Horse Charges and Collision.

[Bacchus]

Note: I'm not sure if this has been discussed beforehand or not (my search results indicate the latter), however these are just mere thoughts and suggestions on the topic of horse riding and horse charges, ideas that may be salvaged by the developers themselves, or atleast by upcoming modders.

I always hated the way your mounted soldier and the horse you are riding come to a death staring halt, after bumping into another horse or an enviromental prop. Personally, it ruins the flow of the game, and sure, it might stand as a penalty to the player for "bad" horse riding skills, but it never seems realistic under any circumstances. Naturally the horse tries to avoid colliding into another horse or obstacle (even if being a bred warhorse), except for when it has no choice but to do so, whether it's the vision-reducing head armor, or just many horses charging at the same place and time. Whatever the scenario may be, the outcome never results in the immediate "freeze" of the mounted unit.

In fact there are many outcomes in the case of just 2 horses crashing into one another, whether full speed and head on, or in different angles one another, or even one of them in a motionless state, resulting in their serious crippling damage or deaths involving the tumbling and rolling of their bodies, and of course, the mounted soldiers flying all over the place. Imagine driving a car 50 mph into a wall or another car headed towards your direction, but you're not in the driver's seat, oh no in fact you are sitting on top of it in a saddle, mr. bean style. And you can forget about seat belts and safety bags.

"Considering that horses have maximum speed of 40-48 km/h or 11-13m/s, they actually go fast. Horse running into another horse at this speed can cause fractures for both horses involved. Riders can be launched off of the horses backs at this speed and they will be falling from the height of their saddle or the horse can fall sideways while the rider is on it.

Falling from horseback can be fatal and often leads to severe bone fractures and things like concussions. If you combine that with heavy armor, even if you landed on something soft on your back you might be unable to get back up on your own. Falling on the ground and surrounded by the enemy infantry you were charging is bad even if you don't get hit. You can be trampled by friendly horses or dismounted troops and the enemy is out there go get you, regardless of broken bones or concussion.

It could be that your horse is injured and it falls to the side while you're on it - and your leg may get stuck under the horse while it's unable to move." -Matti Porkka, https://history.stackexchange.com/questions/38409/physics-of-a-heavy-cavalry-charge

Throughout history, horse charges consisted of keeping closed ranks amongst the mounted units. That is, the horses were near eachother to insure that all of them were charging towards the same direction, rather than having a friendly horse close in on a different angle and resulting into a friendly collision. On top of that, if the charge were to be slowed down, due to terrain or an act of premature tactics versus physically and mentally prepared defenders, the mounted unit would not be able to penetrate through the entire enemy formation, thus considered an unsuccesful charge, having the first line of cavarly get stuck among enemy units, while also being endangered by the upcoming clash of the rest of the friendly horses.
In Warband, charging as a mounted unit into a pikeman often results into the immediate halt of the horse and horseman, and of all the upcoming colliding horses behind said unit, leading into a moment of dull gameplay without any serious consequences or penalties on behalf of bad tactics and decision making. In short, the horses in Warband lack any true weight (now im sure this has been stated multiple times).

Keeping these facts in mind, implementing new game mechanisms and model animations can bring to the surface of the gameplay exciting battle strategies, decisions and outcomes, reinforcing the tactical side of this game, and really enhancing the great role of a mounted soldier.

 

[Honved]

The force of the impact seems to make no difference to the magnitude of the result.  Either it does nothing, or else it stops the horse cold in its tracks.  This is extremely annoying and ridiculous when you're in the midst of a cavalry charge, and the horse behind you slips THROUGH your horse from behind, and a moment later you're suddenly halted dead in your tracks by collision with the back of that other horse.  It also happens when you're along-side another horse charging in the same direction, and bump side-to-side, instantly halting your horse, when in reality the slight contact would barely be noticed by either horse.  Another case is the small foot-tall (or smaller) rock, which your horse can't jump or step over for some ridiculous reason, and won't simply swerve around because it has no ability of its own to evade or choose an exact path in the general direction you choose.

