So when it says "best against light ranged and mages" it literally lies to us?!
No, it just doesn't say what you think it says. The bet place to use them is against archers and mages, because they have an inherent bonus against those enemies. That doesn't mean that they are great, but it does mean if you are going to use them, that's the best place to use them.
Combat result is a mix of inputs, and the pentacle arrangement is a simplistic guide.
Initiative decides who goes first. The rudimentary rules the troops follow is approximately:
1) who can I reach
2) if I can reach more than one, which one will damage me first. (reducing the damage I will take on the next attack)
3) if I can't reach any, which move will put me closest to being in reach.
-) there appears to be a component of selecting injured enemies first (all else being equal), probably because the chance of preventing their next attack all together is greater.
Again, these are simplified. the code will include other factors, but that will tell you the enemy's most likely attack pattern.
Honestly, IMHO, it IS a mess right now. If all the "strong vs/weak vs" and "best against" info the game and devs tells us is thrown out hte window for other things... then the combat system is built on something OTHER THAN what they tell us... and sometimes has random "you just lose" chance added (terrain, apparently just screws you despite having the best setup possible and when you should totally win). So it IS "just spin a wheel" right now...
If you rely on the game to do everything for you, then choosing according to the strong vs week pentacle gives you a small advantage over pure random. If you want more than a small advantage, you have to pursue advanced strategies. Getting a Martial Monastery (human=Sanctuary) down and spend a few months getting it to a high level will give you a significant boost in winnability. Crafting every martial boost building you can in the magic Academy and using them will help even more.
I did that once, by accident... and it's super confusing. It moves troops up, then back... this way, then back that way... it's like they have to MOVE every turn and so it just moves them somewhere. And archers, IMHO, are god-like in that- cuz they mow all sorts of stuff down of mine... but mine didn't seem to do the same. They wanted to get SUPER CLOSE to attack. I don't know how to make sense of what it does, cuz it makes MY units act diff than their units, even if they're the same kind (per the pentagon dealie - like "range/melee/mage").
The game aI is simplistic and pretty stupid. The only good thing about it is that it is just as stupid for your oponents as it is for you. That means if you learn to fight manually, you get a huge advanatge over the stupid ai.
Ok, wait... I am gonna need you to break that down and explain HOW that makes sense.
Pentagon says they are strong vs both types. The game "info" when you click the "i" for the Cerb LITERALLY SAYS "Best against" and lists those two units.
How is that telling me they are NOT good against those?!
And if "best place to use them" means they get destroyed... what DO you use them for?! Are they totally pointless units if the BEST CASE scenario is a losing battle?!
Because in English, the words "Good" and "best" are not directly related. At it's simplest, in world where every single fighter is blind, the best fighter might not be very good at all, but they are still the best. Also see: Glyphosate (RoundUp) is
best used outside. It's still a carcinogenic, but it's less dangerous than using it inside.
Cerberus are "best used" against mages and archers, because they are even worse against the other troops. Until they get their extra stars, they are not very good at anything, except getting across the field quickly, but if you are going to use them, use them against:
1) only mages
2) mages with one or two archers
3)
nothing else if there is more than one other thing and the enemy isn't at least 50% mages
To simplify that even further, unless the mages outnumber everything else on the enemy's side, don't use Cerberus.
I am working on getting those wonders. The problem there is that the RUNES are hard to get. I have like 2 wonders in one of my cities, and like 3 in my other- aside from "instants/summons" ones. But the runes are super hard to get- and ppl tell me, doing better in the tourney will win those... but you need to be able to do the combat to get there.
So I am in a place where I can't do combat cuz I don't have runes to get the wonders to make combat viable? Yet, I have to do combat to get the runes... to make combat work... IDK how that is like gonna be fixed. LOL
Look for active neighburs and FS members who have a Monastery/Sanctuary and ask them if they'd like to do a KP trade with you so you can be their top contributor and get some runes. That will get you further than your own FS exchange threads, which are dependent on the whims of other players.
--------- Aside:
Shortly I'm going to combine my last half-dozen posts to pare-down the length of this exchange, so some of my recent messages will vanish.