Extensive combat testing in 1.22, and why combat number are so skewed

  • We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.

anomalacaris

Lt. General
51 Badges
Jan 17, 2013
1.546
441
  • Crusader Kings II: Legacy of Rome
  • Crusader Kings II: The Old Gods
  • Crusader Kings II: Rajas of India
  • Crusader Kings II: The Republic
  • Crusader Kings II: Sword of Islam
  • Europa Universalis IV
  • Europa Universalis IV: Art of War
  • Europa Universalis IV: Conquest of Paradise
  • Europa Universalis IV: Wealth of Nations
  • Europa Universalis IV: Res Publica
  • Crusader Kings II
  • Imperator: Rome
  • Stellaris: Lithoids
  • Crusader Kings II: Holy Fury
  • Shadowrun: Hong Kong
  • Stellaris: Distant Stars
  • Stellaris: Apocalypse
  • Stellaris: Humanoids Species Pack
  • Hearts of Iron IV: Expansion Pass
  • Hearts of Iron IV: Death or Dishonor
  • Stellaris: Ancient Relics
  • Age of Wonders: Planetfall
  • Age of Wonders: Planetfall Deluxe edition
  • Age of Wonders: Planetfall Premium edition
  • Age of Wonders: Planetfall Season pass
  • Stellaris: Digital Anniversary Edition
  • Age of Wonders: Planetfall - Revelations
  • Stellaris: Federations
  • Crusader Kings III
  • Crusader Kings III: Royal Edition
  • Europa Universalis IV: Mandate of Heaven
  • Sword of the Stars
  • Crusader Kings II: Monks and Mystics
  • Stellaris: Leviathans Story Pack
  • Europa Universalis IV: Rights of Man
  • Crusader Kings II: Reapers Due
  • Europa Universalis IV: El Dorado
  • Hearts of Iron IV: Cadet
  • Stellaris
  • Europa Universalis IV: Cossacks
  • Crusader Kings II: Horse Lords
  • Europa Universalis IV: Common Sense
  • Crusader Kings II: Way of Life
  • Mount & Blade: With Fire and Sword
  • Crusader Kings II: Charlemagne
  • Crusader Kings II: Sons of Abraham
  • Europa Universalis IV: Pre-order
  • Stellaris: Megacorp
  • Stellaris - Path to Destruction bundle
  • Crusader Kings II: Jade Dragon
So there is much frustration over extreme combat casualties in the early game and dozens of men dead everyday in late game battle
To get to the bottom of things, I created a custom testing mod to check influences of various factors.

MAJOR EDIT:

So originally I thought weapon modifiers act like simple multipliers, so that was my assumption when I got this conclusion:
TLDR: The weapon modifiers (infantry fire etc) are currently NOT influencing combat at all! :eek:
EDIT: for those who are not familiar the formula, in general damage should be proportional to *weapon_modifier*discipline*combat_ability/target_tactics, this is implied from tooltips

new TLDR: The weapon modifiers are influencing combat, but not in a way to counterbalance tactics increase for similar tech enemies.

in this post, Balor kindly clarified that in 1.2.2, only the difference in weapon_modifier influence combat. So for instance, you are still gonna slaughter Aztecs fine as Spain, however if you are fighting same-tech France you will notice damage decreasing with tactics rise. While I don't agree with this design, they are certainly changing things to make early/late game combat more balanced (look at later posts from Balor).

/END MAJOR EDIT

Some other important insight from the simulations:
- morale damage you inflict is proportional to your own morale :cool:
- damage scaling from dice+modifiers is not linear: It is (from 0-9): 12, 16, 20, 24, 32, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80 (-1 is 8 on this scale, have to do more test)
- morale has no influence on strength loss whatsoever
- peasant rebels do NOT have reduced morale (it says it's 80% in tooltip: it's NOT!) :confused:

EDIT: updated some conclusion from later test (also shown in this thread)
- as people already worked out, the pips act like modifiers to rolls (just like leaders and terrain)
- combat ability is currently useless too (Sorry quality tree! Bye Polish hussars!)
- discipline did not decrease damage taken
- rebels do not benefit from ideas

