• Registered: 2006-10-02
  • Posts: 44

Topic: Some nasty things

Hi, I think I found two flaw in the point system, let see this:

First Flaw
I wish to recreate the army of the dead, an element of ghostly warriors.

Infantry
Move 4, Melee 2d8, Defense 4,3 wounds, morale 2+
Cause fear, Chaotic, Ignore Terrain, Impetous, Undead.
Cost 503 point per elements.

Ok, I think this is a little expensive... but after all the remnants of spirit in search for vengeange are'nt quite a monster? And so...

Monster (size 1)
Move 4, Melee 2d8, Defense 4, 3 wounds, morale -
Cause fear, Chaotic, Ignore Terrain, Impetous, Undead.
Cost 205 point per elements.

Quite expensive indeed, but imho 300 point less is a huge discount, and Morale 2+ could still fail.

Ok, allowing units of monster is a propostal, but if you do you should consider give morale value to all elements, even if alone or the point cost formula lost an important modifier.

Second Flaw:

I wish to recreate a huge artillery, a very big trebuchet or a big ballist or something weird and almighty...

Artillery of doom
Artillery
Move 2, Melee 2d4, Missile 3d12/20, Defense 1, 6 wounds, morale -
Piercing
Cost 147 point per elements.

Woha... maybe a little costly... but an artyllery should be near immobile right? So adding Rabble and Slow Moving:

Artillery
Move 2, Melee 2d4, Missile 3d12/20, Defense 1, 6 wounds, morale -
Piercing, Rabble, Slow Moving
Cost 52 point per elements.

This is a juicy discount and is justified... and if I can have battery of them allowing them to make units... brrr. Of course I can give them veteran (64pt) or better chaotic or disciplined (82pt) and it could bring down heaven...

So this is in short:

Morale is an important modifier for the point calculator, removing it from other than personalty make unbalanced units.

Defense and Wounds are a sensible matter. Very low defense (0 especially) can have a bunch of wound with no cost, high defense pay for it... now, much wound is definitely better than high defense.

Some ability is good but are too prone to abuse, must search and destroy... well maybe not destroy but sure make some limitations.

Hope this helping, see you soon.

  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 811

Re: Some nasty things

I will try to address what you se as flaws individually.

1) Expensive it is, but worth it. I think...We have some knights in the book that are upwards of 600pts per element and they seem to be fairly well-balanced.  You can't bring a lot of them, but then, you don't need to.

2) Monsters cannot be grouped into units at this point. If they get Morale, then they become a unit and thus have morale.  A non-issue, I think.

3) Well, you've found something we need to address.  I would say at this point that the following special abilities may not be given to artillery.

Banner, Frenzy, Hesitant, Horde, Impetuous, Irresistable Charge
Piercing, Quick-Firing, Reckless, Slow-Moving, Steadfast, Steady
Swimmer, Trample, Undead, Undisciplined, Veteran

Here's a little math (which Dan can "fix" if I'm wrong.

Given a 6-element unit attacking

Given a defending unit:
Def 3 Wounds 3 morale 6+
On average you'll hit about 1/3 time against that enemy.

 d4         d6        d8        d10       d12    
1.6%  16.7%  37.5%  50.0%  58.3%  average=32.8%

That means, you'll generally have to attack with
1728d4 or 162d6 or 72d8 or 54d10 or 46d12
to kill the unit

Given a defending unit:
Def 0 Wounds 12 morale 6+
On average you'll hit about 3/4 time against that enemy.

 d4         d6        d8        d10       d12    
50%  66.7%  75.0%  80.0%  83.3%  average=71.8%

This time, you have to attack with
108d4 or 81d6 or 72d8 or 68d10 or 65d12
to kill the unit

2.5% of the dice for the d4
50% of the d6
exactly as many d8 (wierd)
125% of the d10 and
140% of the d12

so, finally, the cost to kill the units goes like this

Attacking the Def 3 unit with:
2d4 takes 144 attack commands
2d6 takes 14 attack commands
2d8 takes 6 attack commands
2d10 takes 5 attack commands
2d12 takes 4 attack commands

Attacking the Def 0 unit with:
2d4 takes 9 attack commands
2d6 takes 7 attack commands
2d8 takes 6 attack commands
2d10 takes 6 attack commands
2d12 takes 5 attack commands

hmmm. just a tiny bit cheaper, no? smile

  • Registered: 2006-10-02
  • Posts: 44

Re: Some nasty things

1-2) My purpose is to point the difference between an infantry or a monster, if as you say units of monster have morale then there is no problem. Of course, a lone monster cost 200 and the same in pack cost 500 IS a bit odd...

