Brigade comparisons

[Olorin]

Recruitable troops do need a little tweaking when compared with companions. You get only 2 and it lowers the production of the PC permanently. I believe those 2 points counter balance with the advantage of having your troops at a PC for both attacking and defensive purposes. The other 2 costs are where I believe some adjustments are due. They come in as green. This is big. I have long thought companions should come in as green also. I realize that probably won't happen.
Is it possible to have them come in as regular and remove the training order altogether? The other cost is the actual recruiting and maintenance cost of these troops. Many have pointed out they are high. I imagine if their other values can be tweaked that these can be also? Maybe its already on your ridiculously long to do list?

This is something we have discussed. Brekk feels that leaving companion raising at 7, even all at one spot, gives a Kingdom the chance to raise an army quickly if they just lost a battle. This is because I was thinking of dropping how many Companions can be raised in one spot to, say, 3 or 4 so to be more in line with recruiting. You could still raise 7 maximum a turn, just need more than 1 group to pull it off. like needing 4 groups to recruit 8 brigades. This may be revisited if needed.

Next, the loss at the PC is just population now. Which fits really.

The recruitment and maintenance costs are under consideration, along with all the other brigades. So, yeah, it is piled on the plate already.

Last is the training level. I tend to agree with this. I think all troops raised should be green and require training, including companions. Either that or recruits should be able to train up to veteran status. I do not know if either of those is doable without code changes.

I suspect that making most companions start green would change the flow of the game considerably. Would increase the value of summoned brigades compared to others though. The question is whether it would be good or bad for the overall balance of the game.

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BTW, folks, Brekk makes all final decisions on this stuff. I can have recommendations, thoughts, ideas, arguments, and what have you, but ultimately it is Brekk's game. So if you are thinking I change things, I do not. I am an assistant, not the boss.

[Xerro]

I Recently started a game as the giant. I was noticing how oppressive my maintenance costs were for my 17 brigade group. the cost was 50000 gold and 48400 food. I ran in to a masked army group and got my butt kicked. It was turn 12. His 28 brigade group beat me bad. I got upset by this since I was close to my kingdoms entire budget and made other orders hard to execute I calculated their maintenance cost at 36500 gold and 32050 food. This group was much stronger and cost much less to maintain. Not a ratio a military kingdom wants. The other player had better traits also. The main reason that this contest was so lopsided was the HIGH maintenance costs of giant troops. The upkeep of giants need some close scrutiny. I wanted to post this ramble so you could consider their costs while you are making all the troops changes. Also I dont know if this is in your realm of posibilitys, but giant scorpians seem a little weak for a troop that takes elite troops to recruit. It might be better as a veteran recruit requirement.

[davekuyk]

I agree Xerro. I have found this to be true with any of the non-evil kingdoms - over time the troop cost becomes oppressive (good word for it). As the RA I had strong groups and was paying over 140k gold a turn, a similar amount of food (and STILL couldn't take a legendary pop center).

An interesting data point, I don't have time to compute, would be troop strength per food and gold - which troops are efficient and which are not.

[uncledarkseid]

Recruitable troops do need a little tweaking when compared with companions. You get only 2 and it lowers the production of the PC permanently. I believe those 2 points counter balance with the advantage of having your troops at a PC for both attacking and defensive purposes. The other 2 costs are where I believe some adjustments are due. They come in as green. This is big. I have long thought companions should come in as green also. I realize that probably won't happen.
Is it possible to have them come in as regular and remove the training order altogether?  The other cost is the actual recruiting and maintenance cost of these troops. Many have pointed out they are high. I imagine if their other values can be tweaked that these can be also? Maybe its already on your ridiculously long to do list?

This is something we have discussed.  Brekk feels that leaving companion raising at 7, even all at one spot, gives a Kingdom the chance to raise an army quickly if they just lost a battle.  This is because I was thinking of dropping how many Companions can be raised in one spot to, say, 3 or 4 so to be more in line with recruiting. You could still raise 7 maximum a turn, just need more than 1 group to pull it off. like needing 4 groups to recruit 8 brigades.  This may be revisited if needed.

Next, the loss at the PC is just population now.  Which fits really.

The recruitment and maintenance costs are under consideration, along with all the other brigades.  So, yeah, it is piled on the plate already.

Last is the training level.  I tend to agree with this.  I think all troops raised should be green and require training, including companions.  Either that or recruits should be able to train up to veteran status.  I do not know if either of those is doable without code changes. 

I suspect that making most companions start green would change the flow of the game considerably.  Would increase the value of summoned brigades compared to others though.  The question is whether it would be good or bad for the overall balance of the game.

---

BTW, folks, Brekk makes all final decisions on this stuff.  I can have recommendations, thoughts, ideas, arguments, and what have you, but ultimately it is Brekk's game.  So if you are thinking I change things, I do not.  I am an assistant, not the boss.