So to carry out a truly scientific test, I kept all other confounding variables constant while changing the factor of my choice.
For combat, the confounding factors are many: weapon modifiers, tactics, discipline, morale, troop number, leaders, rolls etc
To achieve that, this is implemented in the mod:
- All techs from level 4-32 are set to year 1445. All adm techs now gave 0.5 morale, all dip techs gave 0.25 infantry fire, and all mil techs gave 0.25 tactics. No other effects for these levels.
JfrBYsK.png

- made test country Kongo westernized, reduce basetax and base manpower in Anziku to 1 (so it spawns exactly 2 rebels)
- made an event to create presant rebellion in Anziku, or to create 2 infantry in Anziku for perfectly repeatable combat (Both won't have any generals)
f7Je4VV.png

Alas there is no simple way to fix dice rolls. So as a side effect I am able to tabulate dice roll effect on damage

The test itself went like this:
I start as Kongo, go speed 1, spawn troops, spawn rebels, record combat stats for day 1, go speed 5 and let combat resolve, clean up remaining troops/rebels, repeat.
After some tries, I console command for some monarch point to tech either tactics or infantry_fire, and redo many trials.

Here's the simulation results. I planned to do more, but I got my answer early. I would of course love to test other aspects of combat with this later:
Code:
Our_side_roll Our_side_damage Our_side_morale_damage Rebel_roll Rebel_damage Rebel_morale_damage Our_max_morale
t = 0.5 f=0.25 m=2.5
8 140 0.79 0 24 0.15 2.63
5 80 0.53 7 120 0.67 2.63
7 120 0.71 2 40 0.27 2.63
7 120 0.71 8 140 0.75 2.63
5 80 0.53 8 140 0.75 2.63
6 100 0.62 8 140 0.75 2.63
3 48 0.35 3 48 0.34 2.64
1 32 0.31 2 40 0.27 2.64
7 120 0.71 5 80 0.50 2.64
6 100 0.62 5 80 0.50 2.64
2 40 0.28 3 48 0.34 2.64
0 24 0.21 5 80 0.50 3.12
0 24 0.21 -1 16 0.14 3.12
0 24 0.21 9 160 0.84 3.12
4 64 0.52 4 64 0.42 3.12
4 64 0.52 8 140 0.75 3.12
2 40 0.33 7 120 0.67 3.11

t=1.0 f=0.25 m=2.5
8 70 0.46 6 50 0.29 3.11
5 40 0.30 3 24 0.16 3.11
6 50 0.36 2 20 0.14 3.11
7 60 0.40 3 24 0.16 3.11
5 40 0.30 9 80 0.42 3.11
8 70 0.46 7 60 0.34 3.11
4 32 0.25 7 60 0.34 3.11
2 20 0.15 7 60 0.34 3.11

t=1.0 f=0.5 m=2.5
5 40 0.30 9 80 0.42 3.11
4 32 0.25 2 20 0.13 3.12
5 40 0.30 3 24 0.17 3.12
9 40 0.51 5 40 0.25 3.12
5 40 0.30 1 16 0.10 3.12
3 24 0.19 3 24 0.17 3.12

t=1.0 f=2.0 m=2.5
6 50 0.25 8 70 0.38 3.12
8 70 0.45 1 16 0.10 3.13
7 60 0.40 0 12 0.08 3.13

Insane as it sounds, it explain perfectly what we observe in the game. Tactics does it's job to nerf damage, but weapon modifiers didn't compensate by increasing damage, making late game combat extremely humane. It also solves the mystery of early game slaughter after patch 1.2: weapon modifiers are effectively 1 instead of 0.25 and 0.5 for infantry, and 0 and 1 for cavalry! Basically everybody dies in the fire phase.

PS: Where should I put the mod if anyone else wanna try do their own test or check results? Steam workshop?
 
Last edited:
Are you only checking fire modifiers? Does the halberd infantry unit have fire points (or did you mod them to have it)? What about the effects of shock modifiers?


It also solves the mystery of early game slaughter after patch 1.2: weapon modifiers are effectively 1 instead of 0.25 and 0.5 for infantry, and 0 and 1 for cavalry! Basically everybody dies in the fire phase.
I think it's the auto-kill when all morale are lost that's doing that. Regardless, if modifiers have no effect it would explain mid-late game combat.
 
