• We are looking for you!
    Always wanted to join our Supporting Team? We are looking for enthusiastic moderators!
    Take a look at our recruitement page for more information and how you can apply:
    Apply

Do something about Rogue armies

  • Thread starter DeletedUser37869
  • Start date
Well, 4 hours later my attacker plundered and stole 10 Granite. I still got all my other stuff.
I guess I'll default to 2 Spearfighters since there's no way to beat 7 rogues +1.
 

qaccy

Well-Known Member
Rogues are absolutely a problem when it comes to city defense. It's not so much about winning or losing here, or even about being plundered, it's about the fact that rogues shift the 'balance' so far in favor of the attacker that the entire defense system becomes essentially meaningless, and that's a problem with game balance if you ask me. Of course, this also applies to any other area of combat where rogues are prominent, but it's up in the air as to whether or not Inno designs this stuff around the expectation that players have rogues (they probably do, at least later on). But when it comes to a single-wave army, rogues are essentially guaranteed to win except for in very specific situations, regardless of what the bonuses on either side look like. There's little to no skill nor strategy involved in using them.
 

DeletedUser36572

Well, 4 hours later my attacker plundered and stole 10 Granite. I still got all my other stuff.
I guess I'll default to 2 Spearfighters since there's no way to beat 7 rogues +1.

You don’t necessarily have to win the fight, if you make it more costly to attack your city. If someone is going to attack your city, do your best to make them lose something in resources.

You don’t actually lose units set in your Defensive Army, so there would be no reason to use the default 2 Spearmen.

Keep Your Head

.
 
Last edited by a moderator:

DeletedUser

Well, 4 hours later my attacker plundered and stole 10 Granite. I still got all my other stuff.
I guess I'll default to 2 Spearfighters since there's no way to beat 7 rogues +1.
Don't do that. As @Emberguard and @Algona point out, leaving your defense at 2 Spearmen means anyone in the hood can successfully attack you, leaving you to deal with potentially up to 80 plunderers to deal with instead of one or two. And, as @BlackSand the Sly points out, you don't have to necessarily beat them, just make it so that the cost of beating you is not worth what they can maybe plunder from you. The one "advantage" that the city defense army has is that you never lose units in it, nor do your units ever have less health than when you assigned them there. At the end of every attack on your city defense, all your units are restored to the health they had at the beginning of that battle, even if they were killed. The attacker, however, really loses units that die in the attack, and any injured troops of theirs has to heal normally. So if you can make it even a little costly to attack you, that will deter a good portion of your neighborhood from even trying.

Of course, the key to having a defense that deters some neighbors is to not rush your advance through the ages. When you properly develop your city and take your time on the tech tree, you will generally end up in the top half of your neighborhood rankings. And that, by itself, will deter many of the lower ranked neighbors from ever even testing your defense.
 
Thanks to the Forge Bowl I've amassed a large number of unattached rogues and I heve two of my own. When I use the 7+1 combo on Guild Expedition battles I generally lose 2 rogues. I'm Early Middle Ages... I replayed the battle where I defended against 7 rogues and 1 heavy infantry. I fielded 2 mercenaries, 2 heavy infantry, 1 champion, 1 heavy cavalry, 1 mounted archer, and I had failed to replace my flag bearer. I only had seven units... The result was all my units dead (not really, since it was defense) and they inflicted a total of 2 points of damage on 2 different rogues... does that sound right?
 

DeletedUser

Thanks to the Forge Bowl I've amassed a large number of unattached rogues and I heve two of my own. When I use the 7+1 combo on Guild Expedition battles I generally lose 2 rogues. I'm Early Middle Ages... I replayed the battle where I defended against 7 rogues and 1 heavy infantry. I fielded 2 mercenaries, 2 heavy infantry, 1 champion, 1 heavy cavalry, 1 mounted archer, and I had failed to replace my flag bearer. I only had seven units... The result was all my units dead (not really, since it was defense) and they inflicted a total of 2 points of damage on 2 different rogues... does that sound right?
Yep, that sounds about right. Even once those Rogues were transformed, you only had one unit with a built in advantage against heavy...the mounted archer. Your Mercenaries would be at a disadvantage, and your Heavy Infantry, Champion and Heavy Cavalry would have no advantage or disadvantage other than relative boosts.

Incidentally, you're not using auto-battle when attacking with 7+1, are you? That's a recipe for disaster sometimes, and is generally not a good idea unless you have really good attack boosts. And if your 1 regular unit isn't suitable in regards to the opposing lineup, you could lose a lot more than 2 Rogues, especially in 2 wave battles.
 

