Cav way too powerful

[Waleed]

Been playing for about a day now and I've noticed cav are still overly powerful just like in Rome total war. Even the lightest heavy knights available to catholic factions (mailed knights) have no trouble running right through a prepared spear wall. Even armoured seargants are no match to mailed knights let alone feudal or chivalric. No matter what infantry unit you use to defend it always appears to suffer greater than 50% casualties within the first few seconds of the charge. Something about this doesn't seem right.

[RomoR]

Dont know if cav is overpowered but I think spears are too weak, I play as Portugal and I can say that pikes are ok against cav but normal spears almost always loose even against Hobilars!!!!!

A 340 gold spear unit looses against an Hobilar 220 gold unit even when in shiltron formation (which by the way seems useless to me). Its a bit sad

[Zort]

Too powerful? My cav refuses to charge correctly and even peasants killing the frontline pretty fast...

[The Wizard]

I'm hearing two sounds here... one side tells me the cavalry is weakened from RTW, the other says that spears are underpowered.

Say we take MTW as the level to be achieved. I've recently gotten back to playing that. I've heard normal spears get decimated by cavalry, even in close quarters (say a siege). In MTW, this is also the case, unless you misuse your cavalry. Chivalric knights will win any encounter with normal spearmen, even feudal sergeants, under normal circumstances. Uphill, even kataphraktoi and Gothic knights flounder.

Can't speak of a combat experience. Don't have the game, you see

[Grimmy]

Spears would suffer from cavalry charges. What makes the pike different is that it's butt end is grounded and then the pikes are leveled in a hedgehog bristle. Spears might have a bit of reach over swords but the weapon is still only held by the spearman and so a horse charge will still penetrate the line.

Not all pointy ended sticks are the same in use or effect.

With pikes, the weapon itself absorbes the impact and transmits it to the ground so it forms a real barrier.

With spears the man still absorbes the impact through the weapon and suffers the direct shock of the charge.

Cavalry has always been powerful and decisive on battlefields. First, prior to impact charges, by being able to quickly flank infantry and out manuvere foot soldiers.
After the development of impact charges, foot soldiers would often run at the mear threat of a horse charge.

Pikes gave the footman some hope of success but foot soldiers were still subject to being out manuvered by horse and forced to defend either from an infantry push from their front, or horse impact from rear or side.

Also for pikemen, the weapon itself would often inflict casualties on themselves or their fellows by becoming ungrounded and shoved like rams through the ranks by the impact of the horse charge.

Anyway, that's my limited understanding of the issue.

[The Wizard]

You forget the effects of a spear formation. The densely packed mass of men, in which each man's weight contributes to the staying power of the man in front of him, is a major reason why a spear formation can stop cavalry. That is the power of the shield wall, the major infantry tactic in the early ages of MTW2's timespan.

Like pikes, spears do not massacre cavalry; rather, they win by sheer staying power. Cavalry bogged down is no force at all.

The difference between, say, a spear-armed formation of Anglo-Saxon fyrdmen and the gladius-armed Roman cohort is the reach of the spear. The Roman cohort could most certainly stop an oncoming cavalry charge, yes, but its soldiers couldn't reach the man on the horse. A spear's reach remedies that problem. Again: killing power is not the power of the "long pointy thing" soldier category.

[Throumbaris]

Even peasants can destroy mailed knights once they are stopped, they are most definately not too powerful.

[The Wizard]

The sentiment expressed in this thread is: sure, but how can they be stopped if my spears can't do the job?

I can't say, for one. I'm just a sucker without the game

[RabidGibbon]

I did some Game research just now, and was surprised by the results. After playing 150 or so campaign turns I don't make frontal charges with my heavy cav, so expected some different results to what I got here.

I took 3 units of Gendarmes, against 3 units of (HRE) Sargeant Spearmen. Difficulty was VH.

I expected the HRE spears to form a line, but they kept their general in reserve, so I charged 2 units of gendarmes against the front 2 spear units. The 3rd Gendarme unit was never used throughout the battle.

Total value of the Gendarmes is (770 x 2) 1540

Total value of the spearmen is (420 x 3) 1260

The spearmen were routed within a minute. However they were deployed piecemeal (ie: the front 2 then the General) against the Gendarmes. The Gendarmes won, but only 36 out of 120 were left.









Now the cavalry has won here, but they are more expensive than the troops their fighting. Once you factor in that you never get a charge as straight and clean as I got in this test fight - In MP or the Campaign archers, terrain and confusion would all have reduced their effectiveness.

Overall I don't think Cavalry are overpowered. At all.

[ELITEofWARMANGINGERYBREADMEN88]

Think Cav is Kinda Overpowered when I did some SP games today, but not to bad..

