Equites unit movement speed < foot soldiers?

[Bullman]

Hello,

I have posted before about how unintuitive and unpredictable the AJE map and unit movement can be.

I have just discovered something that leads me to post again as it makes absolutely no sense to me.

Here is a screenshot of the map and units in question with terrain and weather overlays:





I have a bunch of units in Corduba (made up of 2 leaders, legions, auxillia, funditore and one equites) in the south and was plotting movement orders to Ilerda in the north when I realised something unusual. All start at full cohesion.

When giving movement orders to units individually to travel from Corduba to Ilerda (allowing the game to auto-route), the game tells me that the cavalry equites unit will take the LONGEST time to get to Ilerda.

Here is what the game estimates for each unit as time to travel from Corduba to Ilerda (and the Movement type category and Speed Co-eff the unit card tells you)

Equites: 52 days (Movement: Medium, Speed Co-eff: 100%)
Legion: 50 days (Movement: Heavy Inf, Speed Co-eff: 110%)
Auxillia: 44 days (Movement: Line Inf, Speed Co-eff: 110%)
Funditores: 32 days (Movement: Light Inf, Speed Co-eff: 110%)
Leaders: 15 days (Movement: Skirmisher, Speed Co-eff: 100%)

Not only that but it seems that the game auto paths certain units differently to others. There are two branching roman roads from Corduba: and inland road and one along the coast.

The auxillia and funditores are auto-routed along the coastal road (of which 4 regions are snowing) but vary just at the end:

note: the game manual seems to suggest rain/mud are interchangeable as far as weather and it's effects go

Funditores: total regions crossed= 6
Wooded Hills/Roman Rd/Snow/Civilized
Wooded Hills/Roman Rd/Snow/Civilized
(cross river)
Woods/Roman Rd/Rain/Civilized
(cross river)
Wooded Hills/Roman Rd/Snow/Civilized
Wooded Hills/Roman Rd/Snow/Civilized
Woods/Roman Rd/Rain/Cleared
(cross river)


Auxillia: total regions crossed= 7
Wooded Hills/Roman Rd/Snow/Civilized
Wooded Hills/Roman Rd/Snow/Civilized
(cross river)
Woods/Roman Rd/Rain/Civilized
(cross river)
Wooded Hills/Roman Rd/Snow/Civilized
Wooded Hills/Roman Rd/Snow/Civilized
Woods/Roman Rd/Rain/Cleared
(cross river)
Forest/Roman Road/Rain/Civilized
(cross river)



The equites, legions and leaders auto-routed along the inland path (no snow, just rain):

Legions/Equites/Leaders: total regions crossed= 8
Woods/Roman Rd/Rain/Cleared
Woods/Roman Rd/Rain/Cleared
(cross river)
Woods/Roman Rd/Rain/Rich
(cross river)
Woods/Roman Rd/Rain/Cleared
Wooded Hills/Roman Rd/Rain/Cleared
Wooded Hills/Roman Rd/Rain/Cleared
Mountains/Roman Rd/Rain/Cleared
Forest/Roman Road/Rain/Civilized


According to the game manual, it says that snow and rain (mud) both have "moderate penalty" on movement, but rain(mud) making rivers more difficult to cross.

Why are the equites shown as being the slowest moving unit? Even when travelling the same path as Heavy Inf legions"? Is this intentional?
Where can I find more details on how terrain seems to affect the different Movement types?

Bull

[PhilThib]

The terrain files in GameData...they give the number of days to enter different terrain, based on current weather. Please note that roads and low civilization levels will alter movement speed (up and down respectively)

[Bullman]

The terrain files in GameData...they give the number of days to enter different terrain, based on current weather. Please note that roads and low civilization levels will alter movement speed (up and down respectively)

OK, they are .ter files. Are the viewable with a txt file editor?

Can you perhaps comment on why the equites unit is shown to take the LONGEST time to get to the destination?

[Bullman]

(double post)

[Franciscus]

Can you please post a save with the situation you mention ?

thanks

[Bullman]

It's actually from a PBEM. Is that still OK?

[JacquesDeLalaing]

I don't have the time to take a closer look at this example, but, as far as I remember from RoP, cavalry is much more affected by bad weather than infantry. But you'd really need to check the corresponding terrain files for AJE. Has the database been released yet? Also, cavalry gets slowed down by mountains and hills much more than infantry, but that's not the case here.

It would be interesting to know if the equites can "win" more days if they're properly commanded (no ooc-penatly) than infantry, and it would be nice to know how many days it takes the cav to enter each region (compared to inf) in this example.
By the way, by attaching the cavalry to a unit/brigade that consists predominantly of inf, you should be able to make them move at the faster infantry-speed as well, as a brigade uses the speed of the predominant elements in it.

[Franciscus]

It's actually from a PBEM. Is that still OK?

Yes, of course

[Bullman]

I don't have the time to take a closer look at this example, but, as far as I remember from RoP, cavalry is much more affected by bad weather than infantry. But you'd really need to check the corresponding terrain files for AJE. Has the database been released yet? Also, cavalry gets slowed down by mountains and hills much more than infantry, but that's not the case here.

So does the slow equites still seem odd to you? Or is it possibly the terrain movement costs for the equites in those regions are set to high? Does all terrain cost data for all movement types in exist in each region file? Or do they reference other game wide common files that contain the movement costs based on terrain type?

It would be interesting to know if the equites can "win" more days if they're properly commanded (no ooc-penatly) than infantry, and it would be nice to know how many days it takes the cav to enter each region (compared to inf) in this example.

No effect. You an see the time to enter each region in the screenshot.

By the way, by attaching the cavalry to a unit/brigade that consists predominantly of inf, you should be able to make them move at the faster infantry-speed as well, as a brigade uses the speed of the predominant elements in it.

