skirm cav cost 25 metal back in a23.

  Reveal hidden contents

#SaveMacedonians

[davidsrsb]

Why do sword cavalry have such high health? Cavalry is all about mobility and a strong attack. Its weakness should be cost and low health - there are limits how much armour that you can put on a horse and it makes a big target.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

6 hours ago, davidsrsb said:

Why do sword cavalry have such high health? Cavalry is all about mobility and a strong attack. Its weakness should be cost and low health - there are limits how much armour that you can put on a horse and it makes a big target.

Well, they have the same health as spear cav. IMHO, a problem is the armor. Honestly, I'd revamp cavalry entirely, but that's none of my business.

[BreakfastBurrito_007]

17 minutes ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

Well, they have the same health as spear cav. IMHO, a problem is the armor.

I agree, the armor is the problem. Swordcavalry should not be superior in every way except barely losing to spearcav. The best way to fix the discrepancy between spearcav and swordcav is to let swordcav keep the high damage, but reduce their armor. This way, spearcav will defeat swordcav more convincingly and spearcav will be more survivable, but not as lethal as swordcav. 

Edited November 10, 2021 by BreakfastBurrito_007

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

19 minutes ago, BreakfastBurrito_007 said:

I agree, the armor is the problem. Swordcavalry should not be superior in every way except barely losing to spearcav. The best way to fix the discrepancy between spearcav and swordcav is to let swordcav keep the high damage, but reduce their armor. This way, spearcav will defeat swordcav more convincingly and spearcav will be more survivable, but not as lethal as swordcav. 

If you get rid of the dumb pierce attack with spear units, that also solves some issues. But apparently it is a sacred cow that must not be touched.

[Dakara]

2 minutes ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

If you get rid of the dumb pierce attack with spear units, that also solves some issues. But apparently it is a sacred cow that must not be touched.

what you means? can you reformulate my english is bad 

 

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

4 minutes ago, Dakara said:

what you means? can you reformulate my english is bad 

Right now, all spear units have a mix of attack values, with both pierce and hack damage. If you just give them hack damage and remove the pierce damage they give, then re-adjust the armor values of cavalry, you can make spear units better against cavalry by default.

It should be thus:

Cavalry

• Low hack armor (vulnerable against melee units)
  • Spear cav are the anti-cav cavalry, bonus attack vs. cavalry (in DE this is reversed, but let's not argue anymore about this, I'm just going with EA's counter scheme)
  • Since spear infantry have their piece attack given back to hack attack, spear infantry are now a natural counter to cavalry
• High pierce armor (strong against ranged units)
  • Combined with fast speed, should make short work of ranged infantry
• High crush armor

Ranged Infantry

• Low hack armor (vulnerable against fast melee units, such as melee cav)
  • They should melt away against any melee unit that reaches them
    • Their range and pierce attack should help keep melee infantry at bay, but melee cavalry close the gap too quickly and massacre them
• Medium pierce armor (good at dueling other ranged units, but not great)
• Low crush armor (vulnerable against splash damage from catapults, eh hem)

Melee Infantry

• High hack armor (good at dueling other melee units; resistant against melee cav)
• Pierce armor
  • Medium for spear Infantry
  • Low for sword Infantry
    • Sword infantry are the anti-infantry infantry, bonus attack vs. infantry
• Medium crush armor

 

I mean, we can quibble with exact values, but something like that^

[Freagarach]

IMHO It could be like this:

Cavalry:

• Glass cannons
  • Low armour meaning they should be used wisely
  • But high speed meaning they can pick their fights.
  • Decent attack values lets them easily kill off stragglers.
• Allows them to quickly reach ranged infantry to make short work of them.

Ranged infantry:

• Low armour, vulnerable against any unit when in range.
• When the enemy is too close, they switch to their melee weapon, which is merely a dagger, so they'll be massacred by (almost) anything.

Melee infantry:

• Good armour, depending on the exact unit type, meaning they can hold their ground against cavalry.
  • Spearmen have their "range" advantage so multiple men can attack one target more easily.
• Their lack of speed make them sustain casualties against ranged infantry, but when up close they hack them away.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

20 minutes ago, Freagarach said:

IMHO It could be like this:

Cavalry:

• Glass cannons
  • Low armour meaning they should be used wisely
  • But high speed meaning they can pick their fights.
  • Decent attack values lets them easily kill off stragglers.
• Allows them to quickly reach ranged infantry to make short work of them.

Ranged infantry:

• Low armour, vulnerable against any unit when in range.
• When the enemy is too close, they switch to their melee weapon, which is merely a dagger, so they'll be massacred by (almost) anything.

Melee infantry:

• Good armour, depending on the exact unit type, meaning they can hold their ground against cavalry.
  • Spearmen have their "range" advantage so multiple men can attack one target more easily.
• Their lack of speed make them sustain casualties against ranged infantry, but when up close they hack them away.

Essentially, yeah. I just got into the weeds talking about armor values. You summed it up nicely. 

[alre]

2 hours ago, Freagarach said:

When the enemy is too close, they switch to their melee weapon, which is merely a dagger, so they'll be massacred by (almost) anything.

why would a unit have its attack lowered when in a close fight? right now skirmishers deal a higher damage than spearmen.

[Freagarach]

2 hours ago, alre said:

why would a unit have its attack lowered when in a close fight? right now skirmishers deal a higher damage than spearmen.

Because it is hard to be firing a bow at someone when they poke you with a sword?
And that means you don't have to give cavalry some pierce resistance just becasue they "need" to counter archers.

[Dakara]

The archers are already killed by the melee cavalry. We need to better define the role of the spear cavelry. Give him tools to reach them. Currently they are sometimes ok, sometimes extremely bad. Making an army in late game with a significant amount of cav spear seems like a pretty bad idea, Could anyone try? 

Their rush are ok, more resistant vs arrow and defensive building. is good because they have a shield so it realistic (for rome, macedonians no have shield but differentiating the two units could create too much imbalance for a phase 1 unit so let's leave it that way for now). Their defensive aspect (chasing other riders from a distance is also an asset.

Domamge :

I think they don't do enough damage against cavalry ? and you ? same opinion ?

But come to think of it in what way the spear cav unit should be against other cavalry? They should a priori as strong as the cavaliers against infantry units. It is in any case certain that in 1 against 1 the spear cav unit has a hard time against the other riders while in the current conception the spear cav must win against the others.

Many ideas can come into play. I don't know if they are good

1) attack when moving for spear cav.  If you run through an army, the spear cav can attack  one or two attacks without having to stop. intéressant non?

2)To simulate the effect of a strong charge and stimulate the strategy of combat / withdrawal / combat / withdrawal / etc. Reduce the attack speed of cav spears and significantly increase their damage. This way when they arrive to land their first melee attack they hurt a lot. The sword cavalry will have a more constant dps while the spear cav will play with its mobility to use its attack when leaving and returning in combat.

3)Modify the armor of all cav types to rebalance them in the metagame. Big balancing work.

4)Sad idea lol, the spear cavalry and the sword cavalry is the same. Only the appearance changes. We keep the principle of spear cavalry for the champions already present.

5) Up their range attack. To simulate the length of their lance, and their ability to "bodyblock" thanks to their reach and height on a horse.

6) Your ideas