Feedback [Feedback] - Oceanic Future Part 6

[DeletedUser7942]

Yeah it clearly doesn't make sense from what I can tell by all the discussion here regarding Medusa. I mean C.R.A.B. also has Blast +6 and it isn't doing the same damage apparently as Medusa. Exoskeleton Soldier from FE and Howitzer from Indy also have Blast +6 and I don't recall anyone crying havoc regarding those units like this Medusa is causing.

 

[qaccy]

It still has to do with how Blast works, combined with the range of the Medusa. Much higher than any other Blast unit, allowing the 'damage bonus for each field closer to the target' part of Blast to contribute much more here.

However, I'm still wondering why the community's focus is specifically on Eels here. Has nobody done any checking to see whether other units are also affected in a similar way? If an artillery-boosted unit is apparently being destroyed in one shot, surely other units, particularly those WEAK to artillery, would be as well...right? But nobody's coming forward saying that their Mantas, or Turtles, or any other unit is being destroyed in a single attack so that must not be the case? Is it just some sort of bug specific to Eels?

 

[DeletedUser7942]

It still has to do with how Blast works, combined with the range of the Medusa. Much higher than any other Blast unit, allowing the 'damage bonus for each field closer to the target' part of Blast to contribute much more here.

However, I'm still wondering why the community's focus is specifically on Eels here. Has nobody done any checking to see whether other units are also affected in a similar way? If an artillery-boosted unit is apparently being destroyed in one shot, surely other units, particularly those WEAK to artillery, would be as well...right? But nobody's coming forward saying that their Mantas, or Turtles, or any other unit is being destroyed in a single attack so that must not be the case? Is it just some sort of bug specific to Eels?

I guess I'm not sure on how Blast works then. I mean all it says is the unit gets an increase in damage, well how much increase? Doesn't say. Then it says "for each tile closer to the target" okay, so how much per tile then? Mystery. And what is the +6 or +3 or if it has no number and just says Blast like in the case of Plasma Artillery?

Plus maybe I'm confused on what Range means. I thought all that meant was simply how many tiles away a unit was able to hit another but then I see Medusa at 100 range, what is that about?

Regardless, I guess since Medusa can land pretty close right off the bat with Rapid Deployment and first strike I can see how it can do more damage right off the bat than CRAB can of course since CRAB has to scoot across the battlefield for a while. And I can see how it would have more Attack power than Plasma Artillery since it has Rapid Deployment whereas Plasma hits from further tiles away thereby not getting as much "blast power". But still it seems to mainly come down to how much AP gained per tile which we don't know, or at least I don't,(did I miss a meeting or something?Suicide Kings reference)

But yes, people keep mentioning Eels, would like to see results of damage other units are taking for comparison.

oh, yeah, and look what it says on the wiki "

Artillery units are lost in close-range combat. They are very slow and have a weak attack." so much for weak attack I guess, ay?
https://en.wiki.forgeofempires.com/index.php?title=Army_and_battles

They need to fix this too btw; "There is no retaliation to fear from ranged attacks" yeah except when the unit has Contact of course like Sub Cruiser, so yes, range can in fact retaliate.

 

[qaccy]

@TheSlayerofSloppyJoes To answer some of your questions:

1) From what I understand, Blast provides the listed attack bonus for each field closer to the target than its maximum range. For example, the first Blast unit we have access to is the Howitzer. It's also the only one which can be used in battles not subject to the 1.5 scale battlefield. It has a range of 6 and a Blast bonus (coincidentally) of 6. I'm unsure of whether the bonus is applied even at max range, but what I do know is that for each hex closer to the target beyond max range, the Howitzer will gain +6 attack for a maximum bonus of either +30 or +36 attack added to its attack value when directly adjacent to a unit. In 1.5 scale battles (Progressive and higher units present on the field), the bonus is still applied in the same way but condensed in the same way the range is. A Medusa's 50 range ultimately ends up being only 34 in battle, but if directly adjacent to a unit it's still going to receive the full +294 or +300 attack bonus for a range of 50. For what it's worth, I'm also unsure of whether the Blast bonus is applied before or after military bonuses, but I'm inclined to believe that it's applied after (like terrain and unit bonuses are). However, I feel like if that were the case then this whole thing with the Medusa might not be possible so perhaps Blast's bonus *is* affected by military boost?

Incidentally, the Plasma Artillery, at least for me, does have a Blast value of 3 displayed in-game.

2) The Medusa was given such a range value essentially to mean 'infinite', so that it's always able to hit any (non-flying) unit regardless of battlefield positioning. Unfortunately that's led to some unforseen problems due to that range's interaction with Blast, as outlined above and in previous posts.

