Question: Field of Glory 2 army composition bug? Cheating?

[thisisnudge]

Hey there

So far, I enjoy the turn-based tactical battles in FoG2, even though I think that it was a bad decision to make it dependent on a standalone game. I saw numerous player comments in which they complained that it felt like a ripoff. You probably missed a big opportunity here.

However, I have a question regarding FoGE vs FoG2 as it feels sometimes as if it was cheating where I, as a player, do not have much influence.

A battle between 37 vs 17:

Army 1 (37 units, good shape, good general):

- Heavy/Medium (14): 4 Armored Hoplites, 3 Italian Foot, 7 Citizen Hoplite
- Light (11): 11 Skirmishers
- Cav (12): 6 Light Cav, 6 Cav

Army 2 (17 units, bad shape/food shortage, good general):

- Heavy (11): 9 Armored Hoplites, 2 Citizen Hoplite
- Light (3): 2 Javelinmen, 1 Skirmishers
- Cav (3): 3 Light Cav

This is what FoG2 made of it:

Army 1 (41)

- Heavy/Medium (19): 2 Armored Hoplite, 9 Citizen Hoplite, 8 Italian Foot
- Light (13): 13 Skirmishers
- Cav (9): 5 Light Cav, 4 Cav

Army 2 (30)

- Heavy (24): 22 Armored Hoplite, 2 Citizen Hoplite
- Light (4): 4 Skirmishers
- Cav (2): 2 Light Cav

Now, tell me why would I play that battle? I have no chance. Not only is the ratio wrong (17/37 vs 30/41), but the army quality difference is staggering. Of course, only 3 Army 2 units are disheartened; the rest is in good shape. I recall similar situations before, but I think that I was just hoping that it was in my favor. This time it feels like the AI is cheating. It is some interesting battle, of course, but it has nothing to do with my Field of Glory Empires campaign.

Can you please fix this soon? I do not see a reason to fight such battles, as it feels fake and like cheating. Instead, I loaded an older save game and asked the AI for peace.

Update: Same armies. Different terrain. Apparently, Army 2 lost 1 Arm Hop in the meantime and the terrain has an effect. First battle (see above) was in the mountains. After I loaded an older save game and avoided the battle, I had another chance but this time in flat grassland. Guess what? Not only Army 1 received in FoG2 -1 Cav, -1 Light Cav, +3 Italian Foot, -2 Italian Foot, -2 Skirm, for some unpredictable reason. Army 2 received in FoG2 -6 Armor Hop, -2 Skirm and +1 Light Cav. -6 Arm Hop? Please fix this or else FoG2 battles are pointless playing FoGE, I'm afraid.

[zakblood]

this has been answered numerous times now tbh,

viewtopic.php?f=534&t=91261

and the manual btw explains it better, it's not cheating, it's correct and done on a points system

[thisisnudge]

I do not see an answer there, only excuses. Then it means that it remains unsolved? This sounds like fun. So, there is a serious bug in the game which makes the battles useless, unless you hope that is in your favor. In my case, where I had an advantage, the system decided to cheat and let the AI win. And, when I fought almost the same battle another time on different terrain, I won because the system did cheat again? Urgs. This is really bad and makes the battle export to FoG2 look buggy and/or badly designed.

I have to say that I'm working in the gaming industry where we work on bigger projects, but this... is not smart. Imagine Total War being like this. The Total War community would stomp the developers. Not only that, Sega would step in and probably fire one or two producers or managers after such a long time. Why? Because it is critical to the game.

[zakblood]

so you've not read the manual then?

11.2.1. Converting Unit Types
11.2.2. Converting Unit Characteristics
11.2.3. Army Size in FOG2

as this explains it all, no excuses,

now once read, does it suit you or not, as it's not a bug or error, it's by design

[rbodleyscott]

Hi.

The conversion ratio for Empires units to FOG2 units is points based, so an expensive Empires unit will generate more FOG2 units than a cheap one, especially if the FOG2 units are not too expensive themselves.

The normal average conversion ratio of a full strength Empires Armoured Hoplites unit to FOG2 Armoured Hoplite units is 3.05. This ratio would be reduced due to scaling because of the size of the battle.

The probable explanation for the low conversion ratio of your Armoured Hoplites is the Empires units being understrength.

However, if anything like that happens again, we could take a look at the export file, if you .zip it and attach it to a post.

It is called AgeodBattleData.txt and you will find it in /Documents/My Games/FieldOfGloryEmpires. (There is only one file, and it is overwritten each time you export a battle).

It would also be a good idea to attach the Empires pre-battle game save.

Also please tell us if you have set either of the Empires related options in FOG2 - to adjust the conversion ratio and/or to use FOG2 difficulty settings. If the latter, what FOG2 difficulty setting were you using?