On the other hand, giving horses more "intelligence" and path-finding ability could be a disaster.  I'm sharply reminded of the horrendous pathfinding algorithms used in map mode by the game at present: you click on the map a couple of inches ahead of your party icon on the screen, and see it turn 120 degrees to one side, in order to take a "faster route" along a nearby road that goes off in some other direction.  You click again, and your party turns 180 degrees and heads off at 60 degrees from the direction you chose, rather than heading toward it, until it reaches some point where it decides to FINALLY turn back toward the point you chose, after having wasted 5-10 seconds of travel time going laterally to the objective.  In several cases, I've clicked to run directly away from a much larger and far more powerful enemy unit, and then watched my party turn around and head directly toward that enemy.  Reload time, AGAIN: I'm not going to play out a disaster that wasn't caused by MY error.  I've also sat and clicked on a single point repeatedly in bewildered amusement, 5 or 6 times about 2 seconds apart, as my party ran back and forth at 90 degree angles to the direction of travel, never actually moving toward the objective.  Having your horse do that same kind of stupidity at odd moments on the tactical map would make cavalry close to unplayable, and constant collisions inevitable.

 

[Bacchus]

There is a fine line between realism and fun, and in my honest opinion the horse gaits in warband, and in bannerlord (seen in gameplay footage, practically identical to those in warband) don't belong to any field, being too predictable and sometimes anti-climactic.

Other than just being a disaster, implementing more intelligence and path-finding to horse AI must require allot of time and effort, having to calculate directions/projectiles/speed/particle effects/animations...it's a hell of a work. Of course, the m&b universe was never meant to be that realistic. But by giving full control of the horse to the player, it's less prone to unpredictable moments that could be memorable. It's almost like driving a vespa, as read in another post in this forum.
The ideal would be to find that sweet spot between realism and fun, having control over the horse, but also adding that touch randomness and creativity. For example, I remember having so much fun playing GTA IV and witnessing my character torpedo through the windshield of the car, leading to some disasterous, albeit hilarious moments.

 

[Terco_Viejo]

What we have

隐藏: What it should be

What we have

隐藏: What it should be

min 0:20

 

[Bacchus]

Those are great videos that emfasize the topic very well, thank you. However I don't mind the exaggerated way the infantry get launched after getting hit by a horse, I might even like it. It's more fun than realistic. But the problem is the contradiction of the different models: you can't have infantry made of paper, horses out of rock, and terrain out of diamond.

 

[vicwiz007]

Good videos Terco but tbh the second real life one was not much different from the game except for the guy not going flying, but he was not hit exactly the same. The horse didnt seem to be slowed down at all by the actual collision. The first one is only possible with a physics system like Rockstar's Euphoria physics engine, which doesn't really fit here. Even if it did fit, it's way too late to go and change all that.

The desert gif of the horse hitting the guy is not exactly how it works every time. You often see the horse stutter (which in itself doesn't look great either), slowing down a bit. Though as we see in Terco's video, it shouldn't slow down the horse much anyway.

 

[Triune Impurity Rites 999]

Any one seen the final cavalry charge in LotR 3? Nothing but megalithic elephants slowed those horses down. Maybe Calradian horses are just as perpetuous(?).

 

[lolbash]

I always hated the way your mounted soldier and the horse you are riding come to a death staring halt, after bumping into another horse or an enviromental prop. Personally, it ruins the flow of the game, and sure, it might stand as a penalty to the player for "bad" horse riding skills, but it never seems realistic under any circumstances.

It was never mean't to be realistic in the first place.

implementing new game mechanisms and model animations can bring to the surface of the gameplay exciting battle strategies, decisions and outcomes, reinforcing the tactical side of this game, and really enhancing the great role of a mounted soldier.

Punishing cavalry players with death because their A and D pressing skills are a little off is a stupid idea that only exists to satisfy players that want extreme realism in Bannerlord, or players that go naked 2 handed and complain about being shot by arrows and run over by cavalry. 2 of the worst types of people to talk to about game balance.

