HRE: Reiters Tactics and Deployment.

[Shahed]

Greetings everyone !

Inspired by some brief comments in the thread about Camel Gunners, I decided to post a thread about Reiters.

How does everyone use these guys. I have not used them yet, but I have fought against them. the superior range of bows and muskets mean they will suffer casualties to enemy fire before getting a shot off. If the survivors do get close enough they will be attacked before they can get a shot off.

So obviously I'm missing something here.

Any discussion, tactical suggestions on their usage most appreciated. I'm looking forward to an HRE game once Pure Fixer 1.14 is out.

Personal observations: The HRE is one of the most impressive factions in the game. Unparralled unit roster. Powerful 2 Handers of all descriptions. Gothic Knights, mounted and (modded) dismounted. Serpentines and arqbusiers. Throughout an HRE campaign you are guaranteed to smash even the most powerful armies your European contemporaries can throw at you.

THE REICH SHOWS IT'S OBVIOUS SUPERIORITY THROUGH BATTLE !

SALUTE !

[King of Kings]

well i have only used them a few times on custom battle and they were great, but anyway once i just left them in the same place the whloe battle and they killed any thing that got near them.And the other time i held the enemy forces with infantry and cav,and flanked them with my Reiters and they killed most of the army anyway thats what i do i hopes this helps.

[Shahed]

Thanks.

They have lances as secondary weapon I believe, so good charge too. I guess the impact of the volley would rout most units, then you charge to mop up. So... I guess one of the keys is to get that one shot off.

[Doug-Thompson]

So, is quoting myself like talking to myself, a sign of getting old?

Anyway:

Reiter tactics are a sadly neglected topic, but a few general observations can be made.

I suspect that if I could read German, I'd find a lot of discussion on the internet.

My best guess on using them would be to leave fire at will on, then alt-attack. The defender would get a face full of a powerful pistol volley (and morale penalties) right before getting hit by a powerful knight-like charge.

[Shahed]

So, is quoting yourself like talking to yourself, a sign of getting old?.

HAHAHAHA !

I suspect that if I could read German, I'd find a lot of discussion on the internet.

My best guess on using them would be to leave fire at will on, then alt-attack. The defender would get a face full of a powerful pistol volley (and morale penalties) right before getting hit by a powerful knight-like charge

It's an idea though, I might check google.de. And good points !
That sounds great, steady canter, shoot then charge. Plain and simple.

[FactionHeir]

Going to google.de alone won't do it. You also have to change your advanced preferences to be German. Tried that the other way around as I use google.de and when I used google.com I was still getting the same results I did as if I had used google.de until I changed my preferences for it to display preferrably UK content.

[Husar]

Hmm, I've used them in one HRE campaign, IIRc I had a stack of 4 Reiters and one general and they could mop up quite a few stacks of rebels etc, losing only few if any Reiters. With the shieldbug fixed, many units should survive better against Reiters, but I guess they're still quite effective, against archers you can do whatever you want, shoot them or charge them and spears are usually shot to pieces, as is most infantry of course.
It's quite some time ago that I've used them though, so I cannot remember everything exactly, I've moved away from playing the HRE as it makes me feel a bit too nationalistic. And the other factions are interesting as well.
Anyway, I think Reiters are quite a good allround cavalry, decent armour, decent melee and a very deadly short range pistol to take on everybody they don't want to make contact with(and most others as well). I think due to their high pistol attack, they're even dangerous to elephants and since their horses are pretty fast, they can stay away or close in as necessary against most units. Horsearchers sound like a good counter to Reiters, but they better don't let them into pistol range or the battle may turn around quite quickly.
Well, that's all I can think of for now.

[Vladimir]

That sounds great, steady canter, shoot then charge. Plain and simple.

Hmm, wow. If you can pull off a gunpowder volley shot then a good charge .