Neither generalist nor specialist: A "Hybrid" approach to team building

[Invictus73]

Ok, so maybe I should conservatively assume 100 Melee Defense, not 90 or 92, is safe, albeit tentatively? :)

[ManaSeed]

>> That’s just too little. Can’t the nastiest enemies hit for over 200 per hit? Assuming you have fifty or so HPs, I’d imagine you want an armor piece that gives you around 200 or more to avoid getting at least one shotted.
If you’re talking about orc leader, he doesn’t have chance to attack you because you would keep a cunning distance with him. When he approaches, you will probably slay him with 1 or 1.5 melee brothers. Not sure, I didn’t pay much attention to him. But it definitely won’t take more than 2 melee brothers to kill him in single round.

The 90+120 armor only meant to tank projectile and 1h attack several times, especially when you don’t want to waste time waiting for safe opportunity to attack. You can avoid all melee attack if you’re patient/defensive (by keeping distance). But I never go for defensive if I fight on plains, or after I’ve made sure there are no hidden enemies.

↓ The following opinion might be biased because playing with woven tunic melee is a little uncommon, judging by other’s opinions. So it might only fits similar team setup and play style. ↓
You rarely take melee hit even if you’re offensive, because your melee brothers can be anti-melee specialist. [Perfect Focus + Battle Flow + Berserk + high max fatigue + 2h weapon] is sooo deadly. It makes me happy when I see a lot of melee enemies, it makes me frown when I see a lot of ranged enemies. Basically my tactic is to kill all ranged enemies as soon as possible, without getting hit/killed by them.

>> My two captains have 95 and 89 Resolve, respectively. Is that enough? If I started at 65, I may still not have reached 95 for instance, though I likely would’ve reached 89.
>>So once again: What FINAL number am I aiming for?
I should have answered your question just now. But for clarification purpose, why not answer once more? You can get 85~105 final resolve if you have 65 initial resolve. The final number you’re aiming for, depends how greedy you are. Weird answer. Now I’m not sure if I’m answering/understanding the question correctly.

>> And my DPS guys simply had an absurd luck with hits and high damage hits. In fact, even my “tarpit” Riposte bot did a lot of damage.
If it’s 1000 damage it still can be luck. 4000 damage dealt by a single brother in 6 rounds requires a lot of hits. It is high damage with high precision.

>> You hit the five percent minimum hit chance v. Orc younglings at Melee Defense 92, but we don’t know what kind of Melee Skill the more skilled AI units possess to make an ironclad conclusion about what Melee Defense we need in general?
Also, you forget to mention I hit the six percent minimum hit chance v. Orc younglings at Melee Defense 80. Would you spend 12 melee def stats for just 1% extra dodge chance? Yes I don’t know optimal melee def against all enemies, with the suspicion of different enemies have different accuracy.

Maybe it is not fair for an offense junkie say this, but I optimistically guess it is very hard for most enemies to kill a brother with 80 melee def, especially if he wear some decent armor.

[ManaSeed]

>> Ok, so maybe I should conservatively assume 100 Melee Defense, not 90 or 92, is safe, albeit tentatively?
We know our dodge chance against orc youngS. But we can never guess the relationship of accuracy between different enemies, if we have never compared most of them. If orc young appears to be accuracy genius or idiot, your self-satisfying adjusted melee def value would be greatly biased.

Making the melee def higher is not necessarily the most conservative approach. You might waste melee def if orc young appears to be accuracy genius. If you want to be conservative, 82~83+5 (+5 is to combat increased accuracy due to greatsword and billhook) = 87~88 melee def

[Invictus73]

ManaSeed wrote:

If you’re talking about orc leader, he doesn’t have chance to attack you because you would keep a cunning distance with him. When he approaches, you will probably slay him with 1 or 1.5 melee brothers. Not sure, I didn’t pay much attention to him. But it definitely won’t take more than 2 melee bro

Hmmm, you sure only Orc leaders can hit that hard? I thought any generic orc with 2 handers can nail you for 200 or more.

Perhaps I should watch their damage more, but I rarely get the occasion to do so, because 1) I eliminate 2 handers fast; and 2) I rarely get hit by melees in general.

ManaSeed wrote:

The following opinion might be biased because playing with woven tunic melee is a little uncommon, judging by other’s opinions.

You say? If you had Battle Sisters (which apparently are implemented soon), I bet you’d trot them out in lingerie! ;)

In all seriousness, I never feel safe without at least Lamellar Harness at minimum. And I think that’s light enough for your damage guys to do their thang without sacrificing much damage.

