Yari Cavalry

[Tony Furze]

Been playing as Uesugi on Normal starting at 1530. I tried Hard but I ended up after several years hanging onto/fighting over the first two provinces I began with!

So, I ve managed to encroach into the rebel provinces- I must say I ve never seen a defending AI army move so fast in some of the battles. I m used to MTW and the defender crawling towards some high hill.

Here, they will positively dash for a vantage point, taking you off guard...

Well, I ve had many of my Generals as Yari Cavalry and I have nt worked these units out yet.

I have the handy FBEgg guide, but under my clumsy handling, I only manage to get them to rout...and when its a general, you know what that means:

"Your Taisho (correct spelling?) has forsaken all honour..."

I have managed to put together a large (320 strong) Yari Ashigaru army thats really good at running routers off the map. The units are all good, and the small choice is something I like.

So, about the Yari Cavalry? How are they best used?

[Sasaki Kojiro]

I'm not a huge fan of yari cavalry to be honest. They take way to long to beat a unit of SA for my liking. Best use is for hitting other units in the back that are already weak, and for chasing down routers, but the only significant advantage they have over cavalry archers in that area is that they beat other cavalry. Naginata cavalry are a much better option for melee.

[Wasp]

I don't train many Yari Cavalry either - they seem to weak. Today I trained two groups because I knew Hojo would attack me with some Cavalry Archers, and I didn't have any fast units yet, but I won't build them as 'normal' unit - I'd rather have Naginata Cavalrymen or Heavy Cavalry like Sasaki.

So my tactics with the YC are either using them to attack fleeing enemies, or to use them as anti-cavalry (and usually only against CA since they seem so weak).

[Martok]

So my tactics with the YC are either using them to attack fleeing enemies, or to use them as anti-cavalry (and usually only against CA since they seem so weak).
Ditto that. I find Yari Cavalry to be useful for only three things: Scouting, chasing down routers, and attacking/pinning Cavalry Archers. I occasionally use them to flank Yari Ashigaru as well, but that's pretty much it. Their melee stats are so poor that you cannot rely on them to do much fighting as a general rule.

[R'as al Ghul]

Additionally to what was said, remember that maneuvering is one of the key tactics in STW.
You can use the Yari Cav, the fastest unit, to maneuver around the enemy lines while they are engaged with your infantry, and break their morale.
You don't necessarily have to charge, being there is already enough.

[ReluctantSamurai]

I usually have 2-4 of them in a 'typical' army. With sufficient upgrades, they can be a force. Being a pole-armed unit, theoretically they should have an advantage on non-spear units including other cav units.

As everyone has already mentioned, they are the best weapon against enemy CA, as flankers, and for chasing routers. In my experience, they hold up reasonably well against enemy cav units, particularly NC. My tactic is to pin the enemy cav frontally (either with infantry or another YC) and charge from the flank or rear. With a good charge bonus, and any type of terrain advantage you can give them, they will serve you well, IMHO.

I pair them with my CA units and use them to disrupt enemy archer/CA units. In open terrain, I can often get enemy infantry to separate from its supporting archers that way, as the AI can't seem to resist holding up its archers to fire on them. When enough separation happens, my YC can then over-run them and get away before any AI infantry units can return to help.

In rugged terrain, I set traps for enemy YC when I can......the AI cannot seem to resist sending its YC after CA's. Leading them into a prepared trap can be tricky, but with good timing the hunted becomes the hunter......

As to having them as Taisho or as heirs....I almost never permit that. The way I use my YC more often than not places them far from the main battle-line, hence of little use in steadying wavering troops. I prefer my Taisho's and heirs to be YS or SA. This means they will be near the main battle front, and much less likely to take heavy losses and rout.

[LittleGrizzly]

In MP i used to use 4, and usually use at least 2 or 3 for SP, with yari cav and a few CA you can split units off from the enemy and hit them from 2 sides at once, i don't think many units survive a sandwich from 2 yari cav. If the enemy try to counter this with thier cav you have the best unit to fight them with, and the CA can also flank well enough if YC are all engaged.

[Tony Furze]

Great !!!! Thanks very much.

Sasaki Kojiro : Yes, I tried first to take on SA but soon got routed. Back to the guide-where it says try to flank or attack from rear. I suspected, after using Yari Cav, they felt a bit weak. But in Shogun you have so few units you have to find a way to play to their strengths.

Most of your advice centres round the YC as anti cavalry-which explains a lot as I m the only faction so far that has cavalry in any number...

Martok : great to hear from you. Looks like my YC general just has to sit on top of the hill and command waving his spear.

Rás al Ghul : thanks for the good advice!

