Unit Design - Abilities

I had an idea for each Weapon to have inherent "skills" that any unit could learn if they leveled far enough.

The default is to automatically use any skill available to the unit, as soon as possible, as long as its not a formation. Formations or "Modes" need to be activated, but if its an attack that can be activated every X turns the default will be to Automatically Activate the attack every X turns.

example: Blunt Weapons

Skill 1-> Heavy Swing (every 5 combat turns, can activate this attack. +2 attack, and if it hits, twice the damage it would normally deal)

Skill 2-> Sweeping Blow ( every 5 turns, can activate this attack. Large Sweep that attacks all enemy units within range. Can effect max of 4-5 enemy units)

Skill 3-> Crushing Blow (every 10 turns, can activate this attack. +5 attack, and if it hits, three times the damage it would normally deal.

For normal units, Skill 1 is unlocked at lv 5, Skill 2 at lv 10, and Skill 3 at level 15

Veteran units start with Skill 1, so skill 2 is unlocked at level 5 and Skill 3 is unlocked at level 10.

Expert units start with Skill 1 and Skill 2, so Skill 3 is unlocked at level 5. At level 10 Expert units gain +1 attack speed.

Elite units start with all three skills. Elites gain +1 attack speed every 5 levels.

Champions (and Sovereign) gain Skill 1 at level 2, Skill 2 at level 3, and Skill 3 at level 4.

Upon Level up, Sovereigns get 10 points, Champions get 8 points, Elites get 6 points, Experts get 5 points, Veterans get 4 points, Normal units get 3 points, Draftees get 2 points, and Slave Soldiers/ Thralls/ Zombies get 1 point.

Cleave:  If unit kills opposing unit gets a free swipe at a nearby one.

Great Cleave: same as above, but not limited to number of times.  As long as units keep dying it gets a free swipe.  (Which means strategy wise don't send a ton of little peasants at it). 

Whirlwind blow: hits all adjacent units with its attack

Vampiric regeneration: heals self after doing damage.

Shield Wall: soldiers ban together to improve their defence stat.  Bonus vs. Archery

Recieve charge: Lancers set their spears to get bonus to charging units.

Charge: bonus to speed and slight attack bonus

Parry: Unit has chance to defend its self and/or deflect blows.

Riposte: Makes a counter-attack after blocking a blow

Flanking: Does bonus damage hitting from sides and rear.

Assassins: Does heavy damage hitting from rear.

(can think up more in time, but this for now.. )

Hey Tatsuke again!!  Hey Klaxxton!

As Tatsuke Just mentioned, we have been discussing this on the XP thread.  I'll quickly outline my views as well as a mixed solution that I only just thought of.

1)  Adding skills for all units would be overly complex, especially if they gained skills thruogh leveling.  I'm not against the soverign having skills, in fact the sovereign already does have skills, but this should be limited so you do not end up with a uber unit like you do in Sins of a Solar Empire vanilla (pre expansions).  Stardock actually said letting you fully upgrade the battleships was a mistake.  Reduced strategy.

2) Having too many skills would result in uber units that would detract from strategy and tactics.

3) I believe (tell me if I'm wrong) but not all equipment is in the game yet.  Also, the quipment in the game hasn't been balanced/tweaked for combat as that isnot until beta 4.

4) All combat modifiers should be gained through the choice of equipment.  eg, spears could give "first strike", while a set of spearmen could get the ability of "spear wall", to use your examples klaxxton.  The current equipment sets that I've seen would need a raft of changes so that this would work.  eg, knife should have increased speed over  a spear (sort of like having "sprint" from klaxxton's list.  Heavier aromurs should cause detriment to speed.  There currently are some misc equipment that provide non-combat bonuses.  Perhaps these shuold be expanded to include ones with combat bonuses?

5) My new thought.  ONE skill may be chosen after a very further on research was obtained for unit training. 

Really, what my above points get at is that there should only be one way of getting combat bonuses, and thatshouldbe through equipment.  It will reduce complexity, and if there are enough different pieces of equipment  then you will have plenty of options to create units with "abilities" which are caused by the modifiers on equipment.

As for the picking all the best equipment for unit design, way tooo costly and shuold be able to be outgunned by a more numerous diverse army of the ame cost (numbers shuold beat one uber unit).

