Dom4 - LA Pangaea Thoughts

Discussions and debates about video games

Moderator: Moderators

Post Reply
Shatner
Knight-Baron
Posts: 939
Joined: Fri Mar 07, 2008 7:54 pm

Dom4 - LA Pangaea Thoughts

Post by Shatner »

I've worked up the following document and I'd like to submit this to you all for review and feedback. I want to run these suggestions through the Den's scrutiny before posting it on Desura because I find the signal-to-noise ratio over there kinda low and I'd prefer to be told about the merit or lack thereof to these ideas quickly and bluntly where possible. Also, since this is essentially a balance discussion, The Gaming Den seems like a good place to start before wading into the maelstrom that is Desura balance discussions.

Thanks in advance,
Shatner

During the beta I tried out the shiny new LA Pangaea and posted a couple of times in a couple of places how I thought it was a neat nation with some real potential. I received some push-back from others who thought I was perhaps being too optimistic, or failing to see some of the weaknesses within the LA Pangaea line-up. Well, I decided to put my money where my mouth was so for my first MP game of Dom4 (full game, post-beta, no patches) I played as LA Pangaea. Here's what I have to say in the midst of that.

Pangaea Pros
1) Cost-effective Heavy Cavalry: the Centaur in full armor has worse encumbrance than a mounted knight, and he is armed like light cavalry (light lance + hoof attack) but has much better stats than most heavy cavalry (hp, strength, magic resistance, defense, etc.) all for a reasonable price. Consider these guys more like really beefy middle or light cavalry given their lack of a sword or other third attack.

2) Solid hoplite line holders: your satyr and dryad hoplites are fairly priced and resourced for what are solid line holders. Better than average hp, magic resistance, speed (both in the battle and on the map), and defense in exchange for much lower morale. The morale issue is a real problem, but you do get a decent pile of stuff to compensate. Recuperation is nice while expanding. Your Dryad hoplites are a joke as far as sacreds go, but with Awe+2 they'll hold a line superbly well.

3) Very nice lab rats: universal astral on a lab rat is great because it means every one of them is useful in combat. Communions, body ethereal, luck, Light of the Northern Star + mind burn/paralyze spam are all nice. The research bonus and a superior chassis (high speed, recuperation, high hp, high MR, high precision) make them very flexible and robust low-tier mages. They can research just as well as an X1Y1Z1 mage, but unlike those sorts of mages they can survive a stray arrow/spear wound, endure a lot of communion fatigue-damage, and their natively high defense + their staff means they can fend off the occasional melee attack when something breaks through and harasses your back row. You're never sad to hire another Centaur Sage. Their only real downside is that they can't wear earth boots. Fortunately Pans can, so you're good until you want to forge a Crystal Coin.

4) Nothing important is Cap-Only: Dryad hoplites are your only cap-only recruit, and they are simply a "nice to have". LA Pangaea grows more powerful with each fort at a rate faster than nations that are more capital-dependent.

5) A diverse recruitable lineup. Nothing Pangaea has is the best at what it does (except maaaybe Centaur Sages as lower-tier communion slaves/masters), but it does have a lot of different stuff. Stealthy troops. Flying troops. Crossbows. A good assortment of chaff, with flavors that fly, have shields, and have javelins. Heavy(ish) cavalry. Tramplers. Berserkers. Flying commanders. Stealthy commanders. Stealthy thugs. Seducers. Pangaea probably has *some* natively-recruitable answer for any situation, which they can assemble if they're given time to recruit/research as needed. Again, not all of these answers are great or cost-effective, but having options at all is nice.


Pangaea Cons
1) Weak starting army: LA Pangaea has pretty much the same starting army as EA and MA Pangaea. That lineup has not aged well with the steel armor, crossbows, and shields that are common in the late era.