Salsuero

Well-Known Member
Well, 4 hours later my attacker plundered and stole 10 Granite. I still got all my other stuff.
I guess I'll default to 2 Spearfighters since...

You got beaten by one player. You were plundered once... on one building. Your attacker took some unwanted damage (which might be worse for him if you have the "right" defense up... possibly even causing him to lose a unit, or several). Giving up in the way you suggest opens you up to being attacked by others who might not have been as successful with your defense fully loaded. It would certainly allow your existing attacker to win with no effort. Why make it easy, even if it's inevitable?

...there's no way to beat 7 rogues +1

This is factually false.
 

Salsuero

Well-Known Member
when it comes to a single-wave army, rogues are essentially guaranteed to win except for in very specific situations, regardless of what the bonuses on either side look like.

Very specific situations or not, the bonuses are a major reason why this is also factually false.

There's little to no skill nor strategy involved in using them.

I suppose that's true if you have 1,000% bonuses and your opponent does not. But there is more than zero strategy when you pick the unit to accompany your Rogues and you're dealing with "normal" bonuses on both sides. If you disagree, then I suspect you just can throw any old unit with your Rogues... and take 100 attrition without a thought. I don't think this is all that common, though.
 

qaccy

Well-Known Member
@Salsuero Compare attacking your way through the hood using rogues, and without using them. Try to place a numerical/boost value on simply using rogues compared to not having them. The difference is so massive that to me, this isn't even really a matter up for debate. Rogues are broken when it comes to neighborhood battles.

To be clear, I'm not concerned at all with what happens after an attacker beats a city's defense, plunder, or how to mitigate the effects of a successful attack. I'm focusing solely on the usage of rogues as it relates to game balance in regards to city defense.
 

DeletedUser36572

One reason I can give is if you don't want your opponent to earn tower points. I have on occasion done so to discourage an attacker from hitting me because his sole purpose for doing so was to gain tower points (since I never leave anything to plunder).

I hope more people apply your reasoning.

I only wish I was disciplined enough to care to remember a player’s name, much less what they regularly have available to plunder.

Just Another Avatar

.
 

Algona

Well-Known Member
Compare attacking your way through the hood using rogues, and without using them. Try to place a numerical/boost value on simply using rogues compared to not having them. The difference is so massive that to me, this isn't even really a matter up for debate. Rogues are broken when it comes to neighborhood battles.

Butting in uninvited.

If I'm attacking my hood (I don't normally have the time or inclination but will do so for some Quests or DCs) I load up with 8 Choppers and autobattle each as fast as I can. No strategy there either. I win almost every fight in the bottom half of the hood* and most of the fights in the top half.

Do I care that I may lose a few score Choppers? Not really. Traz ftw. It ain't just about Rogues, it's also about the 7 combat GBs and all those lovely supporting SBs.

---------

Any given fight no matter the Era or the Troops does take some thought and a bit (or more) tactical analysis. Which can become rote quickly. I agree that 1+7Rogues is considerably easier, it's not purely thoughtless especially come a new Era.

I will admit, if I'm going into a PVP battle I absolutely have to win I'm going 1 AA and 7 Rogues and will be very careful how I fight it. D



*Even in CE a surprising number of folk run crappy defenses. 2 spears or less then 8 units or Rogues or units from previous Eras.
 

The Lady Redneck

Well-Known Member
As the system regenerates your defensive army you are losing nothing. Unless you get plundered, in which case make sure to set all your collections to a time that you know you will be in the game to collect. If you are getting beaten by a 1/7 combination when you try fighting, do not use autobattle. Battle manually and keep your units on their start point for the first couple of moves and let the enemy bring the battle to you. Once they are near enough. Use your troops to traget the one unit. Once it is killed, you can pick the rogues off as they have nothing to morph into. But listen to the others in this thread. All they say is relevent in one way or another
 

ahsay

Active Member
I'm surprised no one has recommended defensive armies.

The best way to defeat the 1+7 combination is to have 5 AA and 3 heavies. Any ratio could be effective but I find that works "most" times. If the "terrain" is in your favor you will take zero losses, assuming attack and defense is with 100 boost or so. This is especially effective when the screen stretches to 1.5 ratio and man made impediments are in use, in PE.

This is also very effective if your attacker "auto-battles". The AI,will send the non-rogue unit out too far. Then your AA takes it out leaving the rogues with no unit to transition to.

In other era's, other combinations may be more effective. 8 heavy in CE, for instance.
 
Top