How does Undead fight high-impact factions?

[peet]

If you're playing Undead, what do you recruit against an enemy that has good impact attacks? Do you still recruit skeletons?

[wsultzbach]

JW's "How to play.."

http://www.wesnoth.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=11150

[Weeksy]

It depends what your opponent is doing. Are they wose-spamming? Ghosts and DA's to kill, with ghosts and skellies to protect, remembering to retreat when needed. More detailed info gets you more detailed results.

[JW]

JW's "How to play.."

http://www.wesnoth.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=11150

lol, thankfully I finished that section, eh?

Perhaps my favorite faction to play when I wrote those guides. The advice should hopefully be sound.

[Caeb]

yeah, not enough has changed to warrant a complete overhaul of JW's wise words, although the UD mirror section could use an update, what with the introduction of arcane... the ghoul and bat have also become more interesting/usable, I think, with the former gaining fearless, the latter traits, and both having positive arcane resists now... (stronger Walking Corpse with fearless may also deserve a mention...)

regarding impact, which you should already be expecting from any opposing faction (drakes to a lesser extent) as soon as they realize you're undead, it's less a question of whether or not to attack with adepts as it is of protecting those adepts once they've delivered their payload... even though most impact users cost at least as much as adepts, so a trade-off is usually worth it (especially with the gain of better map position), there's little point in sending 2 adepts to kill a HI or dwarvish fighter in one turn without enough support to cover them for your opponent's turn...

for specific recruitment strategies, specific opponents and their strategies will be needed... in general, against the biggest impact threats:

Troll Whelps: adepts-fair, skel. fighters-bad, skel. archers-bad, ghosts-fair...
Wose: adepts-fair, skel. fighters-good, skel. archers-bad, ghosts-fair...
HI: adepts-good, skel. fighters-bad, skel. archers-bad, ghosts-fair...
Dwarvish Fighters: adepts-fair, skel. fighters-terrain dependent, skel. archers-terrain dependent, ghosts-terrain dependent...
Footpad- adepts-good, skel. fighter-fair, skel. archer-fair, ghost-bad...
WC: adepts-good, skel. fighter-good, skel. archer-good, ghost-good...

note that these are still very situational match-ups, so that you may still attack any unit with any other unit as long as you have the advantage... nighttime combat was kept in mind for these assessments, and they are based on the ease with which the UD unit can take on and/or kill the impact unit... "fair" ratings are essentially a toss-up or represent match-ups that would take too long to decide either side victorious (re: ghost)...

even though we can assume ghosts have the upper hand against whelps, woses, and HI at night, regeneration and hp effectively prevent the ghost from getting the kill before dawn approaches in most cases, and during daytime the ghost can probably stall but risks defeat with a few timely hits...

the above list is roughly in order of difficulty for undead to handle, with trolls isolated at the top due to good hp, regeneration, blade/pierce resistances, decent movement/defense in hills, and especially low cost... even though ghosts can slow them down and a couple adepts can take a troll out in one stroke, a few magical misses combined with a rotation of fresh whelps to the front can be a real bother to an undead assault... at least woses are expensive enough to sting your enemy's pocketbooks when brought down and HI lack the auto-healing factor to stand in your way for long, but whelps are just... bothersome... (until you get a level 2...)

the defensive differences between mountains/hills and other terrain for dwarvish fighters account for the difficulty in predicting how undead can handle them, ranging from a pretty even fight against skeletons even at 30% at night (hp/resistances) to a definite knalgan advantage at 60/70%...

ghouls, bats, and WCs can play important roles against impact as well, although bats are less useful due to their impact weakness, and WCs have the added bonuses of not being resisted as much and fighting decently through the day, so throw them in the mix as desired... ghouls are just all-purpose defensive units with welcome offensive utility, and can even out your luck when the adepts aren't hitting by giving you another chance against units that are either getting weaker or not regenerating after being scratched...

finally, this was just a tip of the iceberg look at how my undead view impacters, without even taking into account the fire users and ulfs that will most likely be sent your way for a bigger party... I would still suggest a balanced recruitment, even if you know the opposing faction will use impact a lot, since there really aren't any useless units when they're used appropriately... however, do consider focusing more on an adept-based attack, since there's really nothing they can't hit hard at nighttime, with minimal to no retaliation... if anything, bats and skeletal archers should not be heavily recruited for the specific purpose of taking on most impact units, as either they are ineffective or there are better alternatives to use...

hope some of this helps, and if not, refine your inquiry for a more refined response...

[F8 Binds...]

There's a little trick I use as UD if the opponent has a good number of impact units. In general, units with impact as their main weapon have 4 MP, with the exception of the footpad. And other than the footpad / dwarvish fighter, most take a good amount of MP to cross terrain.

Taking this into account, you can actually slightly retreat from HI, woses, and other such units in the day, getting just out of range. If the opponent chases you into the night, he does so suicidally. At dusk, especially as player 2, I like to hunt these specific units down with adepts, preferably quick ones, as these slower units are left behind as they retreat or require more units to cover up, hindering the opponent's retreat. If the opponent strays behind to finish your adepts, they surely will be destroyed on the bad terrain they must attack you from (Yes, you have to place your adepts correctly. ) with your following skeletons, ghosts, and WC's. Thus your opponent will take some heavy shots from your adepts, and if he/she retaliates, those units as well perish.

