Archon, there is a battle simulation program, but not 100% reliable, but it is good to do sometimes, this program has nothing to do with plarium, but you can try to use it

http://sparta.playtamin.com/en/

FastReD said:

Archon, there is a battle simulation program, but not 100% reliable, but it is good to do sometimes, this program has nothing to do with plarium, but you can try to use it

http://sparta.playtamin.com/en/

It's not good.

46 vs 122 it's far away compared to losses of Emporia.

good as I said before is not 100% reliable, but it is something more approaching a battle

Scrumbilos, you never know...

I had 1m6 in an emporia and someone attacked with 50k, result : he lost obviously but killed me almost 50k, that's nonsense.

It's as if 5 soldiers fought 160 at the same time and they managed to kill 5 of them before dying... 

lefeubleu said:

It's as if 5 soldiers fought 160 at the same time and they managed to kill 5 of them before dying... 

And why not, Gandalf, why not? I am envisioning such battle, and -even if the greater force were defending- I do not find it incredible to have each one of the attacking force killing  one of the defensing force. Range weapons would do the difference, but only if the small force were not actually able to engage; otherwise, well... friendly fire is not. 

Regards

Hello everybody :)

I know the rules have changed recently, but this is how it used to work :

Let's assign A = attack power of all the sworsdmen with their bonuses (agreements, elixirs, Dominion, plus possible offense enhancer)

Let's assign D = defense power of all the javelineers (same as above applies, on the defender's side, with possible defense enhancer, of course)

Then the original rule worked like this :

Combat resolution ratio = A / (A + D)

If A >= 0.5 (or 50%), then the combat is won by the attacker.

The same ratio was then used a the defender's losses ratio, while the attacker's losses ratio was the complement to 100%.

i.e. : Defender's losses ratio = A / (A+D) and attacker's losses ratio = D / (A+D)

This ratios are applied to the quantity of each kind of units and rounded to the closest integer value.

Let's calculate with only base values as an example:

So we have 250 swordsmen with 40 attack points each : A = 250 x 40 = 10,000

And 150 javelineers with 20 defense points against light infantry each (here we have to take the nature of attackers in account) : D = 150 x 20 = 3,000

Notes :

- When mixed troops are involved, the majority present on each party are taken in account.

- About your remarks about "5 people fighting 100 people", you're forgotting the most important : they're NOT the same "people". They're differently equipped, meaning they'e not even. This is translated by the fact 1 swordsman inflicts 40 damage, while 1 javelineer only intercepts 20 damage, and also inflicts back only 20 damage when attackers losses are calculated.

Now in this example, we're using only light infantry, so they're mostly equivalent. When you're calculating heavy cavalry vs light infantry, however, we're not talking about the same things at all. Remember this is a simulation wargame, so the cavalry here plays the role of armored tanks or even airborne bombers. Light footmen can just NOT match them. In the game, this is translated into attack and defense points, but the proportions clearly show how all this goes.

OK, so let's calculate now. :)

We have our 250 swords worth D = 10,000 offense vs our 150 javs worth 3,000 defense.

Attack ratio = 10,000 / (10,000 + 3,000) = 77%

This is also the defensers losses ratio

The attackers losses ratio will be 3,000 / (10,000 + 3,000) = 23%

As a result, the defenders will suffer 150 x 77% = 115 casualties (115.38 rounded down to 115)(, and the offenders will suffer 250 x 23% = 58 casualties (57.69 rounded up to 58).

Now you have to ckeck from real combats how much the recent change has modified these rules.

They're now supposed to be "one dead attacker for each dead defender", but actual units characteristics are taken in account (attack and defense points), so one Agema is never equal to one javelineer (easy to check from combat reports).

Now it's probably still close enough to the original rules. For instance, if forces are even, both opponents will lose half of their troops (ratio = 50%).

Do some tests and check how accurate the original rules are.

Was the cavalry defending or attacking ? Your side wasn't specified... ^^

Cavalry has very notoriously poor defense ratio against infantry. I suppose they're going under the horses and hamstring their legs ? :p

Same for phalanx. Thorakitai have slightly better defense ratios that Thureophoroi, but they're still more efficient against cavalry and other phalanx.

That's the reason why mixed defense is better.

Consider it's because they're heavier while infantry units are lighter and more agile... Think about Achilles in the movie "Troy". ^^ LOL

On the other hand, offensive cavalry and phalanx will bust defensive infantry into pieces.

