Non-Dismountable Cavalry Exploited

http://video.xfire.com/8bf31-4.jpg
Click above to watch

Very simply.
Since some units of cavalry can not dismount, if you station some men (even firelock citizenry) in buildings, they can defeat one of the toughest cavalry units there is.

Just in-case you were wondering, I had another unit of citizens who fled after taking out 3 and losing about 27, but they were scouting outside.

This seems like a VERY serious problem, especially in online battles. :oops:


Relic.
:egypt:

EDIT: Since a lot of people failed to realise, I was the US. The AI was the INDIANS. THEY attacked me. IN THE CAMPAIGN!:dizzy2:

lolwut?

1) Why would you attack infantry in a building with cavalry? Don't do it unless they can dismount...obviously.

2) In the vid, you're just walking your cavalry around outside the building. If I was playing I would realize in like 3 seconds that the cavalry were sitting ducks, and have them sprint away and put them to use somewhere else.

This isn't a bug or exploit imo - it's Captain Obvious.

I haven't played any online, but it doesn't seem this would really be a problem unless someone used an exclusively mounted army. I'd also add that this doesn't really bother me because if a cavalry unit is outstanding at fighting on horseback, that doesn't necessarily translate to being effective at dismounting and clearing out buildings. I guess that everyone cavalry unit could work like dragoons, but doesn't seem like that is really necessary.

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Originally Posted by ArtillerySmoke

lolwut?

1) Why would you attack infantry in a building with cavalry? Don't do it unless they can dismount...obviously.

2) In the vid, you're just walking your cavalry around outside the building. If I was playing I would realize in like 3 seconds that the cavalry were sitting ducks, and have them sprint away and put them to use somewhere else.

This isn't a bug or exploit imo - it's Captain Obvious.

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Uhm. I was the Americans. Considering you CAN'T PLAY as the Huron Confederacy without modding. Look at the UI before making such a strong comment. By the looks of things you didn't even read the post. :whip:

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Originally Posted by Ardri

I haven't played any online, but it doesn't seem this would really be a problem unless someone used an exclusively mounted army. I'd also add that this doesn't really bother me because if a cavalry unit is outstanding at fighting on horseback, that doesn't necessarily translate to being effective at dismounting and clearing out buildings. I guess that everyone cavalry unit could work like dragoons, but doesn't seem like that is really necessary.

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It's the whole point. Dragoons dismount - and therefore, you could use them to ride up to a building (again, RUNNING, not walking lol) and dismount to storm the inside. Alternatively, you could just use infantry - you know, the "old fashioned way".

What you cannot do is expect every single cavalry unit to be capable of dismounting and storming buildings. It's called balance. Some units can, some units can't.

I just think the OP's example is crazy. What did he expect his cavalry to do? He kept walking them back and forth in front of a building loaded with infantry.

This is like complaining that a tank can't disassemble itself and walk into a building after infantry.

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Originally Posted by Relic

Uhm. I was the Americans. Considering you CAN'T PLAY as the Huron Confederacy without modding. Look at the UI before making such a strong comment. By the looks of things you didn't even read the post. :whip:

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I haven't got the foggiest idea what you're talking about.

Not being sarcastic either - just at a total loss.

What?

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Originally Posted by Relic

http://video.xfire.com/8bf31-4.jpg
Click above to watch

Very simply.
Since some units of cavalry can not dismount, if you station some men (even firelock citizenry) in buildings, they can defeat one of the toughest cavalry units there is.

Just in-case you were wondering, I had another unit of citizens who fled after taking out 3 and losing about 27, but they were scouting outside.

This seems like a VERY serious problem, especially in online battles. :oops:


Relic.
:egypt:

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Simple exploit fix: Bring infantry.

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Originally Posted by ArtillerySmoke

I haven't got the foggiest idea what you're talking about.

Not being sarcastic either - just at a total loss.

What?

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It was not his cavalry!

Did you read what he wrote at all???

This thread is like watching a two trains heading at each other full speed and not being able to do anything about it.

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Originally Posted by Ibn-Khaldun

It was not his cavalry!

Did you read what he wrote at all???

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....

Look what the last guy wrote: Infantry solves this.

/thread.

Care to explain that to AI?

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Originally Posted by Ibn-Khaldun

It was not his cavalry!

Did you read what he wrote at all???