3) Forgot Rabble?

4) Ooooook, no more math pls  big_smile  Only a questions, you have calculated with 3+def or half dice + def? I think 3+def, so you have technically cheated  :wink:

So long, go ahead, this is my impression on skill:

Cause Fear: (1.25) I'll raise this to 1.50, see Fearless for more arguments.

Fearless: (1.5) I wonder why this cost more than cause fear, this skill work only if there is units with fear, fear works ever. I suggest to low this to 1.25.

Forester: (2) I will lower to 1.5, is much more specialized than ignore terrain.

Hesitant: (0.5) I will raise to 0.75, after all who get hesitant? Archer, Artillery (no more) and other people you don't really want to send in the fray... so in effect is'nt a big disadvantage.

Horror: (1.5) Only .25 more than cause fear? I mean, if you fail a morale test an element is gone right? I'll rise this to 2

Impetuous: (.75) This is odd. An impetuous unit is a unit you normally wish charging, so I don't see this much as a disadvantage...

Rabble: (.25) : I dislike this ability soooo much. If you give this you have a low cost immobile... fire platform? Wall of flesh? I mean, it is an easy discount for artillery and archers, and this is bad. If don't removed at all at least forbidden to unit with ranged attack, and raised to .50

Reckless: (.75) Nothing to say. At least nothing more already said, with 3+defense is good as it is.

Regeneration: (4) Maybe some bad feelings for units of monsters, but should be tested.

Steadfast: (1.5) If Horror and Cause Fear changes, this should be raised to 2 and should ignore Horrore and Cause Fear as well.

Swimmer: (1.5) Nothing to say, maybe lower to 1.25 since there is much limitations.

Undead: (2) Hey, this virtually doubles the wounds of the units, should'nt be related to how many wound the unit had?


So for now this is all, I hope this help.

  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 811

Re: Some nasty things

1) Technically, units of monsters are still illegal, but I can't find the rule that says so. Darn.

I'd say it would be legal to put monsters in units only if they have morale.

2) Darn, you caught me.  I honestly didn't mean to cheat. But use the 3+ Def rule.

3) dang it! I forgot to add rabble!

4) yikes, I like the new numbers for the most part.  But in my defense, if you notice, the whole thing is just a giant product anyway, so the 2x multiplier for undead does double the initial worth of the wounds.

  • Registered: 2005-03-28
  • Posts: 287

Re: Some nasty things

Zerloon wrote:

So long, go ahead, this is my impression on skill:

Cause Fear: (1.25) I'll raise this to 1.50, see Fearless for more arguments.

Fearless: (1.5) I wonder why this cost more than cause fear, this skill work only if there is units with fear, fear works ever. I suggest to low this to 1.25.

There is sound logic there, and frankly I cannot remember back to the dark ages of why these scores were determined.

Zerloon wrote:

Forester: (2) I will lower to 1.5, is much more specialized than ignore terrain.

Ignores terrain is just related to movement (and probably under costed after many recent games). Forester also affects the ranged attack modifiers for shooting through trees, which is not to be underestimated.

  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 811

Re: Some nasty things

We played 3 times each with a unit that had the ability versus one that didn't and then made an educated guess.

  • Registered: 2005-03-28
  • Posts: 287

Re: Some nasty things

jimbeau wrote:

We played 3 times each with a unit that had the ability versus one that didn't and then made an educated guess.

Ah, that's right.
Either not enough, or too much, beer and scotch since then.

  • Registered: 2005-03-29
  • Posts: 8

Re: Some nasty things

Hi!

I'm one of the two guys which play with Zerloon on a regular basis, and have some comments too.

jimbeau wrote:

3) Well, you've found something we need to address.  I would say at this point that the following special abilities may not be given to artillery.

..., Piercing, ..., Slow-Moving, ..., Steady, ..., Undead, Undisciplined, Veteran

I'm not so sure about removing the evidenced abilities from artillery...

Piercing - it applies to ranged attacks, yes? I use it to represent cannons and the like. may I suggest to split in two this ability, one affecting melee attacks and one for ranged attacks?
Slow-Moving - I use it for catapults, which shouldn't be able to use opportunity fire.
Steady - why not? especially useful to represent entrenched artilleries.
Undead - I'm translating Warmaster armies to For the Masses, so I need this to represent undead artilleries, since they are made of bones like the rest of the army...  tongue
Undisciplined/Veteran - why not? may be useful to differentiate between a war machine used by goblins and the same used by, say, elves.

hope these suggestions will be useful, keep up the good work!

