Cavalry way overpowered

[TinCow]

If you think it is realistic that I can crash 6 or 8 light cav units into a mixed infantry wall frontally, and watch it collapse in seconds, then you are sorely mistaken. While I usually flank as well, I just rush straight in if I'm not facing much in the way of spears and want to get it over with. Target 2 or 3 cav on a single infantry unit, and it crumples at the charge. Then hit the adjacent flank units and they rout before they can react.

If your problem is simply that you kill the enemy too fast with lots of cavalry, might I suggest using less cavalry? That might not be the ideal fix to your problem, but all that matters is that you enjoy the game... so just stop using them if that helps.

[Sir Robin]

Just for the record I have only played battles as the Julii, Scipii, and Carthaginians.

I still have not gotten to a good mid-game point so I have mostly faced lighter cavalry with the occasional General's Bodyguard.

Cavalry is behaving exactly like I would expect. It destroys unsupported or out-of-position units.

Depending on the AI General's ranking I have owned the battlefield, had a slugfest, or been owned.

Cavalry may be to fast but its effects feel accurate.

Myself, I try for deep infantry-melee lines with missile behind and cavalry on the flanks. Never let elephants run free on your flanks.

I counter their cavalry with mine and I have seen the AI do the same.

Of course its seems harder to control the chaos than it did in STW or MTW but hopefully one of our esteemed modders will find a way to slightly slow down movement speeds and disable the (insert echo here) Battle Timer of Dooooom.

[Red Harvest]

If your problem is simply that you kill the enemy too fast with lots of cavalry, might I suggest using less cavalry? That might not be the ideal fix to your problem, but all that matters is that you enjoy the game... so just stop using them if that helps.

Nice try, but it isn't just me, the AI has the same issue. When I used infantry I got whipped by cav the same way (even worse on "very hard.") I started out using an historical mix of units. What I found was that the infantry was useless. They couldn't hold in melee while things happened on the flanks. There is no real battle line being formed. Battles devolve in just a few seconds to a mess where the AI has the advantage of issuing orders to everyone simultaneously as often as it likes.

The AI likes to do lots of bizarre crossing patterns as the units close and this disorders the line.

[Russ Mitchell]

They wouldn't panic, because they wouldn't even be aware of what was happening. That is how fast it happens in RTW.
....
If you think it is realistic that I can crash 6 or 8 light cav units into a mixed infantry wall frontally, and watch it collapse in seconds, then you are sorely mistaken.
....
In RTW you get an increased flanking effect or morale hit, plus a very high movement speed that increases the number of flank attacks disproportinately, along with a rapid kill speed. Does three wrongs make a right?

Sir, what you're describing is either patch or mod material, similar to my difficulties with horse-archers in MTW: finessable material. The speed of collapse may be one thing... the expectation of collapse, another, and the difference between a swordsman and a pikeman against cavalry... vast. There's a REASON Giovanni Villani was woken up from his bed in the middle of the night all the way in Florence with the news that the Flemish infantry had defeated the french knights at Courtrai -- it was the equivalent of hearing that the US 2nd Infantry had gotten routed by the Taliban in a heads-up fight. Certainly the Normans wiped the walls with the (elite) Swabian greatswordsmen at Civitate, who were killed to the man. The Hungarian heavy cavalry inflicted huge casualties on the Ottoman infantry, scything back and forth through their ranks like wheat until the latter finally figured out how to defeat them (by opening their ranks and then falling on them from all sides).

Was heavy infantry raised that could stand against a charge? Yes, such infantry did exist. But they were by no means the norm, and the ease with which they are able to be raised in MTW is a fairly unrealistic thing. Fine for game balance.. but it's nice to see that they figured out a way to keep the game balanced while putting the "realism pendulum" closer to the center.

