Are bayonet techs critical in early game?

[LuxIrae]

Think the point of cavalry really is just to persuade enemey formations to adopt square so that your troops gain a firepower advantage when engaging in line. Other than hunting down routing units, cavalry is too expensive to replenish and takes too many casualties unless handled really carefully....? Think that was historically accurate for this era?

[Didz]

Think that was historically accurate for this era?

Well the game is actually set in a period of transition. The game starts at the tail end of the with Pike and Musket era, where cavalry were kept off the infantry by stand-of-pike and schiltron. That led to the change in cavalry tactic's and the greater reliance on dragoon's and Reiters. Cavalry tended to focus purley on the enemy cavalry and only after having driven them off did they turn their attention to the infantry. The main objective being to inhibit their movement and force them into 'Stands' so that their own infantry had the freedom to defeat them in detail. Basically, read any Engish Civil War battle report to get the gist of the process. Marston Moor is a classic example.

The development of the bayonet and improvements in musketry saw the fading out of the pike as it was no longer necessary, and for a while infantry gained the upper hand. Being able to drive off cavalry without having to sacrifice mobility, just using firepower alone. e.g. Battle of Minden for example.

Then the cavalry enhanced their own tactic's and dropped the obssession with being a mounted infantry. They developed new organisations and tactic's that enabled them to expliot the extended formations used by the infantry to maximise their firepower. The wheel essential turned full circle and by the end of the period covered by the game we were back to square one. With infantry having to huddle into squares or dense columns to prevent cavalry explioting their formations.

But in between, and for the bulk of the period covered by the game, there is a transition of tactics. By rights, the cavalry in the game ought to start off operating in quite slow mounted columns using horse pistols to deal with pike stands, and gradually evolve the flexible squadron tactic's necessary for delivering shock action to the infantry's flanks and intervals. At the same time the infantry ought to be evolving better firepower (which they do to an extent) and eventually the square formation needed to fend off they new cavalry tactic's.

In between there should be a period of mismatching where some armies will find themselves drilled in the wrong tactic's to deal with those of their opponents. e.g. Pikes faced by shock cavalry, Rieters opposed by platoon volleys etc. What shouldn't be happening of course is the headlong charge into formed infantry, which only actually happened at Universal Studio's remakes.