ReluctantSamurai : I ve just had a really good bridge battle against the rebels in
Shimosa. I got fed up with the YC routing so I "got rid of" the leftovers. (I really find Shogun very emotionally immersive; more so than MTW , and the dishonour those cowardly YC brought on my clan was too much to bear...)

Anyway, I used CA to lure the defenders away-they had positioned themselves a little to far back from the bridge. I found CA s much more comfortable to use.

LittleGrizzly thanks- I ll bear in mind the YC sandwich, one of the favourites I ve used with the Polish and Hungarians in MTW.

Thanks, all, again.

[Drisos]

I train lots in SP, because I can't train NC yet, and because YC are better then CA in melee. 'I have too'. I always love having a few cavalry to chase the enemies when they rout. It's very effective in killings loads, and you lose almost none.

Later in campaigns I will use more NC and HC.

I use both on the flanks in the same way. when the enemy has lonely ranged units on the flank, I'll hit those. when they have lonely inf, I'll sandwich them, when they're in tight formation, I wait 'till the infantry has engage mine, then circle round the back.

Btw, good/nice pieces of micro-managing tactics to read here! Good job guys! :book: :book: :bow:

[TosaInu]

Hello,

I used yaricavalry online. Usually just one unit, upgraded to honour four. I like that unit.

It's also great in single player campaigns, as it it a fast unit to either chase, flank, backstab, finish off missile units and counter enemy heavy cavalry. They and cavalry archers are the first ones available after building a horse dojo because I already have yari and archers. Heavy cavalry is a bit underpowered in original STW and expensive.

[Spongie]

I'll train archer cavalry over yari cavalry, for the most part - perhaps a 3:1 ratio - I like having mobile archers who can pepper enemy units from a distance, and flank to attack archers once the enemy melee units are engaged / chase down routers.

I very rarely use heavy cavalry or naginata cavalry... they're too vulnerable to yari samurai, and my preference is to fix enemy troops with my own melee units before charging cavalry into their backs. Admittedly, because I don't use them much, I don't get much practise with them... and because I don't get much practise with them, I don't use them much. Catch 22! :charge:

(Oh yes, and I only play single player.)

[TosaInu]

Hello Spongie,

Yes, lcav (cavalry archers) are great to pepper wm (warriormonks) and nod (nodachis).

The patched jhc (Japanese heavy cavalry) is quite tough. It's nice to have one just behind your own infantry. They can quickly move to either flank to prevent it to collapse or counter (almost anything will fail when a jhc hits their back or flank).

http://www.totalwar.org/tosa/tactics/jhc.gif

Red is the enemy line, blue is your line, the square is a jhc reserve. It can quickly run to either the center or the flanks to help defend, but it can also move behind the enemy line and deal a blow in the back. Sometimes you can quickly turn the tide in the center with a frontal attack through your own lines and then turn either left or right to attack one of the flanks from behind.

[Drisos]

Ah indeed, HC do quite well in head-to-head melee. :yes:

[ReluctantSamurai]

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, please.....these are unit stats for cavalry from the Warlord ed. modified by the 1.12 patch:

Marching Speed/Run Speed/Charge Speed/Charge Bonus/Melee Bonus/Def/Armor

Yari Cav: 10/24/24/8/2/2/3

Cav Arch: 8/20/20/1/2/2/0

Naginata: 8/16/20/4/5/2/4

Heavy Cav: 8/20/20/8/2/3/3

Mongol LC: 10/26/26/4/2/2/4

Mongol HC: 10/20/24/6/4/4/5

YC share the highest charge bonus with the Samurai HC. That is a big factor if you play to this strength. In my experience, one should not leave YC in melee for too long.......take advantage of the charge bonus.......get in, get out.

Typically, one of my YC units (small unit scale) with +3/+3 upgrades will take 15-20 casualties against NC/HC if left in contact for several minutes. Longer contact (if enemy unit hasn't routed) means higher casualties, 30-40 perhaps. This, of course, is not set-in-stone and varies depending on terrain and opposing unit honour.

I like using Naginata Cav/Heavy Cav, but I usually limit their use to line-backing.....sending them in at a crucial point in the center to break a wavering enemy unit. Combined with a charge from my Daimyo, many battles have been tipped to my favor this way. But they get easily tired in bad/winter weather so one has to account for as frequent rests as one can afford. My Yari, OTOH, always seem so tireless, and unless it's just my imagination, recover more quickly from the near exhausted state to fighting condition.

In any case, the YC/CA pairing that I employ is probably my fondest use of units in the game.

