Topics

1

Suggestions Corner / Fix average players uninvolved state - Strategus

« on: December 01, 2011, 03:53:36 pm »

I posted this in the thread "Strategus - The poll" http://forum.c-rpg.net/index.php/topic,21140.0.html

Ignoring all the crying about archers and general balance that appears to be quite irrelevant to the topic of this thread, Zapper does, IMO have the basis of a good idea in one of his earlier posts.

If the amount of troops was highly limited per person, and there was some means by which people could "join battle" like in SP M&B whilst retaining control of the remaining forces after the battle there would be a lot more for your average strategus player to do.

Say for example a basic player could carry Y men, you could then level up some "strategus skills", crafting, leadership, first aid blahblah whatever that could potentially increase this limit. Maybe there could also be an increase in the amount of troops you can carry at level 5 and level 10 within a faction (this risk vs benefit is obvious). Further increases could be permitted with the ownership of fiefs.

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If each person had to then be present on the map in the correct location and move onto the initiator of the battle and enter it much like entering a village or attacking someone, within a specific amount of time, things could get interesting. Factions would require their players to actually be active and involved, it would not just be about mass production and there would be a very important space for independant armies and mercenary armies to support the larger factions as every active player would be a great asset.

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It would be even better if the roster for a battle could be split in ratio to the number of contributed troops so each warlord managed his own roster and brought his own equipment for his own troops. Of course if this is next to impossible to code then putting all tickets and equipment into a shared pool could do the job.

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Strategus Issues / De Bitre - VS - Village

« on: November 26, 2011, 09:26:50 pm »

So the server crashed.

Whats gonna happen? It is central to our plans that the village won so the army we have in the local area can make a swift counter attack and score an easy village. Last time this happened I heard the Fallen were awarded the village as a gift. I do not think this would be fair as the village was winning on account of our superior organizations and skills. I hope the battle will be re-scheduled, I was having some good fun

3

Game Balance Discussion / Throwing vs Archery vs Crossbow

« on: May 13, 2011, 03:36:33 am »

In this post I will compare the upper/mid range equipment in these three ranged schools of combat.


Javelins:

Requirements:
Power throw
WPF

Stats:
2 slots
3 ammo
33p damage

Strongbow + 1 stack of arrows:

Requirements:

Power draw
WPF

Stats:
2 slots
24 ammo (cheapest arrows)
27c damage (cheapest arrows)

Crossbow + 1 stack of bolts:

Requirements:
WPF

Stats:
2 slots
15 ammo (cheapest bolts)
54p damage (cheapest bolts)

*All info taken from the cRPG character equipment page at this point in time.

As you can see the throwing weapon has drastically less ammo than either of the other two methods of ranged combat.
It has comparable damage to the bow but inferior damage to the crossbow (at low levels of power throw, which are IMO more common). The lower bow damage will often be balanced by on average a higher power draw. Overall I think the damage is pretty even, thw bow may come off slightly worse purely on damage but this is made up for in other areas.

Which other areas?
Specifically in the amount of ammo, note how there are 24 arrows in a single quiver compared to the cross bow at 15 or the throwing at 3.

How does this ammo difference affect damage potential?

Bow: 27*24= 648 potential damage.
Crossbow: 54*15=810 potential damage.
Throwing: 33*3=99 potential damage.


Surely this massive difference in damage potential is evened out by some other advantage inherent in the throwing weapons?

1) You can carry a shield.
2) Maybe you can throw a bit faster than enemies can pull a bowstring. They are faster than a crossbow though.
3) You can use them as near useless melee weapons (bar the axes and lance which are near viable) if you have the correct WPF.

So maybe it is not all bad?

Well let us look at the disadvantages throwing weapons have as well shall we?

1) Less range
2) Less accuracy
3) Less ammo
4) More requirements than crossbows but lower damage compared.

I think those equal out any theoretical advantages of the thrower. Leaving nothing but the cold truth that the damage potential of a thrower is (at base stats) only 1/6 of that of an archer and 1/8 of that of a crossbowman. This is despite having exactly the same skill point and WPF requirements as an archer and MORE requirements than a crossbowman.

Specifically regarding one class in particular, the Javelin Cavalry, it is now no longer viable in the slightest. Unless you choose to take 6 javelins and no melee weapon. Then maybe you can take one or two enemy light cavalry down, so long as you are accurate. If that can in fact be called viable. 3 ammo is barely enough to kill a courser unless you hit it in the face when it is running at you.


I think the recent nerf is extremely unfair and goes so far as to make the class of a thrower whether dedicated, hybrid or horse pointless.
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I will forever resent the day I chose to be a thrower instead of a crossbowman because I like to avoid OP classes. Please someone on the dev team, help me understand. What was so overpowered about javelins that you had to make them suck so hard?