HA in RTW

[Doug-Thompson]

Won the Roman campaign yesterday evening, played Parthians all night.

For the first time ever, I applauded a computer game out loud. When a big battle with the Seleucids was over, I felt like CA deserved a hand.

The problems infantry players have with this game are pretty obvious -- the foot troops run around like winged Mercury. However, this is a GREAT game from a cavalry player's point of view, and I'm not talking about cavalry being overpowered.

1. Skirmish mode actually works. HA hit and run from the closest unit, not the one they're firing at, or seem to so far.

2. The keyboard commands for wheeling, or rotating a unit's facing, are perfect. So are the commands for widening or shortening the formation, which appear to work while the unit is on the run.

3. You get to deploy before you attack, a big improvement over M:TW where you could only deploy properly when you were defending. All units may benefit from careful placement, but HA do in particular.

4. HA fire on the move.

5. Galloping through a routing unit works very well.

But first, foremost and above all: The strategic map is a cavalry player's dream come true. Cavalry can explore and raid almost at will. Even if an infantry-based army has some decent cavalry, that cavalry will be badly outnumbered if it detaches from the army to chase my cavalry.

Three armies of cavalry converged on one invading Egyptian army in my current game, coming hundreds of miles from each direction. Then the commanding general hired more cavalry mercenaries. This is great. I get to finish that battle tonight and fully expect to give the Egyptians a thorough humbling.

In the earlier battle, the one I applauded, the Seleucids had a general, his unit of bodyguard cavalry and a good unit of light cavalry -- the ideal anti-HA unit -- but were short of missile troops. They had one unit of peltasts among the phalanx and peasants. Less than 500 Parthian cavalry, all HA except for two units of 54 cataphracts each, killed more than 700 Seleucids and routed the rest in an open battle. I wrote the figures down at home but, if I remember, I lost between 5 and 10 men.

[Sleepy]

I felt like CA deserved a hand.

Something not said enough on these fora, amidst all the whinging.

Three armies of cavalry converged on one invading Egyptian army in my current game, coming hundreds of miles from each direction. Then the commanding general hired more cavalry mercenaries. This is great. I get to finish that battle tonight and fully expect to give the Egyptians a thorough humbling.

Famous last words perhaps ...

[71-hour Ahmed]

I was feeling about the same regarding horsy troops till my Scythian army (I changed the unlockable factions if you are wondering how) fought the germans in winter. I don't know if they were fighting on an ice rink or something, but when the HA were riding towards the "Screeching Women" (such a bad unit) the ladies starting storming towards them.... so I turned them to the right and away to keep them a safe distance.... and several fell over! Not a joke - they fell over trying to turn to the side and died. The enemy was never closer than 100 yards and had no ranged weapons but I lost ~ 10 soldiers, and it can't have been friendly fire when no-one was shooting.

Incidentally, anyone else killed an amazon general yet? If you do, there seems to be a graphical glitch, she turns into a male corpse as she falls to her death.

[buujin]

I personally think horse archers are over powered, eccpecially from a multiplayer perspective

I like the way they fire on the move , but they should be less accurate.
When in cantabrian circle they are almost impossable to hit by other missles but can still fire just as well. This means that they can destroy infantry missle troops in a shootout and also have the speed and power advantages of being cavalry.

[Doug-Thompson]

... When in cantabrian circle they are almost impossable to hit by other missles but can still fire just as well. This means that they can destroy infantry missle troops in a shootout and also have the speed and power advantages of being cavalry.

A-ha! So that is what cantabrian circle is for.

If foot archers are no longer a good counter, you're right about them being over-powered.



I can't wait.

[Doug-Thompson]

I was feeling about the same regarding horsy troops till my Scythian army (I changed the unlockable factions if you are wondering how) fought the germans in winter. I don't know if they were fighting on an ice rink or something, but when the HA were riding towards the "Screeching Women" (such a bad unit) the ladies starting storming towards them.... so I turned them to the right and away to keep them a safe distance.... and several fell over! Not a joke - they fell over trying to turn to the side and died. The enemy was never closer than 100 yards and had no ranged weapons but I lost ~ 10 soldiers, and it can't have been friendly fire when no-one was shooting.