Isnt that what an Olorin would do?  Guide and advise, not dictate and demand?

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I agree Xerro. I have found this to be true with any of the non-evil kingdoms - over time the troop cost becomes oppressive (good word for it). As the RA I had strong groups and was paying over 140k gold a turn, a similar amount of food (and STILL couldn't take a legendary pop center).

An interesting data point, I don't have time to compute, would be troop strength per food and gold - which troops are efficient and which are not.

Ranger is a terrible  kingdom because of that. Played them once, will not again until their costs are changed .  No little flying scout can overcome that restriction.

[Pine Needle]

Were these troop strength changes implemented?

Thanks.;

[Frostking]

I have a comment/complaint. I was playing the fairies, had 7 fairies' brigades, 1 chimeras, 20 sprites, 20 pixies, 5 gargoyles, 5 manticores, 3 - 5th level wizards, decent leaders (marshal or warlord , can remember). Group was 153000. Fought a full red dragon army 4 red dragons, 1 phoenix, 5 wyverns, 10 bats. Probably 75-80 thousand. His leadership was about mine, and his wizards were slightly worse. We fight, full attack from him, full defensive for me. He losses 17 percent and i loose everything. Why give strengths that don't match up to how they fight at all. I probably should have destroyed him, I would have been ok with both of us loosing 80000 in strength. But to be destroyed like that kind of ticked me off. I don't understand the battle system here at all and have been severely punished in games by it once the game goes to turn 18 plus.

[Mauler]

I have a comment/complaint.  I was playing the fairies, had 7 fairies' brigades, 1 chimeras, 20 sprites, 20 pixies, 5 gargoyles, 5 manticores, 3 - 5th level wizards, decent leaders (marshal or warlord , can remember).  Group was 153000.  Fought a full red dragon army 4 red dragons, 1 phoenix, 5 wyverns, 10 bats.  Probably 75-80 thousand.  His leadership was about mine, and his wizards were slightly worse.  We fight, full attack from him, full defensive for me.  He losses 17 percent and i loose everything.  Why give strengths that don't match up to how they fight at all.  I probably should have destroyed him, I would have been ok with both of us loosing 80000 in strength.  But to be destroyed like that kind of ticked me off. I don't understand the battle system here at all and have been severely punished in games by it once the game goes to turn 18 plus.

Hey Frostking,
We would need to know terrain, artifacts, and spells to properly compare. Out of the gate, the FF are one of the weakest kingdom with the weakest companions and the RD the strongest. The defensive adjustments are likely 1 vs 3 or more.

[Strongwill]

I have a comment/complaint.  I was playing the fairies, had 7 fairies' brigades, 1 chimeras, 20 sprites, 20 pixies, 5 gargoyles, 5 manticores, 3 - 5th level wizards, decent leaders (marshal or warlord , can remember).  Group was 153000.  Fought a full red dragon army 4 red dragons, 1 phoenix, 5 wyverns, 10 bats.  Probably 75-80 thousand.  His leadership was about mine, and his wizards were slightly worse.  We fight, full attack from him, full defensive for me.  He losses 17 percent and i loose everything.  Why give strengths that don't match up to how they fight at all.  I probably should have destroyed him, I would have been ok with both of us loosing 80000 in strength.  But to be destroyed like that kind of ticked me off. I don't understand the battle system here at all and have been severely punished in games by it once the game goes to turn 18 plus.

Weaker troops need improved armor, weapons, and a high lvl shield to stand toe to toe with a military kingdom. Even then it’s all about mixture of troops and spells.

[Xerro]

My rather poor math skills have come to the following conclusions. The group strength is the amount of offense the group has. The defense is a damage divider. An average defense is 2. I also believe each group has a health score based on its defense rating. I think its a base 10 health per percent point times its defense rating. so it takes 20 points of damage to kill 1% of a brigade. Now a higher defense could have a divider of say 4. So a high defense brigade could take 4000 points to destroy divided by 4 its defense. So 16000 compared to the average of 4000. Now it gets worse with below average defenses. possibly having a defense of 1 ( or lower) so only 1000 points to kill. Hence why defense rating is SO important. A low defense group takes 1000 to kill or less. An average takes 4000. A high Defense group 16000 equivelant. This also effects magic damage. The rulebook does say group vs group is HARD to calculate. This is why. Group VS PC numbers are easier to calculate. However many forget to calculate the defense divisor against well fortified PC. Also capitals get a unknown defense bonus that has thrown many calculations off. These numbers could be wildly off but should demonstrate how some of these results occur.

[Strongwill]

Capital I think is +10%, 1st group is 10%, declared enemy is 10%… I think that’s right… so many many factors, terrain is huge also.