If my horse dies, why do I die too

[Budwise]

Is it just me or does it seem kinda funny that when one of my knights horses dies, the knight dies too. Now I know, its not that effective to have a knight without a horse doing a flank charge but couldn't he be off on his own feet or just merge with another group.

For instance, 20 knights:
one horse dies so couldn't the knight without a horse just join a squad of spearmen or something.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

From a coding point of view thats a nightmare. From a historical point of view, if your horse throws you as soon as you hit the ground some archer will cut your throat.

[DensterNY]

Actually, your question reminds me of something I read long ago about heavily armored knights in the Medieval Era. Some of the full plate armor were several hundred pounds and knights had to be hoisted onto their horses. If at any point the knight fell he would be quite vulnerable since the armor was so heavy and cumbersome.

This point was not missed by the Mongols whose smaller ponies and light armor it seems would be butchered by the heavily armored knights. Instead the Mongols opted to find different ways to unmount and then butcher the fallen knights. They even came up with a pike just for this purpose that they'd hook use by speeding past the heavier cavalry on their ponies and hooking the knight and pulling him off.

[CBR]

Thar armor was so heavy that knights had to be hoisted onto their horses is a myth. Some armor for tournament use could be very heavy and unweildy to walk in but battle armor was not too heavy. It didnt weigh more than what a soldier has to carry today and the weight was distributed over the whole body.

A rider plus horse in Total War games is seen as one to make it simple both for the computer to calculate and for the player so he doesnt have to worry about having a unit divided into a mounted and dismounted part.


CBR

[Marcellus]

Indeed. Much medieval armour was actually very flexible. I think that an unhorsed knight could still fight.

[CBR]

Indeed. Much medieval armour was actually very flexible. I think that an unhorsed knight could still fight.

Yes that what we see lots of times with dismounted men-at-arms. In one battle between a Swiss and a Italian army we even have the Italians first doing a mounted charge that was repulsed and then dismount for a second go at the Swiss.


CBR

[Budwise]

Thanks for saying that, when I started reading the responces back, I was going to say. "Couldn't fight without he horse with that kinda armor on, then what the hell do you call a CMAA."

I know its a coded nightmare - Hell, they couldn't even make a competent AI for the Danes, how would they handle this.

But even so, I think a Hobilier rider's horse dies off, he should become a spearman or you should just see him run or something.

[EatYerGreens]

Heh heh, that makes two threads about horse-death on the go at the moment.

I don't know if the Brit TV series called 'Time Team' gets shown in your part of the world (it's about archaeology) but in one episode a medieval re-enactor was keen to dispel this myth about armour being heavy and cumbersome. He did some physical jerks, star-jumps, rolled over onto the ground, leapt to his feet again and got a round of applause from the crowd of onlookers in the background!

I can probably accept early-era armour being crude, heavy and cumbersome but my concept of advanced-level armouring is that they improved the quality of steel to the point that equivalent, or improved levels of protection could be achieved with steadily decreasing overall weight.

Sometimes just hammering and shaping to form curves will increase strength well above that of flat plates. I've seen demonstrations of armour piercing arrow tips which will penetrate a surprising thickness of flat plate but fail against a thinner, but curved, chest-piece. It's inherently stronger, so it's not just due to the curve deflecting the impact.

Of course, in the game, we have that thing where high armour rating causes a severe fatigue penalty in the desert environment - see the recent thread about that - whereas the penalty ought to be worst for low-tech armour and least for high-tech armour.

We can rationalise the dead horse = dead knight situation by assuming that the horse rolls on top of them.

That English/French one where the longbows supposedly won the day was largely down to the French knights deciding to dismount because the ground was too wet and boggy to charge across. The soil in that area has been analysed, is rich in clay and very sticky after it has rained. The knights walked into this quagmire and it is thought that as many tripped over when their feet got stuck as were actually felled by the archers. The suction from the mud stopped them from being able to pick themselves up again and they either drowned, if face down, or were finished off by knife or poleaxe.

This detail possibly got lost in the re-telling and the myth of fallen nights struggling to stand up probably spread because of that. The butchery was the kind of thing soldiers would do in order to win but, as is common with veterans even these days, prefer not to include in tales told on their return home. The continued need to encourage daily archery practice amongst the masses, back on home soil, is probably why they got given the credit for that day, as well as sanitising the ugly truth somewhat.

[Joshwa]

I don't think the longbowmen would care about talking about throat slitting to be honest, since at Agincourt the great majority of Henry's archers were criminals anyway, let out of prison on the condition that they fight!

[King of Atlantis]

Falling of a horse is bad business. You can easily break you back especially if the horse fell on you.

other than that i doubt mtw could handel it.

[Productivity]

It would just be an utter nightmare to implement. Not worth it at all.

Simplifying assumptions are useful.

[PittBull260]

Is it just me or does it seem kinda funny that when one of my knights horses dies, the knight dies too. Now I know, its not that effective to have a knight without a horse doing a flank charge but couldn't he be off on his own feet or just merge with another group.

For instance, 20 knights:
one horse dies so couldn't the knight without a horse just join a squad of spearmen or something.

u try gettin up with a horse on u and u wearing 100lbs of armor in middle of a humoungous battle.......

[antisocialmunky]

u try gettin up with a horse on u and u wearing 100lbs of armor in middle of a humoungous battle.......

Does that mean you ahve tried?

[Budwise]

u try gettin up with a horse on u and u wearing 100lbs of armor in middle of a humoungous battle.......

Yeah, like a Hobilar wears that armor. It would be hard pressed if they came dressed in underwear. OKAY THEY DIE WAY TO EARLY DUE TO ARCHER FIRE.

Oh, their armor is made of MAGNETS - my bad.

100lb armor I can see now.

[BAD]

Is it just me or does it seem kinda funny that when one of my knights horses dies, the knight dies too. Now I know, its not that effective to have a knight without a horse doing a flank charge but couldn't he be off on his own feet or just merge with another group.

For instance, 20 knights:
one horse dies so couldn't the knight without a horse just join a squad of spearmen or something.

As an additional point, why can't archers go and get their arrows back from the dead at a lull point in a battle.



PS - j/k

[DensterNY]

I guess these are all valid questions when we relate the game to a common sense kind of thinking... my horse died and I still have a big old sword, armor and shield I'm good to go... same thing with the arrows and why shouldn't you be able to pick some up.

Of course, the reality is that it would be absolute hell to program. The one thing that I would love to see is allowing the victor to salvage arms and armor after a battle. You'd then have the equipment from your dead troops and your enemies to retrain more men or even upgrade surviving units.

[Budwise]

Call me a cheater, I don't care. For that very reason, I turn of LIMITED AMMO.