Questions and Comments About the Improved MA Ulm

[CUnknown]

Just to be contrary to majority opinion, I might as well throw out my 2 cents. You probably don't want to listen to me, because everyone else disagrees.

I -love- Arbelests!!!

I normally use about a 1:1 ratio of arbelests to infantry, because I do like meat shields for them. Although as people have pointed out, the arbelests don't do that bad in melee.

I think Arbelests are hands-down the best missile weapon in the game, at least against high-value targets. So Tuidjy doesn't burst a vein, I will add that this opinion has already been disproven by him. Heh.

I just remember the time when I killed an enemy SC god with nothing but 100 arbelests. This god had a high protection, luck, and an air shield active. This is the way the combat went:

Turn 1-5. Arbelests fire from long-range, doing slight damage. SC god buffs out.

Turn 6. SC god flies into the mix of my arbelests, killing a couple of them.

Turn 7. Arbelests fire at point-blank range, all hitting and killing the god, lol!!!

That combat made me forever a complete devotee of arbelests. They have my vote from now until the end of time as "best missile unit ever."

I don't think that 100 crossbowmen would have been up for the task, since the high protection value of that god would have mostly negated the damage dealt by them. Arbelests do -much- more damage per hit than x-bows, especially against high-value (high-protection) targets, i.e. the ones you -care- about. X-bows can kill 12 protection infantry better than arbelests, but who cares??

[Sombre]

Arbalests are better than crossbows against high prot targets. Tuidjy talked about that quite a bit when he was testing. You say those are the only targets you -care- about. Other people clearly disagree, or indy archers wouldn't be so popular.

It's quite telling that the arbs have basically no synergy with Ulmish troops, while shortbows have plenty.

Btw: did the SC have a shield? A good shield + airshield + luck should have stopped every single shot.

[CUnknown]

I know people disagree, that is why I prefaced my response like I did. By all means, do not listen to me.

But, I'm not saying not to recruit indy shortbows. It's just that they are sort of a throw-away add-on unit whereas your arbelests are your core, heavy-damage-dealing unit.

I only care about doing damage to high-protection targets because the indy shortbows do great against the low-protection ones. They have that covered already. We are talking the targets they don't have covered, those are the only ones that matter.

I think this "synergy" argument is a little misplaced. I don't think it's very relevant here. Lack of synergy is a minor side-effect of having a missile unit that is so astoundingly effective that it can actually harm your own extremely tough units. That is a good thing, not a bad thing.

Attempting to paint that as a bad thing strikes me as a little odd, honestly. I mean, you'd rather they do less damage?

Or you'd rather Ulm have indy-shortbow style units to recruit rather than arbelests? That's a joke. You can recruit indy shortbows anywhere, arbelests are unique to Ulm. Revel in Ulm's unique POWER!!!

edit: I can't remember about the shield, in all likelihood that pretender was not carrying one. It was a while ago.

[Sombre]

Ulm would be better if it had indy shortbow units as recruitables, yes. It would speed up the Ulmish early game.

And yes, Arbalests doing so much damage is a bad thing in the context of Ulm. Your troops have heavy prot, your enemy's will generally speaking have medium or light prot. Against light prot shortbows are better, against medium crossbows are better. Arbalests are basically designed to kill shieldless Ulm infantry.

Obviously I'm not saying arbalests would be better if their damage were reduced to crossbow levels and the fire time remained 1/3. What I'm saying is that they're worse than crossbows most of the time.

You seem to be making the same mistake as the guy in the thread before (perhaps it was you, I forget). Yes Arbalests do more damage per hit. No that doesn't mean they're better or more effective. They have to be taken in context. If the usual enemy was heavy prot shieldless infantry they'd be great. But that isn't the case. In this thread people are specifically talking about their use against indies too, for the most part.

[Endoperez]

I'd like to add to that. I've tried expanding without arbalests, and it's much easier. I'm not quite certain how many infantries I need to beat an indep force, but it's less than half. I'd need almost equal numbers of arbalests to do the same, for similar resource cost.

[CUnknown]

Sombre said:
Ulm would be better if it had indy shortbow units as recruitables, yes.

Of course, I agree. More options is always a good thing. But surely you don't mean -instead- of arbelests? Why would you want to give up the option to recruit an extremely-heavy hitting unique unit in exchange for a dime-a-dozen throw-away that you can recruit anywhere?

