Should knights have secondary weapon?

[DukeofSerbia]

Question: Should knights have secondary weapon?

My view: YES.

One of rare good things introduced by Rome Total War was secondary weapon for cavalry armed with spear or lance. I think it would be great that M2 TW continue that tradition.

Knights used lances when they charged but they were fragile as lances were constructed of wood with metal reinforcements at the breaking points. After initial charge they switched weapon to sword (especially Carolingian sword was used by knights) and later became popular mace (plus special versions of maces like flail, morningstar, holy water sprinkler, and ball and chain).

What I wrote about knights the same can apply to other heavy cavalry units armed with spear or lance.

P.S.
Thanks econ21 for adding polls.

[Basileus]

If i remember correctly they had secondary weapons in MTW aswell

[Ibn Munqidh]

Nope, no secondary weapons in MTW. RTW looked stupid, with the 1.5 patch, cavalry would charge ino another unit without lowering their spears. Then, they wouldnt use their swords most of the time. I just hope that I wouldnt see this in MTW;2

[Peasant Phill]

No they didn't, knights kept using their lances in MTW. Archers did have melee weapons, that's maybe where your confusion came from.

I agree that cav should have a secondary weapon (as this was so in reality). Actually every unit that had a secondary weapon should have it in the game as well.

[econ21]

I think units should only have secondary weapons if they are programmed to automatically switch to that weapon where it is appropriate. There's some debate about whether AI cavalry currently do this enough in RTW. And the pike to sword switch in phalanxes was often infuriating. From a player's point of view, to have to micro manage the switch seems ahistorical (the lance is broken - what are they going to do? hit the enemy with stump?) and inefficient (if, as seems likely, the game plays at the same fast speed as RTW).

[Vlad The Impala]

Side-mounted missile launchers for knights!!1

But seriously, it sounds like a good idea. It looks very odd to see a knight in melee combat trying to poke somone with his lance, it almost looks like a medieval form of snooker.

Would it be possible to program the knight's AI in such a manner that it thinks 'when engaged in combat, and not moving at charge speed, use secondary weapon'?

[Yggdrasill]

Ofcourse they should have.

Though if they do then they should use it when appropriate, which is something AI never does in RTW/BI which is very strange, after all the missile units can do so it can't be that difficult to program.

Just one of those things - TW series is great overall but there small and easily corrected mistakes here and there like this one that are very frustraing. I am hoping the game (and the devs!) have matured enough by now not to let that happen again

[Husar]

I think units should only have secondary weapons if they are programmed to automatically switch to that weapon where it is appropriate. There's some debate about whether AI cavalry currently do this enough in RTW. And the pike to sword switch in phalanxes was often infuriating. From a player's point of view, to have to micro manage the switch seems ahistorical (the lance is broken - what are they going to do? hit the enemy with stump?) and inefficient (if, as seems likely, the game plays at the same fast speed as RTW).

In RTW cav switches only when being attacked.
If the player makes them attack, they charge with spears and then go on with spears. If the player types Alt while giving the attack-command, they charge with spears and go on with their secondary weapon.

I think the only change M2TW needs is to make the switching of weapons the standard and then we´re all happy, should be rather easy to do for CA.

[B-Wing]

Historically, once a knight's lance broke or was dropped, was he stuck with whatever secondary weapons he had for the duration of the battle? Or did they have back-ups somewhere? I'm assuming a lance is too large to just holster on the side of your horse, so I guess you'd have to just drop it for good if you decided to switch weapons?

If so, then a more realistic M2TW would make it impossible for knights to use their lances again once they had switched to secondary weapons. What are ya'lls thoughts on that? I'm all for it, but I don't know if that's how it actually worked in real medieval combat.

[IrishArmenian]

I think if archers have secondary weapons, so should knights, even moreso. If archers can be programmed to do this, so should knights. And, yes hopefully it doesn't turn out like the phalanxes in Rome.

[Sensei Warrior]

Yes, knights should have secondary weapons. Didn't a knight drop his lance after the initial charge and then switched to a melee weapon afterwards?

I mean if they didn't, what did they do? Retire from the field?

It just seems to make more sense.

Of course, the cav that don't use lances, like Gothic Knights, won't need a second weapon. There is no need to make it overly realistic. If they did that, they should keep the knights who lived but whose horse was killed on the field as Foot Knights .

[sunsmountain]

This is a no brainer, unless the knights are not using lances at the charge (which were discarded afterwards), and using their "secondary" sword/mace (gothic!) straight away. Even then it's easy to strap another handheld weapon on your horse in case the first gets broken during the charge or first few (hard) hits.

[Husar]

I think they should require three graphicscards and a physicscard for the game to run at all, this way they can make the units very high poly and physically calculate every breaking lance, maybe the abundance of calculation power will also be sufficient to simulate the knights´ thoughts and feelings and affect the way they use their weapons.

[B-Wing]

Hey, I think you're on to something, Husar! A physics card... I've never heard of them before, but somebody should definitely make one!

[Husar]

Hey, I think you're on to something, Husar! A physics card... I've never heard of them before, but somebody should definitely make one!

http://www.ageia.com/

[DukeofSerbia]

Of course, the cav that don't use lances, like Gothic Knights, won't need a second weapon.

Even Gothic knights used lance in initial charge, but their secondary weapon was mace (in MTW it was so called "morning star" for devastating armour piercing).