  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 811

Re: Some nasty things

piercing should not be in the list.  Doh!

Keep whichever ones you want, I'm just giving siggestions to those afraid a .75 modifier will "cheese" up the arty too much.

Also, do not lose sight of the fact that this is a "Mass" combat game.  i.e. thousands of warriors duking it out for control of the battlefield.

With the prevalence of "heroic" mass combat systems, people sometimes think. "I've got Aragorn on my side I should be able to kill everything you have with one guy.  Well, that's unrealistic even for a fantasy game smile

I think Noel put it best when he said You may have already killed 10,000 orcs, but if the 10,001st kills you, you're still dead.

  • Registered: 2006-10-02
  • Posts: 44

Re: Some nasty things

Keep whichever ones you want, I'm just giving siggestions to those afraid a .75 modifier will "cheese" up the arty too much.

a .75 is not cheese, more .75, coupled wit .50 and .25 is cheese  :twisted:

With the prevalence of "heroic" mass combat systems, people sometimes think. "I've got Aragorn on my side I should be able to kill everything you have with one guy. Well, that's unrealistic even for a fantasy game

I beg for pardon... but what's the point? I don't see the connection...  :?:

  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 811

Re: Some nasty things

THe connection is that people might expect "heroes" in FtM to be like heroes in many other systems.  We did not set out to write a heroic mass combat game, so havig a single guy be able to destroy an army will just plain not work.

You know, you CAN take feeble, undisciplined, slow-moving but you'll have a really easy unit to kill.

Try it out sometime.  If it follows our playtest, then you'll find yourself with a really cheap, crappy army that is highly ineffective smile

But they're cheap!

  • Registered: 2006-10-02
  • Posts: 44

Re: Some nasty things

THe connection is that people might expect "heroes" in FtM to be like heroes in many other systems. We did not set out to write a heroic mass combat game, so havig a single guy be able to destroy an army will just plain not work.

Again I don't understand how this is related with skill cost... but indeed I must disagree. Your Hero are very big fellow, with so many wounds and high defense they can beat to sand much of ordinary guy over there... Keeping the example of Aragorn, in my LoTR setting he have more or less the stats of one of your boreal hero, and IMHO he IS powerful... I think captains should,nt have stat higher than troop, the added command dice should be enough. Frankly speaking in a mass combat I find very odd that a single commander can do the mayhem they do where launched in the fray...

You know, you CAN take feeble, undisciplined, slow-moving but you'll have a really easy unit to kill.
Try it out sometime. If it follows our playtest, then you'll find yourself with a really cheap, crappy army that is highly ineffective 
But they're cheap!

There is a little misundestood I think.  8)

I'm not speaking of an army, I'm speaking of units not designed for hand to hand combat, but with other role, that they perform very well (maybe shooting, or maybe stopping people) at low cost since they have ability that theorically should hamper them, but in pratical have little or not effect...

Take Hesitant as example: I have archer with 2d4 melee and 2d8 range... Why should I charge? I'll shoot, and when my enemy charge I'll shoot again, counter attack is not a valid options, IMHO...

  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 811

Re: Some nasty things

Well, I know in practice that once the commanders get surrounded they die pretty quickly.  So maybe you ended up with a fluke or something.

As far as hesitant archers, I guess any point system can be min-maxed until it fails.  We'll always be fixing things and working on tweaking the points system till we reduce the problems with the points and the specials.

Bonus points to you for finding these issues.

  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 811

Re: Some nasty things

I also don't have problems with you modifying the points costs for the specials, just to be clear.

We'll probably take a look at the hesitant and have already dealt with Piercing as you suggested.

  • Registered: 2022-11-16
  • Posts: 516

Re: Some nasty things

Point costing systems can be "interesting" things to deal with.
One issue that can really be tricky is that of abilities which reduce cost. I don't think they shouldn't be included by any means, but they can have unforseen effects. Like that of the archers example above, where their cost is reduced. What on the surface looks like a penalty (the Hesitant ability) really isn't, because there'e no intention desire to get them into close combat in the first place. So their cost is reduced, making them more effective than maybe they should be.
But there's probably no way around this.
Because the more flexibility you build into a game, and FtM has a lot, the more you allow for the chances of min-maxing.
So what you hope for is to provide as flexible a system as you can, and hope that players will use it, for lack of a better term, wisely.
smile
Kevin

  • Registered: 2005-03-28
  • Posts: 287

Re: Some nasty things

underling wrote:

