Optimizing Heavy Cavalry charges in the Campaign

[Reapz]

I'm fighting a lot of battles in my campaign with heavy cavalry (particularly against Hungary who are fielding lots of feudal knights) and I am trying to get the best from my units. I have been playing TW games for years and I know all the basics of using cavalry so I'm not talking about flanking, charging from the rear, downhill, or multiple directions simultaneously, weakening target morale first, etc. I am talking about the M2 specific quirks - if there are some. I think there are as cavalry feel a bit different in my hands - maybe more realistic in that you can't go clicking all over the place during engagements. Time spent in setting up the engagement is critical. So I wonder how other people micromanage their cavalry charges?


I have reviewed the threads in all the forums on this and it seems like there is a lot of confusion.

In these forums in this thread in the Guild Hashashiyyin (based on play-testing) says:

"The key difference between M2:TW, and its predecessors, is the use of single-clicks verse double-clicks. It's a big difference. In all other total war games (to my knowledge and experience), the difference between single and double click only differed with the units movement speed. Single click was a slow march, used to get into position with out tiring your troops. Double click was the "Charge those infidels!" command telling your units to charge into combat.

In M2:TW this has changed a little. Single click is for "engage that enemy" and double click has become get "here" as fast as possible"

"Well in M2:TW, Single-clicking tells your unit to "engage" another unit. That is, they will walk/trot in formation to a point 15-25 meters away, close ranks, rally and then charge.

Double-clicking tells your units to get "here" as fast as possible. Thus, your units don't "charge" because they are trying to get to that point/enemy as fast as possible and don't have the time to set up for a proper charge. This has become a command for flanking maneuvers and light/archer Calvary pursuit orders only!"

"So [how] do I get good with charging? Practice with a lot of custom battles. Most importantly, SINGLE-CLICK your unit if you want them to charge! Double-clicking should only be used for flanking maneuvers"

So I concluded that he was suggesting that:

- Cavalry charging in M2TW is different from the other games in the TW series
- use double-clicking to move units quickly around the battlefield only
- single-click for the best charge results.

However in this thread over at the totalwar.com forums - entitled "Time to dispel these single/double click charging myths" - Gutted says (again based on play-testing):

"i'm just going to give it to you straight.. from many hours of observation and testing, and tell you how it actually is"

"There is no new charging system as some have dubbed it. It is the same as every other TW version"

"after many tests by myself and others... double clicking (or running in general) has infact been found to be much better"

But wait - in this thread at TWCenter:

dear mad says:

"I had 2 cards of Knights of St. John. They were green. In battle after battle they just couldn't get it together. I'd line them up. Wait a bit- then single click... they charged sometimes, other times not."

and goes on to suggest the difference might be battle experience bonus affecting unit cohesion?

MasterAdnin had tested and delivered some hard data on that theory:

"I tested this a bit, and I found that experience helps a lot. I had two units of Feudal Knights, one maxed out experience, the other a new unit of Feudal Knights. I clicked the opposing unit from far away first with the new unit of Feudal Knights, their charge was unorganized and screwed up very bad, they didn't do too well. Now, I restarted the custom battle using the experienced unit of Feudal Knights. I did the same thing, clicked the opposing unit, same unit, from far away. They charged and completely anihilated the unit within a few seconds. I guess experience really does help a lot in M2TW."

Some people, like Hamburglo, say it isn't complicated - just fire and forget:

"Once your cav are moving towards the enemy and are fairly square, attack the target unit. Double or single click, it doesn't matter. Enjoy the carnage."

But others disagree and say it is very complicated like Vihuri who says:

"in campaign you just cant get the damn buggers do a charge"

Procopius did get the buggers going tho' - he says:

"There is no knight charge bug!!!!!!! I played a battle in my Venetian campaign: my Venetian half stack against HRE three quarters stack of militia spearmen, armoured spearmen, dismounted feudal knights and crossbows. I had 6 units of Venetian Broken Lances. Ground was level and unwooded....I advanced at a walk.... Then I ordered each unit of cavalry individually to charge using one click only. As someone else said it is important that you only charge units which are directly in front of the charging unit, that the ground is level, and that you are not obstructed by other units.

