The Absolutely Best Heavy Cavalry in EB...

[LordCurlyton]

I know I'm going to sound like a broken record but....how fast is each secondary attack animation? Not the attack speed that the unit is set for, I mean the actual animation itself. All these bodyguards can have the same attack speed, which basically just sets the cool-down between attack animation runs. If the length of the animation of the attack differs by any great amount, however, then it will still be a tangible and noticeable difference.
Also, when the tests were being run by CuteWolf did the defending human just sit and allow the charge to hit home or did they counter-charge? I've found that the AI goes about 50-50 as to whether they counter-charge my attack or not in battles. If you're just sitting there there's always thepossibility that the attacker can win by getting those few extra men free to gang up on enemies.

[Watchman]

Eh, they all use the "hc_swordsman" skeleton. Not much choice there anyway.

[LordCurlyton]

Well poop. There goes my theory. But I'm definitely in the "Pahlava FM should not get AP" category. The tests even seem to show that they perform better than stats would indicate, as is the case with many units in my experience.

[The Persian Cataphract]

This is all very strange. All my custom games show that the Late Parthian Bodyguards get their living daylights kicked out of them, in particular against their Bactrian counterparts, whenever switching to their swords. Now I'm reading that some dude is actually emerging victorious every time against the same Bactrian... Which sounds completely bizarre if you're asking me, as I've gotten my ass kicked by kontos-wielding Bactrian, Sacae, and Armenian AI-controlled bodyguards.

Either, I've got a very fucked up EDU, or something truly, deeply, madly, isn't right. It's driving me crazy, but apparently on someone else's machine, the longswords don't behave like toothpicks, and to boot against... A human controlled opponent?

[LordCurlyton]

Could it be b/c you're letting the AI pick at you with the toothpicks whereas the two humans are both switching to secondary (the fairer way of testing)?

[The Persian Cataphract]

As weird as that sounds, that might be the exact issue.

[LordCurlyton]

Well it seems reasonable. I mean, why else would you get a human on the other side but to do something you know the AI won't? If you wanted to test against the AI you could always do toothpick vs toothpick, which I would imagine is how auto-calc does it. Plus the results should be fairly even.

[The Persian Cataphract]

The point is that at a stand-still melee, the aforementioned toothpicks should fall short against weapons that are tailored for melee. Upon making these observations, it appears quite obvious that we have bumped into a peculiar special case. Quite important if you ask me.

[Cute Wolf]

Both of them charge to each other in the same time... I just order my friend to run and charge in one, two, three, charge.... while I also do the same...

I use the default 1.1 MP EDU...

[LordCurlyton]

Well as long as nothing changed from 1.1 to 1.2 in terms of these particular stats then it should be no different.

[NeoSpartan]

The point is that at a stand-still melee, the aforementioned toothpicks should fall short against weapons that are tailored for melee. Upon making these observations, it appears quite obvious that we have bumped into a peculiar special case. Quite important if you ask me.

well why not just increase the attack delay (or whatever the name is) of the tooth picks.

[LordCurlyton]

Would those "toothpicks" have even been able to been used in close combat? It IS a lance-type weapon, which generally precludes its use. This is just a case of the limitations of the RTW engine and really shouldn't be a big deal, at least until the Total War franchise creates an engine that allows for such things as more than two weapons, discarding weapons when appropriate, weapon breakage, etc etc...

[The Persian Cataphract]

well why not just increase the attack delay (or whatever the name is) of the tooth picks.

Definitely something to consider.

[Watchman]

Hey now, remember that the dumb AI doesn't know how to switch to secondaries. Leads to it being real easy to swamp cataphracts with axe-swinging skirmisher cav that don't really give a rat's ass about slow, low-attack AP lances...
Can't say crimping the lances *more* would exactly improve things in that respect.

Also, although really long heavy two-handed spears are hardly the optimal weapons for close combat, they're not really hopeless either - although the user is obviously going to have to play the reach-advatage and distance-control cards something fierce. In skilled hands lenghty staff-weapons perform well enough in most circumstances, at least initially, but then again the only instance where the game engine actually forces a model to switch to a sidearm when the enemy's gotten "past the point" is the phalanx special formation, so meh...

[The Persian Cataphract]

I give up. I'll just have to wait and see as far as possibilities with M2TW are concerned.

[Watchman]

The RTW engine has its fair share of built-in, unremediable annoyances. I thought you'd have become inured to that by now, tho'.

Anyway, to reiterate my earlier point, if you can't live without AP secondaries on the Sahigans by God don't just slap the AP attr on them. That creates a +/- 0 skill, lethality 0.225, AP monster weapon somewhat lacking in peers - technically known as "hax sword", "beardy cheese" and/or "crazy broken".
It drowns kittens, makes baby Jesus cry, is Luke Skywalker's daddy and doesn't afraid of anything.

Instead, use the axe/mace modifiers which are playtested and consistent with the rest of the game-world. Doing the math in my head, the statline should look something like this:

;429
type             steppe cavalry parthian general
dictionary       steppe_cavalry_parthian_general      ; Sahigan Pahr
---
stat_sec         10, 28, no, 0, 0, melee, blade, slashing, sword, 0 ,0.165
stat_sec_attr    ap

'Course, that makes them offensively identical to the Hai and Saka late BGs, but them's the breaks.

[vartan]

The point is that at a stand-still melee, the aforementioned toothpicks should fall short against weapons that are tailored for melee. Upon making these observations, it appears quite obvious that we have bumped into a peculiar special case. Quite important if you ask me.