And don't say that you are thinking about the balance side of the game when more than 70% of your post historical websites blogs and complaining about unrealistic horses in Warband. Its pretty obvious you are only thinking about realisim, with disregard for many players that like to focus on the more action oriented part pf the game.

This is going to be my last post on this thread. Im tired of repeating myself over and over to idiots that plug their ears and scream "REALISIM REALISM" and I am not going to get myself muted again.

 

[Orion]

This is going to be my last post on this thread. Im tired of repeating myself over and over to idiots that plug their ears and scream "REALISIM REALISM" and I am not going to get myself muted again.

I commend your decision to show restraint, but calling people idiots is counter-productive to your goal.

I do agree with your view regarding balance in this case, though. Realism in an action-oriented RPG is fine up to the point where it is an obstacle to fun. Can you imagine the amount of griefing there would be online if horse collisions could dismount riders and/or damage them? Public servers would be non-stop bumper cars.

 

[Noudelle]

This is going to be my last post on this thread. Im tired of repeating myself over and over to idiots that plug their ears and scream "REALISIM REALISM" and I am not going to get myself muted again.

I commend your decision to show restraint, but calling people idiots is counter-productive to your goal.

I do agree with your view regarding balance in this case, though. Realism in an action-oriented RPG is fine up to the point where it is an obstacle to fun. Can you imagine the amount of griefing there would be online if horse collisions could dismount riders and/or damage them? Public servers would be non-stop bumper cars.

What he said.

One thing that I hope is changed in regards to horse collision is the interaction when colliding with infantry teammates.
I'm going to use multiplayer as an example because this is where it has the most impact.

In Warband, getting rammed by a teammate on a horse/ramming a teammate with a horse at full speed will stop the horse instantly. I've had enough idiot teammates in Warband multiplayer charging into me at full speed trying to hit the guy I'm dueling, only for him to then get stuck behind me, not only rendering him completely useless in combat, but preventing me from moving properly.

I just lowered my IQ by 65 points and booted up Warband multiplayer to demonstrate what I'm talking about and here's the result:
(unfortunately these aren't the best examples as I didn't get nearly as many teammates killed as I wanted to.)
https://youtu.be/SH1XsPR0dVA
This is dumb. Not only is this unrealistic and looks silly, but it's also in my opinion detrimental to the gameplay for both the infantry player and the cavalry.
My solution is simply for horse collisions with teammates to shove the infantry player to the side, allowing the horse to keep moving forwards. Not only will you as an infantry player never have to experience some idiot getting stuck behind you while fighting ever again, but the cavalry player will also have the joy of not completely losing all momentum in a fraction of a second, getting stuck in place.

 

[Orion]

It's not something you see often at a high competitive level, though. Players of that tier are often very spatially aware, and are also usually communicating with each other on VoIP to avoid the scenario you describe. What you propose is an interesting situation to consider for balance. In Warband, who loses in the scenario where a horseman charges into the back of his teammate and is brought to a sudden stop? Is it the infantryman, his opponent, or the horseman? The infantry player gains nothing and loses nothing, he is simply in the same situation he was in before. The opponent loses nothing and potentially gains the opportunity to strike the horseman while he is vulnerable. The horseman loses the safety of his mobility and gains nothing. So, balance-wise, one player is by his own action disadvantaging himself, while providing a corresponding opportunity to his opponent, and the player's teammate neither gains nor loses anything in the exchange. Point being, the horseman is the one who made a mistake and he is the one potentially punished for it.

