Shik town siege test

[SPQR]

Equipment tweaks for defender:
-Need more construction sites. Only had enough to build one thing (which was wasted on a small siege tower, who the fuck built that??), but had a ton of extra construction material.
-More pierce weapons, we had almost exclusively cut weaponry, which kinda sucked against plate
-More polearms, we ran out too soon and people started using 2handers instead, which is why 2handers ran out

Other than that the equipment was pretty good.

PS: apsod is gay

[justjr]

My KD 32:46 LOL
I was jumping down from 10/10 till the end

That was fun!

[PhantomZero]

We had well over 2000 swords and shields after all the 2H and Polearms had run out, as well as all the tickets.

We also had thousands of extra bolts but no crossbows. I too felt we lacked some decent piercing weapons.

Archers could probably use a nicer hat that isn't so heavy.

Some Steel Picks or Mallets are essential for good town/castle defense, but it looked like the attackers didn't have many shields anyways.

[okiN]

Defender had regular crossbow!

I think Shik gave the town a substandard amount of gold for its big population. What bow were they using?

And yeah, crossbows ran out pretty quick - only 300 or so were bought.

That's strange, for 20k tickets the AI should currently buy 2400 crossbows. Are you talking about Shik's gear or something?

-Need more construction sites. Only had enough to build one thing (which was wasted on a small siege tower, who the fuck built that??), but had a ton of extra construction material.

Hmm, the AI must not have had enough gold to buy all the sites, it should have had ten. I'll see if something can be done about that.

-More pierce weapons, we had almost exclusively cut weaponry, which kinda sucked against plate

Again:

It's not this specific, I guide the AI but it chooses the items itself based on a number of variables.

The variation is ultimately based on price range, it picks what it can afford given certain parameters. I can't directly influence the specific kinds of weapons it buys, just the number, value and class. I've added some variation by making it buy the same weapon/armour types at different amounts and prices, when previously there was only one of each item type at one price.

Anyway, I'll run my own town siege as well so that I can see it for myself. Not sure what kind of data collection Shik was doing here, haven't heard from him yet.

[PhantomZero]

That's strange, for 20k tickets the AI should currently buy 2400 crossbows. Are you talking about Shik's gear or something?

Hmm, the AI must not have had enough gold to buy all the sites, it should have had ten. I'll see if something can be done about that.

The town did buy 10 sites, but due to scaling, only one was able to be equipped and placed. After being built it promptly sank into the ground, but I think that was because someone picked a small siege tower for whatever reason instead of the healing tent.

Also,  It is very hard for catapults so close to the town walls, it's siege tower or ladders, and most of the time the siege tower is unusable due to terrain.

When might we see a weapon rack to refill arrows bolts and thrown weapons? It will prevent archers jumping to their deaths to refill ammo, but it will probably double the amount of arrows used in sieges.

[okiN]

Ah, I see. The scaling thing is a bit unfortunate, didn't think of that. Might have to increase the amounts bought.

Couldn't tell you when weapon racks will be in, I'm just tweaking some values here, devs do the coding.

Edit: I think I fixed the issue with siege props and scaling, just need chadz to slot in the new numbers and then we'll see in the next battle!

[SPQR]

I think Shik gave the town a substandard amount of gold for its big population. What bow were they using?

I think we had Tartar bows...?

That's strange, for 20k tickets the AI should currently buy 2400 crossbows. Are you talking about Shik's gear or something?

No I think we did have 2400 crossbows. The problem is absolutely everyone but archers takes a crossbow, because if you're melee your choices are:
1) Sit around fiddling your thumbs until they storm the walls
2) Grab a crossbow and hurl bolts at em

So the crossbows went really fast, with 7x or x8 scaling, we're only talking about 300ish crossbows total. That being said, our team did waste a ton of them.

[Keshian]

I think we had Tartar bows...?

No I think we did have 2400 crossbows. The problem is absolutely everyone but archers takes a crossbow, because if you're melee your choices are:
1) Sit around fiddling your thumbs until they storm the walls
2) Grab a crossbow and hurl bolts at em

So the crossbows went really fast, with 7x or x8 scaling, we're only talking about 300ish crossbows total. That being said, our team did waste a ton of them.