I've also noticed this peculiarity. I figure the AI isn't programmed to switch to secondary after unit charge wears off. This of course would be what you'd expect, but honestly, when, for instance, you're attacking enemy cavalry in battle with your cavalry, do you use alt+attack every single time, in order to generate a realistic attack, rather than unrealistic 24/7 toothpick attack? Humans can decide and may indeed alt+attack in all cases, but against AI, you cannot count on it.

[Cute Wolf]

Yay... my ancient test with sonic is necro-ed

But now... I'm sure that not only lethality and AP status goes into the count... as their running animation of their horsies must be taken into counting.... for what I observe, faster cavalry tend to have better performance than their unit stats said so... no, not the attack animation, but Who strikes first, he'll got something a first strike advantage... that's it.... Why the Early Khuveshavangan bodyguards are soo strong, even compared with their Pahlava and Saka.... (wait, not sure if the Cataphract horse animation is slower than half armoured horse... anyone can clarify this?)

[A Very Super Market]

I thought it was simply because the lance has an unstoppable attack animation, as well as high lethality?

[the man with no name]

773 KILLS HOLY $#!&. That is some serious ing going on there.

[Cute Wolf]

I thought it was simply because the lance has an unstoppable attack animation, as well as high lethality?

Hmm... I now using 1.2 on BI....
Maybe we should run a test with power_charge added, so they will have extra extended duration of charging attack?

[Ludens]

Maybe we should run a test with power_charge added, so they will have extra extended duration of charging attack?

Has that actually been proven, or is it just speculation? I am not up-to-date on R:TW modding research anymore, but AFAIK nobody knows for sure.

[Cute Wolf]

Has that actually been proven, or is it just speculation? I am not up-to-date on R:TW modding research anymore, but AFAIK nobody knows for sure.

AFAIK, that's what in the scriptorium says about adding power_charge attribute, as it will give some extra duration on charging animation. But I forgot the link... maybe I'll search...

[Ludens]

AFAIK, that's what in the scriptorium says about adding power_charge attribute, as it will give some extra duration on charging animation. But I forgot the link... maybe I'll search...

Aradan mentions it in his guide, but does not say where he got it from. If you find out, let me know.

[Brave Brave Sir Robin]

I thought it was simply because the lance has an unstoppable attack animation, as well as high lethality?

Yeah I'm pretty sure it's been determined that the lances are superior cavalry weapons against armored opponents.

Thankfully EBII shouldn't have this problem all that much as secondaries are automatically switched to after the charge. Only instances would be on cata-archers.

[anubis88]

So what's the verdict on this subject?
I'm in the middle of my Pahlava campaign, and i never had so much fun before. At this time i'm still allied with Baktria, Saka and Hayasdan, but war will soon brake out and i don't want my super-tanks to get their ass kicked by them.

The Hetairoi have no chance agains my elite Cataprachts (even against non elite ones they get pwned), but i'm a bit scarred what will happen if the Saka stack with 6 FM with +80 bodyguard decides to attack me

Should i change somethin in EDU or should i leave it as it is? What's the most historical verdict?

[artavazd]

So what's the verdict on this subject?
I'm in the middle of my Pahlava campaign, and i never had so much fun before. At this time i'm still allied with Baktria, Saka and Hayasdan, but war will soon brake out and i don't want my super-tanks to get their ass kicked by them.

The Hetairoi have no chance agains my elite Cataprachts (even against non elite ones they get pwned), but i'm a bit scarred what will happen if the Saka stack with 6 FM with +80 bodyguard decides to attack me

Should i change somethin in EDU or should i leave it as it is? What's the most historical verdict?

-1 from attack, leathality .165 ap This will make your longsword less leathal against light troops, but on par with other heavies when it comes to crushing armor. With the limitations of the RTW engine I think this is the best setting. Just give them the same stats as other heavy catas. After all these heavy catas were designed to battle other heavies. WHich means they MUST have a weapon which will damage the enemies armor.

[Watchman]

Actually I'm fairly sure their kit was originally intented more to let them roll over *lighter* cavalry, in the interests of the "securing cavalry superiority" phase of battle... and, yeah, to proceed through lots of arrows and the like without caring much, which AFAIK is what the steppe folks originally developed armoured cavalry for.

Squaring off against the superheavies on the other side really just came with the territory, kind of how Age Of Sail ships of the line were each others' main opponent - they were the only ones who could take on that kind of fighting power with reasonable chances of success.

[athanaric]

-1 from attack, leathality .165 ap This will make your longsword less leathal against light troops, but on par with other heavies when it comes to crushing armor. With the limitations of the RTW engine I think this is the best setting. Just give them the same stats as other heavy catas. After all these heavy catas were designed to battle other heavies. WHich means they MUST have a weapon which will damage the enemies armor.

I'm with Watchman on this; I say leave the bodyguard as they are. For killing armoured cavalry, you have your Pahlavân-î Zrêhbârân with lance+mace. A charge of these immediately followed by Median Cavalry (spear+axe) should sort out enemy heavies. Keep your FMs and super-Elites for killing light troops and as "general purpose" charge cavalry.

[anubis88]

Ok, so i kept the stats as they were but have a new question now. How armoured must a unit be for me to leave the lances? The non armoured units get pwned by my swords, but where are the Thureophoroi? Are they already armoured (so i leave the lances) or are they still "unarmoured" so that i switch to swords?