[Puzz3D]

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, please.....these are unit stats for cavalry from the Warlord ed. modified by the 1.12 patch:
Someone mentioned stats. :)

The v1.12 patch should not be applied to the Warlords Edition of the game. Shogun v1.12 (Oct 2000) was the final patch for the original game. When the Mongol Invasion add-on was released (June 2001) the version number was reset to v1.00. Mongol Invasion was a separate product in Europe and sold for $15 usd. In the USA, Shogun and Mongol Invasion were combined into a single product called Warlords Edition and sold for $40. Notice how Creative Assembly pumped the USA customers for extra money. I bought Shogun for $30 and then had to buy Warlords for $40 just to get the Mongol Invasion add-on.

Shogun + Mongol Invasion, a.k.a. Warlords Edition, was subsequently patched to v1.01 by Creative Assembly, and then a community based beta team was solicited by them to rebalance the game because MP was badly out of balance and LongJohn was not available to work on it. That community team produced the stats that were released as the v1.02 beta patch. To this day it's still called a beta patch. Unfortunately, the community team of 8 players could not agree on how to adjust the playbalance, and the playbalance suffers as a result. Complicating factors which defeated the beta team before they even got started were that the upgrade costs in MP are incorrectly calculated, the unit costs couldn't be changed, the Shogun v1.12 projectile stats were unknown to the beta team, the MP game was speeded up by 15% due to a network code bug in Shogun being fixed and it's not possible to balance the kensai or battlefield ninja within the combat system.

So with that as a backdrop these are the cavalry stats for the various versions of the game:

Marching Speed, Run Speed, Charge Speed, Charge Bonus, Attack, Defend, Armor, Morale

Shogun v1.12

Yari Cav: 10, 24, 24, 8, 2, 3, 3, 2
Cav Arch: 8, 20, 20, 3, 1, 2, 3, 0
Heavy Cav: 8, 20, 20, 5, 2, 6, 5, 4


Warlords Edition v1.01

Yari Cav: 10, 24, 24, 8, 2, 3, 3, 2
Cav Arch: 8, 20, 20, 3, 1, 2, 3, 0
Naginata: 8, 16, 20, 4, 5, 2, 4, 8
Heavy Cav: 8, 20, 20, 5, 2, 6, 5, 4
Mongol LC: 10, 26, 26, 4, 2, 2, 4, 4
Mongol HC: 10, 20, 24, 6, 4, 4, 5, 8


Warlords Edition v1.02

Yari Cav: 8, 24, 28.8, 15, 1, 2, 3, 4
Cav Arch: 8, 23, 27.6, 10, 0, 1, 3, 2
Naginata: 8, 22, 26.4, 11, 4, 1, 4, 8
Heavy Cav: 8, 20, 24, 9, 2, 7, 6, 6
Mongol LC: 8, 24, 28.8, 11, 2, 2, 4, 4
Mongol HC: 8, 22, 26.4, 10, 3, 3, 5, 8


Note: YC and Mongol HC have a +4 anti-cav attack bonus.

Notice in the Warlords Edition v1.02 patch how the cavalry, except for HC and MLC, had their melee capability reduced by 40%, and how all the cavalry had their charge bonus drastically increased. This is why most of the cavalry do not do well in melee vs infanty unless they get a good charge.

Personally, for Warlords Edition SP I think you are better off with the v1.01 stats, but the Naginata Cav are overpowered in that because they have the melee stats of a Warrior Monk but are cheaper. The best solution I've found for that is to take 1 point off the attack value of the Naginata Cav. The guns in both v1.01 and v1.02 are overpowered, but you can fix that by restoring them to the Shogun v1.12 stats.

[ReluctantSamurai]

Someone mentioned stats. :)

Thank you......:bow:


That community team produced the stats that were released as the v1.02 beta patch.

Thank you for the correction..........I knew that, but for some odd reason I always seem to confuse the two (v1.12 & 1.02):dizzy2:


The guns in both v1.01 and v1.02 are overpowered, but you can fix that by restoring them to the Shogun v1.12 stats.

Which is what I do, and probably why I get the versions confused (or maybe my 'pre-Alzheimer's' has begun to kick in:laugh4: )


This is why most of the cavalry do not do well in melee vs infanty unless they get a good charge.

Which was the real point I was trying to make.........and I noticed that in all versions, YC get the highest charge bonus:2thumbsup:

[Drisos]

I bet Puzz typed those stats by head! ~;p :laugh4:

Seriously, thank for all info/tactics advice, guys! :bow:

[Puzz3D]

I bet Puzz typed those stats by head! ~;p :laugh4:
Actually, I didn't because I don't want to post wrong stats by mistake.

[Wasp]

Doesn't matter Puzz, I'm glad you're here with your experience ~:)

[Brave]

Yari are like breakfast in bed, a treat that you do not want to kill by overuse.