Re: OLY: breaking Beastmastery

From: schott@cs.umbc.edu (Brian Schott)

Date: Mon, 02 Oct 1995 00:00:00 +0000

I'm glad to hear that more experienced players also have reached the
same conclusion.  I thought I might be missing something.  It appears
that pikemen and crossbowmen/archers *are* sort of optimal given
limited noble time and a game system that favors length over strength
(at least according to the battle simulator which could be incorrect).
This means that a significant number of skills are less than useful
(mining, for example).  It is also a disincentive to trade for scarce
resources (wood and peasants are plentiful; horses and iron less so).

It is interesting that you point out that in Hades where there is a
limit on the number of men stronger units are useful.  Maybe a similar
limitation (number of men in a single stack) would help outside Hades?

Another idea is to allow Knights to act as independent units sort of
like NPCs with a *very* limited set of orders (move, attack, explore,
seek, etc.)  Combine this with the idea of limiting the number of men
in a stack that can participate in an attack and you add depth to the
game.

Brian Schott

In article <DFsEE9.I9D@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU>,
Greg Lindahl <gl8f@fermi.clas.Virginia.EDU> wrote:
>In article <43pggmINNoha@retriever.cs.umbc.edu>,
>Brian Schott <schott@cs.umbc.edu> wrote:
>
>>One of the limitations of the combat system is that there is little
>>incentive (that I can see) for expending the effort of producing
>>stronger non-beast units.  A Knight requires too much effort for the
>>benefit
>
>While I have no use for riding-speed humans, I could imagine that
>others do. If there were an area, like Hades but with no teleport
>loophole, where you were limited in the number of humans you could
>bring in, then there would be more incentive to build stronger humans.
>For right now, I don't build much more than pikemen myself; they're
>great at providing a hard-to-kill target for enemy fodder. One
>memorable combat between Dogmatix and BtA's army resulted in Dogmatix
>losing almost no men because BtA's huge army of savages couldn't get
>through Dogmatix's front line of pikemen. So there are some nice
>trade-offs in the current game, but the expensive humans aren't really
>viable options.
>
>-- greg

References

OLY: breaking Beastmastery
pepper@smead.ecn.purdue.edu (Pierre H Pero)
Tue, 19 Sep 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: OLY: breaking Beastmastery
desj@ccr-p.ida.org (David desJardins)
Tue, 19 Sep 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: OLY: breaking Beastmastery
gl8f@fermi.clas.Virginia.EDU (Greg Lindahl)
Sun, 01 Oct 1995 00:00:00 +0000

Referenced By

OLY: breaking Beastmastery
pepper@smead.ecn.purdue.edu (Pierre H Pero)
Tue, 19 Sep 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: OLY: breaking Beastmastery
desj@ccr-p.ida.org (David desJardins)
Tue, 19 Sep 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: OLY: breaking Beastmastery
gl8f@fermi.clas.Virginia.EDU (Greg Lindahl)
Sun, 01 Oct 1995 00:00:00 +0000