True Cost Experiment

[GoIndy]

Well, you can't just compare estimated damage in 1 turn and expect the range throwers to be close, since, they get to also fire at range.  Well, you can...since...you did....but not sure that is a reasonable comparison. 

I mean, you compared what damage the militia would do if they engaged bowman themselves, (at a lamesauce 0/2 defense), versus the 0.833 I see if they engaged another militia.  It is pretty dang unlikely any bowman will be spearheading the charge, it is much more likely there will be line units helping shield them. 

Here's what I would call a reasonable Dwarven build....both players have...
2x Battleaxe
2x Axemen
2x Militia
1x Antonion
1x Spearman

That leaves 161 points.  One guy takes a militia, the other takes a bowman.   That bowman who approaches from behind the line might be extremely reasonable to help a breakthrough somewhere.  Assuming if he just closes til short or something, (I am implying no real serious tactics here), he'll certainly get a couple of shots off before the lines even engage....lets say he does 1 point of damage total to god knows what (probably something across from the battleaxemen)  That's one point closer to forcing a rout check somewhere.

Now, the extra militia guy is going to either try and swing his extra dude around somewhere, (which won't be easy, the other guy DOES have 7 man line and a cavalry), get him in a two's company (might be hard to stop), or he can do neither and he spends alot of time not engaging anything as he tries to get in somewhere.  (You'll have to admit, that happens) 

What does his damage look like if he is able to two's company one of the axemen....looks like 0.555 damage a turn.  That's pretty dang weak when you look at it that way, as he'd suffer more in return if the bowman just targetted HIM.

Now, that said, you know I much prefer greater numbers of line troops than bowman, so I'd choose the militia, personally.....but I don't think straight comparing them toe to toe damage is all that useful.

[GoIndy]

Oh, and nice one, using like my favorite unit in the whole game, other than healers.

Dwarven Militia!!

[RushAss]

I mean, you compared what damage the militia would do if they engaged bowman themselves, (at a lamesauce 0/2 defense), versus the 0.833 I see if they engaged another militia.  It is pretty dang unlikely any bowman will be spearheading the charge, it is much more likely there will be line units helping shield them. 

No, look again.  I compared the productivity of the 2 of them when attacking a unit with a defense of 2/2.  So let's say the target is Hawk Swordsmen (which you and I NEVER see in our group, right?).  I'm comparing the turn for turn damage output of Dwarven Militia engaged with Hawk Swordsmen vs. the turn for turn damage output of Bowmen firing on Hawk Swordsmen.  Get it?

And yeah, I didn't factor in approach firing.  Let's say the Bowmen get 2 attacks before the lines clash, 1 at long range and 1 at short with a move and shoot.  That's 1.167 points.  Doink.

Edit: I like the Dwarven Militia myself.  Battle Beer Mugs, anyone?

[Niko White]

Well, one big deal is that those bowmen start doing their (admittedly much lower!) damage much earlier in the fight.  Sure, part of their benefit is that they aren't getting hit while they shoot, but an even bigger part is that none of your guys are.  It takes a foot unit three or four turns to cross the 14" range of a foot archer, and in that time they might well have been knocked into the yellow, which, even if they pass the rout check, is a pretty sizeable hit to their effectiveness once they face the enemy line.  You can almost think of them less as a unit and more of a debuff on an enemy unit, in that way.  

They also get to add (admittedly lame) fire to a unit while it is engaged, and focusing damage on a unit is difficult in this game, where lines tend to be so static post-deployment.  You aren't picking between adding a militia to the fight or adding bow fire; you can add bow fire in many cases where another militia would have to fight someone else or spend ages slogging around to get into position, whereas the archers are adding support fire immediately.  Sure, (4) 4/5 is pretty lame, but on top of your melee unit, it helps break through in your chosen area.

I also don't have nearly as big a problem with units that are only sometimes useful in Battleground as I do in miniatures wargames.  If I don't bring my unit of 2" tall Macedonian Pikemen that I've spent $100 buying and a week painting in 75% of my games, then that's a big loss on my part of time and money.  If I don't bring my Dwarven Bowmen in 75% of my games but they're great in the other 25%, then who cares -- they were basically free with the Dwarf units I use more often.  In addition, that's an awesome test of my skill; I'm rewarded for identifying which games I should bring them in, while someone who just randomly throws them in every list is going to find them weak more often than not.

I think that's the underlying reason that I'm way less prone to call units overcosted or undercosted than a lot of this thread seems to be.  I don't want every unit in the game, or maybe even any units, to be mindless auto-includes.  I also don't want any random 2000 points worth of units to be just as effective as any other 2000 points worth of units.  That isn't to say I want army selection to be more important than tactics in the game, as it is in some wargames, but I want having a plan when you're building the army to be important.  If that's the case, then there will virtually always be some units that fit that plan more often than others.  But, again, since it isn't like I have to invest resources in getting a particular unit, that seems fine to me.  What's important is that units have times when they are good, and that a good player be able to identify those times such that it isn't just "well sometimes that guy gets lucky and is awesome."  I think with most of the units people have a problem with in this thread, the former is the case, which leads me to believe their points cost is fine.