ManaSeed wrote:

I should have answered your question just now. But for clarification purpose, why not answer once more? You can get 85~105 final resolve if you have 65 initial resolve. The final number you’re aiming for, depends how greedy you are.

Ok, a better question: Do you know what exactly your captain’s Resolve modifies? In addition to what is written on the captain Perk screen? Someone said your Fatigue recovery; it also seems to modify how much bonus you obtain at Confident status. What else? And what is the precise formula?

ManaSeed wrote:

Maybe it is not fair for an offense junkie say this, but I optimistically guess it is very hard for most enemies to kill a brother with 80 melee def, especially if he wear some decent armor.

Ok, then I will go with 90, to be safe! ;)

[Invictus73]

Addendum:

What about Melee Skill? My Swordmasters have over 100; and some of my Hedge Knights approach 100 as well. Should I dump stats elsewhere once I hit those type of numbers?

[Invictus73]

Update on Adventurous Nobles with 65+ starting starting Resolve:

Do they even exist? Since I have a buttload of cash, I decided to simply keep hiring out heroes and then dismissing them with my final 12th slot to see if I can snag such an Adventurous Noble. And I have yet to see anyone with 65+ starting Resolve, after hiring probably a dozen Adventurous Nobles. Three of them had either Fearless or Brave, but that still didn’t get them there. The highest I’ve seen is 62.

By the way, there is way too much starting stat variation/gyration. I’ve seen Hedge Knights with high 60s start Melee Skill; I’ve seen others close to 50. A bit too much, you think?

Such a disparity means that you could have characters with far inferior stats than the norm, EVEN IF they actually have the starting Trait that are perfect for their Backgrounds/roles.

[Mashed Zombie]

Monks (and any other background that has +10 resolve) can be used in place of an Adventurous Noble. I like high starting resolve as I want to get as close to 100 as I can. recovering 40-50 stamina helps in longer battles. 60+ resolve is fine. 65+ is gold if you can find someone with it.

[ManaSeed]

>> Hmmm, you sure only Orc leaders can hit that hard? I thought any generic orc with 2 handers can nail you for 200 or more.
I searched my database and I’ve record almost nothing about orc weapons’ damage. These are the only ones.

==> enemy’s head chopper can do 60 dmg to your head armor, or 88 dmg to your body armor

==> Orc warrior’s head splitter can hit your armor for 90, 92 dmg

>> Perhaps I should watch their damage more, but I rarely get the occasion to do so, because 1) I eliminate 2 handers fast; and 2) I rarely get hit by melees in general.
Same situation. But recently I have not paid any attention to 2 handers, I treat all melee enemy the same (simply get in position to kill, and make sure someone can clean up the mess if my current attacker runs out of stamina due to poor luck or tough target), except special ones like Living Souls.

>> You say? If you had Battle Sisters (which apparently are implemented soon), I bet you’d trot them out in lingerie!
[battle log]
0042 Battle Sisters has stripped!
0042 Battle brothers are not looking at their enemies!
0042 Accuracy of battle brothers has reduced by 50%.
0042 Dodge chance of battle brothers has reduced by 70%.
0042 Battle brothers become excited for unknown reasons!
0042 Morale of battle brothers becomes Unbreakable.
0042 Fatigue of battle brothers has reduced to 0.

>> In all seriousness, I never feel safe without at least Lamellar Harness at minimum. And I think that’s light enough for your damage guys to do their thang without sacrificing much damage.

I think now is a good time to discuss about certain thing. I think there is an optimal figure/number for Damage Per Round. I don’t know how to call this so I’ll call it “Max Efficient Damage” for the moment.

For example, let’s say this figure is 2500. Even if you can reach this figure with just 5 melee brothers, you can’t exceed it significantly by having more melee brothers. Probably due to the following reasons:

1) limitation of attack range
2) occupation of tiles(spaces), since different characters can’t stand on same spot
3) initial formation and initial distance with enemy

Factor 1, 2 & 3 force your troops at rear or side to detour or wait. In the end, ONLY some of the line fighters are really doing all the work while the others are more or less idling, or fail to reach enemy timely.

I’ve noticed this several times when I look at the battle results at the end. 3 out of 5 brothers dealt noticeable damage while other 2 dealt pity damage, DESPITE all five brothers have same spec, and advancing like suicide squad.

This is something I want point out against pure DPS build(though my team is quite pure DPS). Not all risk are converted into firepower, some risk are taken for no purpose.

