I'm not discounting that, but now we're seeing less hits being lethal, so that has to account for cav's decresing performance
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Cavalry downgraded in 1.8.0
- Thread starter Dabos37
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Dabos37
Sergeant Knight at Arms
While it is true that infantry performs better un Bannerlord, and the armor buff makes everyone harder to kill, it has not to do with the fact that cavalry AI is really bad in 1.8. Cavalry AI was far supperior some patches ago, but in 1.8 cavalry units miss most of the time mostly because they attack with delay.
The issue is especially evident for cavalry using lances like Banner Knights.
The issue is especially evident for cavalry using lances like Banner Knights.
I normally agree with you on most stuff, but on this I can't. Cavalry's already favored by massive bias from TW (and most players also throw the same bias because they have this surrealistic belief that Cavalry in melee battles were gods among men, when in reality that wasn't true)
Again, what made Cavalry so strong during middle ages was the fact that those were mostly if not entirely composed by Knights (professional soldiers of noble blood trained since they were 7yo) while infantry was mostly composed by levies of farmers and other peasants who didn't know how to fight, didn't want to fight, and ultimately would often run away at the first glance of trouble (reason why morale played such a massive factor during Middle Ages battles - because levies would compose the majority of an army, and when they decided to flee like cockroaches, the professional soldiers would suddenly become extremely outnumbered to a point of certain defeat).
Any tight formation was supposed to completely halt cavalry charges (Circle with 3 or more lines of depth, squares, shieldwalls, deep line formations, etc.), in BL that doesn't happen - wrong in all aspects. Now, what lacks in BL is AI, but that affects all combat AI, including all unit types. If that was fixed and the cheat "ghost-through" from cavalry toned down, than we'd have something much better. Though I'm not sure TW can handle fixing this... In Warband it took a bigbrain modder to actually fix the AI to the engines limits with Formations mod, and in BL TW has failed to even make formations behave even remotely like the mod accomplished in WB, so it's anybody's guess if they can fix that or not.
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I don't believe cavalry were gods on the field. They were, however, incredibly important and useful on the field of battle, and provided a pretty significant advantage in a lot of contexts. I would say what TW is doing with polearms in general is more severe than what they are doing with cavalry though. And while I disagree that TW is favoring cav (it wouldn't be a mess if they did), even if they were, they are still purposely going forward with what ultimately does not work. And I think that's a huge problem, that they think their vision of how it should work despite its problems is the only way forward.
cav should always use couched lance on full charges / they should also try to get distance for repeating charges instead of merry-go dancing when holding polearms (you'll see that issue often in tournaments where the AI doesn't have any side-arms). They should also be stopped by tight formations, and the entire couched aiming should be "fixed" (it's off target even for the player, do a few test runs and you'll notice that the hitbox isn't where the spear head is). Cav and foot troops also should get stuck into their own troops instead of perma "pushing" to make room (I've had PC fall from walls due to that ludicrous system way too often).
AI weapon switch triggers are also broken and should trigger earlier, one of the reasons charges are so powerful for any unit type is that.
Bracing spears should trigger on any formations (they seem to only really work with lines) - and even though they have a phalanx picture in a perk, the AI will never do a phalanx bracing no matter how you try to position them.
Enemy army AI also have some really dumb decision making when it comes to using their units and formations. I think the worst I've seen (and way too often) is a another Zerg Rush, but this time it's when AI is losing and the weird deployment keeps spawning them in layers, you'll basically see a sea of enemy troops scattered all over the map with massive gaps that will successfully harass your army, but will be ultimately and completely slaughtered for doing so. That takes away from any strategical plays from us and it makes for a bad experience. We can counter it almost exclusively by retreating a forming a massive spread line of archers, but even than it's only making the battle last longer because after some kills enemy enters retreat mode and takes 3 years to reach the end of the map.
