Thursday, September 30, 2004

Activation Number vs Activation Efficiency

Greetings to all. In this article I'm going to discuss a somewhat controversial topic: the number of activations in a warband vs. the efficiency of those activations.


Definitions

First of all let me state my definitions of "Number" and "Efficiency":

Number: This is rather obvious. This is the size of your warband. The maximum currently allowed is 12 and it is good practice to try to reach this number as often as you can while maintaining a solid warband core.

Efficiency: This is not so obvious. What I mean by activation efficiency is how important is that figures activation? Did it kill something? Does it have a good chance to kill something? WILL it kill something? Will it cast a spell or use an ability that tips the scales of the match in your favor? These are all important questions when considering what figures to place in your warband and also what actions to take with any given figure once you are playing the game.


Number and Efficiency Theory

A general rule in the game is to get your warband as close to the 12 figure mark as possible. While it is a good thing to shoot for, you should not sacrifice figures that serve as a backbone for your warband for figures that will up your activation count. This is a reduction in efficiency. Example: Taking out a Thayan Knight for a Dreadguard and a Xill. You gain one activation but you have reduced your activation efficiency as those two figures don't offer the same melee capabilities of the Thayan Knight.

What you should try to accomplish is to achieve a stable base of figures that create a strong back bone for you to launch your combat assault from. Once you achieve a solid core, then you fill your warband with as many units as you can to reach the 12 figure mark.

Lets use this sample warband to illustrate this....(A warband I generated using the WotC Warband Generator)

1 Eye of Grummsh
3 Orc Champion
1 Tiefling Captain
6 Orc Warrior

As you can see you have a very solid melee base here with 3 Orc Champions and an Eye of Grummsh. The Tiefling adds a higher commander rating and it's very nice commander effect. This is a solid core. Now that we have established our "backbone" we can look into filling out our band with as many figures as we can to reach the 12 figure mark while at the same time trying to create synergy between the troops and commanders. Luckily for the CE faction there is the orc warrior, the most efficient three point unit in the game. This unit also has synergy with the two commanders in this warband. Now we have reached 11 activations. All of those activations are efficient as in they can deal a significant amount of damage or offer a support ability that is an important factor to achieving victory. The CE faction is currently the only faction that can reliably achieve a high number of activations that are also efficient. This is one of the main reasons it has risen to dominance over the other factions.


Now lets take a look at a band that has low activation number, but tremendous activation efficiency (A warband created by me and piloted by my team, Team Malice, to much success):

2 Large Red Dragon
1 Abyssal Maw
1 Drow Wizard


As you can see, this warband only has 4 activations. This is incredibly risky to some people but to players like myself this a very even trade off, if not a non issue altogether.

Despite this band only having 4 Activations it wins consistently vs bands that hit or almost hit the 12 figure mark. Why is that? Its because weenie figures do not have anywhere near the power to take on or incapacitate one Large Red Dragon, let alone TWO. Between their melee, movement, and breath weapon capabilities, you NEED power figures (thus reducing your own figure count; you're trading activation number for activation efficiency) to combat figures like the dragons.

My opponent may "control initiative" by having 12 figures, but when I make two activations and 85% of his warband dies to cone attacks, or 2-6 figures in his band die to melee attacks but ZERO in my band die when he activates turn after turn, where does that leave my opponent? Up the creek without a paddle. The Dragons are examples of tremendously EFFICIENT activations and this is far more important then having superior activations. Now if you can have superior activations and the majority of those activations are efficient, such as the orc band above, you are going to dominate.


Conclusion

I hope this article has helped people gain the ability to differentiate between activation number and activation efficiency. Thank you for reading and if anyone has any questions or comments, please feel free to post in the Maxminis forums and I will help as best as I can to further elaborate on this subject.