Now, imagine your proposal is in effect, and the cavalry player knocks his teammate aside to follow through on his attack. Who loses then? The horseman hit his own teammate but there is no drawback, his charge continues. The teammate on foot is now made defenseless by his teammate's action, and is vulnerable to attack. The opponent is arguably in a worse position as well, as they must defend against a charging horseman, but if the horseman's attack is unsuccessful then the opponent has an opportunity to capitalize on the horseman's defenseless teammate. In summary, the horseman neither gains nor loses, his teammate loses complete control of his character and is vulnerable to attack, and the opponent's situation has simply become high risk, high reward rather than necessarily worse or better. The player at fault is still the horseman, as he has the greatest mobility and thus greatest potential to avoid colliding with his teammate. With a degree of skill, he could have done so and still engaged the opponent.

In essence, I'm saying that charging cavalry being stopped by friendly infantry is the cavalry's fault and they are the ones who are disadvantaged by it, as it should be. Pushing the consequences onto infantry makes it even more difficult to enjoy playing the toughest class in the game, and for no fault of your own.

 

[Bjorn The Broken]

Isn't the reason they are not doing realistic collisions because it is hard to make? I mean real physics based interactions with a charging horse is pretty damn hard, I imagine.

 

[Orion]

Even if they could do it, should they?

 

[Bjorn The Broken]

As you know I can't say anything about MP. When it comes to SP, after playing Kindom CD, I want the game as realistic as possible so it would be good to have reaslistic horse collision for SP, as stated, I can't say anything about MP.

 

[Kentucky 『 ＨＥＩＧＵＩ 』 James]

Throughout history, horse charges consisted of keeping closed ranks amongst the mounted units. That is, the horses were near eachother to insure that all of them were charging towards the same direction, rather than having a friendly horse close in on a different angle and resulting into a friendly collision. On top of that, if the charge were to be slowed down, due to terrain or an act of premature tactics versus physically and mentally prepared defenders, the mounted unit would not be able to penetrate through the entire enemy formation, thus considered an unsuccesful charge, having the first line of cavarly get stuck among enemy units, while also being endangered by the upcoming clash of the rest of the friendly horses.

This isn't how cavalry charges worked historically and is one of the reasons why the current mechanics don't really work that well, because they try to be realistic in some areas while following film logic in others.

Horses can all run at completely different speeds. Cavalrymen would have to canter or even trot towards an enemy and then spur their horses at the very last moment. Some medieval accounts even seem to suggest that a cavalry charge was even conducted as a big trotting line, just riding relatively slowly into an enemy formation until it broke.
Here's a good article about cavalry during the Napoleonic wars which explains some of these dynamics:
http://www.napolun.com/mirror/napoleonistyka.atspace.com/cavalry_tactics.html#charge

Warband expects you to smash headlong into enemy infantry and cavalry and doesn't have anything in the way of collision mechanics to discourage it. If your horse hits 12 people head first, you can just turn around and try again. It doesn't make any sense and it shows. I'm not saying they should try to emulate history completely, but it a lot of the problems with horse mechanics come from half-assed realism.

 

[Scuba Steve]

Cavalry should function like it does in Red Dead Redemption 2 in regards to trampling people or running into other horsed individuals.

 

[Bacchus]

Punishing cavalry players with death because their A and D pressing skills are a little off is a stupid idea that only exists to satisfy players that want extreme realism in Bannerlord, or players that go naked 2 handed and complain about being shot by arrows and run over by cavalry. 2 of the worst types of people to talk to about game balance.

My intention is to state that the "Mount" perspective of the game is not only far from realistic, but also not as fun as it could be. If it were fun, I wouldn't care for its realism. Personally I believe the "freeze" of the mounted unit in Warband almost always leads to his death, a result that would occur less often in the case of having the rider immediately fall off the horse. I'm not posting this to hope for changes that will "punish" the cavalry players, in fact my aim is quite opposite. A cavalry unit could have a more unique role compared to its current state in let's say a team deathmatch or a battle, being the weapon used to make the deciding attack, consisting of a not so large group of horses, rather than having "random" horses rush by like crosstown traffic in India.

