Unit Stats during Export Battles

[Geffalrus]

Been a little while since I last played, but I'm finally getting into the import/export battle mechanic, which is pretty fun. However, I'm a little stymied by why it seems like the AI units always have better morale during the battle exported to FoG2. For a bunch of battles now, my units have been "Slightly Disheartened" while the AI units are almost always Average, Above Average, or better.

Presumably Experience of units in FoG Empires plays a part. Does general ability factor in? What about region terrain defense bonus?

Most recently I had this situation where my Epirus army attacked Aetolia. My general had 1 Attack Skill, while the enemy had 2 Defense Skill. All my units had 1 star of experience, and a few had 2 stars. The Aetolian Army had - just - failed a raid against me, and so had 0 effectiveness and no experience stars. The garrison units presumably had full effectiveness but 0 experience. So I figured the battle would be relatively easy.

Well.......my units were almost all Slight Disheartened, though the actual negative value was -8 when I used Unit Detail. Some units were Average. The AI units were all Average, except for the Urban Militia, who were Uncertain. I won the battle, but having inferior morale across the board is a big pain in the butt when fighting in FoG2.

So anyway, just wanting to understand a bit more on what determines morale values of exported units when fighting the battle out in FoG2. Thanks!

[rbodleyscott]

Presumably Experience of units in FoG Empires plays a part.

Yes

Does general ability factor in?

This is the most important factor, and the reason for your units being "Slightly Disheartened" will be the fact that your general's rating was 1 and the enemy's 2.

Since FOG2 does not have rating systems for generals (well it does, but they don't have as much effect as in Empires) the quality of the troops is tweaked. This represents the effects of the different generals' skill on pre-battle manouevring and stratagems, with the weaker general's troops likely to arrive at the battlefield tired, hungry, thirsty or demoralised by enemy harassment. Similarly the better general's troops will be more likely to arrive at the battlefield well fed and buoyed up by awareness of the enemy's poor condition.

Hence the quality of the worse general's troops is tweaked downwards and the quality of the better general's troops is tweaked upwards. This tweak is larger if the difference in relative skill is 2. In such cases, sometimes, instead of tweaking the quality, some of the weaker general's troops will arrive late at the battlefield.

What about region terrain defense bonus?

No, we felt that the terrain capabilites of the different troop types in FOG2 represented this sufficiently.

[Geffalrus]

Gotcha, thanks!

What about Effectiveness?

[rbodleyscott]

Gotcha, thanks!

What about Effectiveness?

That is also taken into account, although I don't recall for certain which of the parameters it translates to in the export file. Probably COHESIONMOD.

Those parameters are:

QUALITYMOD - affects base Quality (allows different base Empires unit types to convert to modified quality FOG2 units)
COHESIONMOD - affects "elan" and hence Quality.
EXPERIENCEMOD - affects "experience" and hence Quality.

AGEOD_COST - affects base Unit Conversion Ratio for each Empires unit type, depending on the AGEOD_COST and the FOG2 points cost of the base FOG2 unit it converts to.
HITPOINTSMOD - affects manpower and hence Unit Conversion Ratio

[Geffalrus]

Fascinating. It really is quite impressive how well the two games fit together via the (optional) battle system. The computer-generated battle results are rarely too far off from what I can do myself manually exporting.

Next slightly random question:

In FoG2, Epirus has access to Xystophoroi as part of the early Pyrrhic list. Xystophoroi seem to only come from the Companion Cavalry units that as far as I know, so is there any way for Epirus to have cavalry units that translate to Xystophoroi in Export Battles? Or do they just use normal Armored Cavalry the whole time?

[rbodleyscott]

Fascinating. It really is quite impressive how well the two games fit together via the (optional) battle system. The computer-generated battle results are rarely too far off from what I can do myself manually exporting.

Next slightly random question:

In FoG2, Epirus has access to Xystophoroi as part of the early Pyrrhic list. Xystophoroi seem to only come from the Companion Cavalry units that as far as I know, so is there any way for Epirus to have cavalry units that translate to Xystophoroi in Export Battles? Or do they just use normal Armored Cavalry the whole time?

I don't know which Empires units Epirus can have. But if they can't have Companion Cavalry then they won't get xystophoroi.

[Geffalrus]

Ok. Was just wondering if the conversion formula for some units from FoGE (like say Cavalry) would result in 1 unit of Armored Cavalry and 1 unit of Xystophoroi when exporting to FoG2.

[rbodleyscott]

Ok. Was just wondering if the conversion formula for some units from FoGE (like say Cavalry) would result in 1 unit of Armored Cavalry and 1 unit of Xystophoroi when exporting to FoG2.

No. The only units that have such special conversions are horse archers and Republican Roman legions .

[Geffalrus]

No. The only units that have such special conversions are horse archers and Republican Roman legions .

Gotcha. Currently trying to solve my lack of lancers by progressing to empire and praying for the Castrum Cataphractae to come up, and trying to make friends with Steppe factions so that they'll sell me provincial lancers (which feels very appropriate).