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Post by Godfred Thraw BayardsKing(GT) on Jun 6, 2016 23:29:42 GMT
and simplify the roll dice for capture and kill
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Post by Caerleon (Tristan) on Jun 7, 2016 0:21:31 GMT
As it is right now cavalry is pretty shit. Mainly because outriders die first, and the other two units have a shitty cost for their benefit (I am disregarding exotic units). They really only shine if you win the fight, and can use the dice roll modifier (DRM). Remember it caps at +/-1. General scores, cavalry and castle all contributes to DRM. I concur on Cavalry being underwhelming, which is why I made some suggestions to improve it. The whole point is that you do not need to pay the spell cost each round. You prepare it once, and then keep it in your spell slot for free until you need it. For instance you could degrade a lvl 2 spell slot to lvl 1, and use 12 rp to prepare 3 summons (let us say i have a 3/3/4 general). In spell slot 3 you prepare battle fury for 4 units, which cost 8 rp. Now you effectively have two spell slots less, but you are ready if someone attacks. If you fight in a province with a castle, you will very likely win since you have superior morale, a decent general and castle table bonus to negate enemy unit advantages. It costs 20 RP to be ready, or 5GB equivalent. If you only expect to be attacked once a year, this will be many times more cost effective than paying upkeep for normal soldiers (which is 5gb+ for just one unit, who will spend all his time recovering). Add a 3.5 morale unit with some trait, which has higher mortality than your summons and you have a super strong defense that costs 1.5GB and a wage war per turn, along with 2 actions and 20rp to prepare. I disagree with some of the assumptions in your example: - you stage the conflict in a province with a castle of which there are 2 in the game. - you assume the caster has battle fury researched (if they don't this is 3 research actions to research). - you assume the conflict is won in turn, if it isn't the cost needs to be paid each turn (along with the spell memorisation costs). - you assign a 3/3/4 general, which is a character with a +3 proficiency modifier with Warfare Prof + Exp + Int12/Wis12/Cha14 (this is approx. DDC20 Hire Help), and requires a readied action to appoint them general of your army. - Wage War is a realm action for most (probably all) caster regents so it is unlikely they will take one each turn. I agree that the Summon spells are overpowered, I think we have a difference of opinion to the degree that they are overpowered. Which is why I suggested a number of what I think are minor changes that slightly increase the cost to use summoned units. If they don't go far enough then they can be increased upwards, but I think small steps are a better way to start.
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Post by Mercia(andreas) on Jun 7, 2016 2:29:50 GMT
The strength of summon 1 is that they can replace all cheap units and levies( and militias), as they provide better morale and effectively recover 100% hp every 6 war moves at no real additional cost. And there are more castles than shown in the PH whether this is due to the rate of updating or they are not added untill battle proven i do not know.
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Post by X-Nemeth on Jun 7, 2016 7:56:19 GMT
There are more castles than shown on the map right now.
If a war takes longer than 6-12 war moves, then it is likely that someone made a calculation error and overreached. Also, you only need one turn for your allies to step in and provide aid. It is a very reasonable assumption. Only ToB has had a longer continuous war, and not by much. Dont forget Bayard pulled out and that slavers and pirates went home after a single turn. Same goes for GLF and the isle of man incident.
Research progresses with 2 points if it is successful, so most likely it will only be two actions to get that spell. The Divine version is even more powerful.
A bard with expertise warfare and 14/14/14+ is easy to get. But bards are OP. For wizards/sorcerers, it is harder yes, but you could appoint general as a readied court action. DDC20 for hire help is not that bad, given that you most likely already has an established character, which mean he would cost you 15rp for like a 90% chance to succeed. But it is a moot point in regards to magic, as you would need such a character, summons or not, wizard or not.
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Post by Aethor of Helna (ST) on Jun 7, 2016 8:24:24 GMT
Well, the ST-Slaver war has taken 24 war moves (largely due to inaction, but still 12 or so active war moves for now, so not an entirely cold war), so that's not entirely accurate. It also makes more sense for a war to drag out over multiple skirmishes than for doom-stacks to walk around, which has a tendency to happen I've noticed. Isn't a skilled commander supposed to be able to force an opponent into a smaller field of battle, thus negating the advantage of large armies?