Attacking and defending are separate features. Heavy troops attack like a hammer and do huge damage, but are very slow to maneuver. If lighter and faster units gan go around them and attack them from the back, they're defenseless.

That's exactly why Alexander de Great's armies were invincible :the heavy hoplites phalanx were protected by light cavalry that prevented ennemeis from gettin in their back, that was very vulnerable. After Alexander's death, the Macedonians progressively removed the supporting cavalry for economic reasons, and started to lose battles.

Anyway, this game is based upon attack and defense points, and is not necessarily realistic.

Besides, you cannot compare a footman to a heavy horseman. Numbers mean nothing. Can you compare a foot soldier with a heavy tank, a plane, or an aircraft carrier ? Yet they are 1 vs 1, right ? So everybody please stop comparing raw numbers : they just mean absolutely nothing.

Attack a footman with a tank's cannon : he'll die. Now allow your footman to sneak and drop a grenade inside the tank turret : the tank will be destroyed.

This is the perfect illustration to how different attacking and defending are.

The cavalry was on my side i.e. defending but there wasn't much of it anyway.

Yes your history thing seems quite truebut indeed the game is based on points only I suppose.

I'm not only giving numbers, I mentioned the kind of units I had... and my defense was definitely mixed, I said it as well.

OK, so weak defense against attacking infantry : check your horses defense ratio against various kinds of attackers. :)

Plus you never know how much your opponent has invested in signing agreements, and he may have used a +50% offense and defense bonus, have a high level Dominion mode activated, elixirs, etc. etc.

That's why the battle calculator is mostly useless... :p

I personally don't even try to calculate this. I just throw 100+ millions offense and thrust my way inside the opponent's defense. ^^

2100 def vs unlimited off

lose: 9000 res vs 3726 res

Does anyone know how to calculate losses, or we play gambling?

I don't think calculating in terms of resources here is relevant. It's only worth for Persian positions, since it's used to pay back the bank and predict when you'll get the payout to hit a high level position in time.

In PVP combat, I'd rather calculate in amounts of offense and defense lost, or even better, in numbers of good units lost. I mean to evaluate the losses, of course.

As anyway, combats results and losses ratios are calculated opposing total offense vs total defense. The kind of units present in majority is used to select which defense value you must take for the defenders.

Here, heavy infantry was the majority, so the javelineers's defense against heavy infantry was used to calculate their defense value aganist the whole offense party.

I am putting this here because of the subject... but actually not 100% related to this thread.

Emporia mining seems to be very poorly balanced.  The risk sending your troops to "mine" an emporium is enormous: High level players LOVE the fools who mine Emporia and provide a sure and safe source of PVP points.  Yet the reward is microscopic... it takes forever to collect anything!  Sending more troops does not allow you to collect resources faster just to stay there longer extending the imminent risk of being pummeled any second by some level 98 player looking for PVP points.

So the only players sending their "doomed gatherers" to the emporia killing fields are those who have not figured this out yet.  I still mine Traders Emporia on occasion but only with 4 peltast who will grab 2 Drachmas and get out of Dodge in 8-10 minutes.  I only do it because Plarium has made in-game Drachmas so difficult to get. 

I don't think Plarium loses any revenue through the Emporia because so little is ever collected there.

My suggested improved gathering rules for emporia.

1. More troops should gather more resources in the same time. Risking more units should be rewarded with bigger potential gains. Right now adding more troops only increases risk by extending the time you are exposed.

2. Gathering speed should increase the longer you stay: First 5 minutes collects nothing then slow gathering, but after 8 minutes double gathering speed after 9 minutes double again and so on... It is a feat to survive 30 minutes in an Emporium yet the reward is crap with the current rules. You should get 5000 Drachmas for surviving an hour :)

3. Potential take home amount should rival raids... Collecting 50K in a raid is not very risky and can easily be accomplished.  Getting the same from farming Emporia is very dangerous and nearly impossible to accomplish. Only newbies and dumbos farm emporia because Plarium makes it ridiculously unprofitable!  I did it when I had played the game less than a month... since never (except for the speedy Drachma grabs).

and then u have tools who will attack your emporia with everything they got outside pvp, because they have daily quest defeat rivals at emporia...

u lose some defense

they lose some at their city when u retaliate...