Point costing systems can be "interesting" things to deal with.
One issue that can really be tricky is that of abilities which reduce cost. I don't think they shouldn't be included by any means, but they can have unforseen effects. Like that of the archers example above, where their cost is reduced. What on the surface looks like a penalty (the Hesitant ability) really isn't, because there'e no intention desire to get them into close combat in the first place. So their cost is reduced, making them more effective than maybe they should be.
But there's probably no way around this.
Because the more flexibility you build into a game, and FtM has a lot, the more you allow for the chances of min-maxing.
So what you hope for is to provide as flexible a system as you can, and hope that players will use it, for lack of a better term, wisely.
smile
Kevin

Well said all around, Kevin.

And as much as Jim and I tested and retested things, I cannot pretend we hit all the combos that may stress the bounds, so there certainly are questions and areas to tweak left out there. I love getting all feedback as a result to help us out.

  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 811

Re: Some nasty things

You are a wise man with many talents.

I think this means we need more battle reports, right?  esp with shiny pictures.

Would you also like the hexless rules we developed and/or would you share what you've got that is working for you>

  • From: Denver, CO
  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 3,578

Re: Some nasty things

underling wrote:

One issue that can really be tricky is that of abilities which reduce cost. I don't think they shouldn't be included by any means, but they can have unforseen effects. Like that of the archers example above, where their cost is reduced. What on the surface looks like a penalty (the Hesitant ability) really isn't, because there'e no intention desire to get them into close combat in the first place. So their cost is reduced, making them more effective than maybe they should be.
But there's probably no way around this.

Yes, there is. Make sure that the point reduction only applies to that function of the unit that is affected by the limitation.

For example, Hesitant is only applicable to melee combat; thus, only the melee portion of the formula should be affected -- the missile value (which should be significantly higher for archers) remains unchanged.

Daniel Kast
Majestic Twelve Games
cricket@mj12games.com

mj12games's Website

  • Registered: 2022-11-16
  • Posts: 516

Re: Some nasty things

cricket wrote:

Yes, there is. Make sure that the point reduction only applies to that function of the unit that is affected by the limitation.
For example, Hesitant is only applicable to melee combat; thus, only the melee portion of the formula should be affected -- the missile value (which should be significantly higher for archers) remains unchanged.

It does.
But since the equation is multiplicative, eventhough only the melee portion of the formula will be reduced, the overall value of the model is still lowered.
So the "unscrupulous" player... smile ...can add abilities which will affect an area of the game, say melee combat, which won't affect the performance of the model that it's being designed for (ranged combat).
I can only see this being a problem with ranged combat troop types though. The fact of the matter is that you can add in a close combat detriment or two which won't affect the ranged performance of ranged combat troops, and which will decrease the cost of those troops. Whether it's enough to really skew the system I kind of doubt it.
And I definitely wouldn't do that in any bestiary I put together.
But the formula can be min-maxed.
Kevin

  • From: Denver, CO
  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 3,578

Re: Some nasty things

underling wrote:

It does.
But since the equation is multiplicative, eventhough only the melee portion of the formula will be reduced, the overall value of the model is still lowered.

Ahh... but the beauty of it is that portion of the formula is NOT multiplicative. The Offensive Rating is the SUM of the melee value and the missile value. If the melee value is zero (or really really low), then applying a 0.75 modifier will have little if any effect on the final result.

Example:

A unit has a Missile Value of 50, and a Melee Value of 50. Assume that the Defensive Rating is also 100. Normally, the point cost would be 100 (([50+50]x100)^.5). Apply the Hesitant modifier (x.75), and the point value goes down to 94. If the Melee value is only 10, then the normal cost is 77, and 76 with Hesitant.

Thus, for Hesitant to have any appreciable impact, the Melee value has to be high -- which means you're wasting points on it if the unit is intended to stand back and lob arrows.

Yes, any formula can be abused -- but I'm merely pointing out that we've taken all possible steps to limit the effectiveness of MinMaxing.

Daniel Kast
Majestic Twelve Games
cricket@mj12games.com

mj12games's Website

  • Registered: 2022-11-16
  • Posts: 516

Re: Some nasty things

Guess I should have the rulebook in front of me when I'm discussing this stuff.
smile
But in fairness, in addition to FtM I was also refering to ARES, the game I'm working on, or any other game where this kind of thing can happen.
With respect to FtM, the fact that the offensive factors are added before multiplying them with the defensive and special factors is something I might have to take a look at for my project.
Kevin

  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 811

Re: Some nasty things

good idea!