3) To be fair, I think the unit descriptions on the wiki are for what's applicable in the early ages rather than the game as a whole, although artillery remain the weakest units in each age (from an attack power standpoint) until FE with the Rail Gun. Probably because that's also around the point where each unit's combined movement and range is roughly the same, and the differences end up coming down to abilities and type matchups rather than stats.

 

[DeletedUser]

the only question
what is the exact formula (and InnoGames obviously wants that's to be a hidden secret) ?

a normal multiply distance*value would instakill an eel

so it must be something exponential
^10 isn't very much. ^20 hurts a little. but ^50 results in an extreme value
(like costs of medals in GE: 125*1,2^attempt. 10 --> 773; 20 --> 4.792 but 50 --> 1.137.554)

A Medusa's 50 range ultimately ends up being only 34 in battle, but if directly adjacent to a unit it's still going to receive the full +294 or +300 attack bonus for a range of 50.

only 300 more wouldn't kill an eel so easy
because the eel has +150 against artillery

 

[DeletedUser8150]

Perhaps I have had a charmed life or the game code had a brain freeze but something odd just happened on live:

GE lvl 4 fight - 2nd wave:

Army 5 turtles 3 rogues (one damaged turtle)

Nme: 3 medusas (+other fluff)

Medusas landed ~6 hexes away deadcentre of battlefield opposite my 3 rogues and one of the medusas attacked and killed my turtle!? It must have been able to hit the rogue.....

 

[Ian Santa Claus]

Why is anybody surprised that a defending army of 8 units with rapid deployment wins against an attacking army that doesn't have rogues and doesn't have contact?
The defenders only need to do 5 points of damage each to kill half the attackers in the first round before the attackers get off a single shot. The only way the attackers can win following that is if every single shot they fire is an instakill.
If the medusa does 4 - 6 damage on an eel and the eel does 8 - 9 damage on the medusa, then it's still true that the eel is strong against the medusa one on one, but the rapid deployment allowing it to fire first is still going to allow the 8 weaker units to win against the 8 stronger units just about every time.

 

[qaccy]

only 300 more wouldn't kill an eel so easy
because the eel has +150 against artillery

Partly why I've asked several times if this phenomenon only applies when Eels are involved, or if other units are included as well. The portion of my post which you quoted was also immediately followed by me speculating that perhaps Blast's bonus is affected by military boost, which would also have a significant impact.

But hey, at least @Pevsner has provided some evidence for you that it may not be just Eels. Was that turtle damaged when it was attacked or did it take a full 10 damage?

 

[DeletedUser]

I'm also unsure of whether the Blast bonus is applied before or after military bonuses

military bonuses are always only on the base value
not on additional other unit bonus

by me speculating that perhaps Blast's bonus is affected by military boost

no

and wouldn't really matter because the defender has almost zero boost (in neighborhood battles)

so
attack value = base value attack * (1+military boost) + other bonus values like blast, terrain, against special unit type ...
similar to defense

 

[DeletedUser8150]

But hey, at least @Pevsner has provided some evidence for you that it may not be just Eels. Was that turtle damaged when it was attacked or did it take a full 10 damage?

It did have some damage. My surprise was the medusa decided to ignore a rogue in range to attack a turtle which seemed odd given the normal rules.

 

[DeletedUser7942]

@TheSlayerofSloppyJoes To answer some of your questions:

1) From what I understand, Blast provides the listed attack bonus for each field closer to the target than its maximum range. For example, the first Blast unit we have access to is the Howitzer. It's also the only one which can be used in battles not subject to the 1.5 scale battlefield. It has a range of 6 and a Blast bonus (coincidentally) of 6. I'm unsure of whether the bonus is applied even at max range, but what I do know is that for each hex closer to the target beyond max range, the Howitzer will gain +6 attack for a maximum bonus of either +30 or +36 attack added to its attack value when directly adjacent to a unit. In 1.5 scale battles (Progressive and higher units present on the field), the bonus is still applied in the same way but condensed in the same way the range is. A Medusa's 50 range ultimately ends up being only 34 in battle, but if directly adjacent to a unit it's still going to receive the full +294 or +300 attack bonus for a range of 50. For what it's worth, I'm also unsure of whether the Blast bonus is applied before or after military bonuses, but I'm inclined to believe that it's applied after (like terrain and unit bonuses are). However, I feel like if that were the case then this whole thing with the Medusa might not be possible so perhaps Blast's bonus *is* affected by military boost?

Incidentally, the Plasma Artillery, at least for me, does have a Blast value of 3 displayed in-game.