Hmmm...I personally think that is unrealistic game design. Shouldn't the unit travel at the speed of the slowest unit? I actually thought that is how AJE (Ageod games in general) worked.

[Erik Springelkamp]

An army travels at the speed of its baggage train. So I don't see any reason why different parts of a regular Roman army would travel at different speeds at all. Travel speed and tactical movement speed are entirely different things.

[Bullman]

Yes, of course

OK please find it attached (I am not sure if this is all you need. I have never really understood if saved files are "standalone" or if they need something else from the original users PC eg. file or folder/directory structure/the scenario files etc and I get confused with what the different file types like *.ord and *.trn actually do)

An army travels at the speed of its baggage train. So I don't see any reason why different parts of a regular Roman army would travel at different speeds at all. Travel speed and tactical movement speed are entirely different things.

Not sure what you are suggesting here? Are you agreeing a "unit" (or stack in AJE) should travel as fast as it's slowest sub-element?

[Erik Springelkamp]

Not sure what you are suggesting here? Are you agreeing a "unit" (or stack in AJE) should travel as fast as it's slowest sub-element?

No, because I think the speed is determined by the speed of the baggage, a slow minority of units can use the same baggage facilities as the main force.

And the fast men on horseback have to sleep in the same camp as the rest of the force, so on a march taking several days, they cannot move faster.

In an emergency case, troops could march without the train, carrying everything for maybe a week, but not for a full month, the scale of AJE.

I may be wrong, but this is what I understand from the various things I have read about the Roman army.

[JacquesDeLalaing]

So does the slow equites still seem odd to you? Or is it possibly the terrain movement costs for the equites in those regions are set to high? Does all terrain cost data for all movement types in exist in each region file? Or do they reference other game wide common files that contain the movement costs based on terrain type?

In the db-files (http://www.ageod-forum.com/showthread.php?5358-Official-Files-for-modding) for the other games, you can find (among other essential information) the terrains.xls file that provides you with the days that each movement-type needs to enter a specific terrain-type under the different weather conditions. Some examples from Rise of Prussia (RoP_DB_Terrains):

(days to enter for light/medium/heavy horse, light/medium/heavy inf.)

clear terrain
fair: 1/2/3 (horse), 2/3/4 (inf)
mud: 2/3/5 (h), 2/4/6 (inf)
snow: 2/3/5 (h), 2/3/5 (inf)

wooded hills
fair: 6/6/7, 3/6/6
mud: 9/9/9, 4/9/9
snow: 9/9/9, 3/7/7

woods
fair: 1/2/3, 2/3/6
mud: 2/3/5, 2/4/7
snow: 2/3/5, 2/3/7


Judging from the screenshots, AJE uses different values. Your equites (med cav, 100% mov. coeff., full cohesion) need 5 days to enter the first region (woods, mud, roman road), while, according to the RoP-data, they should need only 3. Roads are yet another topic. As the movement costs on the screenshot per region seem pretty consistent (5-6 days), my guess would be that the movement costs in AJE for cav in specific terrain and under specific weather conditions are higher - which seems quite reasonable to me, given that this game has 30-days-intervalls (!).

PS: Shouldn't there also be an info box popping up when you hover over regions while having a unit selected, telling you the number of days needed "to enter this region alone"?

Hmmm...I personally think that is unrealistic game design. Shouldn't the unit travel at the speed of the slowest unit? I actually thought that is how AJE (Ageod games in general) worked.

To clarify: Armies (i.e. stacks) move at the speed of the slowest sub-unit (e.g. supply wagon). Sub-units, however, move at the speed of their predominant element. But I can't even remember if you can create subunits/brigades in AJE (are there only pre-defined legions?).

[Franciscus]

Hi, Bullman

I checked your save, but without the hst file the turn cannot be processed.

Anyhow, I checked on a freshly started Caesar vs Pompey, a similar situation as you describe:

From Toletum to Ilerda, a lonely Equites unit and an army with a leader, 2 legions, auxilia and funditores:

The equites plotted move (prediction: 37 days):


And the army (prediction: 32 days):


Note that this movement is through some pretty rough terrain: wooded hills, mountain, forest, and a major river; and it is raining; even with the road, all those are for sure not at all good conditions for horses...

One turn later:

the equites are trying to cross the river, and they will take aprox 3 days more, so 30+3, better than the predicted 37 days:



the army is also trying to cross the river, and will take aprox 4 days more, so 30+4, more than the predicted 32 and actually a bit more than the cavalry:



Both stacks are almost at zero cohesion, BTW.

Bottom line: in vue of the very rough terrain and weather, I do not see anything wrong with the relative movement rates; on the other hand, the actual absolute speed of movement is probably unrealistically too high, but that has been already discussed elsewhere.

Regards

[Bullman]

Thanks Franciscus and JaquesDelalaing

It seems that all is well then in this case. The rough terrain (despite the Roman Roads) still make infantry faster than cavalry it seems. However, even though leaders are mounted on horses, they don't seem to suffer the same movement penalties. I will keep my eyes open for similar cases where the terrain is clear and where infantry are mixed with cavalry.

[Franciscus]

Thanks Franciscus and JaquesDelalaing

It seems that all is well then in this case. The rough terrain (despite the Roman Roads) still make infantry faster than cavalry it seems. However, even though leaders are mounted on horses, they don't seem to suffer the same movement penalties. I will keep my eyes open for similar cases where the terrain is clear and where infantry are missed with cavalry.

Thanks

Note that I am not peremptorily stating that all is well. Please, if you find again any strange issue with movement rates, please post, we will check it (example: we had until recently a bug in the movement rate of ships in rivers, that will be corrected in official 1.03c patch, due next week)

Regards