Game systems and mechanics

Morale mechanics

Stats involved

Morale Flank damage, which represents the moral loss a flank penalty caused by this unit can cause. The value is entirely applied with a rear flank. When flanking a side, the morale loss is 63% of the morale flank value. Morale is also intervening here and represents the willingness of your unit to fight.

How it works

Units have both morale and health. Morale can decrease if the unit is flanked, or if an ability is used on them. It can also increase if the flanks are protected or if an ability is used on them. If their morale is higher than their base morale value, the unit will enter the Confident state and will have bonuses to their melee attack, melee defence, and charge Deflect. Finally, some units can lock their morale and be unbreakable for a short amount of time.
The abilities which can decrease morale are War Cry, Fear, Hunt (at high tier), Whip, forced March (those two affects the unit using them), Intimidate, Roar.
The abilities that can increase Morale are Battle Cry, Fortify, Wrath of Mars, Infiltration, Oath of Perseverance, Deep Pockets, Unite.
The abilities that make a unit unbreakable are Iron Discipline and Determination.

Each unit possesses 3 flanks: a rear flank, a left flank and a right flank.

Surprise attacks: if you cause a morale flank penality less than 2s after being spotted, it will be even more effective.

Death of a commander: it decreases your unit's morale (and you can't use your third ability)

When an ability is used or if the unit is flanked, its morale will drop. If it drops below 0, the unit will rout, and won't be able to fight or use abilities, making it vulnerable to melee attacks. Note that you can still have control on its movements and order it to flee from the enemy.

If a unit has 10 men (or less), it will enter the Wavering state. The unit will lose 80% of its morale and of its View Range. If a unit routs while in the Wavering state, it will shatter and become unrecoverable.

Elephants are immune to flanking penalities. They can still be routed, but not through flanking.

Vision mechanics

Stats involved

View range: it determines how far your unit can see.

How it works

Each unit gives vision around them to their team, allowing them to spot enemies or deployables. The higher the view range value, the further you will be able to see. The part of the map you have vision on is highlighted when you play

Some terrain elements, such as light forest, forest, or high grass, will diminish your vision range. Your vision is also blocked by obstacles such as buildings, cliffs or large rocks.

A unit is spotted when it enters a part of the map you have vision on. It will remain visible until you lose vision on them. The same goes for deployables.

Vision can be provided by watchtowers, who provide a constant circle of vision as long as it is owned by your team. Note that this vision is not affected by terrain.

Strikes

Stats involved

Melee Weapon Damage,

How it works

Most units have an ability considered as strike: each men will attack the enemy facing them, dealing a bit of damage to them and knocking them down/.ck.. If two strikes are activated (yours and your enemy's), the one who activated it first will deal damage and prevent the other from using his strike.

Charge mechanics

Stats involved

The stats involved are charge impact and impact damage when two units charge at each other. When one unit charges at a unit that is not counter charging, the stats involved charge impact, impact damage and charge deflect (for the unit that is charged)

How it works

Charge impact determines who "wins" a charge, whereas impact damage represents the damage dealt by each unit model and per impact. The impact damage rolls against armour upon impact.

When two units charge at each other, there are two scenarios :
-the two charge impact stats are within 10% : the winner of the charge will be the one who charge first.
-the two charge impact stats are not within 10% : the winner of the charge will be the one who has the higher charge impact value.

Damage dealt to your enemy.

Hitting the enemy

Stats involved

Melee attack, melee defence

How it works

The melee attack of a unit is compared to the melee defence and shield of the other.

Some units, like the falxmen, ignores shield defence.

Dealing damage

Stats involved

Melee damage, melee weapon penetration damage, armour, shield armour.

How it works

Once you hit your enemy, you will deal damage to him. Your melee weapon penetration damage is always applied, no matter how high your enemy's armour is, whereas your weapon damage will roll against your enemy's shield armour and armour. The total (melee AP damage+weapon damage vs armour) represents the damage you deal per hit.

Damage from ranged

Stats involved

Missile damage, missile weapon penetration damage, missile block, armour, shield armour.

How it works

Similar to melee infantry, ranged infantry's damage is divided in two : missile weapon penetration damage is always applied whereas your "normal" missile damage will roll against armour and shield armour. If you fire on the rear or on the unshielded side, the shield armour of your enemy won't be taken into account, meaning that you will deal more damage.

Your enemy can block your arrows, negating the damage. That happens if you fire at a unit frontally. The missile block is equal to 0 when firing on the rear of a unit. If the missile block of a unit is 100 (or more), it will block all missiles, except artillery shots, which ignores missile block and will always apply their damage.

Fatigue

Stats involved

Phalanx fatigue regeneration rate when moving backwards, Phalanx fatigue increase per attack

How it works

This mechanic only affects phalanxes (both pikes and spears). When they are attacking, the men in a phalanx get fatigue. You can see the bar on your unit card. When it reaches 100%, the phalanx will lose its frontal combat efficiency and will become way more vulnerable. For the pike phalanx, it works slghtly differently : your unit will deal less damage, but will still have its frontal resistance. The fatigue automatically decreases when there are no attacks from you men, when phalanx is deactivated, and also decreases even more rapidly when your phalanx is moving backwards.

Friendly Fire

Stats involved

For the pike phalanx FF : all melee related stats, so melee attack, melee defense, melee weapon damage and AP damage. Armour/shield armour for the receiving unit.

For the FF from ranged units : missile damage, missile AP damage. For the receiving unit : missile block, armour, shield armour.

How it works

Some units can cause friendly fire. This includes all units with a range weapon and all units that can form a pike phalanx. Friendly units will suffer from damage if you hit them.

The damage formula is the same as if you were hitting an enemy. The Friendly fire damaged is reduced at low tiers (values ?)

Friendly Fire has some consequences : you lose silver, and this increases exponentially with the damage dealt. So, a small amount of FF doesn't make you lose a lot of silver, but the more you deal FF, the more the FF penality will increase. And, obviously, it damages your allies.

On the battlefield, you can see that you are dealing Friendly fire because :
-The damage indicators (numbers) are yellow.
-You see the "you are dealing friendly fire message, along with ping associated, which is present on your unit cards and on your unit on the battlefield. Note that only you can see the message and the ping. Your allies don't.
-Your commander says a line about Frienly Fire.

High tier ability selection

Only for T9 and T10 units: you have the ability to swap your abilities for others. There are some restrictions, like you can't have two offensive strikes or two focus fire abilities at the same time.