2) No massable archers: The Satyr Sharpshooter (a unit I previously over-praised) is a weird unit for a crossbowman. High accuracy, high hp, and high armor mean it can survive more abuse than you'd normally expect and deliver plenty at range. However, low morale, crap melee ability, and very high resource cost means they are neither willing to endure in the face of enemy action, nor able to show up in sufficient numbers to out-shoot the enemy. Heavy archers (crossbows or otherwise) should ideally be low-resource so you can have a huge blob of them, or highly robust (like LA Man's crossbowmen with swords and towershields, or LA Jomon's Samurai Archers who are high-morale melee bad-asses in addition to good archers). The Satyr Sharpshooter doesn't fit into either niche but costs a similar amount in resources, making LA Pangaea's army weak when it comes to archery combat.

3) Bad morale combined with uninspiring (literally!) commanders and weak priests: LA Pangaea has a hard time keeping their troops from running away during a grind, which is odd given that most of Pangaea's lineup is designed to grind (high protection, high defense, low damage output).

4) Very dicey early expansion: As a result of issues #1 through #3, LA Pangaea has a hard time expanding across the Late Age landscape. Your starting army is undisciplined, low-morale crap, your good melee troops are high resource, and your archers aren't massable. Even with Production-3, you will have to do some very intricate scripting and troop placements to get your tiny handful of hoplites to draw all the aggro while your undisciplined chaff flanks and kills the enemy. Low morale means a single turn of unusually harsh casualties and your army breaks. And you can't really do the standard "hold and attack" hoplites with crossbows in the back until you've got your second fort built because of the resources needed to make that happen. You can't recruit enough light lances to alpha-strike the enemy away because of the resource cost, and actually stabbing the enemy to death with 6-10 centaurs takes a LONG time (since after the initial lance strike, a light lance is just a spear) and time works against your high encumbrance, small-in-number cavalry.

5) No good heavy infantry: I get the impression that minotaurs are meant to fill the heavy infantry role but they don't do so very well. While their high protection and armor can allow them to stay in melee like you'd want, and when they do hit they can certainly hit hard, their low attack and defense scores, lack of a shield, and trampling make them bad at filling that role. How is having trampling a bad thing? Because minotaurs will not hold a line against size-2 opponents; they'll wander out into the middle of the opposition, racking up fatigue and doing relatively little actual trample damage. The enemy will then surround and murder the minotaurs either by swarming or by critical hits (minotaurs tend to go POP around 30+ fatigue, which they hit very quickly). This means that Pangaea can't really do much against heavily armored infantry (especially those with shields) because they have to poke at them with spears.


Overall, the LA Pangaea lineup feels kind of like an artillery nation (powerful archers and/or powerful evocation spammers who hide behind a stubborn shield wall) that... lacks artillery. It also feels kind of like a superior infantry nation (like LA Atlantis, MA Ulm, or all eras of Abysia) which grinds you to death beneath its racially-superior stats and heavy armor... except it lacks the damage and morale to endure a melee grind. It also feels kind of like a nation of mobility and trickery (like all ages of Caelum, EA Ulm, MA Shinuyama) which shows up where you aren't expecting it and wins battles selectively but devastatingly... except it lacks good enough flying and/or stealth recruitables to pull that sort of tactic off.

I feel like the concept of LA Pangaea is neat. The theme is that modernity finally won and all the orgies and blood sacrifices in the woods are past. Instead of rage, minotaurs armor themselves in, well, armor, and the satyrs learned how to march in formation rather than charge headlong. Improved social organization has given rise to centaur nobility who dabble in a mix of old magic and new. The old priesthood is waning and most of the former priest-class, the Dryads, has moved into the military to stay relevant. That's the theme, but how that translates into game terms is: LA Pangaea has less of what made it strong in the past (freespawn, forest-recruits, blood magic, high morale and/or inspirational leaders, berserkers, stealth, universal recuperation) and haven't really gotten good enough at being civilized to compensate. Like the dilution of the Abysians or the decline of the giants, the primal force of Pangaea has been yoked, and much has been lost as a result. That makes a compelling narrative, but it doesn't make for a competitive nation.

