balancing scenarios: cost of units

[Grandviceroy2018]

How do the costs of units in the computer game match up to costs of units in the tabletop game?

it would be helpful if there was a simple table that would show how much each of the different types of units available in the computer game costs. this would help in creating balanced scenarios.

while those of us with the books could probably make up our own lists, the tabletop units do not exactly translate to the computer - at least not obviously. for example, a roman unit and a gallic/carthage/greek unit take up the same space on the computer map - whereas in the tabletop the non-roman units may be 6 to 8 or more bases, vice 4 to 6 for the roman.

again, it would be good to just have a nice, clean simple listing of the units in the computer game scenario maker and their costs....

ps: nice design, by the way. got the computer game yesterday and have fought a dozen fights vs the AI so far...

[CharlesRobinson]

What I do depends on wether the game his historical or not.

If it is historical then I am not worried about points and build the units as close to the historical account as possible and place them in the situation. As an example; I have a Maccabean army of 600 vs Seleucid army of 2000 (units modified unit count dropped by a factor of 10 from the game units; ie heay infantry changed from 1500 to 150). I placed the Maccabeans in the same kind of situation as they had fought in history and they actually win most of the time despite being outnumbered.

If it is a matched battle, I build the army based on the army books and use on unit in the computer game to represent one base in the books. So a unit of heavy infantry that consists of 6 bases will be represented by 6 selection of heavy infantry lined up side by side in the PC game. Works out very close to the points in the book.

[Grandviceroy2018]

for a 6 base unit in the book you put out six units on the computer table?
that has to be a LOT of units.

so you are using the points per BASE as your measure?

so if i wanted to put out a standard republican legion of 4-2-1 (4 princip/hast, 2 velite, 1 triarii) that would be 7 computer units, and 53 points

at 8 per hastati/princip (for avg protected, 10 if armored), 13 for triarii and 4 each per velite (5 if protected)

then to match that with, say gauls, who are 7 pts a base, you'd put out 7 bases (49) plus a javelin or slinger for 4 more

am i getting it?

[Grandviceroy2018]

i just noticed that when you clik on a unit in the scenario editor and paste it on the map, if you right clik a list of properties comes up ....including a VP value!

rather than go down this list cliking each one, and making a note with pen and paper, is there a master list somewhere that shows each unit and its value?

the individual army lists do show the icon and some of the properties, but the right clik after putting a unit on the map shows a lot more.

surely this master list exists?

it would be very helpful to all of us if that would be made available --

Also, nowhere does the game describe the handicap for giving advantage to one side or the other in the battles -- what do the levels do (stack the dice in one side's favor?) and how might that adjust the VP cost overall?

[CharlesRobinson]

The levels, from what I understand, and I may have it wrong, is that it adjust the break points to favor one side or another. As for the unit yes - that is correct. It seems to mach up well. Just for fun I had created two 1200pt armies (mid-republican roman vs gauls) using the army list, and reproduced them on a huge map using the scenerio editor. The armies came out at about the same.

[Grandviceroy2018]

yes, the handicap is in the number of break points it takes to win.

for example, in the first scenario at neutral, it takes 9 to break romans, 12 to break gauls.

if you go favor gaul -- it is 8 to break rome, 14 to break gaul
if you go stronger gaul -- it is 6 to break rome, 16 to break gaul

if you go favor rome -- it takes 10 to break rome, only 10 to break gaul
if you go stronger rome - it takes 12 to break rome, 8 to break gauls

quite a handicap....although in two days of playing i have found the AI to be a fair opponent, i have won every contest as rome on neutral, and have won most as non-rome in neutral - the only exception was the slave revolt and dertosa, which i had to play a few times each to win as the non-romans....

am barely half way through the 21 scenarios tho...just finished the second of the starter armies (selucids vs rome)

[CharlesRobinson]

As far as a master list of points go; that would be rather difficult since you can modify units in all kinds of ways that changes the point values. I think that it would be more convoluted trying to read a table of all the possible combinations for each unit that to use the existing method. The upcoming army buildier should help a lot in making this part of the game user friendly.

[Grandviceroy2018]

an army maker? comes with the next patch maybe? along with new units?
that would be nice.

still, just a simple basic list of what the units you can build would be helpful...

and what is this about being able to modify those units? how?

[CharlesRobinson]

Once you have placed a unit on the map, right click on the unit to see the options, you can change about everything. Before release the points were not always changing as they should though and I have not created a new scenerio yet since public release. It is extremely usefull though since you can recreate armeis not yet released. I have been having fun with Maccabean Jews fighting Seleucids 166BC - 160BC.

PS: Shift Right Click gives you the commander options for a unit (yes any unit can become a commander).