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Yes . . . and regardless of who was controlling what in the video, he was talking about its implications in multiplayer battles.

And, actually, there is a not a problem. From the realism perspective, mounted troops with only edged weapons would find it difficult or impossible to defeat musket-armed troops in a fortified building. From a game balance perspecitve, each units has to have certain limitations; in this case, this is what artillery and infantry is for.

I don't get it either, sorry. Why would it be a "serious bug" that you can't get horses in a house? People have the right to be polite, after all, and not gallop through other people's living room, not even in war. Let's keep civil, even the military. :beam:

Really, I've seen this "bug" before, in MTW and RTW, where cavalry could not climb ladders during a siege. They couldn't even man (err, horse?) a ram, as well. Horses can be quite stuborn creatures. We're lucky TW doesn't feature asses, after all, now these are really stuborn, I hear. Equus africanus asinus, that is, not the other... you know.

ArtillerySmoke, he was using infantry. The point I think he was trying to make that you are missing is that the computer AI can be "exploited" because it is too dumb not to attack a building with cavalry.

I don't think it is a bug or an exploit.

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Originally Posted by Ardri

ArtillerySmoke, he was using infantry. The point I think he was trying to make that you are missing is that the computer AI can be "exploited" because it is too dumb not to attack a building with cavalry.

I don't think it is a bug or an exploit.

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Yeah, I get that now but:

1) That's going to happen at times obviously. We'd have to analyze what difficulty etc. It's not a big deal though.

2) There's no way it's a problem in online battles. If someone attacks buildings with cavalry, what do you expect?

In online battles this would never, ever be a problem because a human player wouldn't sit infront of a house with cavalry getting shot to death. He'd use infantry, or arty, or maybe even fake the infantry unit into shooting at him at range and wasting its ammo.

Do you know another exploit for defeating cavalry? Pikemen in pike wall. Also square formation with bayonets. Also I hear that shooting them works well to.

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Originally Posted by Sir Beane

In online battles this would never, ever be a problem because a human player wouldn't sit infront of a house with cavalry getting shot to death. He'd use infantry, or arty, or maybe even fake the infantry unit into shooting at him at range and wasting its ammo.

Do you know another exploit for defeating cavalry? Pikemen in pike wall. Also square formation with bayonets. Also I hear that shooting them works well to.

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I found an exploit that is such: Killing an enemy general lowers that faction's moral.

If CA doesn't fix this in the next patch, I'm going to rip my head off.

:furious3:

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Originally Posted by ArtillerySmoke

Yeah, I get that now but:

1) That's going to happen at times obviously. We'd have to analyze what difficulty etc. It's not a big deal though.

2) There's no way it's a problem in online battles. If someone attacks buildings with cavalry, what do you expect?

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I just think all units should be able to dismount, but have a very weak attack if necessary to keep things level. I'm sure more than once in history that cavalry have been asked to get off their horses and stand and fight. This was meerly a point of view about a problem that could appear in battles if you didn't have artillery and you had no infantry left. Just consider near the end of a match, they had one unit of weaked infantry in a building. And all you have are two or so cavalry. You could heavily outnumber them, but be unable to do anything.

Okay, so what you suggest is that all cavalry should be dismountable. Now that's a point, I agree with you.

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Originally Posted by Vlad Tzepes

Okay, so what you suggest is that all cavalry should be dismountable. Now that's a point, I agree with you.

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Exactely what I mean. :juggle2:

Yeah fair enough, all cavalry should be able to dismount.

But if you are at the end of a battle and the enemy has entrenched infantry and you have no infantry or arty left then he has won fair and sqair, because he out-manouvered you.

I agree that it would be nice to see them all able to dismount, but I think nearly all of us can agree that CA has bigger fish to fry relating to some much needed fixes for ETW. Having skirmisher cavalry can play huge tactical roles in this type of warfare. For example I point to John Buford and his skirmishing on day 1 of the battle of Gettysburg. Without the dismounted skirmishing of the cavalry the Union may just have lost the battle and possibly the war. Would be a nice addition somewhere down the line.

'From the realism perspective'

Almost all European cavalry had some infantry training and were equipped with long arms (unless they had to give them up for reasons of economy), and dismounted to do things like assault buildings. Even cuirassiers.

