Guide: Bandar Log - you whipped me with what?!?

[AreaOfEffect]

It is always important to avoid direct comparisons of vastly different units, such as elephants and tiger riders. I would not hesitate to choose elephants for initial expansion, but believe me, when it comes to war I would pick the tiger riders first. This goes double when I'm at war with a nation that uses fear effects or forces MR checks with their spells. This goes triple when I'm fighting Ry'leh. (Though I'd bring an elephant anyhow to absorb a few spells.)

Making direct comparisons between gandharvas and niefel giants is also not a fair comparison. Sacred units tend to have naturally higher moral scores. You put the gandharva at a disadvantage when putting them up against another sacred because their awe becomes almost irrelevant. The gandharvas also have a standard and infantry average move speed, which means they are army friendly and operate best by elevating your regulars. Niefel Giants operate best on their own. Niefel giants are also priced in comparison to giants, meaning they absorb the benefits of being a giant as a national advantage.

Back to what KO is saying, it is important to compare units of a nation to each other and not other nations. Otherwise you discount national weaknesses and strengths. If you compared every infantry unit to Mictlan's infantry then you would conclude that all solidly average units should be priced as 9 gold and not 10. This would cause you to completely miss the fact that Mictlan's national advantage is cheap humans soldiers. Bandar Log has a national disadvantage, which is that all of their units are animals. Give them a unit that isn't an animal, but rather a magic being, and you must account for it.

I don't like gandharvas as a national unit because I think it is unthematic. The point of Bandar Log is that the apes have come to stand on their own. It is the only ape nation that rules itself. The summons imply that the celestial beings now answer to them, not the other way around. If gandharvas are around and are revered by the monkeys then it would logically imply that a gandharva-like commander would naturally follow. Though a faction with gandharva-like commanders and sacreds fighting along side apes already exists, it's called Kailasa.

[Epaminondas]

AreaofEffect,

If that post was directed to me, you are already preaching to the (half-) converted. I acknowledged as much in my response to Kristoffer. He introduced an angle I did not sufficiently consider before.

Nonetheless, if you are trying to go to an immoderate lengths with the argument and simply say that cross-national comparisons ought not be made, period--well, then, I can't agree.

[AreaOfEffect]

Originally Posted by Epaminondas

AreaofEffect,

If that post was directed to me, you are already preaching to the (half-) converted. I acknowledged as much in my response to Kristoffer. He introduced an angle I did not sufficiently consider before.

Nonetheless, if you are trying to go to an immoderate lengths with the argument and simply say that cross-national comparisons ought not be made, period--well, then, I can't agree.

Don't get me wrong. I am not against making comparisons between nations in general. Nation-to-nation comparisons are always good in my book. What I'm saying is that unit-to-unit comparisons aren't very helpful. Also note that I feel even more strongly about this when the two units being compared fill completely different niches. Comparing a size 6 trampler to a sacred mounted unit and a standard bearer with awe against an ice giant are rather drastic comparisons to make.

My opinion is that you should make comparisons for the sake of game balance. However, those comparisons should be made by taking in the nation as a whole. Regular units, sacred units, commanders, province defense, priest power, magic paths, starting gems, pretender selection, national spells, extra dominion effects, castle types, and temple costs all have to be considered. It's not an easy comparison to make.

The purpose in the post is to express my concern that some comparisons were being made rather hastily and incorrectly. That comparisons were being made in a manner that didn't reveal much insight.

I'm glad you are half converted on this issue. I guess that means that I don't have much else to say. I just wanted to be clear that nation-to-nation comparisons are fine, though doomed to be skewed by personal opinion. Nothings perfect.

[JimMorrison]

Well AOE, perhaps I misspoke a bit, as I didn't mean to make a strictly direct comparison. I was mostly just trying to show how unless you are absolutely rolling in cash you can't spend, the tigers generally end up not being not entirely cost effective.

And really, I did not just compare them to elephants. I also compared them to White Ones. Unfortunately, Bandar Log has no other cavalry, certainly no other sacred cavalry, so what would be a better unit to compare to? I compared them to the other unit with a similar cost, and to the other sacred unit, I think that's all I could do, since we all seemed to agree it's not right to compare them to Oiorpata, for example.

I just hope that KO's agreement of my point on cost, wasn't a euphemistic, philosophical agreement. I will cross my fingers that we see a cost reduction of capital only units (not commanders) in the next patch - to encourage people to use their special national units more frequently.

<3