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Custom battle tests (1.5.6): Horse archers are insanely OP & Infantry is pointless
- Thread starter Yertyl
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Maximum997
Squire
I 100% can.
All archers or all horse archers work syupidly good.
Mongolian army was 100% cav. Some armies was 100% infantry
Maximum997
Squire
Infantry in this game is pointless and useless.
"But infantry can hold a ground!111"
And why you need to hold a ground? You can just kite enemies to the death or shoot them to death before they even can reach you.
Infantry has only one purpose: to take arrows in the face so more important troops can survive.
"But infantry can hold a ground!111"
And why you need to hold a ground? You can just kite enemies to the death or shoot them to death before they even can reach you.
Infantry has only one purpose: to take arrows in the face so more important troops can survive.
Yep this is my preferred tactic. Though to be honest, horse archers make this tactic pretty OP.
Also for the first time, I decided to go with a Khuzait, "All Cavalry/Horse Archer" Army and horse archers really are OP.
I can literally take 100 horse archers and win against enemy armies of 300-400 strength with very little losses on my side. I just tell me horse archers to follow me, we quickly wipe out their cavalry, then I just kite the enemy infantry and archers until they run away in fear. Then I just charge everyone in. It is pretty ridiculous.
The problem is that in nearly every case, the battlefields in Bannerlord favor the horse archer. There are very, very few tight, clustered maps that limit mobility. As someone who is running a very horse archer heavy army right now, I can attest that battles fought where the engagement begins too close to a village and spawn a village map are living hells for me and my horse archers and I tend to take a massive amount of casualties to both them and my Lancers in this terrain. Infantry would be and is 10x more viable in these fights.
Because
Sergeant
Agree it's all about terrain. Infantry on an open plain or steppe should get clobbered by HA. Of course the reverse should be true for HA in dense woodland or urban terrain. It's why the dynamic terrain thing will be interesting to see, if the AI will try to pick battlegrounds that benefit their troops it will make battles way more challenging. Even now I try to only engage enemies when the terrain suits my army and would always avoid village combat like the plague.
If the Ai could factor terrain into when to fight/how to move it would also make sense if terrain modified auto-calc as well. If they can do this sending HA into the dense snow covered woods of Sturgia should be as tricky as it is for the Sturgians to try and compete on the open steppe.
This would mean that HA would still be OP in the situations where TBH they should be OP, but stop them being able to blindly thrown into any battle. It has to be done for auto calc as well though as most wars will be decided by AI auto calc battles so they need to get these working too.
five bucks
Knight at Arms
Mongolian armies were ~60% light horse archers and ~40% heavy lancer cavalry.
Military of the Mongol Empire - Wikipedia
The light horse archers would soften up the enemy and lower their morale by showering them with arrows, then the heavy cavalry would charge in to finish the job. The heavy cavalry was necessary because killing someone who is well armored or covered by a big shield takes a lot of arrows.
There were a lot of things that helped the Mongols conquer a large empire other than effectiveness as warriors. They had the benefit of high strategic mobility, as their entire forces were mounted on horses who had great stamina and could be used as a source of food (mare's milk). Unlike other armies who had infantry baggage trains slowing them down, they could cover wide areas before the enemy expected them to arrive, easily flee battles they couldn't win, and easily pursue weak enemies. Another factor was their superior tactics focused around flanking, constant harassing, etc. But in pitched battle they weren't far more powerful than other sorts of equally well-equipped and well-trained warriors.
Horse archers were good IRL, but not as effective as they are in Bannerlord. This is because Bannerlord's armor is very unrealistically weak against arrows, and also shield-using AI don't defend themselves properly. Among other issues.
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This was a terrible system in Warband too. Reinforcements should spawn in from the map edge and march over.
Maximum997
Squire
It is true. And this problem is not solved.
Antaeus
Squire
Unless you're cheesing and quitting/reloading large battles... Archers run out of arrows long before the end of large army confrontations. At this point those 'useless' enemy infantry start chewing them up and spitting them out, unless you have your own 'useless' infantry to protect them.
HA dominance has to do with the abhorrent lack of armor effectiveness in Bannerlord.
Since day one of early access, attacks (especially ranged attacks) absolutely shred everything in their path, mowing down Tier 1 peasant and Tier 6 elite troops alike. No matter how well equipped they are, they simply die like flies.
The damage calculation formula is just bad. Really bad.
Since day one of early access, attacks (especially ranged attacks) absolutely shred everything in their path, mowing down Tier 1 peasant and Tier 6 elite troops alike. No matter how well equipped they are, they simply die like flies.
The damage calculation formula is just bad. Really bad.
Frankly I would put HA on a solid last on my tier-list, not so far away from melee cav.
Anyone with a shield and some mates to cover your back is outclassing HA to me, and if you need Khan's Guard to dress any conclusions, then it raises the question about how viable are the others.
Anyone with a shield and some mates to cover your back is outclassing HA to me, and if you need Khan's Guard to dress any conclusions, then it raises the question about how viable are the others.
honestly i ran a series of tests, put my infantry in shield wall and went afk. came back they killed archers after absorbing all their arrows to their shields. with a 3:1 kdr. and the ones that died were mostly because their shields got destroyed by arrow fire in the front row. a shield's durability can probably withstand 2 quivers of arrows
A shield's durability can probably take over five or six quivers of arrows; projos do 1/10th damage to shields.
yeah, honestly. people things archers are good vs ai since their infantry never does shield wall. but seriously the shields... my first ever battle lost was because i got swarmed by enemy infantry. they just came in such numbers, it didn't matter how many we shot down
Strange. I always encounter fat shield walls on my game. To the point that I even recorded a battle when my archers ( ~ 70 + 30 Xbows ) ran out of arrows/quivers, forcing me to make a charge.
edit : I grabbed a screenshot from an earlier battle. Notice the low tier army, and how many arrows they managed to block.
there'a difference between shield wall formation, and shield soldiers holding shields up as they walk towards you. the enemy only knows square and circle for infantry
in shield wall, troops will hold the shield up at 100% of the time, with 0 drop down window which isn't true for normal (they used to drop the shield lots but they changed it to only sometimes).and in shield wall troops will prioritize holding the formation over attacking. you'll have a lot less casualties in melee combat, except when you get flanked, they'll continue to hold formation and ignore the guys cutting them from behind...
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Well I guess holding a shield then walking towards you count as a shield wall. Since you can do exactly the same with your Troops ( Shield Wall -> Advance ).
Indeed they're not lined up, they are still waiting on a Circle on my screen, making it near to impossible to defeat them with Archery.
Indeed they're not lined up, they are still waiting on a Circle on my screen, making it near to impossible to defeat them with Archery.
technically sure, but in this game there's the shield wall formation, f2 f2. which is a specific command and has specific properties.
i don't advance or charge my infantry before the enemy routs and the victory music plays and i'm in the cut down runners phase. i just move them with f1 left click. shield wall is slower than normal advance and tighter. guys in the back hold shields up to block more shots. paired with the 100% shield up time. it allows almost 0 shots through, where as the default line formation with advance command they still allow gaps in the ranks and shield drop down windows.
if the enemy is waiting in a circle for you to attack. you only need to shoot around 100 arrows at them to make them charge. get 5 horse archers and tell them to go ham 100m from the enemy. and they'll come instead