[Morindin]

So far I have played around with Cavalry in Multiplayer and as the Julii faction in single player

Roman Cavalry/Esquites/Generals Bodyguards vs Warband/Swordsmen or any lightly armoured unit...
Front on they will take a few out in the initial hit but usually get cut to bits shortly after.
On the Flanks they will crash through the enemy lines usually causing them to rout IF they are pinned.

Gaul and Macedonian Cavalry vs my own units
Usually they will take a small number of troops out on a head on crash (5-10) and then get decimated by my Roman Infantry. If they hit me on the flanks they will do much more damage but my units still chew them up in melee.

Multiplayer with tougher units. Urban Cohorts, Legions, Legion Cavalry,etc
Cavalry is fairly lame here. The tougher units are hardly phased by a front on or even flanking cavalry charge. Even elephants, while they will clearly rip through units quickly do not cause a rout in these men until they are down to 5 or 6 men left.

In a single player game vs Macedonia my tired cavalry got beaten in HAND TO HAND BY FRESH ARCHERS. Cavalry is very powerful vs unarmoured or lightly armoured men with their initial charge, but they are generally MUCH weaker (except Elephants) in melee.
Spearmen also take a while to kill cavalry but they take very minimal loses. Playing a multiplayer game on one of those histroic battles (the same one as in the Demo I think) my Triarii spearmen completely wiped the floor with Hannibals cavalry and then were the only units intact after numerous elephant rampages.

Is cavalry overpowered? No. Infact it gets worse the later on in the tech tree you go.

[Thoros of Myr]

As far as anyone has found, the base speed is hard coded and not in the data files. The current mod slows the speed of all units by modifying the movement on different terrains.

Yes, and if the actual individual unit speed is hard coded that's a big letdown, how can CA claim this to be a moddable game when we can't even change something that simple?

The movement on terrain mod has a positive affect IMO but ofcourse does not allow specific units to be singled out and modified

I guess we are left to hope that whatever mod tools CA release will have these options.

I think killing speed is a bigger issue as far as vanilla RTW though.

[Morindin]

Yes, and if the actual individual unit speed is hard coded that's a big letdown, how can CA claim this to be a moddable game when we can't even change something that simple?

The movement on terrain mod has a positive affect IMO but ofcourse does not allow specific units to be singled out and modified

I guess we are left to hope that whatever mod tools CA release will have these options.

I think killing speed is a bigger issue as far as vanilla RTW though.

I think killing speed is fine and much more realistic than MTW. I remember my first thoughts playing MTW thinking the killing speed in battles was way too slow, especially large numbers vs small numbers.

The higher the armoured the unit in RTW the slower the killing speeds. Try out some Urban Cohorts vs Sacred band and watch them duke it out. Or even worse two hoplite units fighting.
Of course killing Gauls with no armour is quite a quick affair.

[Thon]

i gotta agree with liking the new killing speed. medieval's was far too slow, once a unit routed you could decimate it through captures, which felt right. but before the route infantry would slug it out all day unless they were totally mismatched(varangians vs spearmen), or severely outnumbered.

so far though, cavalry seems to do exactly what it could in medieval imo, it's effect is just sped up as fast as the rest of the game. in mtw infantry that was engaged already, and took a cavalry charge to their flanks or rear would route within seconds and be destroyed. maybe the crazy ones with super morale would stick it out a little longer but they'd break and run if help didn't arrive asap.

as for charging formed infantry, i havn't had to face any phalanx's yet(playing julii), but i won't be doing that with equites anymore . maybe once legionaire cavalry arrives within my armies. but i did it plenty of times in mtw, mostly when i noticed the ai didn't have any spearmen/polearms in their infantry line. my last mega campaign as the byzantines, more than once i routed and destroyed massive ai armies within minutes with a large kata/prono charge, as the vg and byz infantry watched.

[son of spam]

Cav IS OP. I think the reason some of you don't notice it is that you just charge once.

