Getting smashed as the Mamluks by Qara Qoyunlu for as far as I can tell literally no reason

[n0z3k1ll3r]

Apologies for the tone but this is the most tilted I have been by this game in ages. I've just thrown away an ironman run in disgust.

I declared war on QQ as the Mamluks. I had more than double their army size, and slightly more than that in cavalry strength. My general was equal to theirs. They have the same land tech level. They have no military ideas. I engaged them on favourable ground.

And my army just got smashed. Not just once, either (that'd be weird dice rolls) but repeatedly. A few days into the battle my morale just vanishes and everything flees. I don't have any morale malus (mine's actually slightly higher than theirs) but just.... immediate collapse.

I even lost a battle where I attacked just after they'd finished assaulting a fort and were low on morale AND men. They still won. At that point I just ragequit, with my warscore at -60%.

What the actual hell is going on here? I'm all for learning from mistakes but I can't identify a single mistake I have made here.

 

[Yuiiut]

QQ has 20% cav combat ability in its traditions, and can get even more with its government temporarily. What you're saying is very consistent with their cavalry engaging in the shock phase and absolutely routing your army. I'd say see if you can get even more of an advantage over them-bait them into battles in mountains, make sure you have a 2:1 advantage in every battle, get a tech level on them. Alternatively, grind them down-your economy and manpower should be better than theirs, and even if you have to lose/white peace/take a very small peace deal, you can put them in a situation where they can't recover and you can come back for round 2, while they still have no manpower and 20 loans.

 

[n0z3k1ll3r]

Thanks, I might try that (next run, I've pretty much given up on this run since my army got stackwiped). I mostly just wanted either an explanation of what I'd missed, or a bug confirmation if there was one. Thanks

 

[mag_zbc]

Don't forget, that they have +25% shock damage on flat terrain as a horde

 

[Yuiiut]

Don't forget, that they have +25% shock damage on flat terrain as a horde

Nah, latest patch made them a tribal federation, a new gov form-which also made them much more stable (thanks to religion and culture, they are still unstable, but nowhere near where they used to be)

 

[GaribaldisFleet]

Qara qoyunlu does and may have some military bonuses which can be extremely powerful early on.
- First of all their traditions: +20% cavalry combat ability, +1 land leader shock
- Shia: +5% morale
- Jafari islamic school: +10% shock damagel
- Tribal alegience: +15% cavalry combat ability
- Being mystic: +0-10% morale
- Government form: +25% cavalry to infantry ratio

Of course it may still be a bug which you came upon.

 

[Badesumofu]

Probably need more details as well. You saying you had more cav than them and then suddenly got smashed makes me wonder if you got hit with inefficient support or something.

I guess there are a lot of potential reasons that two armies that might seem to be roughly equal at first glance turn out not to be.

And not saying this is the case, but I've seen more than once someone come to ask while they lost while defending in mountains when it turned out they were actually sieging an enemy fort and were thus the attacker. There's just so many possibilities. Hope you figure it out, regardless.

 

[MiniaAr]

It's most likely cavalry ability and shock damage.

QQ starts with +20% cavalry ability and +10% shock damage. If they have cavalry in the front row, which they probably will as you say you have double their army but early combat width is 20 (the size of their army I assume), then it's understandable that you get smashed during shock phase repeatedly.

 

[Badesumofu]

Yeah, I mean anyone who's getting smashed in 1444 is getting smashed in the shock phase, though. At that point the fire phase is really just the 'everyone stands across a field and gives each other angry looks phase'.

But that cav combat ability and shock damage could well be all it is.

 

[Yuiiut]

Qara qoyunlu does and may have some military bonuses which can be extremely powerful early on.
- First of all their traditions: +20% cavalry combat ability, +1 land leader shock
- Shia: +5% morale
- Jafari islamic school: +10% shock damagel
- Tribal alegience: +15% cavalry combat ability
- Being mystic: +0-10% morale
- Government form: +25% cavalry to infantry ratio

Of course it may still be a bug which you came upon.