Are you only checking fire modifiers? Does the halberd infantry unit have fire points (or did you mod them to have it)? What about the effects of shock modifiers?
From the screenshot, it certainly looks like he was only tweaking fire modifiers, in which case in makes perfect sense that it would have 0 effect on halberds.

But otherwise, cool stuff.
I've been meaning to do some extensive combat testing for a while, but I never found the time.
Would it be easy to mod your testing module to test for the effects of varying levels of discipline?
 
Are you only checking fire modifiers? Does the halberd infantry unit have fire points (or did you mod them to have it)? What about the effects of shock modifiers?
I think it's the auto-kill when all morale are lost that's doing that. Regardless, if modifiers have no effect it would explain mid-late game combat.

I only check fire since it's the phase on the first day of combat. Later combat damage is influenced by troop numbers so it's a pain to record and it's also one more confounding factor.
As far as I know the pips acts like modifiers to dice rolls per wiki. I'm gonna test this too by modifying the units.

It's certainly not always autokill if you watch the combat closely. Troops did die faster in early game combat.
 
Would it be easy to mod your testing module to test for the effects of varying levels of discipline?

What you could do is mod 00_basic_ideas.txt and put "discipline = 0.1" (or whatever amount) in each idea under one or more groups. That'll let you test the effects at each level. Then for the sake of convenient, open defines.lua and change

Code:
	PS_BUY_IDEA = 400,
	PS_ADVANCE_TECH = 600,

to


Code:
	PS_BUY_IDEA = 0,
	PS_ADVANCE_TECH = 0,

Don't know if the game can take a cost of 0 but if it doesn't, just use something tiny :p
 
As far as I know the pips acts like modifiers to dice rolls per wiki. I'm gonna test this too by modifying the units.
I don't know what you think that means. Traditionally each point in offence/defence is added to the dice rolls and terrain bonus to calculate a score, from which casualties are then calculated and multiplied by modifiers from strength, tech, discipline etc. I don't know if this has changed in EU4 (though I consider it unlikely to change too much), but the information available here isn't enough to directly verify the formula. Could give it a try when I'm home.
 
Last edited:
Basically everybody dies in the fire phase.

I had a similar impression yesterday, when I rerolled my start as Brandenburg against TO a few times. Whoever had the better fire leader, would swipe stacks. When TO had a 6 pips one they could swipe 1:2.5 their size. However I assumed that was related to prestige and thus army morale.

Just to clarify for myself 'weapon modifiers' are the additinal pips granted by the leader, the die roll result or simply the unit pips? Im a bit lost at this point.
 
So there are some doubt that fire modifiers should not work on Halberd infantry since it has no fire pips. (If you look closely, actually Halberd infantry does not have shock pips either!)
Easy to test. I just modded some fire pips onto the two starting Western units, like this:
Hf4r5Ld.png


I repeated what I did in opening post, with those two units instead. I don't nearly need as many repeats as I already know dice influences.
Here's results: (Yeah you probably have to go back to opening post results to compare)
Code:
pip 1/1/0/0/2/0
t=0.5 f=0.25 m=2.5
5 80 0.53 8 140 0.75 2.63
4 64 0.57 8 140 0.75 2.63

t=0.5 f=0.5 m=2.5
2 40 0.28 3 48 0.33 2.63
8 140 0.79 2 40 0.26 2.63
1 32 0.21 4 64 0.41 2.63

pip 2/0/0/0/1/1
t=0.5 f=0.25 m=2.5
5 120 0.35 4 100 0.26 2.62
5 120 0.35 5 120 0.31 2.62
6 140 0.44 6 140 0.42 2.63
9 200 0.71 3 80 0.20 2.64
3 80 0.21 7 160 0.50 2.64

t=0.5 f=0.5 m=2.5
7 160 0.53 8 180 0.58 2.64
5 120 0.35 8 180 0.58 2.64
4 100 0.28 4 100 0.26 2.64

Anyways, this round of tests basically confirms that the offensive and defensive pips indeed just act as modifier to dice rolls. Note that for this two units, the results for both strength and morale damage is offset by 2 in dice rolls. (E.g. a roll of 5 on 2/0 fire pip infantry cause same damage as roll of 7 on 1/1 fire pip infantry, vice versa for morale damage)

Infantry_fire still does absolutely nothing.

