Grossly, insanely different PD strengths

[Archonsod]

Not really. I never bother with PD for Caelum (no point, Caelum's troops need scripting to be any use), and it's rare I put in more than four or five PD with most nations.
For those wondering, I find it more effective than the traditional 20 PD for putting off players looking for an easy victim. Just make sure they think the cash you've saved has went on your army instead

Nations with good PD, such as EA Abyssia, tend to use it more because it can do a decent job. This can be a disadvantage as much as an advantage though - a couple of times I've foolishly invested in PD when actual troops would have been a better use of gold.

[Lord_Bob]

Caleum fliers are capable of rapidly countering such raids with their flying armies/mages. Stealth nations can "surprise and destroy" such armies. Also, they are capable of equal raids against normal PD with their stealth units, so it balances.

You not "needing" good PD because the enemy does not raid weakly is like saying the enemy didn't press the "I win!" button because there was no "I win!" button. A truism, yes, but not very important. If you have good PD, then stupid weak raids work as a surprise tactic exactly once. Then they stop working. It's not exactly surprising that your opponent doesn't build a strategy around something that doesn't work against you.

[Sombre]

Uh,.. if a single stupid weak raid makes you go all nuts on PD and build 20 in every province because OMG 30 GOLD PER POINT, it already worked.

[Tichy]

In MP, I find that strong PD nations actually make the strategic decision more complicated. (Granted this is on the basis of having played exactly 3.5 MP games: Perpetuality = 1.5). If you know your PD is trash don't use it. Plop down PD 1 so scouts can't raid you and ignore the rest. But if you have good PD you have to decide whether or not to invest in it.

TC PD11 can stop most random event indy raids, for example. Prevents some income loss and diverting forces to retake provinces, but at the cost of a less mobile army.

But even here, the strategic decision never thinks PD v Human Opponent.

[KissBlade]

If you don't even build a SINGLE point of PD, you will lose to any player worth his salt. Guaranteed. Qm and I have shown many newbier players to at least sink a point or risk losing provinces to a scout.

[NTJedi]

KissBlade said:
If you don't even build a SINGLE point of PD, you will lose to any player worth his salt. Guaranteed. Qm and I have shown many newbier players to at least sink a point or risk losing provinces to a scout.

Some nations have mages as part of their PD... for example one nation has 1air and 1holy horsemen as commanders. As a result 3 rounds of combat with two of these PD mages usually results in 6 phantasmal warriors or banishing undead! Other nations have regular stand behind (do_nothing) commanders.

I don't mind seeing some nations with weaker PD, but hopefully DOM_4 will allow pretenders different options for upgrading existing PD such as improving the type of weapons being used, type of shields being used, and type of armor being worn, etc.

[KissBlade]

NTJedi said:

Some nations have mages as part of their PD... for example one nation has 1air and 1holy horsemen as commanders. As a result 3 rounds of combat with two of these PD mages usually results in 6 phantasmal warriors or banishing undead! Other nations have regular stand behind (do_nothing) commanders.

I don't mind seeing some nations with weaker PD, but hopefully DOM_4 will allow pretenders different options for upgrading existing PD such as improving the type of weapons being used, type of shields being used, and type of armor being worn, etc.

I am so confused as to why you quoted me... o_O?

[Archonsod]

Lord_Bob said:
It's not exactly surprising that your opponent doesn't build a strategy around something that doesn't work against you.

Yes, but at the same time it's foolish to build a strategy based on something which simply does not work for your nation, such as relying on sub-par PD alone to discourage raiding. As you're recent game shows, Bandar can go far simply by stationing a spare mage or similar unit in a province, and enjoy watching them obliterate would be raiders while the raiders themselves waste time and energy trying to deal with a horde of monkeys.

If you don't even build a SINGLE point of PD, you will lose to any player worth his salt. Guaranteed. Qm and I have shown many newbier players to at least sink a point or risk losing provinces to a scout.

Only a problem if I was hoping said provinces would remain mine for long, or generally wasn't expecting a scout to take them. If I'm following a scorched Earth policy, then any province I don't have an army in is going to have literally been bled dry already, thus losing it is matterless to me and does nothing for you (depending on scales, it could actually be a liability). Like most things in the game, it's a question of which strategy you adopt, sometimes losing a province can be devestating, sometimes you won't notice, and sometimes it can even be intentional.

[Sir_Dr_D]

It would help if size of the units is taken into conideration when determining auto army routing. Then 2 markatas would count as one regular sized unit routing, and then the rest of the army would be less likely to route when the markatas do. That would make the army routing more logical. Giants woudn't care if all the goblins ran, nearly as much as goblins would care if the Jotuns ran.

[Lord_Bob]

In my ideal world
Units should simply count to routing by size. A size 1 unit contributes one point. A size 6 unit contributes 6 points. Not exact, no, but simple, understandable, and it fixes the largest distortions.

PD should be made stronger, but nations should be limited to buying only 20 points per turn per province. A nation should not be able to drop 1200 gold into a province the turn after they take it in preparation for the counter attack. Does it make any logical sense at all that T'ien Ch'i can boost it's main army by 1300 gold in one turn by spending 450 gold on PD? PD being used for what it is meant to be used for will work just fine at 20 a point limit per turn. If someone wants to play games, they can easily buy 10 in all their provinces and then REALLY boost it in a single turn to 30.

PD should be given the "home province" morale bonus. Obviously, they are in their home province.
OR
*PD can be given a special "milita" morale penalty of -1 and then made stronger to compensate. This represents cheap troops that either win easily, or bolt.*

Since the point of PD is to stop small attacks, not build "uber-armies", then the level 20 troops should be present from level 1 and players should recieve half of them per point. Programatically, set PD 20 to zero, except the commander, and put in half at PD-1.