it just dawned on me probably the best way to prevent these champion stacks of doom is to make it so that each army can only have one champion in it. This solves a lot of issues. You will be forced to use standard units if you are to have an army of any resonable size. It makes sense for a stack to be led by one "general" unit. You will be forced to split your army up so you don't just have one ridiculously powerful/invicible stack. It also prevents a lot of the stacking and overlapping of champion talents that affect armies.
There could be a few other variations to consider also. We can make it so the sovereigns don't count towards that one champion limit. So you can still have that one main stack that is a little bit stronger. Or we could make it so that a champion costs 2 or 3 unit slots in the army. So at most we can have 4 or 3 champions in a stack rather than 9 with full army logistics.
What do you guys think?
We Germans traveled with fewer men because we were so much stronger than the armies we were fighting.
Seriously though, you make a good point.
The only thing I would change is allowing other techs to alter the size, cost, and efficiency of regular troops. The Civic tree is rather devoid of any units benefits.
You're absolutely right, it's only a shame that the mechanisms you are referring to are not taken into account in the game (or not yet).
The usefulness of a force depends from 2 main points :
- the chain of command, the orders of the chief are given to the smallest unit without dissonance and disturbance,
- the logistic chain that links the force to its stocks of weapons, food and manpower is in place and functional.
In FE, neither of this 2 concepts is implemented. The champions have no personal ambitions to settle or carve a kingdom for themselves, to become king in the place of the king, to create a challenging dynasty for the future generation of sovereigns, they don't want to profit from their plunder because they have no money to spend. The units when they are paid go where the player wants them to go and if the player has no money to pay them don't become bandits and cutthroats. The orders are given instantly without error or interference by a subordinate. The stacks are well fed and in condition to fight even even they are in the middle of enemy territory and cut of any allied bases to pay them, give them food and clothes and heal them. With this level of omitted details it must not be a surprise if sending a stack of champions at the other side of the world to destroy enemy cities is such easy and the way to win.
Relecture of Xenophon (Anabasis), the campaigns of Alexander and Hanibal or the memories of Cortes and Pizarro should be inspirations to take into account. Even in a magical world, everything should not be possible without a good preparation.
Friendly cities and outposts (own or with diplomatically negociated passage and supply rights) should generate supply areas to pay, feed and heal the stacks (could be different areas depending the effect you research) and no a recently captured city should not be a 'friendly city' or you have magical means to give you a limited supply for a limited time (remember the Hebrews and Moses in the desert). Even the use of friendly allied sources should have an increased cost: during the 80 years war the chain of supply (gold mainly) of the Spanish Tercios fighting in the Lowlands was coming from Spain through Northern Italy, Alps, Lorraine and then arrived in the Lowlands. During the 30 years war, the armies fighting in Germany were followed by bands of suppliers, pimps and whores, smiths, horsetraders, professional gamblers that followed the armies and participated to the destruction of the country.
How would my party of heroes embark on their epic quest?
Umm their both right. Sun Tzu is being take out of context a bit as he has had alot to say about logistics, and getting the army to the battle. Once their at the battle though, then its a matter of comunication, which makes what Sun Tzu rather acurate.
With that said, I do think Heroes need to be balanced. Perhaps having leadership bonuses, or even teamwork bonus, to normal units attacking the same target. That way, while a Hero could maybe take single squads on at once, a well cordinated concentrated attack on a single hero, could mean his death... (And by death I mean gangreen in one hand)
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