Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Field of Glory II is a turn-based tactical game set during the Rise of Rome from 280 BC to 25 BC.
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Temple
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Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Post by Temple »

I was playing a Custom Battle of Etruscan 490-331 BC (me) vs Bruttian or Lucanian 420-203 BC. I had a lot of these "Raw Hoplites" with an attribute of Quality: Raw. In my mind I figured that these units wouldn't be much better than my Poorly Armed Rabble, but in the battle these Raw Hoplites performed surprisingly well. I've looked through the manual but I don't feel like I really have a grasp of what these raw quality units represent on the battlefield, other than they get a Troop Quality POA of -25. In terms of the game, and in history, what is a Raw Hoplite anyway?
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redrum68
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Re: Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Post by redrum68 »

It seems raw units just have "raw" quality and usually less armor than standard counterparts. I believe "raw quality" is just a level below average which causes -25 POA and slightly worse cohesion checks (not sure if there are other effects). Depending on the unit lists and terrain, raw heavy foot (hoplites, legions, etc) can be rather cost effective as they are usually pretty cheap. They are definitely way different than poorly armed rabble and can stand up to medium inf and many types of cavalry.
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Re: Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Post by 76mm »

somewhere in the manual it says that raw troops reroll all "sixes" on some kind of test, I believe cohesion tests.
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Re: Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Post by MikeC_81 »

Raw typically represent hastily raised units with less training than standard training. Think emergency levies who are given the gear and basics of the formation but with little to no real time spent practicing compared to their contemporaries.

Rabble would be basically conscripting people en masse who are not even given gear or basic instruction and just told to pick up a pitchfork and told to follow the army.

Besides -25 PoA, they also have a higher Autobreak threshold than Average units, and also have a negative modifier on cohesion tests. Essentially the probability curve is represented by rolling 2 dice and units have to roll 6 or better after modifiers are accounted for. Raw units have that probability curve shifted slightly in that they essentially reroll half of their 6s. Untrained have to re roll all their 6s.
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Temple
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Re: Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Post by Temple »

Thanks for the replies! I have found these raw units are pretty decent on the line, but better if interspersed with higher quality units.
redrum68
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Re: Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Post by redrum68 »

MikeC_81 wrote:Besides -25 PoA, they also have a higher Autobreak threshold than Average units, and also have a negative modifier on cohesion tests. Essentially the probability curve is represented by rolling 2 dice and units have to roll 6 or better after modifiers are accounted for. Raw units have that probability curve shifted slightly in that they essentially reroll half of their 6s. Untrained have to re roll all their 6s.
This is good information. I wasn't sure exactly what their negative cohesion modifier was. Is that in the manual somewhere and I just missed it?
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Re: Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Post by MikeC_81 »

Undocumented feature confirmed by the developer in another thread
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http://www.slitherine.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=494&t=99766&p=861093#p861093

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https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKmEROEwX2fgjoQLlQULhPg/
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Re: Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Post by rbodleyscott »

redrum68 wrote:
MikeC_81 wrote:Besides -25 PoA, they also have a higher Autobreak threshold than Average units, and also have a negative modifier on cohesion tests. Essentially the probability curve is represented by rolling 2 dice and units have to roll 6 or better after modifiers are accounted for. Raw units have that probability curve shifted slightly in that they essentially reroll half of their 6s. Untrained have to re roll all their 6s.
This is good information. I wasn't sure exactly what their negative cohesion modifier was. Is that in the manual somewhere and I just missed it?
They don't have a negative cohesion modifier. They just have to reroll half of their 6s. It is in the manual, but not in detail for each quality level - mainly because Raw, Below Average, Average, Above Average are not single values, but ranges of values, and the adjustment to re-rolls depends on the exact quality value, not the quality name. This is because although units might start at the centre point of a quality name range, their quality will move gradually during the course of a campaign - so after the first battle they will no longer be at their default Raw value, and the exact proportion of 6s they must reroll will change accordingly - but they will still be labelled as Raw until they reach the threshold for Below Average.

You don't really need to know how it works in detail, you just need to know that lower quality troops are more likely than average to fail cohesion tests, and high quality troops are less likely than average to fail them.

You can see the POA by CTRL-L-clicking on the unit in the game to show the detailed unit information panel. Or by turning on detailed tooltips.
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Temple
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Re: Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Post by Temple »

I'm glad to hear that they are not exact values, it makes it more interesting to me that there is some variation.
You don't really need to know how it works in detail, you just need to know that lower quality troops are more likely than average to fail cohesion tests, and high quality troops are less likely than average to fail them.
Good enough for me, I like a battle to have some unpredictability. All part of the "risk versus reward" decision making I prefer.

By the way, speaking of quality, I had the very first instance of something I wasn't sure could happen... I have both the defender and then the attacker rout away from a single melee instance :shock:. Very cool, actually. I also had a battle end with both sides breaking off combat as both went over 60% rout value in the same turn.
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Re: Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Post by redrum68 »

rbodleyscott wrote:They don't have a negative cohesion modifier. They just have to reroll half of their 6s. It is in the manual, but not in detail for each quality level - mainly because Raw, Below Average, Average, Above Average are not single values, but ranges of values, and the adjustment to re-rolls depends on the exact quality value, not the quality name. This is because although units might start at the centre point of a quality name range, their quality will move gradually during the course of a campaign - so after the first battle they will no longer be at their default Raw value, and the exact proportion of 6s they must reroll will change accordingly - but they will still be labelled as Raw until they reach the threshold for Below Average.

You don't really need to know how it works in detail, you just need to know that lower quality troops are more likely than average to fail cohesion tests, and high quality troops are less likely than average to fail them.

You can see the POA by CTRL-L-clicking on the unit in the game to show the detailed unit information panel. Or by turning on detailed tooltips.
Sorry, used the wrong terminology as I believe cohesion modifiers adjust the dice value rather than requires rerolls for certain values. Thanks for the explanation as that makes it much clearer. While I understand that quality level is really a numeric value and the name just corresponds to certain ranges, its still very useful to understand how much worse Raw vs Average vs etc is to some extent to have a general idea of how much more likely they are to fail cohesion tests (it would be great to have unit tooltip info around current cohesion test modifiers/re-rolls and likelihood of pass/fail similar to POA).
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Re: Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Post by 76mm »

Temple wrote:I also had a battle end with both sides breaking off combat as both went over 60% rout value in the same turn.
hmm, haven't seen that yet. In this event, does it matter if one side gets 61 and the other 62, or since both are over 60 they are treated the same?
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Re: Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Post by Temple »

76mm wrote:
Temple wrote:I also had a battle end with both sides breaking off combat as both went over 60% rout value in the same turn.
hmm, haven't seen that yet. In this event, does it matter if one side gets 61 and the other 62, or since both are over 60 they are treated the same?
They are treated the same, as it is considered a "no result", but then you get a message saying that you cannot avoid saying you were defeated. I guess because if you didn't win, you lost :roll:
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Re: Confused about the idea of a Quality: Raw unit

Post by rbodleyscott »

Temple wrote:
76mm wrote:
Temple wrote:I also had a battle end with both sides breaking off combat as both went over 60% rout value in the same turn.
hmm, haven't seen that yet. In this event, does it matter if one side gets 61 and the other 62, or since both are over 60 they are treated the same?
They are treated the same, as it is considered a "no result", but then you get a message saying that you cannot avoid saying you were defeated. I guess because if you didn't win, you lost :roll:
The engine does not recognise the existence of draws - e.g. both players on 62% routed. So if it really is an exact draw, the scripts usually award the victory to player 0. If one is on 62% and the other on 60% the one with less routed will win.
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