Instead, what I'd really like to see is the Pangaea where they've figured out how to take one or more aspects of their primal origins and found a way to have that magnified by modern tactics and metallurgy. They should be like LA Atlantis, with the ways of old diminished, but what remains has been repurposed to good and interesting effect. LA Atlantis learned to fight in the cold with enchanted ice instead of in the depths with coral. They made a traumatic and terrible transition relocating to the shore of bones, adopting new ways and new magics, but the resulting nation is thematic and cool as hell. LA Pangaea should be somewhat similar: different, with a new form and new strengths complement those few old strengths that haven't been lost. I can see three shapes for Brave New Pangaea which I am naming as follows: Super Soldiers, Darken the Skies, and Forest Ninjas.


Super Soldiers: Satyrs are better than humans. They're faster, stronger, tougher, more resistant to magic, harder to hit, they live longer, and they inherently recover from afflictions. A centaur is physically superior to a human on a horse, and even the most elite human soldier should pale in comparison to a similarly-equipped minotaur. In this version, Pangaeans realized that the only reason the humans ever won was because of superior equipment and training, so the halfmen decided to get them some of that. The LA Pangaea roster should add light satyr infantry (shield, light body and head armor, spear, possibly javelins, not undisciplined), glaive or halberd-carrying satyr medium infantry, trample-free minotaur heavy infantry (ideally with a shield and morningstar variety as well as a high-attack and/or berserk version with a heavy two-handed weapon like a battleax), and a centaur knight with a heavy lance, hoof attack, and a sword (or something equivalent). Furthermore, these troops should all be map move-2. Morale should be on a bit higher and/or the leadership should be better (perhaps the centaurs can retain their inspiration bonuses of old). In this version, LA Pangaea is defined by having superior melee units, so said units should be cheaper relative to their value, though they will have a high resource cost. Satyr sharpshooters can remain an inefficient counterbalance to the nation, and the Centaur Sages can even lose their research bonus if it's needed for balance. The undisciplined, hide-wearing satyr chaff can be removed since it wouldn't really be theme-appropriate. In the event of a melee grind, Pangaea should make a darn good showing, so much so that their opponents should counter this with superior numbers, superior archers, or elite-crippling spells like earth meld, poison, and fatigue strategies (skele-spam, quagmire, curse of stones, etc.).


Darken the Skies: Pangaea has always had sharp-eyed centaurs with bows, and with the advent of the crossbow, they have let the satyrs join the archery club as well. Whereas the Super Soldiers version of Pangaea is similar LA Atlantis, Darken the Skies Pangaea should be more like LA Man. There should be a cheap and massable satyr crossbowman (precision of 10 or 11, minimal resource cost), the satyr sharpshooter (roughly same gold cost as the massable version but higher resource cost), and the Satyr Hoplite/Dryad Hoplite should also carry a crossbow. Really. In addition you have the two flavors of longbow centaurs: lightly armored (massable) and more heavily armed/armored (similar in function to MA T'ien Ch'i's cavalry archers, with a light lance and all that). You can keep the short bow centauride around if you want (people will continue not to use them but it's a nice bit of continuity between ages) or you can hand them a superior bow and feel good about being more gender-inclusive in your armies. The fact is, the longbow is actually a very good counter to nations like LA Ulm and LA Marignon who can churn out gobs of their own crossbowmen; the longbows high rate of fire combined with those crossbowmen's low protection will cause unsustainable losses to the enemy. Darken the Skies Pangaea can out-archer their opponents and rely on hoplites to hold a line/confuse "fire archer" commands while their Centaur Sage communions cast Wind Guide and spam evocations. Their opponents can counter them with towershield/kite shield infantry capable of beating up satyrs in melee, clever archer screens, as well as fear spam because this version of LA Pangaea hasn't fixed its morale issues. This version really makes those Dryad Hoplites more valuable because this version really wants to hold the line and Dryads do that beautifully. Plus, it means you'll have access to a sacred archer; you won't want to get an F9 or D9 bless just for them, but it'll be a nice perk if you do happen to pick those paths on your pretender.