Sombre said:And yes, Arbalests doing so much damage is a bad thing in the context of Ulm.

I wish the opposite, I'd rather have a unit that does 25 armor-negating area-effect damage, even if it caused mass friendly-fire causulties. You seem to be in a position of arguing that a unit sucks because it 'does too much damage', something that is very counter-intuitive.

[Endoperez]

Early game, Ulm would benefit much more from recruitable shortbows and recruitable arbalests, and it can easily take turn or two to get both 20 archers and a commander for them in the early game even if you get lucky. You could have second expansion army starting turn 3 instead of turn 5, and your initial army would have taken fewer losses, if Ulm could recruit cheap archers.

Having access to arbalestS is nice if you have to counter something that has high protection and no shield, but other nations can do the same easier with their battle mages. There aren't that many nations that are going to send something like that against you - in MA, only Ulm and Abysia come immediately to mind, and Abysia has tower-shielded units to put to the frontline to draw the worst fire.

[Sombre]

CUnknown said:
Of course, I agree. More options is always a good thing. But surely you don't mean -instead- of arbelests? Why would you want to give up the option to recruit an extremely-heavy hitting unique unit in exchange for a dime-a-dozen throw-away that you can recruit anywhere?

Because shortbows are more useful. This position has already been explained. They are available in indy provinces but in the early game particularly you'd be able to mass them far faster if they were recruitable at the fort, particularly given Ulm's high level of resources. Players who don't use arbalests much, particularly when it comes to expansion, would obviously benefit from them being swapped for shortbow archers.

I wish the opposite, I'd rather have a unit that does 25 armor-negating area-effect damage, even if it caused mass friendly-fire causulties. You seem to be in a position of arguing that a unit sucks because it 'does too much damage', something that is very counter-intuitive.

You wish the opposite of what? Are you suggesting I'm saying arbalests would be better if they did less damage? That's odd, I could have sworn I said:

"Obviously I'm not saying arbalests would be better if their damage were reduced to crossbow levels and the fire time remained 1/3. What I'm saying is that they're worse than crossbows most of the time."

I also don't recall claiming that arbalests suck in this thread. I just said I don't use them for expansion and that crossbows and shortbows are generally better, especially for Ulm (due to friendly fire issues).

Your attempt to put words in my mouth is transparent and rude. You have no argument other than the facile "No you're wrong, arbalests do more damage/are extremely-heavy hitting/are powerful". It's true if you ignore absolutely everything else in the crossbow/shortbow/arbalest comparison but damage, they win and so do you. Congratulations.

[CUnknown]

Sombre said:
Players who don't use arbalests much, particularly when it comes to expansion, would obviously benefit from them being swapped for shortbow archers.

Sure, but it's just as obvious to say that players who don't recruit Vans as Vanheim would benefit by having them swapped for militia.

Sombre said:

You wish the opposite of what?

I mean, I would rather arbelests do more damage (say, 20 ap) and have a still reduced rate of fire (say once every 4 turns). At that point, they would mow down thugs and SCs with ease, and these are the units that most people say Ulm has difficulty dealing with.

Sombre said:
Are you suggesting I'm saying arbalests would be better if they did less damage?

I'm sorry, maybe I misunderstood your position. But.. isn't this what you're saying? You are touting indy shortbows, which are missile weapons that do less damage. It seems as if you prefer these sorts of weapons over the larger, slower firing ones. I personally think that indy shortbows border on uselessness at times, even in the early game.

Your attempt to put words in my mouth is transparent and rude.

I apoligize if I was putting words in your mouth, I didn't mean to.. it just seemed like that's what you were arguing to me.

People are saying "indy shortbows are better for expansion than arbelests", but I don't generally make arbelests to help with expansion. I make them from turn 1, but I am mostly doing that just to get them experience stars, for use later on. I suppose I'm not as concerned about rate of expansion as some other people.

It's certainly not always true that faster expansion = better expansion. Okay, now I'm the one switching to counter-intuitive arguments.

I'll grant that indy shortbows may give faster expansion potential than arbelests. But, I still submit that arbelests are a far better choice in the early game. Shortbows will give you provices, but then I'd like to have them all jump off a bridge, unless I have access to flaming arrows, anyway. They are not worth their upkeep cost past maybe turn 10.

Arbelests will nearly always give you bang for you buck, unless the spell Storm is in play.