KaM Remake gameplay balance

[Lewin]

You are right, all my changes are becouse I thought that you dont want do this simple change or I thought that is impossible to do this (It has beed discused many times, so I lost my hope for this change) ..
If it is possible, so it may be the Best solution for shield units..

In the past I wasn't sure it was needed, before multiplayer became popular it seemed to be suggested just because it's realistic for shields to protect you, rather than to solve a balance problem. We don't want to implement balance changes for realism purposes, that defeats the purpose. But now that lance carrier spam has become so common it is obvious that axemen/swordsmen just aren't useful.
Your excellent diagram that connects all the unit types together made it seem like the best solution, since archer vs melee balance is the only missing piece of the puzzle Thank you for making that diagram, it's very well made, I think it unifies the KaM military system nicely.

and guys, what do you think about more cavalry on battlefield? I think that is very important .. becouse more cavalry = more Lancers and Pikes..

1. cavalry is good solution for countering foot shield units (in this moment, is very hard to have passable group of cavalry, for efective countering, but polearm units are very easy way everytime on every maps)

2. if will be axefighter and swordsman "back in the game" ... players are needing effective counter, this mean usable cavalery..

3. it is over and over again. ... > archers, shield infantry > polearm infantry > cavalery > archers, shield infantry > ...

Well I was planning for the +1 defence against archers to also apply to knights/scouts, in order to have them be the most powerful against archers as shown in your diagram (because they've always had an extra HP and the new +1 defence). The axemen/swordsmen are average against archers, having +1 defence but not extra HP of cavalry, and lance carriers/pikemen are the worst again archers, having no defence bonus. That all fits with your diagram

I think there will naturally be more cavalry as you said, which will result in more lances/pikes, which results in more infantry, and so there should be nice balance of all types of units

This all needs thorough testing of course, after the public release we can implement this change and privately (like RCs) test how it goes in order to have it tested/balanced for the release after this one. We'll also look at other balance changes such as reducing bowmen aim time (as Jero suggested) and maybe some other stuff.

[-George Stain-]

I get it, I like to hear it.. btw my diagram is just for orientation and better imagination

[Siegfried]

Hi guys,

I think the +1 defense is way better than the +1 hp, because it really aims at the problem, but still I think it goes into the wrong direction.

Why? - Because the problem is the crossbow, not the shield carriers.
Let's look at the other units in the game, each the wooden and the iron type. All wooden type have defense 2 and all iron have defense 3, so nothing fancy there.

Now, the axefighter has attack 35 - the swordfighter has attack 55.
So the attack value increases by 57%.
The lance carrier has attack 25 (80 vs horses) - the pikeman has attack 35 (115 vs horse).
So the attack value increases by 40% (44% vs cavalry).
The scout has attack 35, the knight has attack 55.
So again an increase by 57%.

And now comes the bowman with attack 60. The xbowman has attack 120.
So that's an increase by a full 100%. And the highest attack value of all soldiers. And this as a long-range fighter ...

Imho that's also the reason why the bowman feels that unattractive compared to the crossbowman.
Nerf the crossbowman down! Let it have attack 90, which is a 50% increase compared to the bowman and still it is the highest attack of all units (if you don't count pikeman vs. horse).

Nerfing the crossbowman does not affect the balance between melee, so Stain's diagram is fulfilled. And it has the nice side effect, that bowmen become more important.


But I have another concern which I uttered on the chat last sunday and nobody would answer that:
do you really want to exchange pikemen with axe fighters?

Before you consider this a stupid question, let me elaborate: I think, a simple replacement on the battlefield would cause only the same effect that we have now, i.e. armies consisting largely of two soldier types. So no improvement would have been done.

I think, what we really want is a diversification on the battlefields. For this, we definately need the rock-paper-scissor-principle to be present (which already is; at least between melee units)

So what happens now if we promote the axe fighter too much?
I say, horses will become rare. Why? - Because the 60min pt is a kind of de-facto standard, which many people do not want to touch as we've seen. So the same amount of weapons as now will be built.
Now if we really build the axe fighter, than it needs the wooden shield. The same wooden shield that the cavalry wanted to use. If the same building principle is applied, then the amount of axe fighters will decrease the amount of scouts.
You see, the timber is already used for the axe, so an additional workshop for the wooden shield would mean an additional sawmiller and forester - and space and serfs.

So my question is: how do we increase the number of axe fighters without decreasing the number of scouts?

[Krom]

I like the idea, sounds reasonable.