My cavalry continued to approach at a walk. Then just moments from impact they all lowered lances and broke into a devestating mass charge. First time I saw this in my Campaign!!! German infantry units were reduced to half strenght in a matter of seconds. Bodies went flying into the air, just like RTW. Then my broken lances drew their swords and kept on going. Ninety percent of the Imperials routed, the rest retreated and routed when pursued. My infantry never had to fight. I wiped out 15 units of HRE infantry using nothing but 6 units of heavy cavalry and supporting fire from 2 crossbow units."

The other theme in the TWCenter posts is that cavalry charges are bugged for example The Black Prince:

"its very difficult to get cavalry to charge in the campaign battles because it relies on facotrs often not in your control.

if the unit you select to charge starts marching after oyu order a charge, the cavalry switch to pursuing instead of charging. thats a bug....

the slightest thing can interupt the charge as well.... a single knight getting caught up by another unit and starting fighting will cause all the knights to switch to melee mode. and with all the well documented unit cohesion problems that affect all units, thats a serious problem

cavalry are also affected by the engagement bug that prevents units from fighting properly, which really doesn't help"

Sooooooo the challenge is to try to make sense of these and other observations in gameplay to use cavalry optimally. So (with Heavy Cav at least) it seems what is less in dispute is:

- keep good tight formation
- need a certain distance from target to initiate a charge (can't charge if engaged or snagged by another unit along the way)
- need to be facing (or nearly facing) the target
- experience affects outcome
- can't switch targets or direction in mid charge
- if the target moves that might be a problem

Some people are already implying this confusion over using heavy cavalry reflects a bug - which I think is unhelpful. It might be bugged or it might not, but it seems some people get good results the way the game is now with their cavalry charges while others don't. I want to figure out how to use the game engine, as it is now, to get the best from my units. If they need more experience, or a certain positioning, or other factors as yet uncharacterized, then I want to know how to do/get those things.

One other thing that is unresolved in my mind is the triggers that make knights switch from using lances to swords, and the effects of that on kill rate?

So does anybody have a clear understanding of how to use heavy cavalry to best advantage against higher quality units, or have found a system that they like, that works consistently to get the best from a cavalry charge?

[cassiusdio]

The AI will often move units round to counter threats, so, if you are advancing to charge their line with your cavalry, they might shift a few units to counter you, often resulting in your cavalry bumping into each other. the simplest method i hav found is to advance them to the point where the enemy responds to the threat by redeploying, waiting a sufficient time for them to complete their maneuvers, and thn ordering the charge.

It is also useful to have several strong missile units to discourage the enemy from advancing, in the face of cavalry and melee units only the enemy has a tendency to come out and meet your cavalry before they are ready to charge.

It is also of use to attack any units behind an archer screen, since this will often retreat as you approach, and if you were attacking them, your attack would be disrupted somewhat.

regards

[knoddy]

ok well i just tried the whole single click charge thing and it most def works. i tried numerous battles, heres the scenario.

english vs scots.

english army made of 1 unit of dismounted knights, 1 generals body guard
scots 1 unit of noble knights.

in EVERY scenario, i sent the melee in, and sent my general round behind, once the infantry had engaged, i rode my gen up behind and SINGLE clicked the enemy, the walked up, and once within a certain range, they blow a horn, all the lances levelled and they broke into a devestating charge which cut the enemy infantry into peices, and i mean from like 60 men to like 20 men. they were routing almost instantly after the charge hit.

just my 2 cents

Cheers Knoddy


p.s. this even works with a frontal charge on infantry, another test, generals body guard into dismounted feudal knights, walked in, got into range charged, and took the unit from 90 to about 30 in a matter of moments for the loss of 2 bodyguards, huzzah for cav working properly :D

[Doug-Thompson]

Move loose, fight closed.