In general, you can attack any set of units in a lawful chaotic matchup like this, with the same scenario.

[nebula955]

skeletons are definitely not GOOD vs woses. 3 hits kill skeletons at night, 2 kill skeletons in day. because of the distribution of damage, the skeletons really suffer badly. On the other hand....the arcane makes the ghost quite good vs the low defense woses. skeletons are also not necessarily bad vs whelps since they do practically equal damage at night (unless strong), but although the whelp has more hp it often has less defense and will get hit 14 and hit only 10, both being roughly 1/3 of the enemy's hp.

and wcs hitting 9-2 at night against skeletons also can be annoying. The ghost has arcane, but suffering 5-2 while not draining isn't necessariliy good-in both cases potentially losing half hp to a 6g wc is probably not considered good.

If the unit that you use has a good chance to lose half hp from attacking something else it definitely is not a very good counter.

The ud vs ud has become very intersting:
adepts kill skeletons,
ghouls defend well against adepts,
skeletons kill ghouls,

......and ghosts ought not be recruited much, dying to one adept 50% at night.

[Caeb]

again, I'm only making generalizations under the premise of nighttime combat, but I agree that they should probably be under "fair" against woses instead... (I was likely thinking of the results of attacking a wose at 20% with 2 skeletons at night...) otherwise the skeleton's defense usually makes it only a slight wose advantage when the wose is in forest (at night), especially taking into account the ghoul/adept/2nd skeleton that may be present from the economic difference... (but I'm confusing y'all by mixing single unit-unit comparisons with factional advice...)

even though we can assume ghosts have the upper hand against whelps, woses, and HI at night, regeneration and hp effectively prevent the ghost from getting the kill before dawn approaches in most cases, and during daytime the ghost can probably stall but risks defeat with a few timely hits...

about the ghost, it does have an advantage against woses at night, but dealing only 18-8=10dmg max (and less at other ToDs) isn't the most efficient means of killing a wose... and if I didn't make it clear in my first post (which I apologize for), I'm analyzing individual performance rather than with the faction as a whole (which probably would have been more useful, but meh, JW's got that covered)...

I considered putting "fair" for skel. fighters vs. whelps, but taking into account regeneration (so it's more like 14-8=6dmg to 10/12dmg), the ability to keep fighting through day with a possible fearless, and a higher starting hp, and things don't look so fair, even with a 50% to 30% defensive advantage for the fighter...

WCs vs. ghosts, putting aside factors outside of a single head-to-head battle, if you didn't have an adept nearby, you'd probably want a ghost to take out a stray WC, since even if it gets in trouble there's plenty of room for error and you can use ranged if you're not in a hurry... skeletons... can be argued to be put in the "fair" category, especially if poor luck makes you lose the initiative of attacking first and allows to the WC to get in 2 hits... but assuming that the WC generally needs at least 3 combat rounds to kill a skel. fighter/archer, I'll optimistically side with the bones...

If the unit that you use has a good chance to lose half hp from attacking something else it definitely is not a very good counter.

in an ideal world, we could always use adepts against melee units and skeleton fighters against ranged units and they would always hit, but on the field of combat under the mercy of the RNGods, you often have to use what you have and what works... I'd prefer to post more specific insights instead of generalities that may lead to misconceptions, but that can get time-consuming, and I haven't had a functional level of sleep in 2 weeks...

oh, and ghosts can still stall and plug up holes in formations away from arcane-/fire-users, if nothing else... also, intelligent bat->1 kill->blood bat=cheap, efficient mage hunter...

[Swiftfingers]

I wouldn't underestimate the power of the wc. The combination of adepts and wc's is a potent force. If adepts are used to weaken enemies, allowing the wc to get the kill provides an instant meat wall to protect your adept. Also, wc's are easy to level and at level one can do significant damage to units.

Of course you will have to be smart about when and where to attack, but I have found that some people will underestimate a wc thinking it to be an easy kill (and it is), only for them to be overrun through sheer numbers.

I guess you can tell that I like wc's

[Iris]

If you're playing Undead, what do you recruit against an enemy that has good impact attacks? Do you still recruit skeletons?

Archers and ghosts. Walking Corpses are good too.

[peet]

Thanks everyone for your feedback.

I'm actually using these ideas for the purpose of designing a campaign. I'm making the undead the primary enemy and so I want to make sure the scenarios are challenging and varied.

The player will have access to some decent impact units but no mages aside from the "player character" himself and one loyal unit.

However I'm considering adding an archer with a flaming arrow attack. It won't be as powerful as an orcish archer's fire attack, but it will give the player more options against those undead.

The fire arrows would be especially effective against ghosts, I imagine, but no more effective than blunt attacks against most other undead units. Am I right?

Peet

[nebula955]

skeletons have -20 to fire....

[peet]

skeletons have -20 to fire....

Yes, and -20 to impact. So giving the side some moderate fire attacks doesn't change too much for skeletons if we already have good impact attacks. It's the other units I'm concerned about.

[thespaceinvader]

Yeah, that would probably be good given how difficult ghosts are to kill any other way without arcane damage.

[grrr]

If the unit that you use has a good chance to lose half hp from attacking something else it definitely is not a very good counter.

I totally agree with that.