Two questions left: What do we do about damage-per-second for bowmen and arbaletmen (archers shoot ~x1.33 faster iirc), so we cant just nerf arbaletmen x2, cos now they are like only 25% better than bowmen. 2. How do we balance Scout-Polearms-Footmen in terms of costs? Polearms cost just 1gold+1wood+1leather, where horseman +1wood+1horse(4corn)

[pepa999]

Because the problem is the crossbow, not the shield carriers.

I think, it is true. The real problem is, that crossbowmans are too strong. And even all people here indirectly claim it, but dont realize it.
The main idea of balancing units of the current time is, that lancers are as good meatshields as axefighters for the lower price. But, problem
is not, that lancers are better meatshileds than axefighters compared to the cost, but problem is, that ability "be good meatshield" is too important. Nobody cares, that
axefighters have ability "be good damage dealer" better than lancers. And it is because crossbowmans are too strong and main damage dealers in battle.
And all what is need is to keep them shooting for the longest time, so the only strategy is to produce maximum of crossbowmans and the cheapest meatshields,
so other quality of units are not important, so lancers is really "the best". But problem is elsewhere than it could seems as i just explained.
And therefore it is need to decrease attack of crossbowmans.

So my question is: how do we increase the number of axe fighters without decreasing the number of scouts?

Other your idea was, that when it will be beneficial to train axefighters, nobody will train scouts, but only more axefighters instead of more scouts, because
they cost the same resources. I think, it should not be true, and if it is true, we should fix it. The main idea of countering between units in kam is, that scout kills axefighter,
axefighter kills lancer, lancer kills scout. Of course, compared to the cost. So, when somebody will do it, as you said, that he will train axefighters as his main unit,
and not horses. You obviously will be the best against him with a lot of scouts. When this is not true, it means, that scout dont kill axefighter compared to the cost and
we must fix it. Solution of this problem was already said there. +x% more horses from stables at the same cost and per the same time.

[sado1]

(I'm talking about axeman, lanceman, scouts, but of course it all applies to iron units in the same way)

We were just talking with Sieg at IRC chat about the balance. He agreed on my point that it's not important that making more axemen means less scouts. Because it's a tactical choice which ones you should make more. See, when axemen becomes the main, "meatshield" unit, then in fact, it means... scout becomes the main unit! Scout has almost the same stats as axemen but is a bit better. So, you can use both units as meatshield, and everyone will shit their pants to get as many horses as he can, so his army has more scouts than axemen.

Now you say, if everyone has lots of scouts, then someone will think of making more lances. And as lances fail against axemen, it means someone will think of making more axemen. And as axemen fail against scouts, it means someone will think of making more scouts. And if everyone has lots of scouts... See what I mean?

Of course that's all happening when axeman are buffed up against bowmen/xbowmen. I think it also means scouts need to be buffed up the same way, so there's no difference between axeman meatshield and scout meatshield.


We see it as an ideal situation where everything balances itself out, and every player needs to have varied army (Mulberry's dream ). There are some smaller problems here:
-if everyone will spam axemen, which needs 3 wood for 1 unit instead of 2 wood for 1 lanceman, will we have enough wood?
-maybe we should decrease the corn price for a horse?
-still, no one's going to make swordmen meatshield if we won't make bowmen more powerful - so I think reducing xbowmen attack like Siegfried said, might be a good idea.
which need to be discussed, but the main problem should now be gone.

[pawel95]

and every player needs to have varied army (Mulberry's dream ).

That is also my dream, like in real war´s


About the balancing from Swordmen. I have forgotten how it works in real Kam, but i have found a movie and i was shocked, how fast the swordmen die because of some x bows:
However like someone has laugh about me, because I have made swordmen,because the enemy has only pikemen. There must be changed sth. Because 10 years ago there were discussions,why joymania dont implement more soldiers. Now it seems, that the swordmen will die, because it does not make sence to make them, that is pity


08:16
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5rov_9A ... ure=relmfu

[The Dark Lord]

http://www.sendspace.com/file/8v0kdf

Watch this replay and tell me what happens at 7:44 at the bridge between the two large ships, where I attack 3 puny sword fighters. These are the kind of things that ruin games for me, when for example a knight loses vs a militia. This is not as severe but just look at those sword fighters. My knights both attacked the same sword fighter and he still survived. The knights were immediately replaced by sword fighters and I still lose them both. 3 knights and 2 sword fighters lost, 1 sword fighter killed. I forgot how regeneration exactly worked, but I think it works a bit too well. I'm really fed up with random garbage like this. It's 'nice and random' like some people would say, I say it takes away the skill from the game and adds luck and it just happens too often.