I leave my cavalry in loose formation until I have the enemy unit I want to charge directly in front. Then I one-click for an attack. Then I tighten up the formation by hitting the "c" hotkey, because the loose formation helps get the knights pointed in exactly the right direction before they close up. This has the added advantage of avoiding some missile hits, which can cause knights to fall into the "Stop, we have to tidy our formation" problem.

Even after all that, the enemy starts riding away when they see a knight formation lining up -- a very reasonalble response.

That's fine with me. I just wanted to scare them back into my hail of arrows anyway.

If the target unit's pinned in melee, however, it dies.

[Kraxis]

Oddly enough I have been unable to reproduce the problems I myself have faced in the campaign regarding charges.

In Custom battle my knights have does exactly as they should. Even when moving them at odd angles before ordering a charge, they still carried it out. Meanwhile in my campaign battles anything but the most perfect situations and setups have ended up in the dreaded 'swordcharge'. I wonder what gives.

In any case, I have begun to view the Custom battles a bit sceptically when it comes to cavalry.

[ravinnder]

One additional observation:

In many campaign battles, I find having a block formation tends to increase the chances of a correct charge as supposed to say a 10 across-3 rank deep formation.

---

This observation might explain why some people have good results, while others have unfavourable results. I used to always charge with a 2 rank deep formation, but one - it wasn't maneuverable and two - it doesn't charge well (only 20% success in campaign).

I think this issue is related to unit cohesion. Apparently in the game, it is difficult to charge maintaining a long line in shallow formation, as supposed to a shorter line with a deeper formation.

You get a reduced impact area, but I think charging in a deep mass improves the survivability of cav. if you need to withdraw. Partly because 1/2 of the formation is still behind the original impact line.

[Kraxis]

Hmmm... I will try that...

[Whacker]

One additional observation:

In many campaign battles, I find having a block formation tends to increase the chances of a correct charge as supposed to say a 10 across-3 rank deep formation.

---

This observation might explain why some people have good results, while others have unfavourable results. I used to always charge with a 2 rank deep formation, but one - it wasn't maneuverable and two - it doesn't charge well (only 20% success in campaign).

I think this issue is related to unit cohesion. Apparently in the game, it is difficult to charge maintaining a long line in shallow formation, as supposed to a shorter line with a deeper formation.

You get a reduced impact area, but I think charging in a deep mass improves the survivability of cav. if you need to withdraw. Partly because 1/2 of the formation is still behind the original impact line.

In a sense, I think this is a spot on. By lowering the frontal area of a cav unit, you can somewhat control how jumbled up and disjointed the formation can get when moving forward. I still believe from reading that severely out of whack formations are what cause charges to fail to make a significant dent.

Not to derail this thread, but on a related note:

[RANT] I do NOT like how the units in M2TW seem to get so far out of formation and can't seem to hold them under any circumstances except standing completely still, and even then it's a problem. Units moving at normal and high speed, units standing still but under fire from ranged units, etc, they just can't stay in formation! Also, my experience with ranged units, in that it seems they can't all fire a cohesive salvo to save their lives! Constant fire devolves into a "everyone can shoot whenever they individually please!"

In general, it just feels... well, sloppy, for lack of a better term. In RTW, units would keep formation very well, moving slow/fast or holding still, and even under fire. Ranged units would shoot in a cohesive, coordinated fashion. I think this introduced "sloppiness" detracts greatly from the battle experience, at least for me, and I would like to see a strong turn back to the RTW style unit cohesion.

Just my

We now return you to your regular scheduled thread.

[/RANT]

[Nestor]

I believe that cohesion is really the big problem here. You have seen cavalry chasing routing units: they are all over the place! The programming probably says that the effect of a successful charge spreads out at a wide angle, maybe some 180 degrees. So on impact they tend to spread out, that's fine and it seems intentional. But when they meet an opponent, that is not their target, while charging, they do the same thing: they lose their cohesion and spread out fast, really fast. There's no way they can return in formation to finish their charge while some of the soldiers reach their target with their momentum but without the effects of charging.

