Age 78 Power Rankings

[Ethan]

I do have updated rankings for this age... but need to look back over them and write them up, which I lack time for right now.

A few quick comments on my version's Pros and Cons:
Most importantly, my rankings intentionally deal with military only. This is a huge limitation, as following them slavishly would always get you the glass cannon setup, no matter how "glassy" it is. It doubles as a strength as well though, because this focus significantly reduces the judgement calls needed. (Given how off-beat my play style is, you really don't want me making unconstrained utility assignments. An example: I picked WH as my "race" this age, and thus needed Faery as my personality!)

Cons:
As above - scope limited to military. Not even gains, just mpnw.
No horses, causes a circular reference. (Until now! Need to retest that part though.)
Forced conformity to a particular setup (byproduct of limited scope) no matter the racial fit.

Pros:
Full NW compensating (although this also is a small drawback too)
Lots of factors (spells, BE, TPA and WPA mods)
Fixed off:def ratio (such as 2:1 or 70:30). You can even make a graph by varying it (I used to have a little macro back when it was excel years ago).


Overall, I'd put mine as technically sophisticated, maybe even the most so due to the fixed off:def ratio. But strategically it is simple or even simplistic, definitely the weakest on that front. All I ever really say with it is "who has the biggest stick" - nothing about being able to actually use it for anything.

[StratOcastle]

And we appreciate your work, Ethan.

You are recognized as one of the most important links in the chain. You submitted invaluable strategic insight during the steep decline, and inevitable brain-drain, of Utopia.

The Rosetta Stone of Utopian base mechanics.

Thank you.

[Persain]

First @ Ethan its a short age, and we're just figuring out science play around with your stuff and do a next age update. i love seeing your stuff the most becauase it gives me that general age-age feel.

The only issue i have which is a huge con to me is
-Fixed off:def ratio (such as 2:1 or 70:30). You can even make a graph by varying it (I used to have a little macro back when it was excel years ago).
i really really dont see the point of this. If im looking at provs why would i want 2:1 off/def ratio, or even a dynamic RATIO across all races. to what end? i just dont think about off/def as a ratio i think of how many dspec/acre should i run before trying to max my offense.

Rattlesnake:
...
And now to my rankings:

The only issue i have with both your guys calcs is its hard to get an overall feel. Both are super interesting and useful, but
Rattlesnakes
-is overly complicated to read and present the data in a way most kds look at it (off/def, unbreakables, nw/land)
Yours
-litteraly has no off/def values i would need for my kd. The varies lines generally just tell me who has the most flexibility across all build choices

Persain:

You have a classic Ethan rankings: equalising along a fixed nw is interesting! The second equaliser is 54 raw def, which I'm not certain about. So,

Pros: Nw centered
Cons: Is that mTPA and mWPA? Otherwise that's a major flaw. A fixed raw dpa seems a bit odd... perhaps more so when equalizing along a fixed nw. Dunno why this disturbs me really, but it does! Just seems arbitrary.. hmm. Perhaps u have a great explanation for it though!

@tadpole i find equalizing across either nw or acres gives a feel for what your looking to build kd wide since being to heavey in either direction can lead to issues with finding/executing a war no matter what your goal is.

Simillarly the reason i "equalize" is thats its really really easy to do. i build a prov solely by calculating mod opa, mod dpa army in+army out, and then NW/acre. You can then instantly calculate the #'s at 400k nw (400k / 200 nwpa= acres) or 1000 acres (1000 *nw/acre=nw) and u just display the total off/def by multiplying by the acres your at. (See **** )

As for mtpa/mwpa.....i set a fixed raw wpa/tpa for the user to edit, but then normalize across racial bonus. That is if u want to look at a 5 raw wpa halfer and compare it to an elf, i have the elf run 5/1.35=3.7 "raw" wpa. So its effectively comparing mTPA and mWPA i just innately assume a similar science mix when looking at races only. No misstep there

Finally the reason i fix dpa is realitively easy to understand if u look at (and fully understand) my output spreadsheet, To that end I allow for an insane amount of flexibility (the last "no" column, shows def army in on 25% forts)and a fixed raw dpa may seem odd, but otherwise i have a huge issue. I need to fully build every prov, all science, race/peronality specfic spells, be, everything i can think of. If u look i had more slots to select than just the fixed races. i also have a drop down for t/m build "no offense all def" races. I have built up and can select warrior/sage/war hero/other as i desire. Therfore as i have dynamically select-able tpa/wpa/ppa and need to somehow determine what offense and def to run with the reaming population. I'm not all into trying to max-min the ratio you should run I'm into looking at how your typical prov would be built. Train 8-10 defensive units, rest offense then look at what values i get.

So when it comes to kd building i play around alot, maybe you want to see how a race would look with more def? up the "Raw" def number and see how that effects army in def and total offense. i can then play with the dpa # to see how militarizes look. Like the "most logical" reason is everyone always has different provs, honor/science/builds, no 2 provs in my kd are identical. BUT when it comes to setting kd goals, i can generally figure out that if i have a dspec/acre goal and then tell everyone "train as much offense as possible after you reach XXX dspecs/acre i can get a general feel for what def they are running and how well they'll be defended against your "standard candle" attacker who reaches the ppa goal i assume. Like how else could it be done? Its useless to say train a 1-1 leet/spec ratio if what i actually care about is how two races similarly built compare to each other. I want to see how their offense compares since "offense wins fights." My numbers and my general concept is How good an attacker are you, THEN how much def do you run. A fixed def across all races gives that, it shows relative offensive power as well as army in def so u can consider a tanky/hybrid prov when u start messing around more.

Finally: the reason i did/do/show "power rankings" at 54 raw dpa, is i find most people run 8-10 dspecs. It just generally what i see, so i picked it as the "def to present" when showing all provs


***Note: at one point i tried to normalize everyone to the same nw, then take that "Raw" def i use as input for simplicity and normalize everyone to the same fixed def army out. That is for example look at avain 177k off 120k def army out. sure if i ran them at the same 99k def of elf they'd have another 30k offense. and wouldnt look SO bad but that math proved to be a bit hard in google docs and i said 2#$@ it, this is good enough. ie. i punish nw efficient provs by making them go a little def heavy. however, since i also have a fixed land option, for me in kd planning its a moot point.