That's wild. They must have simulated ice. There's no other explanation.

I'm not sure how accurate that would be, though. The Mongols, for instance, prefered to attack in the dead of winter because rivers were frozen over and the ground was always firm.

[Colovion]

Yeah HA's are awesome - the improved AI firing/skirmishing ability has really helped to bring them to what they really are - unbeatable without the right forces. I just did a fun test. 5 Persian Cav against 5 Princeps. I'm guessing the results would have been the same for any infantry, really - they all died without killing one of my soldiers.

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

Won the Roman campaign yesterday evening, played Parthians all night.

For the first time ever, I applauded a computer game out loud. When a big battle with the Seleucids was over, I felt like CA deserved a hand.

The problems infantry players have with this game are pretty obvious -- the foot troops run around like winged Mercury. However, this is a GREAT game from a cavalry player's point of view, and I'm not talking about cavalry being overpowered.

1. Skirmish mode actually works. HA hit and run from the closest unit, not the one they're firing at, or seem to so far.

2. The keyboard commands for wheeling, or rotating a unit's facing, are perfect. So are the commands for widening or shortening the formation, which appear to work while the unit is on the run.

3. You get to deploy before you attack, a big improvement over M:TW where you could only deploy properly when you were defending. All units may benefit from careful placement, but HA do in particular.

4. HA fire on the move.

5. Galloping through a routing unit works very well.

But first, foremost and above all: The strategic map is a cavalry player's dream come true. Cavalry can explore and raid almost at will. Even if an infantry-based army has some decent cavalry, that cavalry will be badly outnumbered if it detaches from the army to chase my cavalry.

Three armies of cavalry converged on one invading Egyptian army in my current game, coming hundreds of miles from each direction. Then the commanding general hired more cavalry mercenaries. This is great. I get to finish that battle tonight and fully expect to give the Egyptians a thorough humbling.

In the earlier battle, the one I applauded, the Seleucids had a general, his unit of bodyguard cavalry and a good unit of light cavalry -- the ideal anti-HA unit -- but were short of missile troops. They had one unit of peltasts among the phalanx and peasants. Less than 500 Parthian cavalry, all HA except for two units of 54 cataphracts each, killed more than 700 Seleucids and routed the rest in an open battle. I wrote the figures down at home but, if I remember, I lost between 5 and 10 men.

All of this makes me hopefull for three things:

-The possibility of a MedMOD 4.0 for RTW.
-In that event, I can finally stop micromanaging my Mongol Horse Archers.
-The Strategical map will allow me to use Subodei and Jebei's strategic pincer manouvers to cut reinforcement routes and encircle enemy armies with my toumans.

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

Incidentally, anyone else killed an amazon general yet? If you do, there seems to be a graphical glitch, she turns into a male corpse as she falls to her death.

Ooops!!! You've found out the secret CA was trying to hide!! They're MEN!!!

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

This means that they can destroy infantry missle troops in a shootout and also have the speed and power advantages of being cavalry.

That is why they aree called HORSE Archers...

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

Double post...

[Morindin]

I was feeling about the same regarding horsy troops till my Scythian army (I changed the unlockable factions if you are wondering how) fought the germans in winter. I don't know if they were fighting on an ice rink or something, but when the HA were riding towards the "Screeching Women" (such a bad unit) the ladies starting storming towards them.... so I turned them to the right and away to keep them a safe distance.... and several fell over! Not a joke - they fell over trying to turn to the side and died. The enemy was never closer than 100 yards and had no ranged weapons but I lost ~ 10 soldiers, and it can't have been friendly fire when no-one was shooting.

Incidentally, anyone else killed an amazon general yet? If you do, there seems to be a graphical glitch, she turns into a male corpse as she falls to her death.

