I want to try a horse army.

[ReluctantSamurai]

Horse Archers are a pain to fight because they use skirmish attacks the whole time and they move very fast. But they also take a long time to kill other units as opposed to Melee cavalry.

I would like to point out an advantage (among several others) that horse archers have over melee cavalry. While chasing a routing or retreating unit, or any other unit that turns its back to your HA unit, you will be delivering missile fire to the rear of the enemy unit where they don't get the benefit of any shield bonus and subjects them to morale penalties.

Equites are faster than your post-Marian heavy cavalry and will give you some pursuit capability.

I did this all the time when I played Roman factions

Another thing the others have not mentioned (I think) is that Armenia gets cataphract archers, which are simply awesome.

These are my favorites! Chariot Archer killers, excellent ranged attack, and can go over to melee when necessary because of good A/D melee stats. They're almost obscene, really

There are plenty of good cavalry factions, so it really depends on what culture you like, and who you like to fight.

The best advice of all!

[yutterh]

Thanks guys sounds liek the carthaginians, scythians, and armenians are up my ally. Now abouot teh cataphracts for seulucide empire when do i get those?

[Cretan]

Thanks guys sounds liek the carthaginians, scythians, and armenians are up my ally. Now abouot teh cataphracts for seulucide empire when do i get those?

To recruit Cats you need to build Elite cavalry Stables, to unlock that building you need the following:

Large city - requires 12,000 population
Cavalry Stables

Something to note, its a good idea to make your military cities in regions that have Elephants in them, such as Antioch as to take advantage of the full tree of units. (Armored Elephants)

Also make sure you have Shrines/Temples dedicated to Hephaestus to get the weapon and armor training bonus.

To speed up the process of upgrading your cities, have Governors only in your Military powerhouses and when conquering cities Enslave them and you get a nice bonus to population in those respective cities.

This is great for advancing your technology in military relatively quickly, giving you an edge over your enemies.

[Tsar Alexsandr]

They've all got different benefits. Scythia is pure cavalry, and they have good cavalry too! So it'll be a total immersion for you if you choose them. Scythia has a good intro level horse archer, and a heavy armored horse archer as well, with long range missiles! Scythian Nobles are a great unit. They only take one turn to make, unlike cataphracts and Scythia's Scythian Noble Lancers, but have high hand to and and missile attack. As well as high defense. Unmatched in defense by any and all horse archers except Armenia's Cataphract. (It is worth noting Scythian Nobles look awesome too..... XD )

Next are the Eastern factions, Parthia and Armenia. Parthia and Armenia get the standard horse archer unit, (Not as good as Scythia's intro level one btw.) but they also get Persian Cavalry and Cataphract Archers. Persian Cav belonging to Parthia, and Cataphract Archers belonging to Armenia. They both have long range, good defense, and good attack. They're flexible too, well able to engage in hand to hand. The Persian Cavalry has good stamina though, and I prefer it for that reason. However, the Cataphract horse archer is the most heavily defensive ranged cavalry unit in the game. Nearly as good as a regular cataphract in every way. (It takes 2 turns to make though....) Oh, Parthia get elephants. :D Not a bad thing to have in your armies at all!

Carthage has great cavalry. As do Macedon and the Selucids. (As well as Pontis btw for it's Pontic Heavy cav armed with javelins and it's Cappadocian Cavalry.) But this nations rely a lot more on mixed units tactics than the others I mentioned. Which can be a lot of fun. Macedon is a great faction for it's Light Lancers, Macedonian Cavalry, and Companion Cavalry. But you'll need to bring your pikes and other troops too. Like Parthia, the Selucids and Carthaginians also get elephants. But unlike them... they get a wider selection of elephants. They can build the intro level one's pretty soon into the game, and have access to the mighty armored elephants.

[placenik]

For steamroling Schytians- they face western faction which don't have a match for horse&bow, having infantry based rosters. Basicly, what can kill you, it can't catch you, what can catch you, it can kill you...
At the east only real horse faction is Parthia, having no decent infantry to field, (it is recommended to abandon your northern province), but lack of temple bonus on exp/weapon/armor can hurt.

[Cretan]

For steamroling Schytians- they face western faction which don't have a match for horse&bow, having infantry based rosters. Basicly, what can kill you, it can't catch you, what can catch you, it can kill you...
At the east only real horse faction is Parthia, having no decent infantry to field, (it is recommended to abandon your northern province), but lack of temple bonus on exp/weapon/armor can hurt.

I don't understand why Parthia diden't get Temple bonuses, i suppose they are not a very main-stream faction but they should definitely have this.

Though if you really wanted to you can Mod this in relatively easy by adding the bonuses to buildings in Export_descr_buildings.txt

[placenik]

I don't understand why Parthia diden't get Temple bonuses, i suppose they are not a very main-stream faction but they should definitely have this.

Though if you really wanted to you can Mod this in relatively easy by adding the bonuses to buildings in Export_descr_buildings.txt

I know, but you have to pay for being only monotheistic faction