So, I think that any obstacle between the charging unit and their target is considered the point of impact for the charge. Even if the obstacle is a rock they might reach the target but they will immediately switch to swords. If it is another unit or the target moves the charge is defused at the first soldiers they meet. It seems like the point of impact is really just that: a central point in the enemy unit, where they start spreading out, instead of the whole width of their formation.

Even if some things are intentional the way it's working now produces some interesting (and not desired) results: instead of devastating an enemy unit that is on the move, they lose the charge bonus on first impact with a few enemy soldiers. It can't be true and it has to be fixed. Nobody expects cavalry to behave better against a spearwall than against a retreating target!

[Shahed]

Actually it is and isn't true.

Only those soldiers which manage to maintain the charge should get the charge bonus. Thos who do not manage to keep formation and run into a rock or whatever, should not get the charge bonus. They could still charge with their lances, but by now the melee is on, and it may be better to walk in with sword unsheathed, pick an opponent and hack him down. In the confusion and chaos of the battle an outsider just joining in has a great advantage of wide view of the action, which the people in the fight don't. Coming from outside he can pick and choose his targets.

A great part of the charge is the fact that the horses moving together create momentum that can dislodge simple infantry. A lone person charging cannot have the same impact on an enemy formation, and should'nt. Niether should dispersed cavalry.

21st century Total War... programming, finally.

What CA has attempted to do is good, but it's not there yet.
Still lot of work to be done.

Lot to be said here, I'll try post back tomorrow, with some cavalry specifics.

[Nestor]

Actually it is and isn't true.

Only those soldiers which manage to maintain the charge should get the charge bonus. Thos who do not manage to keep formation and run into a rock or whatever, should not get the charge bonus. They could still charge with their lances, but by now the melee is on, and it may be better to walk in with sword unsheathed, pick an opponent and hack him down. In the confusion and chaos of the battle an outsider just joining in has a great advantage of wide view of the action, which the people in the fight don't. Coming from outside he can pick and choose his targets.

A great part of the charge is the fact that the horses moving together create momentum that can dislodge simple infantry. A lone person charging cannot have the same impact on an enemy formation, and should'nt. Niether should dispersed cavalry.

21st century Total War... programming, finally.

What CA has attempted to do is good, but it's not there yet.
Still lot of work to be done.

Lot to be said here, I'll try post back tomorrow, with some cavalry specifics.

There are some things here:
i) 39 knights charging together while one guy is left behind or runs faster at the front. Should they lose the charging bonus? Because I feel that they do now.

ii) A charging unit making contact with a unit between them and their target. Do I have to tell them manually that this is also the enemy and they have the right to charge them?

iii) Moving target: it shouldn't stand a chance against a charging unit but now it does fight better than a stationary target.

I am talking about a central focal point of the charges which is just a point instead of the full face of the unit, because I cannot find another explanation for them to NOT behave properly in some instances. If someone can explain it better I am all ears.

[AussieGiant]

My 2 cents.

Charging NEEDS to be addressed by CA. Not solved, but EXPLAINED. They can clearly keep up their work on the patch but they need to pull their finger out, and "outline" what their concept is. once that is done then everyone can continue from an agreed point.

Unit cohesion is certianly part of the current design and it should be. Cohesion was a very important part of medieval warfare and it needs to be incorporated in the game. Again it needs to be EXPLAINED by CA so we can all start discussions from a central point of understanding.

Unit cohesion is bugged, but it will be in the game and people need to be aware of it. It could certainly be influenced by experience and it should be. Archers firing in unison initially is accurate, but only the very best units would stay in unison for the whole battle. Likewise for all units.

It's clearly not working as intended right now, but until the concept is outlined by CA it's like watching two teenages trying ot have sex in the dark for the first time!!

