Dwarfish Thunderer debate

Spanner · Post by **Spanner** » January 25th, 2007, 4:24 pm

Airk wrote:
Spanner wrote:My problem with Thunders is that leveling them up is pretty tricky. With other units you can use other units to reduce enemy units to low HPs, then hit it with the lv 1 unit you want to level and have a good chance that the lv 1 kills it (due to more attacks).

With Thunders, it's less certain because there is only one attack.

But this is a newbie speaking....
The flipside of this is that you need to do a heck of a lot less whittling down to start taking potshots with your thunderer - does that unit have 10 hps left? 12? 14? Fire away! Of course, if you -do- shave something down to the level where an elvish shaman could beat it to death with her stick, the thunderer always has his dagger attack to fall back on.

But the point is you still only get one shot. If you are lining up a L3 boss to be killed by your L1 Thunderer (a common way to speed up leveling), a thunderer is far more difficult to level up.

Sure the Thunderer gets his shot to kill earlier, but if he misses, the L3 will run away or worse yet kill your Thunderer. Of course if you have extra units to kill the L3 in case the thunderer misses then okay, but even then your thunderer doesn't get the XP.

With most L1s you can play it safe, and expose it only when going for the kill until it levels.

With thunderers, that strategy doesn't work as well. True the other units will do less work shaving down the enemy unit down to kill range, but your thunderer still only gets one shot.

Airk · Post by **Airk** » January 25th, 2007, 6:21 pm

But like I said, it balances out. Compare say, trying to level a thunderer to trying to level... I don't know. A spearman. In order to put the spearman into a position to get a kill, you need to work -harder-, because you need to knock the enemy down a lot further into low health. Whereas, if you can just get the enemy target down kinda low, the thunderer can step in and roll the dice. And as I also mentioned, if you really want to put your back into it, you can use the thunderer's dagger attack after the opponent gets down very low and double your chance for a hit.

Sure, it's easier to finish off a unit that has 1 hp left with a poacher, but it's a lot harder to get a level 3 unit down that low without it escaping or killing things.

Tradeoff.

Post by **F8 Binds...** » January 25th, 2007, 10:57 pm

Airk wrote:But like I said, it balances out. Compare say, trying to level a thunderer to trying to level... I don't know. A spearman. In order to put the spearman into a position to get a kill, you need to work -harder-, because you need to knock the enemy down a lot further into low health. Whereas, if you can just get the enemy target down kinda low, the thunderer can step in and roll the dice. And as I also mentioned, if you really want to put your back into it, you can use the thunderer's dagger attack after the opponent gets down very low and double your chance for a hit.

Sure, it's easier to finish off a unit that has 1 hp left with a poacher, but it's a lot harder to get a level 3 unit down that low without it escaping or killing things.

Tradeoff.

Two thunderers usually gets the job done. when you have a 60% chance to hit (usually), and 70% vs drakes/dwarves on grassland, it should only take one.

Spanner · Post by **Spanner** » January 27th, 2007, 12:07 pm

Airk wrote:
Sure, it's easier to finish off a unit that has 1 hp left with a poacher, but it's a lot harder to get a level 3 unit down that low without it escaping or killing things.

Tradeoff.

From the campaign point of view this occurs quite a lot of times. When you have overwhelming force and quite a bit of time on clock. So you can go hunt the l3 leader.

TheChosenOne · Post by **TheChosenOne** » February 6th, 2007, 4:25 pm

Want to know why thunderers pawn drakes?

Since drakes are somewhat connected to dragons, they can be classified as 'small dragons'

Remember the lvl 3 form of thunderers? You're right. Dwarvish Dragonguard

Konrad II · Post by **Konrad II** » February 6th, 2007, 4:35 pm

I'm not sure if thats a good reason, if I was a small dragon and had to kill a dragon heir(drakes are descendants of dragons, aren't they?) I wouldn't be dealing that much damage to them.

So lets just say its cause they got nasty piercing attack, deal?

Kalis · Post by **Kalis** » February 6th, 2007, 7:48 pm

I haven't read the previous posts, but this is my opinion:
Thunderers are great, but they're a high risk unit just like the horseman.

Pros:
- against most units, they would take no damage when they attack (because a lot of units don't have a ranged attack)
- even against ranged units, they have a chance of doing huge damage - instant killing an enemy and taking no damage at all.

Cons:
- Very luck based.

The difference between thunderer and horseman is that the horseman has a chance to do 2 attacks, but let's be honest. If the horseman doesn't hit the first (or god forbid, misses both), they take a ton of damage. And with only 40% chance to block maximum, they are very easy to kill if they get their HP reduced to 35 or 25.

So in my opinion? They're fine. If you make them, you're gambling on the damage.
The dwarves can always make trappers instead if you insist on getting damage over time.
More importantly, the thunderer is a complete counter to low defense units like heavy infantry, trolls, and horsemen. In those scenarios, the thunderer is far more useful than the trapper.

Konrad II · Post by **Konrad II** » February 6th, 2007, 7:55 pm

Well thunderers shouldn't be used against 60% def + enemies, unless its a hopeless final blow, or something like that imo. They are meant to hit 40% def -, so that they are pretty sure to get the hit and deal their massive dmg. Although it's luck based I think it's definitely worth having some against all factions, even more when you're defending because the enemy is on bad terrain(if you defend well) when he attacks, and when attacking factions that have naturally low defense(IE drakes, + drakes got -20% against pierce). but also against those that eventually expose themselves for a counterattack.

TheChosenOne · Post by **TheChosenOne** » February 7th, 2007, 4:23 pm

Perhaps the drakes' low defense is the reason why they get pawned by the thunderers.

TheChosenOne · Post by **TheChosenOne** » February 7th, 2007, 4:24 pm

Perhaps the drakes' low defense and their weakness to pierce are the reason s why they get pawned by the thunderers.

Zombiemambo · Post by **Zombiemambo** » February 20th, 2007, 12:08 am

I'm sure I'm just repeating someone else here (didn't bother to read through the whole thread, sorry), but I find that Thunderers are useful for hitting larger targets like Wose or HIs. They are also great for taking out retreating units.

Post by **F8 Binds...** » February 20th, 2007, 1:17 am

not really. against HI 70% chance of doing 11 damage, against woses, a worthless 80% chance to do 7 damage. that's where theives and fighters take the place of thunderers.

edit: letting you know that topics where nothing has been posted for a week is considered dead, and should not be posted in.

Zombiemambo · Post by **Zombiemambo** » February 20th, 2007, 2:37 am

F8 Binds... wrote:not really. against HI 70% chance of doing 11 damage, against woses, a worthless 80% chance to do 7 damage. that's where theives and fighters take the place of thunderers.

edit: letting you know that topics where nothing has been posted for a week is considered dead, and should not be posted in.

Didn't notice, sorry.

Gus · Post by **Gus** » February 20th, 2007, 2:43 am

F8 Binds... wrote: edit: letting you know that topics where nothing has been posted for a week is considered dead, and should not be posted in.

Errr, no. He had something to add (the meaningfulness of which is not the point of this post), so he was right to post here.

Post by **F8 Binds...** » February 20th, 2007, 2:52 am

Gus wrote:
F8 Binds... wrote: edit: letting you know that topics where nothing has been posted for a week is considered dead, and should not be posted in.
Errr, no. He had something to add (the meaningfulness of which is not the point of this post), so he was right to post here.

ok, go back to the "troll debate" in which i posted my 7th post, which contained 4-5 paragraphs. AND someone told me it was a dead topic. pathetic, eh? so I didn't add anything useful? huh? pathetic...