No thrust attack with polearms while mounted?

Whenever I try to do a thrust attack with a polearm (in my case, a yari and a naginata) while mounted I just awkwardly swing my polearm around. Is there a specific type of polearm that is meant for mounted combat?

lances, usually can be couched for extra damages. However, I doubt that you'll get your hands on one in this mod.

The Su Yari can be couched, but cannot thrust.

Articulo34 said:

The Su Yari can be couched, but cannot thrust.

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even katakama yari can do that

Using the item editor, it appears that NONE of the polearms, whether yari, naginata or what have you, can be used to thrust from horseback. They can all be used to swing from horseback, though. For the yari it should be the complete opposite. There is no good reason why the yari's primary attack should not be available from horseback.

It was an old bug that we talked about prior to 3.0 coming out. Actually I think phlpp fixed it in an older version, one of the betas I think? Weird that it got reverted.

- edit: Upon checking the module system files, it looks like it's intentional. The definition for itc_staff (which determines the kinds of attacks and animations you can do with all weapons tagged like that) has itcf_thrust_one_handed_lance and itcf_thrust_onehanded_lance_horseback removed.

You can edit the .txt files safely with Morgh's, or edit the source files and recompile.

In all fairness, there isn't a mod I've played that I haven't tweaked a bit using the editors. And there are mods I have tweaked far, far more than I've done with this one.

I have to ask though, what is the reasoning for it? Did the Japanese outlaw thrust based mounted attacks? Because that would be new history for me.

It's likely just an oversight like it was before.

Wouldn't be so bad if the hands weren't misaligned with the weapon while swinging, it's quite clear the animations weren't meant for polearms.

Rovernic said:

I have to ask though, what is the reasoning for it? Did the Japanese outlaw thrust based mounted attacks? Because that would be new history for me.

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I've only used yari from horseback, so this might not apply to all polearms, but here's my reasoning (and why I like the current state of affairs):

In this mod, horses are fast and accelerate pretty quickly, which means you get to couching speed in short time. This couched state is your thrust attack, as I feel the mod is trying to get you to use hit and run tactics with polearms from horseback. Note that you specifically get left and right attacks, where vanilla M&B tends to only give you a thrust from horseback with any polearm. It's also worth considering that Gekokujo uses long polearms, which means those sideward attacks cover a lot of distance -- often while moving at high speeds. So this means that your horseback attacks have a kind of "clotheslining" quality to them. You create a danger zone to either side of yourself, with a kind of point of critical damage right in front of you by way of your couched lance.

The overall result is that your overall threat zone resembles something like a wedge, which seems appropriate to me. In regular M&B and mods where there's a heavier emphasis on the knightly lance charge with barded horses that can survive extended periods of heavy combat, this kind of setup isn't really required. In Gekokujo, however, where you're encouraged to hit and run while on horseback rather than wade through ranks of infantry, this kind of wedge threat zone makes horseback fighting much more versatile at the expense of raw power and survivability.

It's really weird not being able to stab someone with a spear, though.  In Brytenwalda, I routinely use a spear from horseback to tremendous effect; I charge at the enemy, then veer away at the last second and do a thrust at a 45-degree angle into their face to avoid their spear thrust.  It's exactly the kind of mounted hit-and-run spear attack you want, but more effective and realistic.

Unrelated question: Is there any reason to use anything but the kanabo/tetsubo/etc. on foot, as far as melee weapons go?  It has good reach and acceptable speed, lots of armor-smashing power, can knock people off their feet, usually brings enemies down in one or two hits, can crush through blocks, and nets you captives to sell.  I want to use a nagamaki or the yari that looks like a Chinese dagger-axe, but it's impossible to justify getting anything other than that vicious baseball bat.

Nagamaki can stop horses right on their hooves with a well timed thrust and it also works well on horse since it has a good combination of speed, reach and damage. Other than that, Tetsubos are better than anything else once your character goes over 250 two-handed proficiency. Although there is a situation where they are counterproductive. On a defensive siege unless you are sure the enemy is going to deploy every single solider they have you´ll want them dead, not knocked out.

I'm a little late in replying to this, but yes, this was actually an oversight, not intentional. I meant to enable horseback swings for staves, but forgot that also messed with spears (or i remembered at first, but forgot to actually split spears away from itc_staff after doing half of my intended 'fix')

Is there any fix for this yet?

And semi-related question, but are there any mods out there that add two-handed spear thrusts from horseback like the xyston and kontos?

There is an excellent tutorial by Hanakoganei about how to add overhead thrust with spears on foot (also an amazing addition that makes spearmen actually useful on the field) and once you understood what you're doing there adding thrust attack from horseback is a piece of cake. I did it myself and I have never modded anything in warband before except for a bit of tweaking with Morghs, so it is really easy to do.

Yeah, I just downloaded this from the Steam Workshop (the only full conversion mod that actually works from there?), and was all ready to thrust some spear when - whoops.  Started over when I realized my pole-arm just wasn't going to hack it (well, "skewer it", in this case).  If you do fix it, please include an automatic update for the Steam Workshop.  In the meantime, I'll stick to my katana.  Amazing mod, btw;  I live in Japan (and am married to a distant relative of Oda Nobunaga, as it turns out), so seeing the familiar place names - including places I've lived - is a hoot.

Well, I changed/added some attacks for spears and the like. I could upload the tweaked textfiles if plhpp is fine with that.

The particular changes are
- Thrust attack from horseback (downward thrust) for all yaris that are usable while mounted.
- Kept the sideswings for these, too.
- On-Foot Overhead swing for all yari-type spears replaced by an overhead thrust. This makes spearmen much more powerful, as the overhead thrust is less speed-dependent than the downward thrust. A blob of spearmen is thus actually a dangerous thing to charge at, as you will get poked to death quickly.
- Left all naginatas unchanged. They still do an overhead swing and cannot thrust from horseback, just as it should be.
- Made the entire thing compatible with Jacob's weapon animation sub mod.

On the other hand, it is really simple to do this yourself if you just follow the few steps in the tutorial I linked above.

How did you get it to work?

I used morghs item-editor, and I enabled for the Yaris: thrust_onehanded_lance and thrust_onehanded_lance_horseback. I disabled the other horseback options (overswing, slashright, slashleft etc).
I even checked how 1257AD did it. I use the exact same flags and capabilities as lances in that mod.

But when I save the changes and try ingame I still only have the slashes from horseback. It drives me to the edge of despair really.

EDIT: Do I need to edit the .py-files like in your linked tutorial, too? Seems a bit more complicated than morghs item editor. If so: changing the values in the .py-files seems straightforward in any texteditor but how do I "compile" them? Is it even possible without having python installed?

Maybe you could offer the changed files as a submod in the meantime?