WTH is with scaling? So so bad!

[DonkeyBallZ]

I don't really get scaling in this game. At Gaines Mill yesterday as Union on Legendary I brought 31.6k troops and the AI brought 59k. Today at Malvern Hill I have 40k troops and the AI has 61k.

Then I see youtube videos like the one linked at the bottom which is supposed to be also on legendary and they bring 29k troops and face 39k. That isn't even a consistent ratio; his is better. And I killed more AI troops in my campaign so far than he has to this point.

It makes ZERO sense; I kill more and manage my army better/get a bigger one but the ratio of scaling literally gets WORSE in terms of working against me? (1.344 for him vs 1.525 for me) Also, I don't get more of the good cannons so literally the scaling just makes the same number of cannons/artillery less useful.

Scaling is far and away the worse part about this game. It literally makes no sense and screws you for no reason whatsoever, absolutely annihilates any sense of immersion which is huge for a historical game, and destroys any rewarding feeling to playing this game and thus makes you very quickly not want to play. In fact, scaling literally discourages you from playing because it discourages you from playing well and makes the game an excerise in futility and frustration.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BS-eqOR6mDg&list=PLgYUpdX_kl3czjyx1V_ow5mokzCV2G7Xz&index=12

[Blegh]

You brought more men than he did, I think that factors in somehow

[DonkeyBallZ]

Originally posted by bwcamp:

You brought more men than he did, I think that factors in somehow

I brought more because I've lost less to this point and killed more but for some reason in this terrible excuse for a system I'm worse off... Scaling is just a cheap lazy cop out way of doing things and the absolutely worse sort of flaw imaginable that ruins the game in such a complete and profound way. There is no excuse for the game screwing me over despite having played better. I can win this battle but why bother? I will just get screwed over EVEN BIGGER the next time around for succeeding...

As I said, "scaling literally discourages you from playing".

[Blegh]

Originally posted by DonkeyBallZ:

Originally posted by bwcamp:

You brought more men than he did, I think that factors in somehow

I brought more because I've lost less to this point and killed more but for some reason in this terrible excuse for a system I'm worse off... Scaling is just a cheap lazy cop out way of doing things and the absolutely the worse sort of flaw imaginable that ruins the game in such a complete and profound way.

I doubt you've killed more than him if you have more men

[DonkeyBallZ]

Originally posted by bwcamp:

I doubt you've killed more than him if you have more men

Why would you say that while not knowing a thing about my campaign?

First I can tell I killed more than him just from the Intel on the enemy army; in my campaign on the same legendary difficulty at Malvern hill it reads; "58k-63k" while in his video before the battle you clearly see it says "88k-93k" on his screen. I've killed substantially more than him; and I even checked his victory screens from his previous videos. I lost less too.

This unit has been my star performer:
https://imgur.com/a/MzkusE4

1,891 losses; 15,190 kills in total

60 losses and 3,650 kills at Gaines Mills; the previous battle. They were on the flank pumping death into wave after wave of Confederate troops.

[Dauntless07]

Yep, scaling is the worst feature in this game by far. Fortunately, the rebalance mod includes an optional file to turn it down or off. Perhaps the UI and AI customization mod has a similar feature, given it's produced by the same authors. I'd give either of those a try.

[pandakraut]

There are two main factors that are the likely reason your numbers do not look the same as the youtube campaign you are comparing to.

1) There is a randomization factor that gets rolled for every battle. The limits of how high and low it can go varies, but on average you're looking at a modifier of 1 to 1.5. If you got a very high roll and History Guy got a very low roll that could easily account for the entire difference, even if everything else between your campaigns was identical. Washington is probably the single best example of this because you can face ~280k total on the low end and 330k on the high end, both on a legendary campaign. Most battles you're looking at closer to +/- 10k at the most though.

2) Army composition. Even if you bring the same number of men, how those men are configured into units can matter quite a bit. For example, if you bring no skirmishers and the AI has 10 skirmisher units, those 10 units won't scale as much. This is more likely to have had an impact at Gaines Mill than Malvern, Malvern numbers tend to be pretty static outside of the randomization.

The intel reported value does tend to have less of an affect on the overall numbers than most people think, it seems to gets dangerous when you've over the minimum by more than 50-70k+. Since you're keeping it close to minimum you've got it under control as much as possible.

You can play small units and optimize around minimal scaling, you can play max size units and take advantage of the extra weapons and xp you can get from killing more men, or you can ignore it entirely and face something in between. All setups can be very successful.

If you would like more details on how scaling functions, see my writeup here: https://forum.game-labs.net/topic/26142-hidden-mechanics-and-weapon-damage-degradation/

If everything I've said just sounds annoying and wrong, then this mod lets you adjust AI unit sizes from battle to battle as desired. There's even an option to turn off all player army based scaling entirely. That mode isn't remotely balanced as battles were never intended to be played that way. Some battles will be insanely easy, others will likely be harder than if scaling was enabled. https://forum.game-labs.net/topic/25750-ui-and-ai-customizations-mod-v191/

For comparison here are several other legendary campaigns numbers:
Minimal scaling setup
Gaines Mill: 22k vs 52k
Malvern Hill: 23k vs 41k
Source: https://youtu.be/Ur_LiGt2-CE?list=PLt-JAMmvyAGnbrADDeAM04mxBsI9FyWQ0

Another minimal scaling setup
Gaines Mill: 19k vs 45k
Malvern Hill: 27k vs 45k
Source: https://youtu.be/1zMGpDapstk?list=PLl9g3AKsEm209nCmsJDSajoAefrfDGlv3

Ignore scaling entirely
Gaines Mill: 36k vs 61k
Malvern Hill: 36k vs 47k
Source: https://youtu.be/9_ByQunBanE?list=PL6-2WZCqywMUYOZwjyaPPArss1fr4ENlv

Max scaling setup
As a bonus, here's a max size full infantry setup showing how scaling tops out:
Gaines Mill: 56k vs 62k
Malvern Hill: 68k vs 62k
Source: https://youtu.be/UuXgp8nQ93A