I had a situation where I had 40~ Equites charging a lone Numidian Spearman who was ROUTING. Upon impact (in the desert) with the fleeing Numidian about 10 of my Equites promptly fell over and died.

[andrewt]

Watch out for the Egyptians and their chariot archers and archers. What I did was build up valor using Seleucids as target practice. I barely lost anything to the Seleucids. Many of my losses were friendly fire. You're going to need those chevrons against the Egyptians.

Also, keep an eye out for the corner of the map. HAs don't know how to skirmish out of corners or against obstacles. The skirmish AI thinks they are passable at first and skirmishes out too late.

[Doug-Thompson]

All of this makes me hopefull for three things:

-The possibility of a MedMOD 4.0 for RTW.
-In that event, I can finally stop micromanaging my Mongol Horse Archers.
-The Strategical map will allow me to use Subodei and Jebei's strategic pincer manouvers to cut reinforcement routes and encircle enemy armies with my toumans.

Now that would be wonderful. And it would work. I've done similar things to the Egyptians already. I hit an army with one force from Armenia and moved another, small force that couldn't make it to the big battle to the only crossing of a river. When I slaughtered the main body, the renants fled -- toward the river crossing.

They didn't even get to get their feet wet.

=========

Come to think of it, horse archers are just as deadly in M:TW. Learning the micro for them, though, was an ordeal. At least it was for me.

Now people who aren't totally obsessed with HA can get the same results I got in M:TW, and better.

HA in R:TW aren't overpowered. Skirmish mode works now. Who wants to argue that CA should break it?

Combine that fix with a elegant way to wheel your formation around. Those two things alone account for most of the improvement to HA.

[Akka]

so I turned them to the right and away to keep them a safe distance.... and several fell over! Not a joke - they fell over trying to turn to the side and died. The enemy was never closer than 100 yards and had no ranged weapons but I lost ~ 10 soldiers, and it can't have been friendly fire when no-one was shooting.

If there was woods nearby, it's possible that it was a hidden units firing at your horsemen.
(though I think that if firing, they go out of hiding, but...)

[Oleander Ardens]

Some thoughts about HA in RTW..

1. Yes, the skirmishing finally works like I suggested in the .com a year or so ago, with a wellthought thread of how to implement this changes. Took me some hours to describe a system which could do that, although I have to confess that I didn't thought about the edges of the map...

I don't know actually if they used this, in any case I'm happy that my Guys do now some nice skirmishing...

Here is it, btw, some kind of self-advertising

"A novel approach to skirmishing

All of us MTW players share the same problem when telling skirmishers to skirmish. Your unit of Bulgarian Bandits evades the fearsome peasant unit just to run into a full nice stack of Janissary Heavy Infantry… So a effective use of many skirmishers did mean especially on thing: much much mircromanagment. But how could we avoid this sometimes unsuccesful and often frustrating clickfest?

The solution is quite simple; Enable them to skirmish not just against one but against all enemy units which come to near. This means that the the skirmisher falls back in the opposite direction when a unit crosses it’s “safe distance” setting, trying to reestablish with a buffer distance which enable it to turn and shoot

So far so good but what happens when two enemy units come from two different directions too near? Easy the computer calculates the distances between your Unit S, Unit A and Unit B and than selects point C, which is in the center of line AB. Than it orders your Skirmisher to fall back in the opposite direction of point C.

An example will get the point across. Imagine your Balearic Slingers come from the North and attack some Velites in the south. The Balaearic slingers skirmishs against a unit of Velites. Both are equally fast, so that when the Velites try to engage the your Balearic Slingers, they simply run away in the opposite direction, also northwards with the velites chasing them. The distance between remains stable, let’s say 50m. Suddenly an hidden Velite unit charges out of some scrub and attacks the Balearic slinger from Eastnortheast. Once they cross the “safe distance radius” of the Slingers the computer calculates Point C which lies in Eastsouteast, with the result that the Slingers turn towards Westnorthwest; Result: your valuable Balearic funditores escape…

If more than two units engage your unit the procedure remains the same as in any case the distance between a pair of units which is the greatest will determine point C. This system works fine as long the enemy are of equal speed or slower that the Skirmisher, and as long the enemy doesn’t encircle him, but this not a question of AI but of HI.