All that being said, I agree with the the gyst of Klaxxton being that at the moment there is not enough diversity in create uits.   But i believe this will be fleshed out/corrected in beta 4 (I think Frogboy said that they deferred the discussion until then).

I don't mind uber units as long as they have appropriate costs.

I think instead of having units labeled "elite" , elite units are good as you make them. Spend only 1 turn training them, they are green and start at low level. Spend 20 turns training them, they are elite and start at a higher level.

More weapons abilities are unlocked and available the higher the level of the unit. Different weapons should have different kind of abilities -AND- at different levels. So a wooden spear kinda sucks, but it has most of its skills are unlocked at low levels...making it perfect for peasant type units. A morning star is kickass, brutal weapon but you need a unit at very high leveled elite knight-type unit to make it worth it, since its abilities are all unlocked at higher levels.

One ability OP mentioned that I really want to see is first strike. This actually ties in with the idea of a "weapon reach" stat for each weapon type that I talked about in another thread, but when you boil it down it iss basically first strike. To make it clear, first strike means that when two units clash, the one with first strike deals damage first. But I would like to see varying levels of first strike. So a Long two-handed weapon has 'first strike 4', but if its going up against with a pole-arm with 'first strike 5', the pole-arm will deal damage first.

As far as getting high end Units + Weapons that are "elite" in the general sense ... see Demiansky's thread on (New take on Elite Units)

In this thread, I was referring to the units that are specially trained without experiencing actual combat.

Basically, these units receive the best training + combat simulators that money can buy (mainly due to the warlike nature of the nation) ... and so they are PURE textbook when it comes to combat knowledge. They are well disciplined in the tactics and styles of their chosen weapon (hence start with all 3 basic weapon skills), and are run ragged every day building up their endurance tremendously (higher initial HP).

Because of their training, they are conditioned to fight more reliably and learn faster than less-well trained units. This is because a regular unit can get "lucky" through a mistake and then try to idealize that mistake as a viable combat tactic, and then a drill sergeant (one that knows any better) would have to spend a long time getting them to unlearn bad habits. They can survive combat longer (usually) and can learn quicker.

Personally I think all units should get +1 combat speed at level 20 just as a "good job" trophy for getting there. Also, all units take the same amount of experience to level up: 100, 150, 225, ect.

Sovereigns get 10 points at level up, Champions get 8 points, "Class III get 6 points, Class II get 5 points, Class I get 4 points, Regulars get 3 points, Draftees get 2 points, and Slaves/Thralls/Zombies get 1 point.

Of note, Class III start with twice the HP as a regular, and a regular starts with twice the HP of a Slave Soldier/Zombie.

Dragons, on the other hand, should probably take twice as many exp to level up: 200, 300, 450, ect

and should get 15 points per level.

If in testing, twice and 15 points prove to be too strong, then we can try triple and 15 points : 300, 450, 625, ect

I like first strike, especially multiple levels of it (higher first strike "gets" the first strike)

after first strike it should be a 50/50 coin flip of who attacks next.

I also think "melee" weapons should have a stopping power (or sp).

Stopping Power is the ability to deflect or stop the charge of a unit that is mounted. I'd like to think of stopping power as damaging the mount's HP directly, however if mount + soldier are one whole entity, then that's fine too.

I can see this happening in one of two ways. However in all cases it must be a full charge. If its just a trot or a gallop, then it doesn't count.

Most of a mounted unit's strength should come from the charge. A mounted unit's defense should always be double if it is charging. If it has a melee weapon, its attack should be double if it is charging.

(with 5 charge levels, Charge 1 increases Attk/Def by 20%, Charge 2 by 40%, Charge 3 by 60%, Charge 4 by 80%, and Charge 5 by 100% (doubled))

Single click orders a mounted unit to move to location, double click orders mounted unit to charge. There is a button that can turn charge on and off (as long as the unit has a destination).

If combat system is simplified with designated tiles, then a Mounted unit can travel more squares (about twice) with "charge mode".

Charge needs a certain amount of distance to "max" its speed, so lets say 5 levels. Charge 1, Charge 2, Charge 3, Charge 4, and Charge 5.

If a weapon's stopping power is above 0, then it does two things. First, its attack is increased by Stopping Power x Charge level (additively). So if a Pike has an attack of 3 and a stopping power of 2, and its defending against a Charge 5 horseman, then its attack for that round is 13.

Secondly, stopping power signifies the number of "attacks of opportunity" a soldier has if their mounted opponent turns to flee.