I think this actually raises an interesting point though-we can discount the shia, mystic, cav ratio, and leader shock bonus, because as per the OP accounted for the in the original post-he had 'equal leaders, more cavalry, and slightly better morale'. OP's annoyance was caused by the fact that the likely causes of his loss (+shock damage, +cav combat ability) were basically hidden away from him-without knowing that QQ can have godlike cavalry with meta knowledge, the game is very bad at signalling why you're losing. As even more modifiers get added in (army professionalism, unit drill, shock and fire damage received and taken, artillery combat ability, artillery damage from backrow and so on and on) that the UI was never designed around, the game could become truly impenetrable without metaknowledge. If the enemies got 10 discipline or 20% morale on you, the battle UI will show you. Sure, if you're a complete novice it likely will be confusing, but at least there's a clear numbers difference that you can take as a starting point to examine, rather than ending like OP, where for all the cues you're given, you might as well have just hit a bug. How do you know if QQ has activated their special gov feature to nearly double their Cav combat ability bonus, or that the manchu stack you're engaging actually has 10 more discipline cos they're banners?

(Also, once paradox is done making a uncluttered, intuitive battle interface that presents all the information needed without overwhelming the player, a perpetual motion machine and world peace would be nice. Or at least adding shock/fire damage modifiers and combat ability modifiers to the new army quality ledger)

 

[GRWalker]

OP's annoyance was caused by the fact that the likely causes of his loss (+shock damage, +cav combat ability) were basically hidden away from him

Government- and tradition/NI-related modifiers are visible in the Diplomacy tab; I'm pretty sure you already know that (does the OP know?). I agree that Paradox could also add some reference in the battle screen; although they would also need to take into account every possible combination of DLCs and lack thereof in the GUI visualization, which makes for an... interesting exercise.

 

[Yuiiut]

Government- and tradition/NI-related modifiers are visible in the Diplomacy tab; I'm pretty sure you already know that (does the OP know?). I agree that Paradox could also add some reference in the battle screen; although they would also need to take into account every possible combination of DLCs and lack thereof in the GUI visualization, which makes for an... interesting exercise.

Yeah, but unless you already know that, and remember those might be the reason for your losses, it's not terribly helpful. OP knew and checked tech, morale, leader pips, terrain and cav's dominance early-game and it still wasn't enough. (And I'm fairly sure the tribal federation bonuses aren't shown on the gov screen, cos they're not the bonuses from the government type, but instead the mechanic the government unlocks with the DLC-tribal allegiance.) Making such a UI would be hard, but collating all 'combat related' modifiers in one ledger screen would surely be possible-tally up Inf CA for every country and display the total, then do the same for other modifiers-the current army quality ledger does exactly that for disc and morale.

As is, you have to cross-reference every idea on the diploscreen if you haven't got each idea group and their order memorised, their islamic school on the religion mapmode and so on, and even then you can't see event-driven modifiers. The issue isn't necessarily that the information isn't there, (I don't mind the idea of intentional uncertainty), but that it's presentation is scattergun. If combat is meant to be uncertain, with the player only able to try to figure out why they're losing through trial and error (or meta knowledge), that's perfectly fine. If the player is meant to be able to form a reasonably accurate assessment of what is happening and why in a battle, that's also fine. But prominently displaying some key modifiers and not others, or hiding them away in submenus when equal or less important ones are prominently displayed just leads to the player feel like the game is playing 'against' them

 

[mruuh]

How do you know if QQ has activated their special gov feature to nearly double their Cav combat ability bonus, or that the manchu stack you're engaging actually has 10 more discipline cos they're banners?

I'd say that some (not all) of these modifiers *should* be hidden from the opponent, at least initially, to simulate element of surprise on the battlefield, when the other side has an ace up their sleeve.