Topics

61

Game Balance Discussion / Upkeep after trying different alts

« on: July 23, 2011, 01:10:39 pm »

Ok, so recently I decided to fire up a few alts, to see what the real difference in upkeep is between a variety of classes and try and gain an unbiased view. What I found is interesting. I decided to use only midrange equipment for all builds, to try and see what an average class cost is for each. Most of these equipment selections are based on observations from what other people use as medium range equipment on the servers, obviously there will be variants of all sorts, but this is just to try and gauge the situation.

So here it is:

2H:

Equipment:

1. Kerghit War Helmet (1775)
2. Sarrinid Guard Armour (8502)
3. Mail Chausses (1290)
4. Miaodao (8376)
5. Total = 19943

An average, medium armoured build with a relatively good weapon. I could get kills, it took a good few hits to kill me and so I was in the top portion of the server with an average KD ratio of 3:1. A very cheap class in comparison to most. I was hitting the top of the siege servers all morning with this alt (and actually found it quite fun) but it is by far the most cost effective build, as long as you don't use overly heavy armour, and on a STR build, you don't really need anything to costly to perform at a high level.

Crossbowmen:

Equipment:

1. Kettle Hat (1936)
2. White Tunic Over Mail (3459)
3. Mail Chausses (1290)
4. Crossbow (10474)
5. Steel Bolts (2563)
6. Mace (2925)
7. Total: 22647

A more expensive build than 2H, primarily depending on what armour you take and whether you go shield 1h, or 2h.

Archer

Equipment:

1. Studded Leather Coat (2679)
2. Leather Gloves (289)
3. Leather Boots (345)
5. Rus Bow (9974)
6. Barbed Arrows (1640)
7. Barbed Arrows (1640)
8. Total: 16867

At first glance this would appear to be a cheaper build. Archers naturally can't vary to much on armour due to penalties on wpf and so have to stick to the cheap stuff. Obviously you can throw a 1h weapon in there if you must instead of arrows. However, this is all very deceptive. The increased arrow breakage means that if you use anything more than Barbed arrows, you start forking out huge amounts for upkeep. 2 Sheaths on bodkins could certainly empty out your money coffers quickly, as could Tartar arrows. Right now barbed arrows and arrows are the most viable on any stronger builds than this.

Lancer

Equipment:

1. Kerghit War Helmet (1775)
2. Sarranid Mail Shirt (5823)
3. Mail Mittens (1376)
4. Mail Chausses (1290)
5. Desert Horse (12357)
6. Heavy Lance (9702)
7. Scimitar (4914)
8. Total: 37237

This is again, a very very average build, this could be increased by 10000 if you just wanted to use the next tier horses, even more for heavies. But due to the nature of needing a lance and a horse, the cost is double that of a 2h and Archer. Even though due to the lance nerf, 2h can beat lancers and lancers aren't as good as they were. In a lot of cases the 2h is the far superior in these builds. An average 2h could quite easily beat an average lancer build.

Horse Archer

Equipment:

1. Steppe Armour (195)
2. Nomad Boots (236)
3. Leather Gloves (289)
4. Desert Horse (12357)
5. Horn Bow (7896)
6. Barbed Arrows (1640)
7. Barbed Arrows (1640)
8. Barbed Arrows (1640)
9. Total: 25893

Again this appears cheaper than a lancer, but more costly than infantry. Yet it is again deceptive, due to the breakability of arrows, anything over normal arrows causes you a huge bleed in finance. This is also a very very average HA build. Most will use a courser, Arabian or Destrier, putting the cost up by another 10000.

Conclusions:

There will be many variations of these, and I did miss out throwing and 1h cav and shielder, partly because I haven't tried it yet and partly because I thought those with more experience in those builds could add a little more. But these are average equipment builds, anything less or anything more would make them useless, or OP for a examination of the upkeep.

It is my belief that upkeep needs to be balanced by effectiveness on the battlefield. Currently it isn't being done like that. 2h comes out as one of the cheapest builds, yet even me, a HA who has never been able to manual block, could consistently hit the top portions of the servers on my first time 2h after a couple of hours of using it.

Archers are weakened by the arrow upkeep as it is a hidden cost that doesn't appear until you start playing, but actually increases the cost of archery immensely. The same applies to HA. And due to the current nerfs I feel this is a little to harsh. Reduce the break ability of arrows again and I think archers would be in a relatively good place.

Lancers got a very heavy nerf last patch. A reduction in the lance angle and nerfs to the horses. Yet nothing was changed about upkeep. It is still by far one of the most expensive builds out there. I know it is still effective on the battlefield, but I think that it's price is to high compared to that of 2h. 2h lolstabs now outrange the lance on a head on fight. And lancers can only back stab. Therefore I think that costs should be readjusted to bring them closer to the average 2h builds. Obviously not that cheap, but still a lot cheaper than they are now.