>> Ok, a better question: Do you know what EXACTLY your captain’s Resolve modifies? In addition to what is written on the captain Perk screen? Someone said your Fatigue recovery; it also seems to modify how much bonus you obtain at Confident status. What else? And what is the precise formula?
Nobody can be sure unless they are devs or they check the game code. In addition to what is written on the captain Perk screen, resolve is also a modifier stat to perk Captain and Rally the Troops. The latter perk can restore your stamina. It shouldn’t affect the amount of bonus gained with Confident status, but the CHANCE to obtain confident status. The description of Resolve has covered quite a lot of stuff. I don’t know the formula. But if I guessing your purpose correctly, you’re thinking whether Resolve is worth investing. I have a brother with Captain perk with about 100 Resolve, other brothers under his influence get Confident status when one or two nearby enemies are slain.

After answering your questions, I want to ask someone else a question too. What else did I miss?

>> What about Melee Skill? My Swordmasters have over 100; and some of my Hedge Knights approach 100 as well. Should I dump stats elsewhere once I hit those type of numbers?
Hohoho~~~~ if you’re asking an offense junkie about optimal melee skill, you must be expecting to hear things like…

“Put all your soul into melee skill.”

So I have never tried to gauge or measure the optimal melee skill. If you don’t mind, here is an opinion based on human’s super reliably vague & biased memory, I think 95~100 melee skill hit most enemies in most situation.

>> Update on Adventurous Nobles with 65+ starting starting Resolve:
It’s like drawing lottery to get Adventurous Nobles with Fearless trait. Since we have to wait for update, you can try recruiting them once everyday. To be more serious, if you insist to get it within hours, you can keep reloading the game.

>> By the way, there is way too much starting stat variation/gyration. I’ve seen Hedge Knights with high 60s start Melee Skill; I’ve seen others close to 50. A bit too much, you think?
I think there is balance/tradeoff between initial stats. But I’m not sure if it’s fair. Still, it doesn’t matter as long as my preferred stats are high.

[ManaSeed]

>> By the way, there is way too much starting stat variation/gyration. I’ve seen Hedge Knights with high 60s start Melee Skill; I’ve seen others close to 50. A bit too much, you think?
Ahh… I wasn’t answering your question just now. For mathematic and realism purpose, it is not much (60/50 = 1.2). It’s not strange if people around you have 20% difference in ability, right? But for myself, I won’t tolerate if my preferred stat (mostly melee skill) is 3 points below the best (e.g. if 60 initial melee skill is highest, I won’t accept recruit with 57 initial melee skill)

==> Recruits at lv1, effects of traits and equipment are removed
best max fatigue 106
best max resolve 45
Best melee 54(55 only seen once)
Best ranged 40
best melee def 5
best ranged def 5

EDIT
I forgot to mention the statistic is very old and doesn’t involve a lot of data. It just serves as reference.

[Invictus73]

ManaSeed wrote:

Ahh… I wasn’t answering your question just now. For mathematic and realism purpose, it is not much (60/50 = 1.2). It’s not strange if people around you have 20% difference in ability, right? But for myself, I won’t tolerate if my preferred stat (mostly melee skill) is 3 points below the best (e.g. if 60 initial melee skill is highest, I won’t accept recruit with 57 initial melee skill)
==> Recruits at lv1, effects of traits and equipment are removed
best max fatigue 106
best max resolve 45
Best melee 54(55 only seen once)
Best ranged 40
best melee def 5
best ranged def 5
EDIT
I forgot to mention the statistic is very old and doesn’t involve a lot of data. It just serves as reference.

Also, I assume these stats are prior to Background & Trait boni? For instance, I just got a Hedge Knight with 115 Fatigue, and every other stat exceeding what you quoted other than Range Skill & Defense.

[Invictus73]

ManaSeed wrote:

0042 Battle Sisters has stripped!
0042 Battle brothers are not looking at their enemies!
0042 Accuracy of battle brothers has reduced by 50%.
0042 Dodge chance of battle brothers has reduced by 70%.
0042 Battle brothers become excited for unknown reasons!
0042 Morale of battle brothers becomes Unbreakable.
0042 Fatigue of battle brothers has reduced to 0.

LOL, I don’t see how seeing naked lassies would “reduce” a man’s fatigue.

ManaSeed wrote:

I think now is a good time to discuss about certain thing. I think there is an optimal figure/number for Damage Per Round. I don’t know how to call this so I’ll call it “Max Efficient Damage” for the moment.