I use general cav, and I pretty much destroy anything in the way. As soon as the cav meets the enemy, I tell them to withdraw. They do so immediately, and I lose maybe one guy. In the meantime, my ubercharge kills like 10% of their unit (it's easy to charge slow inf in the flanks). Rinse, repeat. The only thing that counters my cav is enemy cav.

I suggest that cav should not be able to withdraw as easily. Once a cav charges, it should get bogged down almost immediately, and if you withdraw, you should lose a significant amount of your unit. Then you would have to be much more careful with your cav charges, instead of running them around like a panzer.

[discovery1]

No it is not what happened in real life. Real life battles usually took some time in melee, minutes or hours even. Things collapsed in minutes when flanked, not in less than 10 seconds. It takes time for panic to set in and for the men to run. I doubt you will find it realistic. Heavy infantry is peasant level in RTW with respect to morale.

But in real life, the blocks of men were MUCH larger. I'd bet that the largest army you can have, even on the largest size, is at best half the size of a rf legion(5000 men I think). It makes sense that the enemy collapses so quickly when hit in the flank, at least with these unit sizes.

[Morindin]

Cav IS OP. I think the reason some of you don't notice it is that you just charge once.

I use general cav, and I pretty much destroy anything in the way. As soon as the cav meets the enemy, I tell them to withdraw. They do so immediately, and I lose maybe one guy. In the meantime, my ubercharge kills like 10% of their unit (it's easy to charge slow inf in the flanks). Rinse, repeat. The only thing that counters my cav is enemy cav.

I suggest that cav should not be able to withdraw as easily. Once a cav charges, it should get bogged down almost immediately, and if you withdraw, you should lose a significant amount of your unit. Then you would have to be much more careful with your cav charges, instead of running them around like a panzer.

I NEVER leave my cavalry in melee. And actually, quite a few of them die when you withdrawl. I think you've just been lucky so far to be honest.
Quite a lot of guys get back up after being knocked down by a cavalry charge too.

And when you withdraw you shouldnt lose a "significant amount of your unit", but you should lose a few, which is what happens. Actually most of the cavalry in RTW is bunched up so there are a lot of guys milling around at the back, which is why its so easy to withdraw, but as your cavalry gets thinned down you will lose more and more.

Also, of course cavalry are going to win if you're allowed to hammer someones flank over and over, infact, any unit is going to win in a 2v1 situation. 1v1 I rarely have any success with cavalry and the later on in the tech tree the worse it gets.

I actually think most people think cavalry is OP because they are fighting low moral unarmoured Gauls led by a 0 star general.

[discovery1]

Cav IS OP. I think the reason some of you don't notice it is that you just charge once.

I use general cav, and I pretty much destroy anything in the way. As soon as the cav meets the enemy, I tell them to withdraw. They do so immediately, and I lose maybe one guy. In the meantime, my ubercharge kills like 10% of their unit (it's easy to charge slow inf in the flanks). Rinse, repeat. The only thing that counters my cav is enemy cav.

I suggest that cav should not be able to withdraw as easily. Once a cav charges, it should get bogged down almost immediately, and if you withdraw, you should lose a significant amount of your unit. Then you would have to be much more careful with your cav charges, instead of running them around like a panzer.

Didn't Alexander the Great do something along those lines? Charge with the companions then withdraw before the Persians could recover from the shock?

[Morindin]

But in real life, the blocks of men were MUCH larger. I'd bet that the largest army you can have, even on the largest size, is at best half the size of a rf legion(5000 men I think). It makes sense that the enemy collapses so quickly when hit in the flank, at least with these unit sizes.

This is true, people forget that real life battles were fought with thousands of men and RTW are merely hundreds.

The Romans typically used three lines of battle and each line consisted of far more men than we get to play with.

Also, only early units lead by a 0 star general flee quickly. Even 0 valour Legioneer troops wont flee until they're down to a very small number of men.

The last battle I fought against the Macedonians my units of Principes with maybe 1 valour would flee when they were reduced to 15 or so men, and would put in one hell of a fight. They were only lead by a three star general too.