Investing 15 RP gives +10 to the roll, and with most courts being at -1, I'm failing to see how that's even close to a 90% chance to succeed on a DDC 20? (5 base, 5 bard, 5 lvl, 5 expert, 5 most likely unreasonable for most domains to hire bards (they'd have to look beyond their court - sure you'd have a minstrel, but it's not like Albion's courts are chock full of war-genius minstrels), 5-10 ability scores - 30-35DDC, give or take various modifiers, but definitely more than 20 DDC and definitely not a 90% chance to hire). And then you have to either promote him or give him a title, so it actually takes quite a bit to produce a bard with expertise warfare and 14/14/14.
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Post by X-Nemeth on Jun 7, 2016 8:35:49 GMT
you do not necessarily want a bard. Have you tried to hire someone you actually know? 5 base, 5 lvl, 5 expert, -? well known.
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Post by Aethor of Helna (ST) on Jun 7, 2016 8:37:03 GMT
My point was that hiring a Expert Warfare Bard with 14/14/14+ stats is not 90% chance with 15RP invested by any stretch, and therefore not easy.
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Post by X-Nemeth on Jun 7, 2016 8:54:02 GMT
Also, only two war moves has been spent actively engaging the slavers.
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Post by Aethor of Helna (ST) on Jun 7, 2016 9:16:27 GMT
The war between ST and Slavers has clearly taken more than 6-12 war moves. There were 5 war moves spent in T1 alone. Then there's the levies called in T3, and ship movement in T4. Whether they were actively engaged or not as irrelevant - more than two war moves has been spent on that war. I'd say as long as a war is ongoing, then every war move counts, because inaction is just as important as action.
Edit: Besides the battles themselves, armies need to move, have a source of supplies (whether an friendly/allied supply point or through forage/raiding), etc...
It's disingenuous to say that a war only took 1-2 war moves, if it takes several war moves or other skirmishes before a decisive battle occurs. Fact is that it takes a while to move from point A to point B, and that's part of the cost of war.
Similarly, most casters would ultimately lose in a prolonged war against someone with raised armies. They quite simply can't keep it up over several turns.
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Post by Maelgwyn ap Cadwgan (TOG) on Jun 7, 2016 11:38:27 GMT
The cavalry might be underpowered in general but I am not disappointed in the Knights. From my new understanding of the way the war system works, they are the only reason our battlelines stayed in the field for as long as they did in several of the battles. While a unit on your side its morale is still unbroken the army stays in the battle and dishes out (and the lowest mortality possibly receives) damage. Their high mortality means that on a retreat they are very likely to take the hits yet considering we've quit the field in every single battle and the first the two of them got damaged and the third battle one got destroyed I think they did prétty well. The only reason TOG & Camelot's Knights were not able to heal up a little in between all those battles is that they were in hostile territory and pressed. If not, I can imagine that mine would still be equally alive as Camelot's are. In the human realm, with their experience, I find Camelot it's Knights to be the singly most dangerous unit in active formation. (Seeing you can stack an entire army under them.) Pure statistically I find the regular cavalry to be the most underwhelming. High mustercost and upkeep for rather thin abilities. A little inside information. The TOB war was only cut short for political reasons and the intercession of the weather. If the winter had fallen a season later the war had surely be continued. (At least for quite some participants.) I think the main point you are missing on the spell preparation is that as a Temple domain some of us have irons in the fire all over Albion. You state you have actions to spare, I could not even imagine a situation where this was true. I have to calculate in my Prepare Realm Spell actions (and additional Court actions) 1-3 turns in advance. Further, I am not going to state I do not in fact have defence spells prepared, but it is nigh on impossible to be constantly prepared to a)Counter hostile Realm Magic b) The chance of Invasion c) cast all the actual Realms Spells expected from you. Personally, opposed to what you've said about the threat of war being a once a turn event, I've been in a Cold or actual war situation with several domains since the start of the game. On the Morale Boost & penalties, we have yet to see any of them cast though I imagine to see it happening in the near future. Again however, one needs troops to actually boost. If a caster has 4 slots and 2 of them are blocked by prepared spells he is very much in a disadvantage. Also a spell cast from a slot still blocks it until next turn so one cannot prepare a new spell in it during that domain turn. Those prepared spells