So, although I agree that cavalry's currently very inefficient to past standards, it still comes on top of all fights, they just take longer to kill and aren't using couched as they should. If you field a pure cataphract cav army there's absolutely nothing that can stop you in-game - they move too fast, have too much armor and have enough stats to basically wipe any unit with ease, the casualties you'll get are from the bad AI, but that's it. The natural counter to cav are infantry tight formations, none seem to work except for when AI auto-triggers bracing and solely on the first cav charge (because from there on the cavalry will destroy the infatry 100% of the time no matter the infantry loadout, armor, stats, or formation)
The only unit that can stop a cataphract pure army's the menavilon due to being able to swing their spears and being really fast on movespeed, even than when mixed they can't do much, specially if it's a cluttered battle.
I must have really bad luck then, because cavalry is so useless to me in Bannerlord that I rarely deploy them. They almost always miss, they don't hold formations well, the AI makes wonky decisions etc. I mean yea, they're strong when they do it, but I think they're just incredibly too inconsistent and programmed wonky to be of actual use. I prefer even keeping them out because they get in the way so much, like charging through friendlies to get at enemies just beyond them. It's just so frustrating. lol
Y'all also seem to be forgetting the other major change that screws over elite troops in Bannerlord something fierce - strength and iron skin are gone, weapon skill itself is really only half-in. The difference between even garbage infantry an the best cataphract in bannerlord is purely that of their weapon skill, and on that matter I'm not even convinced there's much of a meaningful difference. The separation of strength and hp is gone so it just becomes a matter of who gets to whallop who first. What this means is that when Bannerlord cav gets bogged down, even if they're in a good position to smack heads - they aren't hitting harder or have more HP than the troops that are poking them to death. In warband if your elite cavalry get stuck in melee, they're still good at that even if the positioning is less than ideal, and especially with maces will absolutely punish even well armored infantry. Bannerlord? The elite cav are only better because of slightly better weapons and better armor (while armor of course does jack ****).
Abandoning warband's stat system and its consequences have been a disaster for bannerlord.
Abandoning warband's stat system and its consequences have been a disaster for bannerlord.
First, holy cow that is extensive testing and data. I applaud this dude for that huge task alone. That shield wall formation looked strong there. Why is it that none of this ever works that well for me? I'm gonna have to re-watch this for sure tonight, that was some really dense and interesting content.
Also, is this channel run by someone who is an academic in ancient warfare? He seems exceptionally well versed in these strategies.
now about the argument point, I guess you're right on that regard, I've been using Warbandlord which fixes it so I'm having a blast with the game overall (nah, mostly combat really):
Road to salvation!
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Zerosaiko
Knight at Arms
Isn't part of the issue with cavalry that both them and footmen got worse at fighting with thrusting polearms in 1.8 than they were in 1.7, like how footmen like to get really close even with a long weapon? Strat did that formation guide in 1.7.1, so you might not get the same results doing the same things in 1.8.
five bucks
Knight at Arms
Well it's kind of the point. They shouldn't be functioning worse than they did in Warband.
Dabos37
Sergeant Knight at Arms
As people are mentionig, these tests were made in 1.7.2 where cavalry AI was decent. Cavalry AI is much worse in 1.8, but Cataphracts are somehow still viable because they switch to melee weapon more often, but units like Banner Knights or Druzhinik Champion which use lances most of the time are considerably much worse in 1.8.
so TW has broken their own already broken AI? POETRY I say!