Its very unreasonable that a man couldn't simply step down from his horse. There is no realism argument. Perhaps it wasn't very historical, but no one would simply sit outside a house on a horse and get shot at.

If a squad can drop their seige equipment, or leave their artillery sitting in the field, they should be able to hop off a horse. Perhaps it does open a whole new can of worms, having to deal with mounting and dismounting in battle (what happens to the horses? what happens if a unit has more men than horses? or more horses than men?), but I agree that all horsemen ought to be able to get off of their horses if necessary.
Perhaps it would unbalance things?

Well, they already have dragoons.

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what happens if a unit has more men than horses?

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I had that happen with dragoons.

:thumbsdown:

They just ran around, mounting and dismounting again, and couldn't even move in the face of a pikeman charge. Rather ridiculously, though, they managed to somehow fend off the 120 pikemen and lose 4 men. Which still didn't fix the issue though, for the rest of the battle the dragoons went about headless, despite the fact their losses had fixed the issue of not enough horses.

This will definately be a part of my mod for Empire at some point.

I would aggree with the concept of all cavalry units being dismountable. The dragoons handle more horses than men fine and the more men than horse issue shouldn't happen to often...

As the game stands though I would say if you turn up to a remotely urban map without infantry or dismountable cavalry and you are attacking then you lose fair and square if you can;t force the defenders out of their buildings.

A similar arguement would be describing a defender kitting his last unit of cavalry around the map until the timer runs out as an exploit if the attacker has no cavalry to intecept them (cheesy of course, but not an exploit IMHO)...

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Originally Posted by HKDDJulker

(what happens to the horses? what happens if a unit has more men than horses? or more horses than men?),

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Pair up. Two guys on horse, or have a horse following the others. Or have horses suffer strokes when their rider gets shot whilst off his horse.

Wouldn't that also mean that every unit of cavalry would need twice as many models? Not to mention different stats, not to mention the PitA that I'm sure it would be to program the AI to use the ability with something approaching a glimmer of intelligence.

:juggle2:

I can see it now. "Teh AI is stoopid! Their calvary dismounted and marched across a field and I shot them!"

Well, the only use would be to plug gaps in a desperate situation, or take down some lightly garrisoned houses.

CA has a very good reason to not allow regular cavalry to dismount. It would only be confusing to most players as they wouldn't be able to tell the difference between cavalry and dragoons. When they see the dismount button on, for example, life guards they will automatically assume that they are good at fighting dismounted.

OK so I haven't yet had Dragoons in the full game but in the demo when a dragoon unit had more men than horses, the remainder followed the mounted dragoons on foot. I'd expect the same in full game.

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Originally Posted by RelatyvT

CA has a very good reason to not allow regular cavalry to dismount. It would only be confusing to most players as they wouldn't be able to tell the difference between cavalry and dragoons. When they see the dismount button on, for example, life guards they will automatically assume that they are good at fighting dismounted.

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You could consider that they only dismount with an attack order on a building? :book:

If your enemy only has cavalry, and you have infantry in a building . . . your enemy at that point deserves to loose (whether AI or Player).

Yes, it would be nice if cavalry could dismount, but the fact is in pitched battles European cavalry generally stayed mounted. Even the Dragoons dismounted role in this game, while plausible, is a bit exagerated in my opinion. Certainly towards the end of the ETW era Dragoons were generally used as light cavalry, rather than mounted infantry. Dismountable heavy/medium cavalry is definately a case where a small degree of functionality would probably be accompanied by complex AI routine requirements and all sorts of ahistorical and unnatural exploitation of the feature by players.

Why were they called Dragoon? Because they tend to eat their horses! :wizard: ~:joker:

:tomato: ----- :hide:



The European cavalries of this eara considered it was below themselve to dismount to do battle, in fact they look down on dragoons for this particular reason.

I found it funny that before patch i had a bug the caused a enemy cavalry unit to be half garrisoned into a house, it made the other part of the unit, that charged my cannons, untargetable... Now that an "exploit"

It seems that the problem the OP reports stems from an overall tendancy for the AI to:

1) Get stuck in an indecisive loop
2) Never retreat in good order when beaten

Clearly it would be prefferable for the AI to realise that it cannot possibly win this battle and therefore needs to retreat. I think that is a far better solution than making all cavalry dismountable, which would simply make the already struggling AI fall in a heap.