thus limit your realms ability by quite some. The action, GB & RP economy just inhibits having all those spells prepared or sometimes even the ability to prepare them in time. Which I do not see as an 'issue' by the way, this is where the difficulty and the fun of balancing all your actions lies for this type of domain. I have great respect for the others from what I've gathered they've been doing with their resources. As far as I know research on spells is always succesful. It does not require a check, it does mean it has a standard and steady progression. For sure I can imagine that a Landed Regent with actions to spare, a castle, a treasury, and a boatload of RP (which landed regents seem to stack up on) would be very strong if he or she could summon troops. Which he or she can already for free with Levy. However, from my side, for Temples the situation is just different. I see the Summon Army as a good boost to allies or a poor man's defense. (That being said, Druids can in fact summon much more than I can pure level wise but the RP cost is still inhibitive.) The strength of summon 1 is that they can replace all cheap units and levies( and militias), as they provide better morale and effectively recover 100% hp every 6 war moves at no real additional cost. And there are more castles than shown in the PH whether this is due to the rate of updating or they are not added untill battle proven i do not know. How do they effectively recover 100% RP? You can either re-cast to maintain at current status or summon new ones (possibly far from the fighting). Though if you mean the latter I concede you could re-summon, keeping in mind that if your Temple/Source network is inhibited you are incapable of doing so in the correct location.
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Post by X-Nemeth on Jun 7, 2016 14:15:20 GMT
It is the average morale of an army that determines how long it stays there. So 4 knights with a +1.5 morale blessing led by a high hp, capable blooded commander in a region with a friendly castle is nigh impossible to beat if they are not facing overwhelming odds. But they will not deal as much damage as if they were accompagnied by levies. Considering the change to healing spells, I would say any temple with access to such a force were borderline overpowered, but then again you pay for it.
I have no problem with temples having access to realm magic. My beef is the fact that half the landed realms has as well. Realms that do not have their spell slots locked due to "services provided", and who are not stretched thin by being involved in conflict over half of Albion. Realms who have 1-4 sources, enough to cast very good, very cheap spells that are really really good.
I would suggest all battle realm magic is moved up 2-4 levels in difficulty.
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Post by Maelgwyn ap Cadwgan (TOG) on Jun 7, 2016 17:09:02 GMT
Making it impossible to cast for anyone except Merlin or the Terror. All decent battle related realm magic, excepting Bless the Sacred fleet, is quite high up considering the level of the casters in this game.
I am sorry, I understand you find realm magic to be powerful but your examples, such as the previous one with the knights/castle/realm magic are most unrealistic. I realise I am defensive myself on the subject as it is part of my play, yet I must ask; take a step back and see what you are suggesting. Putting all battle related realm magic at 200%-400% more difficulty, with a previous statement of not being completely clear on their workings, does not sound of balancing. It sounds more as if you feel upset because other domains that do have it might have an edge over you. Feeling like those specific other landed realms have that is not a reason to completely alter magic for all, you see that change does not hurt said realms nearly as much as it would cripple TOB/GLF/NSE/TOG, Merlin and the Terror.
So far we have hardly seen battle related realm magic in practice. Only summons/undead.
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Post by X-Nemeth on Jun 7, 2016 18:16:21 GMT
Are you telling me you do not have access to lvl 4/5 spell slots? As far as I can see most of the battle spells that do not deal damage directly are lvl 1-3. I suggest making them minimum lvl 4. The whole point of the above suggestion is to leave temple domains largely unaffected, since you do have access to lvl 4/5/6 spells, which the landed realms do not.
I would like to reiterate: Morale boost is that good.
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Post by Aethor of Helna (ST) on Jun 7, 2016 18:37:37 GMT
I think it's dangerous to assume/ask what lvl spells various domains have access to. For all we know, the landed domains that can cast spells also have access to lvl 4 or 5 spells. Are we just supposed to up it until they can't cast the spell? Or what will we do when they level up?
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Post by Godfred Thraw BayardsKing(GT) on Jun 7, 2016 20:34:55 GMT
the simpliest is to finish the crusade against MAgie
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