How are saloon units determined?

[Interjection]

The outlaws which are available appear to be map dependent but consistent every time.

E.g., texas will always spawn Comanchero & Renegado
E.g., ESOC Indonesia will always spawn Wokou Priate & Marathan Dacoit

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Mercenaries however I'm not certain...

-They don't appear to be map dependent - it seems that any merc can appear on every map.
-Does appear to be the same for all players in that match though
-They certainly aren't consistent - it looks like it's random everytime. What kind of random though?


Do all mercs have the same chance to appear? Are some weighted to appear more often? Or to appear more on specific maps? Fortress age mercs seem to appear way more often (but this is probably down to there just being fewer industrial ones?)

Is it the map XML that decides the mercs or the game itself?

___________________________

There doesn't appear to be any information out on the internet so I wanted to settle this once and for all.

Thanks :)

[duckzilla]

I always thought it was entirely random. I would be happy if it was not, since I love to do shit strategies like playing Germany in 3v3 team games to boom and spam fully upgraded fusiliers with 6.5 speed and 95 dmg per shot.

[edeholland]

Outlaws are indeed static for every map. To see for each ESOC map what outlaws will spawn, check the maps page: maps.php

About the mercenaries, the reference guide says the following:

All maps have a randomly produce two of the following: Black Rider, Corsair, Elmeti, Fusilier, Great Cannon, Hackapell, Highlander, Jaeger, Landsknecht, Mameluke, Manchu, Ninja, Stradiot, or Swiss Pikeman

This confirms what I thought: every map randomly picks 2 mercs without any bias or pre-programmed logic.

[Gendarme]

That's BS tho. Indochina spawns with corsairs and shit every time.

[EAGLEMUT]

There is a file which allows activating specific techs on specific map types. It is possible to define both consistent techs and/or choosing a number of random ones from a given list. On all maps featured on RE/EP so far, the outlaws are set to be consistent (but different for various map types), while there are random mercs taken from a list which is the same across all map types. It would be possible to allow different kinds of mercs or other kinds of techs like upgrades to be applied (fishing upgrade, silk road, etc.).

http://aoe3.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=ct&f=14,39277,,10

[HUMMAN]

It is determined by the laws of Garja.

[Interjection]

So to confirm,

By default, the game (not the map XML script) will randomly select 2 mercs from the entire pool of mercs - these will be available in the saloon. And there is never any weighting towards particular units (e.g., highlanders don't appear twice in the list or something like that)

And if I understand @EAGLEMUT correctly, map makers can also enable specific mercs if they want to but this is not the default

[Interjection]

So by extension of that, it would, for example, be a relatively simple change to instead select 4 random mercs?

(say we decided to do this for ESOC Patch or something - we wouldn't have to go through every map individually?)

[Garja]

Static outlaws are cool. They vary from map to map.
Random mercs also make sense imo. We can of course tweak that but I wouldn't mess with that stuff.

[edeholland]

Static outlaws are cool. They vary from map to map.
Random mercs also make sense imo. We can of course tweak that but I wouldn't mess with that stuff.

Why is that? Why not make outlaws random and mercs static? It doesn't make sense to me that the units with the most impact (mercs) are random, while the never-used outlaws are static.

I would much rather have static mercs so you can plan a strategy around it. Currently, you have to spend 200w to see which mercs are enabled, and if you are unlucky, you just wasted that wood. I think the randomness of mercs prevents players from trying it more often.

[EAGLEMUT]

So to confirm,

By default, the game (not the map XML script) will randomly select 2 mercs from the entire pool of mercs - these will be available in the saloon. And there is never any weighting towards particular units (e.g., highlanders don't appear twice in the list or something like that)

And if I understand @EAGLEMUT correctly, map makers can also enable specific mercs if they want to but this is not the default

Yeah, there is a separate mapspecifictechs XML where this is defined. For example Indochina is defined as a "borneo" map type in its map script, therefore borneo logic is used for the specific techs. I think weighting is not easily possible, as it would just activate the same tech twice.
It should be possible to both create a new custom map type with its own definition of mapspecifictechs, or alter the definition of mapspecifictechs for the existing map types completely.

So by extension of that, it would, for example, be a relatively simple change to instead select 4 random mercs?

(say we decided to do this for ESOC Patch or something - we wouldn't have to go through every map individually?)