Being an infantry unit in Warband and spotting an incoming mounted unit causes no psychological effect to the player, in fact if you're half decent you can bring the horse down (arguable statement ). On the other hand, about to receive a wave of incoming horses, keeping in mind the crushing power a horse has against a human, could become a game winning strategic decision in the match, and ultimately a memorable experience. And the fear of the risks and penalties that the mounted unit can go through by riding off a random direction full speed, is what can keep mounted players move together as a unit.

 

[Terco_Viejo]

Cavalry should function like it does in Red Dead Redemption 2 in regards to trampling people or running into other horsed individuals.

Although he has good physics, I see this as excessive. Something in between does...

This would be good for me...

 

[Noudelle]

It's not something you see often at a high competitive level, though. Players of that tier are often very spatially aware, and are also usually communicating with each other on VoIP to avoid the scenario you describe. What you propose is an interesting situation to consider for balance. In Warband, who loses in the scenario where a horseman charges into the back of his teammate and is brought to a sudden stop? Is it the infantryman, his opponent, or the horseman? The infantry player gains nothing and loses nothing, he is simply in the same situation he was in before.

That's not true though. My problem with the way it currently works is precisely because when playing as infantry, having a teammate on a horse stuck behind you preventing you to move and fight properly is something that happens regularly.

The opponent loses nothing and potentially gains the opportunity to strike the horseman while he is vulnerable. The horseman loses the safety of his mobility and gains nothing. So, balance-wise, one player is by his own action disadvantaging himself, while providing a corresponding opportunity to his opponent, and the player's teammate neither gains nor loses anything in the exchange. Point being, the horseman is the one who made a mistake and he is the one potentially punished for it.

Now, imagine your proposal is in effect, and the cavalry player knocks his teammate aside to follow through on his attack. Who loses then? The horseman hit his own teammate but there is no drawback, his charge continues. The teammate on foot is now made defenseless by his teammate's action, and is vulnerable to attack. The opponent is arguably in a worse position as well, as they must defend against a charging horseman, but if the horseman's attack is unsuccessful then the opponent has an opportunity to capitalize on the horseman's defenseless teammate. In summary, the horseman neither gains nor loses, his teammate loses complete control of his character and is vulnerable to attack, and the opponent's situation has simply become high risk, high reward rather than necessarily worse or better. The player at fault is still the horseman, as he has the greatest mobility and thus greatest potential to avoid colliding with his teammate. With a degree of skill, he could have done so and still engaged the opponent.

I think you're misinterpreting what I said. What I have in mind is not a stun/knockback to the affected teammate, but rather just... Gently move him to the side.
Overwatch has a similar system but actually does the inverse of this. Here's what I mean: https://youtu.be/3pcXL9dh9mw
This isn't exactly what I'm proposing since the player who's getting moved in this instance is the one that's actively moving and not the inverse, but it's a similar system.
If a system like this (inverted) was implemented in Bannerlord, it would allow the infantry player to keep fighting mostly unhindered, since the horse would push him to the side and keep moving forwards, allowing for mostly uninterupted combat.

In essence, I'm saying that charging cavalry being stopped by friendly infantry is the cavalry's fault and they are the ones who are disadvantaged by it, as it should be. Pushing the consequences onto infantry makes it even more difficult to enjoy playing the toughest class in the game, and for no fault of your own.

To finish, I do concede that a system like I'm proposing might not be universally "good" for multiplayer. As you said, at higher skill levels, this isn't even an issue because the players know how to communicate and control their horses properly.
The problem is that the vast majority of players do not play the game at such a level. And playing in a public server and having your idiot teammates get in the way of your enjoyment because they can't control their horses isn't fun.
All that being said, I think that this should at least be a server option.

 

[Orion]

I think you're misinterpreting what I said. What I have in mind is not a stun/knockback to the affected teammate, but rather just... Gently move him to the side.

I think you're right. 

No problem with that then, except it kinda devalues positioning for infantry if putting their opponent between them & a horseman doesn't mean anything. This might make it too easy for a horseman to charge into an infantry fight & bump/knock down enemies because he no longer has to consider half of the people on foot.