2) The Medusa was given such a range value essentially to mean 'infinite', so that it's always able to hit any (non-flying) unit regardless of battlefield positioning. Unfortunately that's led to some unforseen problems due to that range's interaction with Blast, as outlined above and in previous posts.

3) To be fair, I think the unit descriptions on the wiki are for what's applicable in the early ages rather than the game as a whole, although artillery remain the weakest units in each age (from an attack power standpoint) until FE with the Rail Gun. Probably because that's also around the point where each unit's combined movement and range is roughly the same, and the differences end up coming down to abilities and type matchups rather than stats.

This is rather confusing but let's see if I got this. A target is 5 tiles away from Medusa. Medusa has a range of 50 tiles, so that target is technically 45 tiles closer to Medusa, even though the battlefield isn't that big, so that would be 45 tiles x 6 Blast bonus, giving Medusa a +270 attack bonus then?

So take that scenario and now the question seems to be, is Medusa getting its base Attack power of 210 + 270 from blast for a total base attack of 480 then that 480 is getting boosted. So if one had 130 attack boost that would give 624 + 480 = a 1104 attack from Medusa. Yeah, I can see that doing it then.

edit: given my tests below now I'm not sure what the deal is but they are not one shotting anything that I have run into yet.

 

[DeletedUser7942]

Okay, I did a little testing and I'm not one shotting anything so far, in GvG anyway.

Spoiler: pic results

damage calc says the same 6-8 damage

https://forum.en.forgeofempires.com/index.php?threads/the-damage-calculator.25048/





couldn't one shot any of em, this is the result of each getting hit once;


another test, still no one shots

I'll try again when the next GE comes up on the 17th, I'll have at least another 170 attack boost added it'll have a +277 attack boost instead of the 107 it has now, then I'll see if it can one shot anything.

 

[DeletedUser7942]

Why is anybody surprised that a defending army of 8 units with rapid deployment wins against an attacking army that doesn't have rogues and doesn't have contact?
The defenders only need to do 5 points of damage each to kill half the attackers in the first round before the attackers get off a single shot. The only way the attackers can win following that is if every single shot they fire is an instakill.
If the medusa does 4 - 6 damage on an eel and the eel does 8 - 9 damage on the medusa, then it's still true that the eel is strong against the medusa one on one, but the rapid deployment allowing it to fire first is still going to allow the 8 weaker units to win against the 8 stronger units just about every time.

When this first was brought up it was said Medusa was one shotting eels, well so far I can't reproduce that, see results above.

 

[DeletedUser]

So take that scenario and now the question seems to be, is Medusa getting its base Attack power of 210 + 270 from blast for a total base attack of 480 then that 480 is getting boosted. So if one had 130 attack boost that would give 624 + 480 = a 1104 attack from Medusa. Yeah, I can see that doing it then.

too bad that this is wrong

your boost is only applied to the base attack value
so 210 * (1 + 130%) + 270 blast = 753

 

[DeletedUser7942]

too bad that this is wrong

your boost is only applied to the base attack value
so 210 * (1 + 130%) + 270 blast = 753

yes I know, it was addressing the idea that what if it was so no it's not wrong in that sense. Regardless as you can see from my results above my Medusa's weren't one shotting anything.

 

[DeletedUser8858]

I found an instance in GE (live servers) where Medusa ignored a rogue at start of battle and targeted a unit further away. I had been using rogues to counter medusa's initial attack and using auto battle a lot but start manually battling to see what has been killing more units than expected (aside from auto battle AI being terrible).

 

[DeletedUser8150]

I found an instance in GE (live servers) where Medusa ignored a rogue at start of battle and targeted a unit further away. I had been using rogues to counter medusa's initial attack and using auto battle a lot but start manually battling to see what has been killing more units than expected (aside from auto battle AI being terrible).

So not just me then. Ok so have I misunderstood the game AI or has this changed or is this a bug in game code? I thought game AI always targeted (GE/PvP) a rogue in range over any other unit?????

 

[DeletedUser7779]

I had this happen to me too this week in GE, but i thought i just didnt see it right. But now I see it's not only me

 

[DeletedUser8150]

I had this happen to me too this week in GE, but i thought i just didnt see it right. But now I see it's not only me

Ok. First time it happened to me was on live last week.

@Zarok is there any known AI changes we/i've missed here ?

 

[DeletedUser7779]

Ok. So has this happened before this week? or before the last game update version?

It happened in GE this week, but i really can't remember if it was before or after the update. I finished lvl 4 GE Thursday early morning, and the update was around noon on Wednesday if I recall correctly? (GMT time)
Haven't noticed it in previous weeks.