EBII Cataphract Formation

[antisocialmunky]

Would it be fitting in the EB time period to give certain horse units a formation that makes them get close together so they can deliver a more powerful charge?

The wedge is nice but it never really works rights in the engine and seldom worth it so this might be a worthwhile change.

Also, any discussion on how to better represent period cavalry tactics would be nice. EBI was a bit too impacty for my tastes.

[Puupertti Ruma]

It would be quite awesome to see actual fluid cavalry action, with horsemen swooping to hit a man then backing up to safety just to lunge back to the fray. Instead of making a charge, and after that just stop, and stand amongst the enemies just hacking away, while the enemies hack him.

[Ludens]

Also, any discussion on how to better represent period cavalry tactics would be nice. EBI was a bit too impacty for my tastes.

I think the problem with altering combat dynamics is the way the A.I. deals with this. It is all very well if you change cavalry to be more suited for skirmishing and less for charging, but that's not going to do much good if the A.I. still insists on using them as a battering ram.

[Watchman]

'Sides, from what I know period horse did their skirmishing with javelins and such and charged in earnest when they did - preferably at flanks or rear (FOR CRITICAL DAMAGE), as frontal assaults against steady close-order infantry had a bad habit of either falling short as the horses themselves hit the brakes (potentially leaving the whole squadron floundedring and open to a swift counter-charge by the infantry) or getting repulsed with casualties if they managed to press home but not break the opposition.

In which case in EB1 at least all the necessary "skirmishing" comes from the immediate double-click fallback the alert player pulls to disengage his horse from the fight before they suffer too much...

[antisocialmunky]

I meant do better in melee rather than have most cavalry doing massive damage in the charge. Maybe tone down the impact damage except for all but the super heavy cavalry and increase melee a little bit. The AI isn't particularly good at telling its horses to pull out anyways and even light cavalry can mess up your day with a quick devastating charge.

:-\

Also, I don't think anyone's figured out a good way to make horses charge through stuff. I saw the implementation in stainless steel but battles involving cavalry turned into hopeless messes since horses ran everywhere and any notion of order exploded as the horses engaged each otehr and everything in a 100m radius.

[Watchman]

I dunno, from what I gather most cav - in any period really - was rather better at doing damage at the charge (although in most cases the impact was above all *psychological* - hard to put that in the game though) than even surviving extended melee with unbroken infantry... around the only exception that springs to mind would be some iterations of cataphract-style fully armed horse.