Forest Ninjas: Minotaurs notwithstanding, every flavor of Pangaean (satyr, dryad, harpy, centaur, pan) has shown itself capable of stealth. So how about all of these stealthy troops learn how to move quietly in metal armor --like LA Pangaea's own Satyr Commander-- so when a Pangaean force decloaks it is capable of beating up 10 to 15 points of province defense. So, all of Pangaea's non-minotaur troops and commanders have stealth (and the satyr, dryad, and Pan commanders have lots of stealth). You can recruit two flavors of Satyr scouts: the Satyr Spy (high stealth, spy, no leadership) and the Satyr Trickster (high stealth, causes unrest, can lead 10 troops so you can give them 10 Satyr Sneaks to go undermine your neighbor's income). In this version, LA Pangaea isn't any better at fighting, and in fact many of its units and commanders will be a little bit more expensive (stealth adds to the auto-calc cost). However, this version of Pangaea is better at picking when to fight and fighting on their terms. Your opponents almost never know where your armies are, nor what those armies are comprised of, and taking a fort from you should be an exercise in frustration. Additionally, this version can recruit the following from forest provinces: Satyr Commander, Satyr Spy, Satyr Trickster, Black Harpy, your three flavors of Satyr chaff, the standard chaff harpy, and the Dryad. These recruits preserve the LA Pangaea theme of "cities and modernity instead of partying in the woods" because the two pillars of Pangaean society, the centaurs and the pans, only come from the cities, and similarly all of the heavily armored troops originate from the cities. It's only the throwbacks (like the Satyr deadbeats you use to eat lance-strikes and Dryads who cling to the old ways) who are still found in the undeveloped forests. I find this idea the most interesting because there really isn't another nation that goes all-in on stealth. Older version of Pangaea came close, but maenads/manikins weren't stealthy and they were a large part of why people played Pangaea. Like Caelum, Forest Ninjas Pangaea would lose battles but win skirmishes. To its opponents, the map of Pangaean territory would look almost completely blank, despite it being potentially crawling with armies and mages.
Last edited by Shatner on Tue Nov 05, 2013 10:52 pm, edited 4 times in total.
User avatar
Ancient History
Serious Badass
Posts: 12708
Joined: Wed Aug 18, 2010 12:57 pm

Re: Dom4 - LA Pangaea Thoughts

Post by Ancient History »

Shatner wrote:I find the signal-to-noise ratio over there kinda low
Strike that, reverse it. Think S:N. A high signal to noise ratio has a strong signal against low noise.
K
King
Posts: 6487
Joined: Fri Mar 07, 2008 7:54 pm

Post by K »

At least in Dom3, mixing berserkers in with regular units made the whole squad basically unbreakable.

LA Pangaea can also make Horns of Valor and Crowns of Command (which both boost morale in Dom4). I expect that this mitigates a lot of the morale issue.

I'd also play around with a Big Air Bless for those dryad holies. It's usually a bad idea to invest in a big bless for cap-only, but they are seriously decent units and could solve your early expansion problem entirely since it only seemed that crossbows had a chance of taking them out (and crossbows are not rare in LA).

Trample thugging with reinvig on the Holy minotaur also seems something to look into.
Shatner
Knight-Baron
Posts: 939
Joined: Fri Mar 07, 2008 7:54 pm

Post by Shatner »

Ancient History wrote:
Shatner wrote:I find the signal-to-noise ratio over there kinda low
Strike that, reverse it. Think S:N. A high signal to noise ratio has a strong signal against low noise.
I'm saying over there is a lot of poor discussion (i.e. noise) relative to the amount of good discussion (i.e. signal). Low signal, high noise, therefore a low signal-to-noise ratio.