[Waleed]

I just did an experiment similiar to the one above. I had a general of peasants, as well as the enemy general of peasants, both never bothered two engage. I had 2 units of Mailed Knights and the enemy had 2 units of Armoured Spearment. Now when I walked them up to the enemy they began dying but if i clicked "move" on the ground behind them the cavalry just walked through the units completly decimating them. I think the problem lies in that fact that infantry don't really have any staying power and cavalry just walk through them like they're not even there. The AI seems to do this. I remember in a siege having 8 units of spear militia almost completly decimated before being able to finally destroy 1 unit of jinettes and 2 units of mailed knights. The mailed knights just kept walking through my men killing them in massive numbers. I finally called in my general and he dispatched them but I lost a lot of spears.

[Husar]

Well, I had mostly city battles so far and at least there, mailed knights fall like flies once a spear unit catches them. I think the balance is about right as it is, I don't want knights to die even faster and I play on medium...

[A.Saturnus]

You forget the effects of a spear formation. The densely packed mass of men, in which each man's weight contributes to the staying power of the man in front of him, is a major reason why a spear formation can stop cavalry. That is the power of the shield wall, the major infantry tactic in the early ages of MTW2's timespan.

Like pikes, spears do not massacre cavalry; rather, they win by sheer staying power. Cavalry bogged down is no force at all.

The difference between, say, a spear-armed formation of Anglo-Saxon fyrdmen and the gladius-armed Roman cohort is the reach of the spear. The Roman cohort could most certainly stop an oncoming cavalry charge, yes, but its soldiers couldn't reach the man on the horse. A spear's reach remedies that problem. Again: killing power is not the power of the "long pointy thing" soldier category.

No doubt that disciplined spearmen in tight formation could stop a cav charge but in medieval times spearmen never were highly trained. Even Sargeant Spearmen would be rather would be rather untrained, since almost the entire fighting elite in these times were knights. That's why heavy cav dominated the battlefields until the late medieval times.

[Maizel]

Also bear in mind, that a unit of gendarmes, is more than 2 times as expensive to maintain in the campaigngame

[econ21]

Interesting test, RabidGibbon. It fits my impression from solo play - knights vs spears head on = mutual assured destruction. Yes, the knights may prevail but at such a cost you don't want to do it. (Think charge of the light brigade.)

As to whether they are overpowered, I think there are at least two alternative standards: gameplay or historical accuracy. Probably three, if separate SP and MP gameplay.

For SP gameplay, I don't have an enormous problem. Unlike RTW, I don't find the AI cavalry rolling over me, nor do I find myself trying to roll over the AI with my cavalry. I'd still rather use swords or missiles to kill those spears. And I'd still rather use spears than other units to soak up a cavalry charge (although apparently pikes are the best).

For historical accuracy, it's open to debate. CA might have got it right - knights could prevail over spearmen but it would not be a smart general who tried a simple frontal assault. I've read more about Napoleonic warfare, where cavalry seem to have balked at steady infantry, but it's likely in the pre-gunpowder age, with heavier armour, they were used more aggressively.

On balance, I rather like M2TW knights. They are very powerful, but very fragile, and so interesting to handle. They remind me a little of heavy cavalry in RTR Platinum Edition. By contrast, I found MTW knights lacked a little punch while RTW cavalry were a little too robust.

[PROMETHEUS]

Too powerful? My cav refuses to charge correctly and even peasants killing the frontline pretty fast...

Same here I play on very hard , but come one it is possible that CA put smoke in our eyes when reading their wonders on AI , but may be they simply pumped up the enemies stats when on hard and very hard .... my cavalry is buggy , don't charge anything if not very far, tire very fast , and gets killed by even archers and crossbowmen....that if charged after a couple of hits they stand firm and cut into pieces all the knights ..... bah .....

[Maizel]

I don't think the AI's cav is more buffed up. The AI does seem to get decent charges more often. Mine always stop charging 2 mweters in front of an enemy unit, and walk the rest of the way like they;re walking down a park.

Also they don;t form a proper front, rather they choose to go into battle one by one, getting hacked away.

[BigTex]

Playing on VH/VH knights and other heavy cav seem perfect. They can decimate nearly any infantry 1v1 in a solid charge. But if they get bogged down they will be massacred. The trick to killing them is to stop them, remember to always keep some form of reserve heavy infantry behind your main line. Let the cavalry hit that cheap infantry and stall out. Then send in your reserve and their ground horsemeat before too long. Unsuported infantry should always be decimated if caught by cav. Even if their spearmen, cav should decimate them but they will take insane casualties head on to make it worth it.

I'm loving the knights and heavy cav atm. CA you truly got it so near perfect this time.