[Lewin]

I watched it and I agree the result of that fight looked very unfair, but it is the way fights work in original KaM too so if we want to "solve" this we need to tread very carefully. I'd say the cause is related to regeneration because the swordfighters didn't seem to be any weaker from their first battles. But the problem is changing regeneration will have huge impacts on all aspects of battles, and if we just lower it fights will become much shorter, so we might want to increase hit points and lower regeneration. But a change like that will take a huge amount of work to balance.

Once we've sorted out the shields buff thing (after this release) we can do tests for fixing this issue, please remind us.

[Mulberry]

This thread is going really well so we don't want to lose the energy. As soon as this release goes public we can setup a build for balance testing, like our beta build except this one will basically be the same as the public release but with new unit statistics being tested (and a different server list of course). We can organise a server like we currently have for beta testing, and you guys can test different ideas on it...

Hey, guys. I think its time to remind about this topic What Lewin wrote in coments to George Stain's diagramm looks very promising. And since i asked opinions of players in TS i know tht people are still very much interested in testing changes. Is it likely a good time to test it now? What do you think?

I also want to share with you my expirience wich i've got after playing oficial release last days. First, i want to say that much more time passe after we had talk about balance here and some opinionns changed, but mainly problem still remains. In my opinion it is: marketplace values, swordfighter/axefighter power (shield bonus, charge improvements), uselesness of bows. Second, i want to go a little bit into details:

- marketplace values (some of them are to cheap now in my opinion. iron bars - horses, as an example)

- swordfighters/axefighters (much more usefull to use lancers and militia as melee then qualified units wich havent got enought bonuses. I am supporting Lewin in his suggestions about this: +1 arrow defence)

- bows (it is too risky to use this unit. why? you can see on this replay. http://www.mediafire.com/?xbpcifw7lj0zbce Where Florek made lots of bows and got perfect position to usethem but lost because i killed them with mass lancers+some scouts. Also bows are too weak against xbows. You need at least 5-6 bows shooting at once to kill enemies 1 x-bow now wich arent good. I think this unit needs an impovements. Also imagine how many arrows will needed to kill axefighter with +1 arrow defence 10-15?...)

People, be active, write your opinions. I hope we will find a solution and fix the problem together

[EDMatt]

I agree with all the points that Mully made in his post.

[Florek]

I'm mostly avoiding balance discussions, because I'm not feeling so confident with my vision of game, but I'm definitely agree with everything that Mulberry wrote in last post.

2 iron bars into 1 horse resulting in really sick frequency of cavalry appearing on battlefield, it's way too easy. Just think in this way - you can always trade few horse during you're waiting for your blacksmiths. Nothing more to add in swordsmans/axe fighters thread. About bows it's hard to say for me. They are cheap as for late-game ranged unit, but from second side you need really swarm of them to indicate any serious damage. Maybe they should get small boost, but making them way better from now could be risky as well as using them now.

[Lewin]

Those 3 issues you posted are the biggest balance issues right now in my opinion, and they'll be the ones we try to address first in testing. I've already made shielded units have +1 defence against arrows. Unfortunately I'm rather busy these few weeks so I won't be able to organise it just yet.

By the way, what happened to tower spam? A few months ago everyone was saying tower spam was ruining the game and making it unplayable, because apparently hitting with ~3/5 rocks is far too accurate. Now everyone seems to have forgotten about it. Personally I'm very happy with tower accuracy at the moment.

[Siegfried]

By the way, what happened to tower spam? A few months ago everyone was saying tower spam was ruining the game and making it unplayable, because apparently hitting with ~3/5 rocks is far too accurate. Now everyone seems to have forgotten about it. Personally I'm very happy with tower accuracy at the moment.

That's how it goes with almost all balance discussions in every single RTS game you find out there.

Mostly it's just complaining because someone has found a strategy that seems overpowered. This lasts for a few weeks. But almost all players are intelligent. So they adopt strategies or develop new ones against it. And one or two month later the balance-issue vanished and new ones occur.

I feel comfortable about tower stength, too. For my taste, they could be a bit more stronger, but ok. For the xbow strength I see that people discovered the strength of knights in the past time. The appearing issue with the 2 iron to 1 horse shows that clearly. Xbows are still too strong in my eyes, but people have arranged.

[Bo_]

Why complaining if it makes no difference?
We complained a lot but you didn't agree so I think nobody felt like wasting more time on it.
If people stopped tower spamming then it's because it's not fun, an act of fair play probably.
It's the same for militia spam, but it's not because it's not enjoyable that it's not OP.
About knights well yes the 2 iron for 1 horse fixed the xbow issue slightly, but do we realy want to obtain knights by trading for them?
I don't think this is realy the solution.