So this system works beatifully, but what if a Velite and a Numidian horse do engage your Sythian Horsearchers? As before the the computer takes into account the distances between the three units after the Numidian horse and the Velites crossed the “security radius” of the Skythians (unit S). But as the Numidian Horse (unit B) closes faster in as the Velites (unit B), thus with a smaller growing distance between the Numidian Horse and the Slinger, with the distance Velites – Slingers remainig constant. Only initially point C is in the center of the line VN (Velites-Numidian horse), as it shifts toward the Numidian Horse. Why? Point C is determined by the relation between distance AS and distance BS. Initally we have a 50m:50m (1:1) relationship, but as the Numidians come nearer also distance BS becomes smaller, with the relation changing after five seconds in a 50m:25m. (2:1). Point C will therefore shift over this five seconds proportionally toward unit B, the Numidian horse, until the line BC is just half as long as line AC. Accordingly The Scythians will change direction and run away more from the more dangerous Numidians than from the Velites, withour getting closer to them or any other enemy unit, if possible. Plus the Sythians will increase their speed to reestablish the safe distance between the Numidians. To sum it up: the skirmisher skirmish in a intelligent way, avoiding elegantly all enemy units…at least as long they are fast enough and don’t get engaged from all sides. But this is a question of HI not AI…

But what happens when three or more units attack our poor Scythians from three greatly different directions, let’s say Velites drive them from West eastwards towards an unit of Hastati in the Southeast and Numidian horse in the Northeast? The Numidians close faster in than the Hastati and the Velites, becoming danger Number one. Now the computer calculates once again the distances between all the units, but point C lies on the longest line between the nearest enemy unit and an other enemy unit, in this case between the Numidians and the Velites.

This pocess is calculate again after a certain amount of time with the result that the Skirmisher gets almost of all weird situations out as long he is fast enough. If implementated this System RTW will have the first intelligently skirmishing units in a computergame, with them acting

2. True. The Keyboard function are very handy and allow you a quick control. Wheeling and the formations change work neatly, as the use of control groups. There is only one problem: You can't assign a number to a single unit and sometimes they are kinda hard to select due to the shallow ranks...

3. Very useful, as you have more room for you HA to skirmish and to kill people

4. Yup, and in every direction, which looks not only great, but it is incredibly useful..


Some other points:

There are some issues with the "stop shooting" command, as even with "disable fire at will" and "stop" they will continue to shoot on the enemy. This cost sometimes too much lifes of your own men..


Tactics:

I had nada problems against enemys weak in missles and cavalry, but I learned to hate swarms of light lancers. With equal low numbers of HA and light lancers I could easilz avoid edge/related problems with micro, wearing them down with arrows, but with 10+ HA and 10 lancers chasing me...
Still it every defeat was still a pyhrric victory of the enemy.

Have still to fight against missile heavy armys, as the Scythians have no such enemy in the West, so I don't know how good the Cant. Circle works against missile units.

Units:

The standard HA is a very good unit, as I conquered most of Thracia, Dacia and Greek with it, being deadly from a distance and fast. Only his morale issues are really a pain; Sometimes I was enraged of the stupidity of this guys.. Instead of picking of the last Hoplite unit from a distances they flee, runnig through the phalanx

Loved the Scythian Noble Archer, a very handy unit, being a perfect medium-heavy HA, while the Noble Woman was a more nimble medium HA.

So what are your impressions so far?

Cheers
OA

[Oleander Ardens]

Creative tactics

A incredible combination is the Persian cavalry with Warelephants and Lancers. Tried this out in the Costum battles. I use Warelephants as ultra-heavy HA, like moving fortresses which protect the nimble HA, the advantages are huge indeed...

A small teaser of OA, waiting for you comments..