For example, let’s say this figure is 2500. Even if you can reach this figure with just 5 melee brothers, you can’t exceed it significantly by having more melee brothers. Probably due to the following reasons:

1) limitation of attack range
2) occupation of tiles(spaces), since different characters can’t stand on same spot
3) initial formation and initial distance with enemy

Factor 1, 2 & 3 force your troops at rear or side to detour or wait. In the end, ONLY some of the line fighters are really doing all the work while the others are more or less idling, or fail to reach enemy timely.

I’ve noticed this several times when I look at the battle results at the end. 3 out of 5 brothers dealt noticeable damage while other 2 dealt pity damage, DESPITE all five brothers have same spec, and advancing like suicide squad.

This is something I want point out against pure DPS build(though my team is quite pure DPS). Not all risk are converted into firepower, some risk are taken for no purpose.

Your recognition of all this renders your refual to employ ranged units that much more perplexing.

[ManaSeed]

>> Also, I assume these stats are prior to Background & Trait boni? For instance, I just got a Hedge Knight with 115 Fatigue, and every other stat exceeding what you quoted other than Range Skill & Defense.
What is boni? But I can guess what you’re trying to say. Yes you’re very keen. These are old stats taken before I use Microsoft excel to record stats. So they are not accurate and less meaningful, as what you’ve pointed out.

>> LOL, I don’t see how seeing naked lassies would “reduce” a man’s fatigue.

There are powers hidden within all of us.

If you’re deadly tired after walking 50km, you must think your limit is around 50~55km.

What if I tell you that you can actually walk for another 50 km? If your beloved ones are waiting at the destination for you to rescue them or something, you can probably do it.

For real men, looking at curvy maidens can mentally energize them. This power-up greatly exceeds the effect of drugs taken by wimps.

These pretty ladies with quite a personality have a chance be the wife of a brother. In other words, battle sister represents “future”. In turn, children represents “legacy”.

Everyone dies one day, your legacy is the only thing that passed onto the world. He/she carries your will, dreams and message to the world. How can you not be excited when you fantasize about creating your legacy?

*wiping nosebleed*

[Invictus73]

ManaSeed wrote:

There are powers hidden within all of us.

If you’re deadly tired after walking 50km, you must think your limit is around 50~55km.

What if I tell you that you can actually walk for another 50 km? If your beloved ones are waiting at the destination for you to rescue them or something, you can probably do it.

For real men, looking at curvy maidens can mentally energize them. This power-up greatly exceeds the effect of drugs taken by wimps.

These pretty ladies with quite a personality have a chance be the wife of a brother. In other words, battle sister represents “future”. In turn, children represents “legacy”.

Everyone dies one day, your legacy is the only thing that passed onto the world. He/she carries your will, dreams and message to the world. How can you not be excited when you fantasize about creating your legacy?

*wiping nosebleed*

I think you need to go to sleep, dude. Your imagination is running amuk! ;)

Some interesting Melee Skill results I’ve found:

On a particular Shieldwalling Orc (forgot which type), my 110 Melee Skill Swordmaster had the max ninety five percent; interestingly, my only 93 Melee Skill Swordmaster had a paltry eighty three percent!

So, yes, 90 Melee Skill is clearly not enough.

[ManaSeed]

>> On a particular Shieldwalling Orc (forgot which type), my 110 Melee Skill Swordmaster had the max ninety five percent; interestingly, my only 93 Melee Skill Swordmaster had a paltry eighty three percent!

So, yes, 90 Melee Skill is clearly not enough.

It depends on your objective. If you’re aiming for melee skill high enough to achieve 95% hit chance against the most agile enemy, regardless of odds against you, I think your melee skill can never get too high.

If you aim for optimal melee skill (highest average hit chance against all types of enemies/stats invested). You have to consider factors such as:

1) how many % of enemies have a shield?
2) how much chance they will use shieldwall?

For this reason, highest melee skill definitely doesn’t equal to optimal melee skill.
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

You sure your 110 melee skill has 95% hit chance against shieldwall? Let’s say a shield reduce hit chance by 10%, shieldwall will reduce 20% hit chance in total, so 110 melee skill should be 90% hit chance if there are no other factors such Fast Adaption, weapon accuracy, height difference, overwhelmed etc. Not to mention some shield reduce hit chance by 15%, thus reduce 30% hit chance with shieldwall. 110-30 =80

[Saitorosan]

I’ve definitely seen some odd hit chances myself. Bros with high but not over 100 melee with 95% to hit shield guys. I may have overlooked something when I noticed it though.

[Author]

Posts