I am currently playing the English, early on hard. Last night Brittany decided to rebel so I sent 2 Hobilar units and 1 peasant to sort them out. The panel came up as roughly equal forces, so I thought I would play it out. Terrain was hilly and I went looking for the Froggy rebels, expecting a few peasants and archers etc. To my horror, the rebels were 2 units of feudal foot knights and i of mounted feudal knights. I led them round for a bit to tire them out then put the peasants in the way of mounted knights. They routed fairly quickly and the knights went off on a spree chasing the routing peasants. I had split the 2 foot units up so i charged my 2 Hobilars in, down hill - 1 in front, 1 in the flank. The foot knights got cut up and routed, I pulled the Hobilars back, then repeated on the other foot knights. By now the mounted knights were coming back so I led them off again, until I was on top of a nice hill. As the knights struggled up, I charged down - again, 1 in front, 1 in the flank and cut them up as well - result, all 3 rebel units well and truly stuffed.

Later on the same evening, 2 Hobilar units took out some Royal knights, so they had a really good evening.

In the guide section, several people seem to turn their noses up at these units, but they are some of the only cavalry around early on - and they are cheap, so you can have a few units and at 40 strong they can take a few losses.