Chariots are Weak!

[sages]

Are celtic chariots bugged? They die insanely fast. A single volley of javelins took out about 30 of 72. It was crazy mayhem as they all exploded into kindling. My generals only seem to last moments in combat h2h, but are too weak to expose to missile fire.

[Zaknafien]

well, chariots are not a very good form of warfare. i mean really they were only used as a mode of transportation for wealthier warriors to arrive to the battle, parade around a little bit maybe. or so im led to believe. I dont know anything about their stats or why, but that seems about right to me. lol you cant use them like cavalry lol..

[Kralizec]

They're not supposed to be as strong as in vanilla RTW, but in 0.8 they have low defense and only a single hitpoint, wich is definitely a mistake in the textfile. You'll have to edit themselves or wait for the patch.

To my recollection, I gave them 4 hitpoints myself and a total defense of 10 wich seems reasonable. I use them as mobile javelin platforms, for scaring enemies and for encouraging my own troops. I only let them charge if I'm confident that the enemy will break. They're also extremely good at ripping through routers while pelting them with spears, making sure that they keep running.

[Caratacos]

They were also used as a means of fast retreat. The chariots would park up the soldiers would then get off and fight as infantry and if it did not go well the would run back and zip off again <obviously not possible on RTW engine though>.

The thing that annoys me playing as Casse is that you can't have you generals up close in sieges--that is in the town-- to get the close proximity morale bonus. unless there are only a handful of chariots in the unit they simply don't fit in the urban environment. I know this is realistic-- but in real life the surely just gotten off the chariot and legged it inside the gates.

Perhaps the casse could have an infantry unit as the general? I know this would be very annoying for whoever worked on the generals unit skins etc. but...

just an idea.

Edit: Actually on second thought disregard that idea-- i guess you can't play all factions the same way. You just have to alter your style of warfare according to which faction you're playing as.

[sages]

"They were also used as a means of fast retreat. The chariots would park up the soldiers would then get off and fight as infantry and if it did not go well the would run back and zip off again <obviously not possible on RTW engine though>.

The thing that annoys me playing as Casse is that you can't have you generals up close in sieges--that is in the town-- to get the close proximity morale bonus. unless there are only a handful of chariots in the unit they simply don't fit in the urban environment. I know this is realistic-- but in real life the surely just gotten off the chariot and legged it inside the gates.

Perhaps the casse could have an infantry unit as the general? I know this would be very annoying for whoever worked on the generals unit skins etc. but...

just an idea.

Edit: Actually on second though disregard that idea-- i guess you can't play all factions the same way. You just have to alter your style of warfare according to which faction you're playing as."

I don't expect them to be as strong as Vanilla by any means! That said, they are so pathetically weak that it's a little silly. They were dying faster than peasants in Vanilla. I have no problem having to play smart with them, but this was just bad!

I'd be in favor of giving the casse general's units that were infantry. It sucks not having cavalry, but it sucks more watching your heirs get completely anhilated in h2h combat in moments.:wall:

[Watchman]

I dunno, when that wandering stack of Rhyfelwyrs tried to cut my Casse campaign short it seemed to me that running rings around those javelin-wavers counter-clockwise (ie. shield side towards enemy) was a pretty good and relatively missile-proof way to make them pesky Eleuthoroi expend their throwables on something more resilient than my bare-chested infantry and whittle down their numbers. Mind you, the way they were constantly running around and redeploying also tired them out pretty neatly.

That said, the Casse generals are clearly more of a "hit and run" and psychological warfare unit than shock troops like those of other factions. Or rather, they make very effective shock troops in the right circumstances but are a tad fragile in a slugging match.

[MarcusAureliusAntoninus]

Chariots were used in the Bronze Age, but by the Iron Age they were no longer used. Why? Because when going up against anything but other chariots, they suck.

[Watchman]

Well, that's not strictly true. But once infantry figured out how to deal with them and cavalry provided a more agile and infinitely more economical mobile strike force they sort of lost most of their usefulness. At least the big ones were very intimidating (which is, aside from sheer traditionalism, presumably why they had a place in Assyrian and Indian armies - those heavy four-man chariots were seriously massive).

AFAIK the Celts mainly used their fast little ones as "battle taxis" for noble warriors, but the RTW engine obviously can't quite handle "mounted infantry"...

[Zaknafien]

I still dont see why it can't, you could choose to dismount your knights in MTW I. Can you do it in MTW II?/

[blacksnail]

No, they have "dismounted knights" as a recruitable unit instead.

[Kralizec]

No, they have "dismounted knights" as a recruitable unit instead.

I'm still dissapointed by that. For the record, I don't have MTWII because my PC can't handle it, but it doesn't seem like a great loss.
Lot's of people, including me were for a long time convinced that dismount was back till CA announced otherwise a few weeks before the release.

[Zaknafien]

Itd be nice if there was a way to incorporate mounting and dismounting from horses, chariots, etc, the same way units can pick up/put down ladders/rams, etc.

[MarcusAureliusAntoninus]

Itd be nice if there was a way to incorporate mounting and dismounting from horses, chariots, etc, the same way units can pick up/put down ladders/rams, etc.

I wish phalanxes worked like that. If they went to swords, and then wanted to go back to spears they had to go over to where they dropped them and pick them up again. No magically appearing and disappearing giant spear.

[McHrozni]

MTW 1 had an option to dismount cavalry units in a siege during the battle setup for both attacker and defender. A unit of hobilar light cavalry became medicore spearmen and a unit of feudal knights became the best western heavy infantry unit. Some units, like chivalric knights, had the ability to do that before any battle.
I was rather surprised that RTW abandoned that concept.

McHrozni