well, we can try to use RBM's AI (though I find it a bit awkward from my testing), or you can try my mod combo, at least it seems to mitigate the effect because I'm not feeling it (although I find it quite ridiculous how often they miss hits)
You'll need: Warbandlord and dismemberment (I'm using the simple RTS but I'd recommned th full OG mod, this one's not very good)
You can apply the same cav tactics that Strat Gaming did, they'll work. The key here is that Warbandlord mimics skill buffs that Warband gave but inserting those % buffs into the appropriate skills (simulating WB's system) - I set dismemberment to dmg (it can only happen if certain threshold applies) lowered all to 1% chance of slowmo except for decapitations, and I'm having a blast. Be advised that you wil NEED the weapon skill you want to be effective at at 5 focus pts and no less than 225 skill level for your PC. Otherwise you won't be as godlike effective as you might in vanilla. It is, however, a very satisfying experience to push for 300, when you reach that level you'll be a killing machine, reminds me a lot of Warband, so much so that i'm sort of hooked into my current save just due to that feeling, though I have to admit it's burning me out fast due to how bad the rest is (too much lack of control piled up on every single aspect of the game makes for a really annoying experience)
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Dabos37
Sergeant Knight at Arms
so TW has broken their own already broken AI? POETRY I say!
well, we can try to use RBM's AI (though I find it a bit awkward from my testing), or you can try my mod combo, at least it seems to mitigate the effect because I'm not feeling it (although I find it quite ridiculous how often they miss hits)
You'll need: Warbandlord and dismemberment (I'm using the simple RTS but I'd recommned th full OG mod, this one's not very good)
You can apply the same cav tactics that Strat Gaming did, they'll work. The key here is that Warbandlord mimics skill buffs that Warband gave but inserting those % buffs into the appropriate skills (simulating WB's system) - I set dismemberment to dmg (it can only happen if certain threshold applies) lowered all to 1% chance of slowmo except for decapitations, and I'm having a blast. Be advised that you wil NEED the weapon skill you want to be effective at at 5 focus pts and no less than 225 skill level for your PC. Otherwise you won't be as godlike effective as you might in vanilla. It is, however, a very satisfying experience to push for 300, when you reach that level you'll be a killing machine, reminds me a lot of Warband, so much so that i'm sort of hooked into my current save just due to that feeling, though I have to admit it's burning me out fast due to how bad the rest is (too much lack of control piled up on every single aspect of the game makes for a really annoying experience)
I do not recommend using RBM if you do not want to use the RBM units. I do not like RBM units because they look too elite IMO, and I prefer vanilla ones. Using RBM with vanilla units makes archers even more OP against infantry, so RBM is not an option for me.
I can't stand the archery slowmo speeds, it's very unrealistic for most bows and for the ones it hits the spot it simply doesn't account for half-draws and other techniques that were and are used in archery, on the plus side, not having actual realistic drawing animations makes it weird!
Longbows were drawn with a leaning technique, while bows on horseback ranged from what we see to this date on both Japanese asymetrical bows and composites from the Mongolians. The drawing animation in the game combined with a realistic speed makes it look too wrong
Low draw-weight bows, which's where the mod "breaks", can be spammed for an almost endless stream of shots, while longbows have a much more tactical application because it needs either advantageous positioning, or to be distant enough to even be considered as a tactical option (talking about realistic scenarios, not the game). It's also a very ludicrous thing having them being "op against infantry" considering the fact that, realistically, heavy armor that contained plate was impervious to any type of bow dmg
- so bow dmg should only happen sometimes IF the arrow managed to slip through a gap, and even so, in a realistic scenario, that would only stop the guy from fighting if it hit a critical soft spot (for almost instant "kill") or a vital organ/artery. Otherwise the guy would keep fighting, although under a lot of pain.Sweynforkbeard
Squire
My point is that they were never strong in Warband because of lances, more like despite of them.
Sweynforkbeard
Squire
I cannot speak for infantry in general. But from recent experience I can say that Legionaries use their pillums very effectively. I honestly doubt that any melee cavalry would stand a chance against legionaries atm.
Zerosaiko
Knight at Arms
Yeah, I could see the pilums being used pretty effectively since they're one of the shortest spears if I remember right? The AI can't really handle long weapons that well I think.
Sweynforkbeard
Squire
Yes, that is also my take on it. The Pillum does basically the same as every other spear and at the same time it is much less unwieldy.