We are ALL over the place!!

[Reapz]

Ok so to try to synthesize something from the collective comments it seems people suggest - even agree the following:

1) If the target units change position that disrupts the charge so you can:

- pin target units using missiles or the threat of assault by other forces
- wait until the repositioning of the enemy army is over before you charge
- don't target missile troops set on skirmish mode in front of a standing army as they will retreat exposing the next line of heavier troops (BTW I always flank and charge archer skirmishers from the side so they retreat sideways)

2) You can single click and get a last minute charge that is quite effective but nobody is saying that double clicking is bad?

3) Try to wait until the last minute to switch to tight formation so that there is less time to have the formation disrupted and resort itself.

4) A tighter block formation may be better than two ranks spread wide which doesn't turn easily (makes sense if the unit is almost square as a turn to the side doesn't require any repositioning of individual troops). Also the quirks of the game engine and its handling of unit cohesion may apply here - we just don't know how.

5) Play testing in custom battles may not reflect accurately what happens in campaign because of terrain or other as yet unclear complications

6) We could use clarification from the developers of how cavalry charges work in terms of the variables of maintaing unit formation, unit experience, orientation of units, terrain obstacles, moving target units.

I hear what AussieGiant is saying - we are all over the road as a community but not just on cohesion also on this cavalry charge issue if you read the different forums. I think the developers did a great thing building this game and part of the problem may be we just need to learn to play it well. I don't want some arcade style game where it is point and click only. Unit micro can sort the men from the boys just as it did on the battlefields of old. We just need to know what type of micro works best.

[Spendius]

It would be nice if people reporting working/non working charges specify the unit size they are using. Unit cohesion can be much more of a problem with very large size.
Also, almost all knights are "impetuous" and can decide to charge by themselves: will they then achieve a proper charge ?
I like the idea of this new system, especially if xp influences how well a unit can charge, but it still should be tuned. It makes no sense that the charge is stopped because one single guy has a faster horse and connects 2 seconds before the rest of the unit.

[Kraxis]

If you remember Sir Robert in the tutorial, he clearly states that cavalry should be in 2-3 lines, not a block.

So obviously something isn't working as it should. O else he would have said something like "while 2-3 lines have a greater potential for destruction, keeping heavy cavalry in a nice dense block assures a better chance of the charge going off as it should."

[jabo0511]

Just a quick hint when you charge I always DOUBLE click at the enemy on the 2nd or 3rd line. What happen is the cavalry will ALWAYS charge and trample anything in its way including (check this out!) routing archers. Playing as the turks right now I have 2 armies, 1 army 90% infantry/archer 10% light cav the other one 100% heavy cavalry+cavalry archers (Qapakulu, sipahi lancers, sipahi archers). Whenever I'm on the open terrain I use my cavalry force and most of the time I only need to engage 50% of my cav force. Those qapakulus are amazing and they're good against armor (or other knights)

[Bijo]

Interesting.


Anyhow, I also noticed that if you're running/charging to an enemy unit downwards - as in going off a cliff, even a small one - the charge will be effective immediately. My general unit actually started charging enemy infantry down a not-so-steep little hill a split second (or slightly more) after I double-clicked them to attack.
But this also (or only) might have to do with the fact that the cavalry unit was experienced.
Still, when it happened I had this gut feeling it was due to the downwards charge. I did the same thing again in that same battle on the same ground.

[Carl]

Having just come off Otumba and Pavia I can say that single clicking on a unit does make them charge cohesively, AND they can even do it to moving enemy units. Really Nasty. (This is in the second Demo BTW, the full game may vary).

For reference in Otumba I had the enemy peasants start running at 90 degrees to my 2 full units of conquistadors, they STILL pulled of a frightening charge in spite of this that killed over 150 peasants from 2 units.

Likewise similar charges into other units seemed to produce similar effects (a rear charge at a bodyguard unit killed all but 2 guys, one being the general).