Spears would suffer from cavalry charges. What makes the pike different is that it's butt end is grounded and then the pikes are leveled in a hedgehog bristle. Spears might have a bit of reach over swords but the weapon is still only held by the spearman and so a horse charge will still penetrate the line.

Not all pointy ended sticks are the same in use or effect.

With pikes, the weapon itself absorbes the impact and transmits it to the ground so it forms a real barrier.

With spears the man still absorbes the impact through the weapon and suffers the direct shock of the charge.

Cavalry has always been powerful and decisive on battlefields. First, prior to impact charges, by being able to quickly flank infantry and out manuvere foot soldiers.
After the development of impact charges, foot soldiers would often run at the mear threat of a horse charge.

Pikes gave the footman some hope of success but foot soldiers were still subject to being out manuvered by horse and forced to defend either from an infantry push from their front, or horse impact from rear or side.

Also for pikemen, the weapon itself would often inflict casualties on themselves or their fellows by becoming ungrounded and shoved like rams through the ranks by the impact of the horse charge.

Anyway, that's my limited understanding of the issue.

What your missing though is that a spear formation is much much more tighter then a pike. While a spearmen will take the brunt of the assualt he is supported by the men behind him, the horse must move not just him but the supporting men in the back ranks. With tight disciplined formations like the shield wall the amount of men the cav would have had to of pushed increased exponentially with each additional rank.

[osb0t]

My experience with the Cav charging thing is this.

You have to allow the cavalry to "reset", they need to come to nearly a complete stop and be lined up roughly on the target you intend to charge. Next you need to make sure their lances are already out, if they are not out try hitting cancel orders, that usually works for me. If cancel orders doesnt work to get them to pull their lances out try having them move forward a little bit. It is obviously very finicky and I think something is probably broken in that regard.

Next when delivering the actual charge, they need a minimum distance because they WILL actually sort themselves out in the approach to present a single line abreast however many ranks deep you have them. Secondly they WILL abort the charge if there are "doodads" in the way. If you are charging them over broken ground, they will abort the charge 90% of the time in my experience. Rocks/Trees/Shrubs etc will all cause them to pull up their lances and go to swords. Seems fairly realistic to me actually.

The biggest issue I have at the moment is being able to consistently have them pull out their lances when they are not currently engaged in combat. Sometimes hitting cancel works like magic, other times nothing seems to work.

[Wartz]

I found that knights charging your line headon are going to smash through, or make a serious dent, no matter what you have in front of them. But once you stall the knights and counter attack them from the flank with polearms, they die fast. The AI will do this to your knights too so you HAVE to break off a change once it hits home then wheel and charge again, unless the AI has redeployed, which it usually does.

[Ulstan]

Those gendarme vs spearmen results don't make cavalry seem overpowered at all.

Man for man, expensive top of the line heavy knight units should definitely defeat an unsupported spear unit. I mean, what are the spearmen going to do to harm heavily armed knights on horseback with lances that may well outreach their spears? Nothing.

The real danger is that the horsemen would get bogged down slowly killing spearmen (they can't just dash them away in a glorious charge) and then other units would rush in and attack them in the flanks, or they'd get counter cavalry charged or shot up by archers or something.

I think this is probably the period where heavy cavalry was most dangerous to infantry, if there's one place for cavalry to be powerful, this is it.

[monkian]

I'd say some Knights are underpowered - Frankish knights always seem to get butchered.

[Sheogorath]

For historical accuracy, it's open to debate. CA might have got it right - knights could prevail over spearmen but it would not be a smart general who tried a simple frontal assault. I've read more about Napoleonic warfare, where cavalry seem to have balked at steady infantry, but it's likely in the pre-gunpowder age, with heavier armour, they were used more aggressively.

Thats what I love about the Napoleonic Russian Army, especially the units like the Pavlovsk Grenadiers.
Cavalry? Where? There?
CHARGE!
Imagine the effect THAT would have on cavalry, used to being the ones doing the charging :P


Anyway, one thing I have noticed with cavalry recently is the fact that the skirmish range for them is INSIDE the range of javaline units, EX: Polish nobles. This means that when fighting such units and trying to avoid MAD, you need to constantly move your cavy on your own.
'Tis quite frustrating, but I guess it would be hard to code proper skirmishing for such occasions.

[AussieGiant]

From what I've seen it looks about right. I don't think Cav are overpowered as you can't just charge around willy nilly, which is correct.

The game play Econ is describing is about what you should expect.

Please note If EVERYONE could please state what difficulty they are playing on so these discussions can be compared.