[Morindin]

I have to laugh at this thread. People were claiming cavalry was underpowered in MTW because swords would beat them when they charged head on (into Fresh infantry too mind you), and now people are claiming cavalry is overpowered because heaven forbid, they kill swordsmen when charging into the flank?

Golly gosh who would ever have thought.

[Thoros of Myr]

I was mainly speaking in terms of the killing speed with cav and I think as was pointed out the main problem there is the small unit sizes, shallow ranks etc... that was making it feel over the top. I'm going to play on huge from now on until maybe a mod comes out that just increases the size of infantry.

[Morindin]

I was mainly speaking in terms of the killing speed with cav and I think as was pointed out the main problem there is the small unit sizes, shallow ranks etc... that was making it feel over the top. I'm going to play on huge from now on until maybe a mod comes out that just increases the size of infantry.

If you're playing as Romans you get way larger unit sizes after you can build legions. 122 I think.

I think that might be pro-marius reforms.

[Thon]

since i havn't faced off against any greek armies in the campaign or used much heavy cavalry, i gave about a dozen custom battles a shot.

regular hoplites vs legionaire cavalry. the legionaire cavalry doesn't do half bad, but the hoplites hold them, and even won several battles(though they were mauled). taking into account lego cavalry costs about 2x what reg hoplites do, and take 2 turns to train, i'm content with that.

armored hoplites are downright scary though, do a few custom battles with them. i tried everything i could think of short of elephants with laser eyes. lego cavalry didn't get one kill in a few battles, praetorian cavalry couldn't kill more than a half dozen with several charges before they broke. and the parthian cataphracts would be lucky to get a few kills in multiple charges

by no means did i do an exhaustive test, just several custom battles, 1 on 1, no upgrades, and a straight up charge into a phalanx's front. but nobody can convince me that heavy cavalry are some kind of unstoppable rambo's on horseback, cutting through professional spear walls like they were red shirt guys on star trek.

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

I was mainly speaking in terms of the killing speed with cav and I think as was pointed out the main problem there is the small unit sizes, shallow ranks etc... that was making it feel over the top. I'm going to play on huge from now on until maybe a mod comes out that just increases the size of infantry.

But people who have low spec PCs and use small unit sizes shouldn't have to sustain ridiculous and unrealistic killing speeds. Using the large unit size is just like using a chewing gum to hold a wall...

IMHO, the killing speed itself as nothing to do with ranks or unit size. It's because the game has been detoured the arcade way. Arcade newbies have no attention span for much more realistic large battles that can last for 1 or 2 hours.

Of course I'm speaking only from my experience with the demo and some mods for it...

[son of spam]

Didn't Alexander the Great do something along those lines? Charge with the companions then withdraw before the Persians could recover from the shock?

Did he? What was the counter for it then? I don't care how historically accurate it is for cav to be OP if it ruins the gameplay.

@Morindin

I think the point of cav is to be used for flanking, but the charge should definitely be all important. You shouldn't be able to just withdraw and charge again so easily. In fact it would make the game (gasp!) strategic if cav charges could only be used effectively once, so you would have to charge it at a point to force a rout.

0v cav did beat 0v CMAA head on IIRC in MTW. Just that cav cost a whole lot more.

[Morindin]

But people who have low spec PCs and use small unit sizes shouldn't have to sustain ridiculous and unrealistic killing speeds. Using the large unit size is just like using a chewing gum to hold a wall...

IMHO, the killing speed itself as nothing to do with ranks or unit size. It's because the game has been detoured the arcade way. Arcade newbies have no attention span for much more realistic large battles that can last for 1 or 2 hours.

Of course I'm speaking only from my experience with the demo and some mods for it...

It has nothing to do with arcade style or newbies with no attention span, and I find it far more realistic than waiting for a unit of 166 men to kill off a unit of 3 men, that took about 60 seconds in MTW.