Cheers

[Doug-Thompson]

Some thoughts about HA in RTW..

1. Yes, the skirmishing finally works like I suggested in the .com a year or so ago, with a wellthought thread of how to implement this changes. Took me some hours to describe a system which could do that, although I have to confess that I didn't thought about the edges of the map...

I don't know actually if they used this, in any case I'm happy that my Guys do now some nice skirmishing.

If they didn't follow your system, OA, they did something very close. Effective skirmishing was probably very difficult to write in to code, but they've apparently done it.

It's going to take me a while to get used to a skirmisher system that works. I still get nervous leaving it all on autopilot.

2. True. The Keyboard function are very handy and allow you a quick control. Wheeling and the formations change work neatly, as the use of control groups. There is only one problem: You can't assign a number to a single unit and sometimes they are kinda hard to select due to the shallow ranks.

We can't click select a unit on the mini-map anymore, either, which is a pain.

There are some issues with the "stop shooting" command, as even with "disable fire at will" and "stop" they will continue to shoot on the enemy. This cost sometimes too much lifes of your own men.

It got so bad in one battle, I left only one unit in place to fire and moved the others away.

Tactics:

I had nada problems against enemys weak in missles and cavalry, but I learned to hate swarms of light lancers. With equal low numbers of HA and light lancers I could easilz avoid edge/related problems with micro, wearing them down with arrows, but with 10+ HA and 10 lancers chasing me...
Still it every defeat was still a pyhrric victory of the enemy.

I started hiring and keeping camel and Arabic light horse mercenaries in the desert. There's plenty of them in Parthian lands. I used a few camels at first as a "bodyguard" unit for my general, then found the Arabic light horse were very good at catching enemy generals once their bodyguard units had been shot to pieces by HA. They support HA very well, too. The enemy cavalry gets worn out chasing the HA. Then the HA turn around and pour fire into the melee as soon as the Arabic cavalry arrive.

Have still to fight against missile heavy armys, as the Scythians have no such enemy in the West, so I don't know how good the Cant. Circle works against missile units.

All I can say about the circle is that is certainly doesn't hurt. Multiplayers who have run up against it say it is effective.

Units:

The standard HA is a very good unit, as I conquered most of Thracia, Dacia and Greek with it, being deadly from a distance and fast. Only his morale issues are really a pain; Sometimes I was enraged of the stupidity of this guys.. Instead of picking of the last Hoplite unit from a distances they flee, runnig through the phalanx

Loved the Scythian Noble Archer, a very handy unit, being a perfect medium-heavy HA, while the Noble Woman was a more nimble medium HA.

So what are your impressions so far?

Persian cavalry are very good, considering the low building requirements. Other than that, I don't have enough experience with other types to comment, OA.

[MadKow]

Hi
One thing about the Cantabric Circle. When doing that on a bridge battle, be sure to be far enough from the river because, if the center of the circle happens to be too near the margin, you may witness the circle of death, as the horsemen go round and drown.

[Bhruic]

It's going to take me a while to get used to a skirmisher system that works. I still get nervous leaving it all on autopilot.

To say that it "works", in general, would be incorrect. It certainly is better. But it suffers from a bad case of "border-itis". That is, it is quite easy to chase a unit (or have a unit chased) to the border, where it stops and stand there shrugging helplessly.

That, and I think they should have made player orders override skirmish orders, instead of vice-versa. Having to constantly toggle skirmish just to be able to have my units not head towards the border (which is a few steps away, compared to the vast open space the other direction) is just plain annoying.

Bh

[Doug-Thompson]

I've had a few units get "stuck" on the border. They touch the border and then stay there, even though their target has gone away. Weird.

Also, you're right, Bhruic. "Works" is perhaps too strong a word, but its certainly so much better that you don't have to be an HA fanatic to use HA any more. A little tidying, a little wheeling, a little avoidance of borders and a little rounding up of stray units sure beats the intense micro of M:TW.

[Steppe Merc]

Something not said enough on these fora, amidst all the whinging.

