Auto-evasion

[edb1815]

As a practical matter what troop types does this involve? In the TT game light troops must evade from heavies, and may evade from other lights. Certain cavalry may evade. (If I recall that was non-impact cavalry). So the player decision was fairly limited but having said that it could be a crucial one - not evading to tie up an enemy unit, etc.

[rbodleyscott]

As a practical matter what troop types does this involve? In the TT game light troops must evade from heavies, and may evade from other lights. Certain cavalry may evade. (If I recall that was non-impact cavalry). So the player decision was fairly limited but having said that it could be a crucial one - not evading to tie up an enemy unit, etc.

Troops that can evade are light foot, light horse, non-lancer cavalry and camelry, light chariots.

[76mm]

The unknown should exist in the random element of the result, rather than a lack of knowledge of how evade mechanics work.

+1

[TheGrayMouser]

Personally I think leaving that unknown, as "fog-of-war" is a better game mechanism.

The unknown should exist in the random element of the result, rather than a lack of knowledge of how evade mechanics work.

I am heavily in agreement with this statement. A dedicated player if they so choose could probably come up with a reasonable model if they were willing to grind out umpteenth hours of trials. There is no reason for this to be a black box to the player. It would be the same as hiding PoA/combat power calculations from the player and just telling them to go by "gut feeling".

If you want to have inherent chance in the game on this mechanic, that is perfectly ok but the player needs to be able to make some sort of educated decision on this. Right now it is a rather arcane process of gut feeling, past experience and guessing at the relative weight of factors involved.

This last part I bolded sounds like how one makes decisions in real life, and IMHO is a GOOD thing to have in a game.

[HughThompson]

As a practical matter what troop types does this involve? In the TT game light troops must evade from heavies, and may evade from other lights. Certain cavalry may evade. (If I recall that was non-impact cavalry). So the player decision was fairly limited but having said that it could be a crucial one - not evading to tie up an enemy unit, etc.

Troops that can evade are light foot, light horse, non-lancer cavalry and camelry, light chariots.

So I have seen the below in multiple head to head battles: Superior armored non-lancer cavalry will evade away from average unprotected javelin armed light cavalry something that seems to break common sense as well as the rules you've discussed above. Why is that happening?

[rbodleyscott]

As a practical matter what troop types does this involve? In the TT game light troops must evade from heavies, and may evade from other lights. Certain cavalry may evade. (If I recall that was non-impact cavalry). So the player decision was fairly limited but having said that it could be a crucial one - not evading to tie up an enemy unit, etc.

Troops that can evade are light foot, light horse, non-lancer cavalry and camelry, light chariots.

So I have seen the below in multiple head to head battles: Superior armored non-lancer cavalry will evade away from average unprotected javelin armed light cavalry something that seems to break common sense as well as the rules you've discussed above. Why is that happening?

I am not sure what rule you think that is breaking, but it can happen for various reasons if the heavy cavalry consider themselves disadvantaged - e.g. they are flanked or disordered etc. I wouldn't recommend charging heavy cavalry with light horse as a viable tactic - they won't usually evade, and then the light horse will be massacred.

[elmo3]

... Right now it is a rather arcane process of gut feeling, past experience and guessing at the relative weight of factors involved.

This last part I bolded sounds like how one makes decisions in real life, and IMHO is a GOOD thing to have in a game.

Agree completely.

[klayeckles]

... Right now it is a rather arcane process of gut feeling, past experience and guessing at the relative weight of factors involved.

This last part I bolded sounds like how one makes decisions in real life, and IMHO is a GOOD thing to have in a game.

Agree completely.

Ditto...
you think the commander in chief half a klick away from the action knows wht those half naked velites are going to do when faced with charging gauls? of course not. the troops aren't robots, but independent thinkers that may or maynot follow orders depending on what they see, a good general will keep this in mind when giving instructions the night before the battle.... i find the unknown of the evasion is managable and the more i play the better i manage it... i'm becoming an experienced general that has a good understanding of his troops mannerisms. or so i hope

[MikeC_81]

That is a fine sentiment but is not consistent with the rest of the game layout of information. Ex. Knowledge troop counts in units, knowledge of morale levels, and knowledge of combat percentages. It also is something that can be tested extensively and thus is simply a barrier to newer or more casual players from making good decisions. Which I find a regressive game design philosophy.

[76mm]

Which I find a regressive game design philosophy.

Generally I agree with this, I appreciate the need for a large degree of randomness, but I never like "black box" game mechanics.

[elmo3]

That is a fine sentiment but is not consistent with the rest of the game layout of information. Ex. Knowledge troop counts in units, knowledge of morale levels, and knowledge of combat percentages.....