Again heavily armoured troops slog it out for quite a while, maybe killing one another every 20 seconds. I have zoomed in and watched plenty of fights to observe these so called killing speeds and even unarmoured units mill around each other for about 6 seconds in a "parry" stage before taking a swipe. Sometimes it misses sometimes it hits.
Lightly armoured units tend to take that swipe much quicker resulting in fast deaths between them but the heavily armoured units do not do this at all.

[Morindin]

Did he? What was the counter for it then? I don't care how historically accurate it is for cav to be OP if it ruins the gameplay.

@Morindin

I think the point of cav is to be used for flanking, but the charge should definitely be all important. You shouldn't be able to just withdraw and charge again so easily. In fact it would make the game (gasp!) strategic if cav charges could only be used effectively once, so you would have to charge it at a point to force a rout.

0v cav did beat 0v CMAA head on IIRC in MTW. Just that cav cost a whole lot more.

In a 1v1 situation the cav will lose even if you use your tactic. If an enemy unit is engaged and pinned by another enemy unit it allows the cav to easily keep charging, and this is exactly the same as in MTW.
The non engaged unit always disengaged without any problems.

The main difference is in RTW cavalry actually carries some momentum and can take out the first few ranks of an infantry formation rather than magically getting stuck and coming to a halt, infact, some cavalry units in RTW jump the first ranks.

As I have said before, some of these infantry units that are taken out in the initial charge do get back up again, making it seem worse initially than it really is.

My god Ive even charged a sacred band unit in the rear while it was engaging Urban Cohorts and lost around 1/4th of my cavalry units (Praeton or whatever) each charge without phasing the Cohorts, how can that be "overpowered"?

What units are you fighting our of curiosity?

[Thoros of Myr]

Theres no substitute for more men on the field.

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

Again heavily armoured troops slog it out for quite a while, maybe killing one another every 20 seconds. I have zoomed in and watched plenty of fights to observe these so called killing speeds and even unarmoured units mill around each other for about 6 seconds in a "parry" stage before taking a swipe.

So, tell me... ...do you realy think that, in real life combat, ANY unit could be sweeped off the field in 6 seconds?

If that was true, battles like Andrianople would have lasted about 20 min, instead of a whole day, from early morning tiill after sunset...

Sometimes it misses sometimes it hits. Lightly armoured units tend to take that swipe much quicker resulting in fast deaths between them but the heavily armoured units do not do this at all.

That should be obvious. In reality it is so also. But not at the rate we're seeing in this game. In real life, a unit is not a coerent single-minded entity. It is a collection of many men and these man react and recieve different stimulae and information throughout a battle. So, accordingly, some of them might percieve a cavalry charge on the flank, while the other flank won't know it for some minutes. We're nor talking minutes here, we're talking 1-2 seconds at the most for the whole unit to rout...

[Kraxis]

Alexander made singular charges at different enemies at different times.

At Gaugamela and Issus he charged the Persian left flank. He steamrolled both times, then he turned and charged towards the center, routing the units he encountered one by one until Darius had to flee. Quite simply Alexander used his much superior cavalry to the best effect possible.
But considering the Companions were perhaps the best cavalry (at least in the department of the charge) in the ancient world it is unfair to say what Alexander did is ok for all others.

[Morindin]

So, tell me... ...do you realy think that, in real life combat, ANY unit could be sweeped off the field in 6 seconds?

If that was true, battles like Andrianople would have lasted about 20 min, instead of a whole day, from early morning tiill after sunset...



That should be obvious. In reality it is so also. But not at the rate we're seeing in this game. In real life, a unit is not a coerent single-minded entity. It is a collection of many men and these man react and recieve different stimulae and information throughout a battle. So, accordingly, some of them might percieve a cavalry charge on the flank, while the other flank won't know it for some minutes. We're nor talking minutes here, we're talking 1-2 seconds at the most for the whole unit to rout...