Just to clarify for myself 'weapon modifiers' are the additinal pips granted by the leader, the die roll result or simply the unit pips? Im a bit lost at this point.

FuTKMHn.png

The ones circled in red are what I call weapon modifiers. Mouseover them for tooltip (which they don't follow).
 
I applaud your effort OP.
(I will admit I'm too lazy to look at your statistic and make a deduction myself lol)
If all your conclusions are true, it is a hard evident that combat in 1.2 is currently broken in many level.
I hope Dev see this and if possible confirm with us if this is the case or not.
 
I was under the impression that fire/shock modifiers affected fire/shock pips, but I guess I was wrong?
In any case, these findings do seem to suggest combat is very broken, literally broken, not the figurative "omagad, I don't agree with how it works, so it's broken".
 
So, uh, general stats and unit pips are the same thing? A unit with 3 stat pips lead by a general with 2 in the stat who rolls a 3 in the corresponding phase will resolve the day with an 8? And the same for defense? And the total result is capped at 9?

So a unit with 10 pips in shock attack and defense (theoretical) would have no use of a shock general at all? (If rolls are 0-9)
 
I was under the impression that fire/shock modifiers affected fire/shock pips, but I guess I was wrong?

So, uh, general stats and unit pips are the same thing? A unit with 3 stat pips lead by a general with 2 in the stat who rolls a 3 in the corresponding phase will resolve the day with an 8? And the same for defense? And the total result is capped at 9?

So a unit with 10 pips in shock attack and defense (theoretical) would have no use of a shock general at all? (If rolls are 0-9)

The wiki explains things quite well, but not perfectly.
To cut and paste the relevant parts: (and I changed parts to reflect results here)
The unit makes an attack:
attack = (Attacker's Offensive Shock/Fire) - (Defender's Defensive Shock/Fire) - (50% of Defending Artillery in back row's Defensive Shock/Fire)
result = attack + modifiers (terrain, generals) + roll
Artillery deals 50% damage if attacking from the back row (only Artillery can attack from the back row).
The result is then multiplied by the Weapon Modifier (Infantry Fire/Infantry Shock/Cavalry Fire/Cavalry Shock/Artillery Fire/Artillery Shock). (OP's note: except it doesn't work in 1.2.2)
The Weapon Modifier is multiplied by Combat Ability (Infantry/Cavalry/Artillery Combat Ability).
Nomads deal 25% extra damage in home provinces that are desert or plains.
Natives deal 5% extra damage per level of ferocity.

After these calculations we have damage.
Artillery takes double damage when attacked.
The damage is then reduced by Military Tactics. Military Tactics is increased by Discipline and reduced by Insufficient Support.
damage /= (military tactics*(discipline)*(insufficient support))
The damage is then used for inflicting and casualties. Morale damage is calculated separately and is proportional to attacker's morale.
Units inflict damage depending on their strength. Units at full strength deal more damage than those who have suffered casualties.
Flanking units deal less damage if they are under strength (see section about flanking above).
The attacked unit then suffers casualties and morale damage.

So as an example, the following two situation cause the same damage in shock phase (provided other things like tactics are the same):
Longbowman (shock 2/1), led by 3 shock general, attacks Men-at-arms (shock 1/1) in the mountains (-3) with a roll of 6: 6(dice)+2(off shock)-1(def shock)+3(general)-3(mountain)=7
Azab infantry (shock 2/2), led by 2 shock general, attacks Eastern Militia (shock 1/2) with no terrain with a roll of 5: 5(dice)+2(off shock)-2(def shock)+2(general)=7

The rolls are not capped in 0-9. I simply don't have much data for other numbers.
 
This kind of research really makes me wonder why Paradox doesn't just publish the formula of what they think it's supposed to be. All this guessing whether the game may or may not be bugged is rather annoying.
 
Looks like you found it buddy. Why could you find this but the devs couldnt?

I'm getting pummeled in my new Austria game and it's frustrating... Now I know how to beat the system though, More fire pips! Being HRE empreror isnt fun very early game when casualty rates are so high, and wars are non stop.