The only issue that needs to be addresses globally is the issue with only a few front rank soldiers in any formation charging when given the attack order. When this happens with a charge it is suicide (both Cav and Infrantry). You must have all the soldiers in a unit hitting at the same time. This I believe is a patch issue and should solve much of the balancing issues we are all talking about.

Maybe, "prepared" spear units should be a little more robust but it is certainly not going to get off a cav charge without some serious losses.

"Prepared" to me is either a spear unit in Guard Mode or in a shield wall or shiltron formation.

Please note, unprepared spear units would be very ugly.

Just a thought Waleed, can you double check this when spear units are 5 deep or greater. This should help.

[Leaping-Tall]

hmmm a good way of beating cav is to stop them from hittiong your infantry with a long ranged attack sacrafice archers or ur weakest infantry

[Daveybaby]

I really think the balance is about right.

Cav, if used properly, will devastate spearmen, especially if its 1 on 1.
Spears, if used properly, will devastate cav, especially if theyre used to pin the cav so another unit can get stuck in from the sides/behind.

Its not about one unit being better than the other, its about how you use them in combination with the rest of your army. Perfect.

Admittedly cav charges do seem a little fragile, and difficult to set up. It would be interesting to hear from CA as to whether this is intentional or a bug.

RabidGibbon's test is all well and good, but, as he admits himself, it isnt really relevant for a realworld battle. The purpose of spears isnt to beat cavalry, its to hold them while another unit does the killing. Also, unit purchase costs arent nearly as important in the campaign as maintenance costs are - in reality those gendarmes are going to cost more than twice as much per turn in upkeep - maybe this should be reflected in MP game unit costs.

[Whacker]

I'm inclined to agree with Mr. Davey, with the possible exception that *some* spear units are slightly underpowered, and some of the light cav units feel a bit overpowered. Even against basic spears the average "Frankish charge" of heavy knights and it's various cultural equivalents was absolutely devastating, even if the receiving company did not break on impact.

Just my $0.02 USD.

[PseRamesses]

Cavs are finally represented in a proper way. The speed is realistic and their impact in any troops are too IMHO. To you guys that always whine about cavs being too strong in previous CA-titles I have one serious Q: do you have any idea how devastating it is to try and stay in the way of a horse running straight at you? A mass of 500-750 kg´s running at 40-50 km/h creates a huge momentum. Only a deep, stationary and well organized formation will be able to counter such a charge, like the shieldwall or a phalanx formation but will still take losses. This is why the horses dominated the battlefield from Alexanders day until the 19th century.
To all that thinks spears are underpowered I must state that their are few unit types throughout history that was significantly better that others. No matter how strong and well equipped infantry ever was they still took losses.

My personal feeling with M2 is that things are finally getting portrayed in a more realistic way. I do feel however that units stamina in M2 are a bit too good, they shure can run for a long time without getting tired.

[FrauGloer]

Here's what I found:

Cav vs Spears: in SP I faced a full general's unit (30) with just one unit of spear militia in city combat. On the initial charge, I lost about 20 spearmen, but after that, the cav was butchered. In the end, I had about 50 of the original 112 spearmen left, and, considering they are low-tier, that kill ratio is amazing IMO. --> on the charge, cavalry is adequately powerful even vs spearmen, but once they are stayed, they die very quickly.

Cav vs cav: in MTW and Rome, I liked doing pitched all-cav battles in custom just for the looks of it. Having two cav armies charge at each other looks just plain cool. In MTW2 I found that cavalry units have problems charging each other head-on: In Custom Battle, I set 1 unit of Teutonic Knights vs 1 unit of Hospitallers. When I ordered the head-on charge, my unit stopped just before the impact without any apparent reason. As the enemy cav continued their charge, they killed about 10 of my knights while I killed none!

I hope they fix that...

[AussieGiant]

Here's what I found:

Cav vs Spears: in SP I faced a full general's unit (30) with just one unit of spear militia in city combat. On the initial charge, I lost about 20 spearmen, but after that, the cav was butchered. In the end, I had about 50 of the original 112 spearmen left, and, considering they are low-tier, that kill ratio is amazing IMO. --> on the charge, cavalry is adequately powerful even vs spearmen, but once they are stayed, they die very quickly.

Cav vs cav: in MTW and Rome, I liked doing pitched all-cav battles in custom just for the looks of it. Having two cav armies charge at each other looks just plain cool. In MTW2 I found that cavalry units have problems charging each other head-on: In Custom Battle, I set 1 unit of Teutonic Knights vs 1 unit of Hospitallers. When I ordered the head-on charge, my unit stopped just before the impact without any apparent reason. As the enemy cav continued their charge, they killed about 10 of my knights while I killed none!

I hope they fix that...

I think you have identified the bug FrauGloer.