Thats too many xbows (over 1/10 the the number of tickets means everyone spawns even with 1 wpf and doesn't reuse properly), which with such a narrow wall to defend for cities is ridiculous.  A solid set of defenders could have killed over twice their number and not once did atatckers come close to even getting on the walls because during the first half 80% of defenders were ranged shooting down anyone who even tried to climb a ladder and by the second half, many attackers had rage quit because continuous dying in spawn due to masive ranged spam.

If you want a balance between ranged and melee fighting (where people vie back and forth trying to get a foothold on the walls) you need fewer bows/xbows so only the people with proficiency use them and reuse them.  The complaint that people got bored and started jumping down en masse is because there simply was too much ranged on defenders side (normal xbows reload fast and allowed for a continuous hailstorm around attacker's spawn that cause half of attackers to rage quit).

[Jarlek]

I think we had Tartar bows...?

No I think we did have 2400 crossbows. The problem is absolutely everyone but archers takes a crossbow, because if you're melee your choices are:
1) Sit around fiddling your thumbs until they storm the walls
2) Grab a crossbow and hurl bolts at em

So the crossbows went really fast, with 7x or x8 scaling, we're only talking about 300ish crossbows total. That being said, our team did waste a ton of them.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. BUY ROCKS! Make something where you can get a refill of them! Throw rocks at them attackers! Also ROLLING FIRE LOGS! And POTS OF OIL!

(click to show/hide)

I really want rocks to get a HUGE buff in damage, an ability to "refill" (pick up from ground/stone basket) and that they are NOT affected by power throw (because that would be OP). It would make especially sieges more fun for melee defenders, there wouldn't be any silly suicidejumps and it actually makes damn sense! Defenders didn't just stand around doing nothing while waiting for the attackers to defend the walls. They shot with their bows (archers), released bolts (crossbowmen) or threw javelins/axes/ROCKS (thrower/infantry) while the enemy rushed to get up the walls.

[okiN]

I think we had Tartar bows...?

Then normal crossbow sounds about right as well.

No I think we did have 2400 crossbows. The problem is absolutely everyone but archers takes a crossbow, because if you're melee your choices are:
1) Sit around fiddling your thumbs until they storm the walls
2) Grab a crossbow and hurl bolts at em

So the crossbows went really fast, with 7x or x8 scaling, we're only talking about 300ish crossbows total. That being said, our team did waste a ton of them.

That's really not something you can plan a budget for, though. Infantry wasting crossbows instead of leaving them for skilled users is an issue with the players, not the buy script.

Thats too many xbows (over 1/10 the the number of tickets means everyone spawns even with 1 wpf and doesn't reuse properly), which with such a narrow wall to defend for cities is ridiculous.  A solid set of defenders could have killed over twice their number and not once did atatckers come close to even getting on the walls because during the first half 80% of defenders were ranged shooting down anyone who even tried to climb a ladder and by the second half, many attackers had rage quit because continuous dying in spawn due to masive ranged spam.

If you want a balance between ranged and melee fighting (where people vie back and forth trying to get a foothold on the walls) you need fewer bows/xbows so only the people with proficiency use them and reuse them.  The complaint that people got bored and started jumping down en masse is because there simply was too much ranged on defenders side (normal xbows reload fast and allowed for a continuous hailstorm around attacker's spawn that cause half of attackers to rage quit).

Looting is something that happens when you can't afford to buy enough items, which the AI can. It doesn't make sense to plan for it and expect people to loot when you can just buy enough to last the battle. If it seems like there are too many tonight then I'll reduce them, but with the old system crossbows always ran out way too early, and that was with people looting and reusing them. It basically sounds like you want to nerf AI fiefs by not letting them buy enough ranged, which I really don't agree with. There needs to be enough items for all classes, so that everyone can play properly. Except cav, because that would be silly.

[Lt_Anders]

Wouldn't the percentages of buying be similar to a village battle, just with more money and tickets?

You had 20% ranged in that battle, we had 50 more ranged than needed(bows, xbows ran out). I'd say the 18% there would still be sufficient in city battles.