K wrote:At least in Dom3, mixing berserkers in with regular units made the whole squad basically unbreakable.

LA Pangaea can also make Horns of Valor and Crowns of Command (which both boost morale in Dom4). I expect that this mitigates a lot of the morale issue.

I'd also play around with a Big Air Bless for those dryad holies. It's usually a bad idea to invest in a big bless for cap-only, but they are seriously decent units and could solve your early expansion problem entirely since it only seemed that crossbows had a chance of taking them out (and crossbows are not rare in LA).

Trample thugging with reinvig on the Holy minotaur also seems something to look into.
I'll have to look into the horns of valor. Crowns of command are certainly nice but not really in the cards until you have the research and have secured a good astral income; something you are not at all guaranteed with only native S1 site searchers (or else I've had an unrepresentative streak of bad luck in my test games when I've had my centaur sages scour my provinces looking for pearls).

I did a series of quick test games doing some indie expansion with a mixture of sacred minotaur commanders (MC), dryad hoplites (DH), and armored minotaur troops (MT). Variations included:
1) an MC with an MT set to "guard commander"
2) an MC with a DH set to "guard commander"
3) an MC leading 1 turn's worth of DHs
4) an MC leading 2 turns' worth of DHs
5) an MC leading DHs with a MT set to "guard commander"

I tried expanding against indies with the following blesses: A9, A9E4, A9E6, E9, N9, E9A9, A9N9, E9N9, N9E4.

#1 with an E9 or N9 bless worked surprisingly well against dinky indies (militia, light infantry, non-crossbow archers, etc.). N9 #4 worked okay against a range of enemies, but anything other than a quick knockout meant fatigue and death. Without E6 or better, the dryads would fatigue out before they could stab their way through a block of melee troops; not because the troops were doing any damage (they weren't) but because the dryads were doing so little with their strength-10 spear attacks. Without A9 or N9 they'd die to crossbows. E9N9 worked well, but then just about any sacred would with that double bless. If the MC were a size-4 trampler or if you could somehow instruct minotaurs to trample in formation then they'd rock the casbah. However, even with double blesses, MCs (and their guards) would wade out into the blob of enemy troops and get fatigued and critted to death. #3 and #4 with E9 or N9 did pretty well against cavalry precisely because the minotaur would stay in formation with the dryads, and each lucky hit that did penetrate the enemy defense and armor was proportionately larger (because of there being relatively few cavalry present) than when trying to stab through a blob of 20+ infantry.


The N9 bless actually was kinda interesting. It's dirt-cheap with that immobile tree pretender, worked fairly well across a range of indies, and it's nice because the DHs hit 21hp: just enough to get them +3hp/turn from regeneration. Hmm... maybe an F9E4 (or E6) Forge Lord could work. I'll have to experiment with that later


Anyway, I certainly appreciate the suggestions. If you all have more, I'd certainly like them, especially concerning
1) whether or not my assessment of the pros and cons of LA Pangaea is accurate
2) whether one or more of my suggested variations of LA Pangaea would be dumb/broken and should NOT be taken past the drawing board
3) what any of my suggested variations of LA Pangaea might actually work and, if so, what balance considerations need to be observed.
Shatner
Knight-Baron
Posts: 939
Joined: Fri Mar 07, 2008 7:54 pm

Post by Shatner »

K wrote:At least in Dom3, mixing berserkers in with regular units made the whole squad basically unbreakable.
Oops, I realized I overlooked this one. This may still be true for Dom4 but the units that really need the morale boost (the Satyrs) are all size-2. In tests, the Minotaurs would trample into the enemy ranks and be among the first to die, meaning their contribution to squad morale would be fleeting at best. Also, the berserk minotaurs are map move-1, which is a real bummer when one of the defining qualities of LA Pangaea is their mobility (otherwise universal map move-2 combined with forest survival).

Still, I should test mixing berserk and non-berserk minotaurs together to see if a winning combination can be found.
Post Reply