1. I have NEVER seen a unit being swept off the field in 6 seconds in RTW. I would challange you to provide a replay of this. I have left Histari fighting Gaul Warbands and come back minutes later to find them still slogging it out.

How many lines of battle in Andrianople, how many men? how good were the generals? Apples to Oranges. By the same account do you really think a battle comprimised of one line and a few hundred men would last all day? I really doubt it.
Have you actually been in a war? I dont know about you, but I cant imagine a fight between two light infantry units going on for very long myself, with all the other crap happening.
The more defence the unit has the longer the battles. This is like bitching in the MTW thread because fights are two quick between highland clansmen. When people have played the campaign right through and are experiancing "20 second fights" with large armies of quality troops then Ill listen.


2. Infact, in RTW, with two good generals units generally will fight almost to the death.
And I would challange this point as well, in RTW units work much better on the invidual scale than they EVER did in MTW. Mass routs are also gone too in RTW, so if you're going to critise RTW for this you have to be more harsh on MTW. Also the ONLY units I have EVER seen rout that quickly have been exhausted Gaul pathetic units already pinned. You'd rout too.
Again I point to my example of Sacred Band infantry being charged again and again and not blinking an eye. The thing that took them down in the end was a volly of Pilum.

[discovery1]

Actually, I would say that at Gaugamela the Persians had the batter cavalry forces, but they were poorly lead and failed to support their fellow Persians(a large chunk of them ran off to alex's camp to save darius' family). SO yes there is a counter to it:more/better cavalry.

Another idea: keep a junk unit on the flank but keep your own cav close. Then when the cavalry charge, send in your own cavs b4 they can with draw.

[Kraxis]

Actually, I would say that at Gaugamela the Persians had the batter cavalry forces, but they were poorly lead and failed to support their fellow Persians(a large chunk of them ran off to alex's camp to save darius' family). SO yes there is a counter to it:more/better cavalry.

Before the battle the Persian cavalry was considered superior. It hadn't been defeated directly yet (at Grannicus it had been local forces and at Issus they had been at the other flank). But at Gaugamela the cream had faced Alexander personally and had been routed savagely.
The troops on the other flank had squared off with Pamenion's Thessalians and few Companions and had been checked despite a massive advantage in numbers (they would have won eventually though).
The troops that had gone off to the camp were the less than stellar Indian cavalry, in fact the right troops to use for such an adventure (but in this particular battle it had been better if they had attacked the Macedonian rear).

It is the fact that Alexander attacked a numerically superior force of elite cavalry with his own cavalry and managed to not only rout them, but really handed them their asses, then disentagled himself to attack a fwe more cavalry, then do the same and attack some infantry ect ect until he reached where Darius was. That is what makes Gaugamela and the Companions so great. They were apparently unstoppable. And this was despite the fact that Daruis was actually doing everything right (picking the best terrain for his larger army, levelling the ground for elephants and chariots, fanning out to encircle Alexander, pitting his best troops against Alexander himself while overwhelming the other flank with numbers, it should have worked).

[discovery1]

Oh. Hmmm, guess I was wrong then

[son of spam]

Actually, I would say that at Gaugamela the Persians had the batter cavalry forces, but they were poorly lead and failed to support their fellow Persians(a large chunk of them ran off to alex's camp to save darius' family). SO yes there is a counter to it:more/better cavalry.

Another idea: keep a junk unit on the flank but keep your own cav close. Then when the cavalry charge, send in your own cavs b4 they can with draw.

LOL...if the counter to cav is better cav I think that's a slight problem

Actually, I'm not complaining that I can't beat AI cav anymore...the solution simply seems to be don't use that much inf in the first place. Massive gen cav rush!!

[discovery1]

Why? it doesn't seem unreasonable that the weapon of choice against a fast mobile foe is your own fast mobile force.

Massive gen cav rush!!

Ok, if you want to let the AI govern you cities, be my guest.