Yes, might also need to adjust the Saloon UI, but should be relatively simple.

[Garja]

Static outlaws are cool. They vary from map to map.
Random mercs also make sense imo. We can of course tweak that but I wouldn't mess with that stuff.

Why is that? Why not make outlaws random and mercs static? It doesn't make sense to me that the units with the most impact (mercs) are random, while the never-used outlaws are static.

I would much rather have static mercs so you can plan a strategy around it. Currently, you have to spend 200w to see which mercs are enabled, and if you are unlucky, you just wasted that wood. I think the randomness of mercs prevents players from trying it more often.

Because outlaws are coherent with the geography of the map, which makes sense imo. While mercs are mostly european so can't make them map dependant.
As for why I wouldn't mess with it, I don't see the benefits. Randomness is what makes merc strat an accessory option as it should be. Only thing I would do maybe is to weight mercs so that arsonist are more rare as the unit completely sucks. Other than that perhaps just make the selection 1 infantry and 1 cav.

[oxaloacetate]

Static outlaws are cool. They vary from map to map.
Random mercs also make sense imo. We can of course tweak that but I wouldn't mess with that stuff.

It's cool, but also totally irrelevant since they are used so infrequently.

[Interjection]

Thanks @EAGLEMUT for the clarification.

To @edeholland 's point, the randomness of mercs is quite unhelpful. But I also agree with @Garja - static outlaws thematically make sense. So, what do you think of this middle ground - would it be possible to have the map announce the mercs available or add some functionality where pressing 'alt' reveals them - similar to how pressing alt on a native village reveals the techs & units inside.

EDIT: Upon hitting the colonial age, the game might announce something like "Highlanders are offering their services for a fee at the saloon". The message would look very similar to the announcement given when a treasure is collected.

EDIT: Though that might be more helpful in the discovery age so you can select a special deck if you want to

[gibson]

Merc strats would be boring if they were static, the part that makes it cool is that its random.

[EAGLEMUT]

Only thing I would do maybe is to weight mercs so that arsonist are more rare as the unit completely sucks.

That doesn't seem like a great approach to me, why not just buff the unit into viability?

[Interjection]

and/or decrease the cost of various bad mercs

[Gendarme]

The term "Arsonist" brings so much nostalgia. Mafia <3

[Garja]

To @edeholland 's point, the randomness of mercs is quite unhelpful. But I also agree with @Garja - static outlaws thematically make sense. So, what do you think of this middle ground - would it be possible to have the map announce the mercs available or add some functionality where pressing 'alt' reveals them - similar to how pressing alt on a native village reveals the techs & units inside.

My point is that we shouldn't probably be able to know what mercs are available in advance, exactly to not make it any more viable than what it is already. Mercs can be OP af and the randomness is what it balances it out basically.

That doesn't seem like a great approach to me, why not just buff the unit into viability?

Well, if we want to also buff grenadiers then ok. Thing is that arsonists stats are ok. It's just the unit role that is often no useful at all. And it detracts one of the 2 spots. Ideally I would just remove it but well that would be arbitrary removing just one merc unit.
Maybe we can add a 3rd slot for artillery. So we make it 1 infantry, 1 cav and 1 artillery (arsonists or lil bombs). This make sense from design pov and shouldn't be too OP, while giving some sort of consistency to plan on in advance.

On top of all this German merc combat needs a nerf regardless.

[Interjection]

Instead of adding logic to the selection I'd rather just keep it random and change it from 2 units to 4.

There's even just enough room in the UI without having to move the techs. Also checked it will be fine for the Monastery too.

[Garja]

With 4 units you're very likely to get the unit you want or at least the unit type. And that wouldn't solve the problem with extreme cases of 4x cav.

[lemmings121]

instead of changing anything, we could just create a way to inform players which are the avaiable mercs in that game without building a saloon/church.

Maybe a in game msg, just like the treasures that show "garja rescued a squirrel and got 50f", at the start of the game, we could have a msg "In this game, corsairs and elmetis are avaiable to hire"


its a smaller change then making them static or giving 4 options (op!), but with that knowledge from the start, people could adapt their builds to include mercs, instead of having to spend 200w to check mercs

[gibson]

I dont think you should be able to know without building a saloon. I'm against giving players free information.

[Gendarme]

Not a communist I see.

[gibson]

Not a communist I see.

#freedom