Also why did shik buy horsies for attackers?

[okiN]

It was originally 20% bows and 6% crossbows, I changed it first to 20% bows and 12% crossbows, then 16% bows and 12% crossbows after the village battle. I can, for example, take crossbows down to 10% if it looks like there are too many of them in tonight's siege.

Also, when I checked village loot, I think there were actually something like 30 bows left out of 100.

[Keshian]

Looting is something that happens when you can't afford to buy enough items, which the AI can. It doesn't make sense to plan for it and expect people to loot when you can just buy enough to last the battle. If it seems like there are too many tonight then I'll reduce them, but with the old system crossbows always ran out way too early, and that was with people looting and reusing them. It basically sounds like you want to nerf AI fiefs by not letting them buy enough ranged, which I really don't agree with. There needs to be enough items for all classes, so that everyone can play properly. Except cav, because that would be silly.

The only thing is that people loot in every battle to keep using better weapons, doesn't mean you should have 10,000 great mauls so you dont have to loot.  As it is now its pretty easy in city defenses to reuse ranged weapons (I've gone as many as 50 times without having to respawn with a new bow), so that on average these xbows get reused 3-4 times.  If you have 2400 xbows, thats equivalent to 7200 to 9700 tickets with xbows and then you have the same thing with bows so that you have 15,000 to 19,000 tickets out of 20,000 getting to use powerful ranged weapons (not even including throwing yet). 

It makes it a pure ranged fight instead of a more realistic, dynamic and enjoyable balance between melee and ranged where people can get to the top of the walls and then defenders can push back and forth with melee to prevent a foothold on the walls.  When you have too much of one category of items it pushes more people too use those items and unbalances the siege.  Many melee defenders got bored and jumped to the ground once they couldn't respawn with a new xbow because attackers never really got to the top of the wall to melee with them.  Better balance = both ranged and melee.

[Lt_Anders]

It was originally 20% bows and 6% crossbows, I changed it first to 20% bows and 12% crossbows, then 16% bows and 12% crossbows after the village battle. I can, for example, take crossbows down to 10% if it looks like there are too many of them in tonight's siege.

Also, when I checked village loot, I think there were actually something like 30 bows left out of 100.

I believe xbows should be weighted higher. You want kill power over rate of fire. Historically, xbows were DEFENSIVE weapons. Able to kill heavy armor with minimal training. AI fiefs should do the same for cities and castles. Archers should rule villages and field battles, xbows should rule the castles and cities.

Just an opinion, mind you.

This battle also showed that town maps need some serious work. they aren't set up for crpg mechanics, but for native ones. increase spawns and perhaps make some(not all) flat portions of walls to attack?(so siege towers would be useful)

[SPQR]

The only thing is that people loot in every battle to keep using better weapons, doesn't mean you should have 10,000 great mauls so you dont have to loot.  As it is now its pretty easy in city defenses to reuse ranged weapons (I've gone as many as 50 times without having to respawn with a new bow), so that on average these xbows get reused 3-4 times.  If you have 2400 xbows, thats equivalent to 7200 to 9700 tickets with xbows and then you have the same thing with bows so that you have 15,000 to 19,000 tickets out of 20,000 getting to use powerful ranged weapons (not even including throwing yet). 

It makes it a pure ranged fight instead of a more realistic, dynamic and enjoyable balance between melee and ranged where people can get to the top of the walls and then defenders can push back and forth with melee to prevent a foothold on the walls.  When you have too much of one category of items it pushes more people too use those items and unbalances the siege.  Many melee defenders got bored and jumped to the ground once they couldn't respawn with a new xbow because attackers never really got to the top of the wall to melee with them.  Better balance = both ranged and melee.

I think the real problem is the attackers spawn area being so incredibly close to the wall that ranged weapons were able to fire into their spawn/siege equipment with great effect (and from multiple angles).

In normal PvP castle sieges ranged weaponry isn't that decisive even when defenders have plenty of bows/crossbows and the discipline to re-use them.

Basically, the city scenes are the real problem, crossbow and archer domination are a symptom of that.