Useless or redundant units?

[Gandalf Parker]

Epaminondas said:

Dear Gandalf Parker,

We have some serious philosophical differences. Taken to extremes, what you seem to be suggesting is that the game is perfectly balanced, and there are no units that are extremely powerful or extremely weak or redundant per cost. Do you really believe this? It would assume that the game designers have infinite resources and infinite powers of judgment. Even game makers with far greater resources tinkering games with far fewer variables and aspects like Blizzard take years to get the balance right.

I afraid of people who feel that balance should move closer to each nation getting equal pieces which wear different colored uniforms like in some games. And actually, I havent seen worthless units yet. Only worthless units to me. Most of the units people dont like are cheaper and less armored so they feel that they are worthless compared to the "better" units. To me thats a play style choice.

My personal preference (Pangaea) tends to get "improvement" suggestions which remove all of my favorite pieces, and replace them with more Ulmish pieces. Less stealth, more armor, and in my opinion.. less Pangaean.

By the way, regarding your implication/accusation that I am singling out units that do not fit my playing style, well, I tend to be an extreme experimenter. I am not the type of person that finds the "right" tactic and play it to death. So while I can appreciate a specific analysis of where I have gone, to make a quasi-ad hominem argument along the lines of "You are too stupid to have figured out how to use the unit" isn't really helpful for anyone.

I dont think I commented on any particular persons choices. I talked generally based on many conversations Ive seen. If you feel I was talking about you in particular then I apologize for that.

And Im not trying to imply that any one is too stupid to figure out a style different than their own. If I did then I would have to include myself since obviously I could never master the use of certain nations and their units on the level of some of the players whose strategy stresses large armored armies built with formulas so efficient as to make an accountant dizzy. But I am leary of declaring such strategies as the ultimate winner of everything. Nor do I consider them the ultimate decider of what is good or not good to have in the game.

[Graeme Dice]

Gandalf Parker said:
Most of the units people dont like are cheaper and less armored so they feel that they are worthless compared to the "better" units. To me thats a play style choice.

To be frank Gandalf, people feel that the unarmored versions of units that have the same gold cost as armoured versions are useless because they _are_ useless compared to the other choices. Battles between equal gold costs of hysapists and cardaces will end in an overwhelming victory for the hysapists. Equal resource cost battles are closer, but gold, and not resources, is almost always the limiting factor on troop production beyond the first dozen turns. If you have the ability to choose between slingers and shortbows, the contest comes out overwhelmingly in favour of the short bows. There are some nations where the basic troops have natural protection values that make light infantry more effective, such as Atlantis or C'Tis, but on the whole, light infantry are to be entirely avoided. The same can be said of unarmoured horse archers, who cost more gold than regular archers, yet do not provide any kind of battlefield or strategic advantage over foot archers.

My personal preference (Pangaea) tends to get "improvement" suggestions which remove all of my favorite pieces, and replace them with more Ulmish pieces. Less stealth, more armor, and in my opinion.. less Pangaean.

As it currently stands, most of Pangaea's units serve little useful function. Pangaea's best stealthy raiding units are also their most effective fighters in a pitched battle. You could remove both generic Satyr units, both minotaurs, and centaurs archers without having any serious effect on the nation.

Satyr sneaks at least have a strategic use, hoplites have the armour to not be slaughtered by arrows, and revelers go berserk so they can be an effective meat shield. The two generic satyrs have almost no armour, and a morale score of 8 that virtually guarantees that they will run at the first sign of trouble. The minotaurs would be decent if trampling units would also attack smaller units with their weapons, and if they had attack and defense skills at least as good as a normal human. Currently, they are size 3, and meaning that they they don't cause sufficient damage to size 2 troops to be worthwhile. Centaur longbows cost almost three times as much gold as Man's longbows, giving them only a third of the offensive punch. Then there's centaur warriors, which completely overshadow any other Pangaean unit other than the Cataphracts and white centaurs. If given the choice between purchasing one centaur warrior, or four satyrs with javelins and spears, the correct choice is almost always going to be the single centaur warrior.

[Gandalf Parker]

Graeme Dice said:

To be frank Gandalf, people feel that the unarmored versions of units that have the same gold cost as armoured versions are useless because they _are_ useless compared to the other choices.

Thank you Graeme.
You have always been one of my best examples. Lets both hope that neither of us ever have anything to say in the games development.

[calmon]

Just some comments to the Arco Chariot Archers:

They are quite usefull because after taking the 10 damage (full hitpoints) only the archer dies and the chariot still attack with the charioteer and have another 10 hitpoints!

The best thing is after the battle the chariot is full repaired and has a new archer.

The normal chariot has a better protection but die after 10 damage.

I use both units and especially the archer chariots. The good defence, the acceptable protection and the 2 Lifes make them extremly powerfull in early game. They tremple independent forces all in ground and lost nothing most of the time.

[Graeme Dice]

Gandalf Parker said:
You have always been one of my best examples. Lets both hope that neither of us ever have anything to say in the games development.

Why? Do you have a use for any of the Pangaean units I mentioned that makes them a better use of your gold than the other available units? If not, then those units should be improved so that they add useful capabilities to the nation. Minotaurs can't be fixed without either removing their trampling or fixing trample so that normal attacks also take place, but satyrs could be given a use by dropping their cost by a great deal. Stating that the truth of a matter must lie somewhere between two opposing viewpoints is known as the Golden Mean fallacy.

The game would be improved, and would be much easier to learn, if many of the units that have little use compared to the other available units were improved. Perhaps by halfing or quartering the gold cost of those units. Realistically, a unit such as militia that's unarmoured and has a morale of 8 is probably worth somewhere between 2-5 gold when compared to the performance of heavy infantry at the same gold cost. Such a change would have the additional advantage of bringing the relative abundance of heavy infantry to light infantry closer to historical levels. As an example, the Persian army outlined by Herodotus was virtually all unarmoured.