Agree. Just about every wargame ever made gives the player more information than his real life counterpart ever had. Ideally a reliable estimate of troop count and morale would degrade with distance from their commander. Percentages should not be shown at all, or maybe just expressed as something like good, fair, poor. But most people would be unhappy with that approach I suspect.

[HughThompson]

I am not sure what rule you think that is breaking, but it can happen for various reasons if the heavy cavalry consider themselves disadvantaged - e.g. they are flanked or disordered etc. I wouldn't recommend charging heavy cavalry with light horse as a viable tactic - they won't usually evade, and then the light horse will be massacred.

I guess it's a matter of opinion in how broadly you define "consider themselves disadvantaged". There is no penalty disordering penalty from being hit from behind if you're not in combat, but they were "flanked" but not disordered. In one case, after evading for no apparent reason the previous opponents turn, I turned them to face their Numidian nemeses who charged them again the next turn and, again, the superior armored non-lance armed noble cavalry evaded. That seems excessive unless the chances of that happening are minute and I've won the lottery multiple times.

[rbodleyscott]

I am not sure what rule you think that is breaking, but it can happen for various reasons if the heavy cavalry consider themselves disadvantaged - e.g. they are flanked or disordered etc. I wouldn't recommend charging heavy cavalry with light horse as a viable tactic - they won't usually evade, and then the light horse will be massacred.

I guess it's a matter of opinion in how broadly you define "consider themselves disadvantaged". There is no penalty disordering penalty from being hit from behind if you're not in combat, but they were "flanked" but not disordered. In one case, after evading for no apparent reason the previous opponents turn, I turned them to face their Numidian nemeses who charged them again the next turn and, again, the superior armored non-lance armed noble cavalry evaded. That seems excessive unless the chances of that happening are minute and I've won the lottery multiple times.

We will look into it.

[redrum68]

Are there any other factors besides unit speed, remaining action points, and how disadvantaged they are?

I just had a Velite charge a Light Javelin Horse (fragmented) from 2 squares away and it broke the Light Javelin Horse rather than evade. I would think based on the criteria it should have a very high chance to evade unless I'm missing something. As Light Javelin Horse is one of the fastest units, the Velite wasn't adjacent to it, and it was vastly disadvantaged as it was already fragmented. Was it just extremely unlucky or are there other factors?

[SnuggleBunnies]

Fragged units being charged take a cohesion test before contact/evasion

[redrum68]

Ah ok. I do remember reading that somewhere but hadn't had it happen in game. Thanks for the quick reply.

[Najanaja]

"Right now it is a rather arcane process of gut feeling, past experience and guessing at the relative weight of factors involved."

A bit like being a military commander as opposed to chess player...

[Cunningcairn]

Personally I think leaving that unknown, as "fog-of-war" is a better game mechanism.

The unknown should exist in the random element of the result, rather than a lack of knowledge of how evade mechanics work.

I am heavily in agreement with this statement. A dedicated player if they so choose could probably come up with a reasonable model if they were willing to grind out umpteenth hours of trials. There is no reason for this to be a black box to the player. It would be the same as hiding PoA/combat power calculations from the player and just telling them to go by "gut feeling".

If you want to have inherent chance in the game on this mechanic, that is perfectly ok but the player needs to be able to make some sort of educated decision on this. Right now it is a rather arcane process of gut feeling, past experience and guessing at the relative weight of factors involved.

Would that not give us as much information or certainty as the ancient generals had before committing troops? A good understanding of ancient troop types strengths and weaknesses should be enough for correct decisions to be made most of the time without detailed tool tips provided the game mechanism is sound which it appears to be.

[MikeC_81]

I will quote my own post that was in response to some similar sentiments.

That is a fine sentiment but is not consistent with the rest of the game layout of information. Ex. Knowledge troop counts in units, knowledge of morale levels, and knowledge of combat percentages. It also is something that can be tested extensively and thus is simply a barrier to newer or more casual players from making good decisions. Which I find a regressive game design philosophy.

We could theoretically just hide all the numbers including the combat predictor right? So why then is this hidden from us?

[stockwellpete]

I can see both sides of the argument here but I am one of those players who is not to bothered about knowing all the minutiae of what is happening in every situation. I take the view that there are far more important things to be thinking about in the game than the evasion mechanism. Above all, am I co-ordinating my army as effectively as I possibly can and am I covering the most dangerous options open to my opponent?

As for the display of combat odds while we are playing, I would quite like the option to turn them off for tournament play and I would also like to turn off the option to take back a unit's move during tournament play.