So we notice mistakes... Is that bad?

Any way, cavalry is extremely fun. Sadly, the HAs tend to kill each other when chasing routing troops, as you will evantualy see.

[Aymar de Bois Mauri]

Now that would be wonderful. And it would work. I've done similar things to the Egyptians already. I hit an army with one force from Armenia and moved another, small force that couldn't make it to the big battle to the only crossing of a river. When I slaughtered the main body, the renants fled -- toward the river crossing.

They didn't even get to get their feet wet.

Excelent!!! I'm getting really pleased by this hability. Indeeed...

Come to think of it, horse archers are just as deadly in M:TW. Learning the micro for them, though, was an ordeal. At least it was for me.

For me they were too.

Now people who aren't totally obsessed with HA can get the same results I got in M:TW, and better.

HA in R:TW aren't overpowered. Skirmish mode works now. Who wants to argue that CA should break it?

Combine that fix with a elegant way to wheel your formation around. Those two things alone account for most of the improvement to HA.

Thanks for the tips. I can't wait to try it...

[Doug-Thompson]

Sadly, the HAs tend to kill each other when chasing routing troops, as you will evantualy see.

This is so common, I stopped using HA with arrows to melee-chase routers. Arabic mercenary cavalry are relatively cheap, about $110 a turn in upkeep, if memory serves. They are better router chasers anyway. HA who are out of arrows will do, too.

Another thing that seems to work very well is to double-click on the ground right behind the routing unit, and keep doing so until you can see the galloping HA on the bottom edge of the screen in a close up. They're really close then. THEN order the pursuing HA to fire, not to melee.

The HA stop and let loose a volley at point-blank range straight into the backs of the fleeing unit. They can get off several close volleys before you have to repeat the process. If you have to.

To state the obvious, HA do much better at close range. Much of the micro now is ordering them to close in on the flank or rear of a marching unit and pour in that fire. Make every arrow count.

Finally, I have a few friendly fire problems but nothing like the problems that afflict some of the players. I can't account for that, unless it's because I always use formations only two ranks deep, and string all the units out in a very long, thin line. Units that don't get in action right away wrap around the enemy. There's usually plenty of targets for everybody.

[Doug-Thompson]

Thanks for the tips. I can't wait to try it...

You won't be disappointed.

[Steppe Merc]

I also use 2 ranks deep, but then again it's on huge size, and I use massed numbers... Mabye too massed.

[Doug-Thompson]

I use large. Tried huge, but got a crash. However, I'll try again because there's apparently some glitch in the Parthian campaign start. At least there was for me.

Also, my next upgrade will be more memory. I have only 256k.

=========

There's less value in chasing routers now. A big ransom was nice in MTW, but now that incentive is gone. I still do it against disciplined units, especially, to prevent a rally.

I do like to chase down generals and family members. Leaves the opposing factions without heirs.

[andrewt]

I also hired all the mercs. Especially at the beginning, I kept checking for Bedouin Warriors, Bedouin Archers and Arab Cavalry. I just stopped recently because I have lots of them already. I'm still hiring Sarmatians every chance I get, though.

The Parthians have some fun HAs though the Scythians do have the better selection. I can now build elephants and cataphracts so I'm going to supplement my army with those, especially the cataphracts.

[Medieval Assassin]

Hi
One thing about the Cantabric Circle. When doing that on a bridge battle, be sure to be far enough from the river because, if the center of the circle happens to be too near the margin, you may witness the circle of death, as the horsemen go round and drown.

Ouch, Ive seen that bridge bug around some lately.

[Doug-Thompson]

I also hired all the mercs. Especially at the beginning, I kept checking for Bedouin Warriors, Bedouin Archers and Arab Cavalry. I just stopped recently because I have lots of them already. I'm still hiring Sarmatians every chance I get, though.

How are the Bedouin Archers? I haven't hired any because Parthians there's plenty of cavalry archers.

Bedouin Warriors saved my bacon once, and Arab Cavalry a couple of times.