Namely, if your stopping power is 2, you can attack the horseman twice as he turns around and leaves.

You should be able to make units with some abilities. Like camo, skirmish, shieldwall. It should just take longer to create those units.

@ Supreme Shogun: All units should have flanking. An axe in the back deserves no less a dmg bonus then a dagger.

So far you can already give your units 1 skill. Give them the Pioneer's pack and they can build on resources.

The game is drawing a lot of insperation from from MoM which each unit was very unique and did have their own skills. Even games like Civ have added the ability to "level up" units through promotions which modders have then used as a way to give them special abilities, such as in the FfH mods. So I think odds are there will be unit skills.

The problem is this is early beta and the strategic level combat is very simplistic. Most of the skills are likely to be combat oriented and thus we won't see them until the tactical combat system is in play.

I'm not in the Beta do weapons have attributes other than + to attack?

@ leeboy26  Not at the moment but everything is subject to change.  I'm sure most of this will get addressed in the combat beta.  The main point behind the original post is the thought that Abilities are Fun and more Intuitive for the player.

All weapons have at least two stats. +Attack and +Combat Speed. That is the current status.

It has been previously stated that packs, rings, scrolls, and other such items will be able to endow soldiers with special skills or abilities.

I see thanks for clarifying. Certainly adding skills to a unit design (if it's been researched in warfare first) would add some interesting tactical options to battles. As for weapons, I would like to see them have inherent abilities- a spear for example was a very popular weapon for millenia simply as it was cheap and allowed you to maintain an intermediate distance. As for translating to the game, I'd like to see something like-

Spear (infantry)-

Cavalry fend- Gives a defensive bonus when attacked head-on by cavalry.

Skewer- Gives attack bonus on the charge. 

Unwieldy in melee- Gives a melee attack penalty unless vs. another spear. If unit in melee with enemy and flanked by other enemy unit, the spearman recieves a penalty to defense.

Thrown- The spearman may throw the spear but if he does he loses it until he enters the square where it landed. As the spear was not designed for throwing there is an attack penalty for doing so.

And so on and so forth. I hope there is something like this or many weapons will be redundant.

Personally, I'd just like to be able to create units like Roman Hastatii or Norse Berserkers. Not the actual /cultural flavor/ mind, but being able to have effective troops that say; use light weapons, heavy shields, and move quickly, or use no armor, and heavy weapons, and attack suicidally.

Having troops in this game be flexible and very customizable to your play-style is important to me.

You are preaching to the DamnedChoir.  Sorry couldn't resist. 

Your post is exactly what I had in mind.  Also, I think we can all agree historically soliders could be trained to run faster, use shields properly, etc.  This is what initial training should do.  Training should not move a unit from Green to Veteran.  Only actual combat should do that.

Yea, true. It makes a lot more sense for Units to be "trained" with special abilities, and the abilities that you "can" train a unit is dependent on their equipment. For instance, you cannot train a plate-mail unit to "sprint" or to "run faster" ... and you can only train Spear n Pike units in the art of Phalanx formation, and you can only Train units with Tower Shields (of at least 10) in the use of the condensed "turtle" formation. A reiteration of the turtle, is that it is only to avoid archer fire, and has no use in melee combat. And its VERY good at reducing the effect of missile/arrow attacks. IE at least 80%.

Only Horse Archers can use a Cantalabrian Circle ... (rides in a loose circle to reduce effect of enemy archer fire)

and ANYONE can use Wedge, however theoretically melee armed cavalry would be the best at it.

Also, anyone can use "loose" and "rank n file (box)" ... with loose for anti-arrows, and box for melee fighting.

If we want to have more interesting choices, simpler (and a less overloaded UI), then we can limit each "unit" built to only 2 formations ... of course you need more than one to be ABLE to USE formations (preferably a company (10) minimum).

For instance, a Flight of Drakes might use the Chevron for even distribution of Fire-flames across the entire battlefield ... or use a more tightly packed wedge to either do some dive-bombing maneuvers or to maximize their Fire-flames in one area.

*Dive Bombing could be like a Charge attack, and a critical attack could "grab" the unit and carry him with the drake up into the sky, where he is dropped, and either dies from the fall or deals heavy damage.

These are all good ideas and i totally agree with this! Help us out on making units more diverse! this will add more of an RPG feel to the game!