Crossbows are hard for me to comment on. This build is often incoporated as a hybrid and I'm not entirely sure of the expense of making a pure xbower. But It appears to me that they are in a good place upkeep wise, although the cost of the crossbow is a little bit painful.

62

Game Balance Discussion / Horse Health/damage taken

« on: July 12, 2011, 10:48:18 pm »

Ok this isn't a general cav topic. This is specifically about the damage of arrows to horses now.

Put simply, pre-patch my Spirited Courser took 4 arrows to down. Now it takes 2. With the added nerfs in terms of lancing/speed it's not great.

So I'm wondering what is the problem here? It seems to be general to all horses. They now go down after only a couple of arrows regardless. Considering when people suggested nerfing cav, they wanted to buff HP. It doesn't seem to have worked.

This also leaves cav open to HA (can't believe I'm saying this). It's to easy for HA to down horses now. I can 2 shot any cavs horse. Even Destriers only take a maximum of 3 if I'm unlucky.

I propose to rebuff horse armour/HP. You nerfed lances to hell, at least buff horse HP and armour to make up for it.

63

Suggestions Corner / Open Plains

« on: June 18, 2011, 01:34:40 pm »

Ok for the sake of the poll I'll summarise the argument and split it off from what I originally posted:

The argument is that:
1. More flat (only slight hills) maps that allow you to see the enemy directly would promote more teamwork i.e. cavalry and infantry formations. Resulting in big epic battles. This is achievable simply by a couple of guys taking charge in each team.

2. It provides more variation. Currently we have village camp maps, hill camp maps, town maps and the very occasional open map. Adding a few more open plains would simply increase the variation and there would be something for everyone. You'd have your street brawls as well as your mass tactic battles.

3. It would help promote cRPG for pubbies to be able to see that it isn't just a nub server hacking and slashing at each other 1vs1 all the time. You can go to native for that. Teamwork is a big part of cRPG (else there wouldn't be so many clans) and it should be shown off even in pubby.

4. By voting no, it can be considered that you are voting against such variation for whatever reason. I am not arguing that all maps should be like this, merely that there should be a few more in there. As it is currently sorely lacking. For those fearing a cav rampage, if you end up in one of those maps, take charge of the infantry and organise them, that way you have nothing to fear.

If you want, read the rest but that is the basic summary of what I propose.

Vote away!

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Ok before a lot of you come in here and shout this down, listen to the argument.

I would like to propose that the servers have a lot more open plains, flatter maps. Here are the reasonings:

1. It promotes teamwork. This morning on eu 1 we had an open plains map, completely flat, possibly the first I've ever seen in rotation. It also happens to be the first time in CRPG pubby that I've ever seen teamwork with 100 people. On both teams the infantry banded together, formed shield walls and slowly approached each other. The cavalry took up positions on the flanks and covered the infantry in the advance before finally charging eachother. It was well organised and what a real battle should feel like. Honestly the only thing that threw this off was the appearence of flags one round, so both teams had to charge the flags down.

I feel that the amount of town maps and village maps simply don't promote teamwork. They are hack and slash maps designed for individual fighting. I have never ever seen team work done on any scale on those maps. An open plains map, with no spots to camp, requires that a team works together or else die.

2. I feel that open organised battles should be what M&B is about. We have enough members of various groups in order to form some sort of organisational team work, even with pubbys. On open plains maps people listen because they know they have to. The result is truly epic large scale battles rather than crappy street brawls and everyone who played in the one this morning said they wished their were more, flat open plains maps. Both infantry and cavalry said this. So no it wasn't just cav rampaging.

I understand the possibilties of this being difficult when there are a smaller number of people on. But in a battle server that regularly tops 100 people, I feel that the village maps ect are simply too small and cramped. They don't promote team work, simply camping and individualality.

3. It would attract more people to CRPG if they could see that battles are regularly organised and not just individual hacking and slashing. Making this mod more popular can only be a good thing and will prolong the life span of it. Not everyone will want to play strategus (if it eventually appears) in order to feel some sort of teamwork.


I know there will be some players who come in here and immediately shoot this down because I'm GK and they think I'm just a cav player trying to get maps for cav to own. Well I'm not. The infantry actually did incredibly well against the cav today, and there were some very good, regular cav players on the sever. Each team had around 20 cav and 30 infantry. So it was relatively balanced. Consider this as a proper possibility. I'm growing tired of endless street brawls and bad village maps. I'm not saying get rid of them entirely, there should be town maps. But there should be more open, flat plains maps (not the ones with giant hills for people to sit on and camp). CRPG should be about teamwork and epic battles.

EDIT:

Not the only situation as well. Last night a similar situation occurred...you guessed it, on an open plains map (albeit with a big hill). But because we had lots of GK on, the cav banded together. The infantry then realised what we were doing and it resulted in both teams switching to teamwork. In almost every battle there's a good number of one group. Whether it's GK, Guards, Risen, Shogunate ect ect. If some just step up and take a little responsibility, then great battles can occur on these open maps.