Axefighter/swordfighter balance

[Lewin]

So how did the chat end up? Did you come up with any brilliant ideas?

EDIT: I split this discussion from the KaM Chat topic because I think it deserves its own topic

[Siegfried]

We discussed a lot about the soundtrack.

But concerning the balancing, we did not find to an end until I had to leave. Most of the people agreed that storm attack has to be improved somehow. And many think, that not lance carriers but axe fighters should not be the built in masses. I don't know if they found a good agreement on the 'how?' afterwards.

[The Dark Lord]

I think it is up to the players to find out how. If axe fighters are stronger, people will try to make more of them. People will adjust their strategies to the balance between units.

[sado1]

After you quit Siegfried there was no further discussion. We also seemed to agree that the best idea (I think you posted it somewhere Lewin) is to click a place on the map that would be the direction in which infantry units will storm.

TDL: the whole problem is, how to buff the axemen (and maybe other shield units) best.

[Shadaoe]

As I said on the chat before having some connection problems, I think improving the storm attack would already be a nice "buff" to axemen over lance carriers, and it could make them more interesting and more used without changing the statistics. (because playing with the statistics is a dangerous game, adding one point, removing one ... can have a lot of unexpected effects)

[The Dark Lord]

A storm attack that is easier to handle will not be enough. Storm attacks are very dangerous to carry out. If one of your units gets caught, the whole group will have to fight and that might not always be in your advantage.

[Shadaoe]

That could always make it easier to suprise the enemy, and buffing more would imo break even more the balance.
And it's good (again, imo) to make it a more tactical "buff" rather than a +1 to a random stat which would be quite strange. A better storm attack could add some tactics with several groups storming (and against lance carriers, you are more likely to win if you manage to do it well), but it won't make lance carriers useless neither, wich is better for the balance I think.
What I say is theory, I'm not 100% sure if it'll be enough because you can't be totally sure about balance without playing, but I think it'd be a great way to improve the balance without doing heavy modifications that would change too much the original combat system and/or that would reduce/break the rock/paper/scissor thing.
But after all, if there'll ever be the balance builds, this will be the best way to find a solution.

[Da Revolution]

I can tell you it won't be enough, people always use meatshields so your charge isn't really useful.

[Bence791]

Some more percents of hit added to the first 2-3 strikes of the melee troops after a storm attack? If the militia/axemen/swordsmen/barbarian/warrior catches or be caught in 10-15 seconds after the storm attack. So it wouldn't give them the ability to buff themselves, only some plus thing to make storm attack more useful. It would make melee units to breach the (first line of the) meatshield easier. Or storm attack could give them higher chance to dodge arrows/stones, because they are usually hit by stones even if they do a storm attack. These are only ideas, discuss

[Krom]

I like the idea of buffing footmen during and shortly after the storm attack. It looks natural, makes them more valuable and encourages better tactics. The drawback is footmen will be more useful at attacks than in defence, and "pro" players will need to click "Storm" moments before enemy gets close. What do u think?

[Bence791]

Yeah, it only would improve their attacking skills, but would that be possible to give them + defense point (not 1, maybe 0,2-0,5) if they are still for at least 1 minute, and then they are attacked where they exactly were, not if you order them to attack a very close enemy troop. And it would last for 10-15 secs too.

[Lewin]

I like the idea of buffing footmen during and shortly after the storm attack. It looks natural, makes them more valuable and encourages better tactics. The drawback is footmen will be more useful at attacks than in defence, and "pro" players will need to click "Storm" moments before enemy gets close. What do u think?

It sounds good in theory but I have mental images of players hitting storm attack as the enemy army has almost reached them, just to get the bonus. Then both the attacker and defender gets the bonus, and it cancels out. And maybe other cases where it was used in unusual circumstances. I'm not sure whether I like that. If the bonus was small maybe it could work.

[sado1]

It sounds good in theory but I have mental images of players hitting storm attack as the enemy army has almost reached them, just to get the bonus. Then both the attacker and defender gets the bonus, and it cancels out. And maybe other cases where it was used in unusual circumstances. I'm not sure whether I like that. If the bonus was small maybe it could work.

Maybe the bonus activates only if the units stormed for at least X distance?

[Krom]

That becomes even more ugly, you will urge to hit Storm when enemy is at "magic" distance. Overall thats a good idea, but it needs additional work to avoid feeling of ppl "exploiting" it and being disappointed if they did not exploited it right.

[pepa999]

I suggest to give units, that used storm attack, bonus to attack more naturally. So, there is a maximum length, which units can travel during
storm attack. So, let define maximum bonus to damage from storm attack. Say, Damage +400%. So, this will be that bonus, only when max length
was traveled. When only 0.5 of that max length was travelled, bonus will be only 0.5 x MAX_BONUS, so +200%. When "pro" player will make
storm attack too close, it will be for example only 0.05 x MAX_BONUS, so only +20%.