I like Bannerlord's current balance between realism and fair play. I don't think such weaponization of horse charges would be good for the game's health. Maybe it could have a greater effect on morale (if it does have any effect at all at the moment) and knock down more often or something as a way of "buffing" melee cavalry, which seems to be a bit lacking compared to horse archers or melee infantry.
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Please make shield wall like this......
- Thread starter veronicaaltoids
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Napoleonic cavalry and square is not a good comparison.
- guns (much more important than the bayonet)
- difference in the role of cavalry (hussars/light cavalry was not armed with lances and armor)
- difference in the origins of cavalrymen (conscripts vs. nobility)
- difference in the equipment of cavalry (which limits their use)
If you don't want to accept pre-Nappy written sources, because of biased viewpoints, it will be difficult to discuss this topic
that's really impolite. you want to appear smart? attack the argument not me. i don't think it will
take you anywhere. i won't discuss this topic because of biased(?) viewpoints(?).
You just moved the goalpost.
Being able to break a formation is not the same as the mere physical possibility of charging at one.
The point that was being made was that horses would NEVER charge at a block of infantry. What you are arguing however is that even if such a charge would occur, it would not be successful. Those are two completely different arguments.
Personally through gameplay i feel the imperial menavliatons and their elite counterparts are best vs cavalry, especially the player, they seem to time their attacks very well against approaching cavalry
Any swinging two-handed polearm does well against cavalry, especially in Loose formation (more space to swing). It is approximately backwards from real life, but that's the way the game works currently.
@Askorti, what i'm trying to understand is why would in some periods
horses wouldn't dare charge and at other times they would. it's a little
strange that horses would charge pikes and not bayonnets.
it startles me. anyway about f.e waterloo, there are about 700+
primary sources, eyewitnesses. that's why i am confused, as to why apparently
trained horses in the one would charge something that is really
more fearfull, like long forests of pikes of 700AD, and not
small in size riffles with bayonets.
in napoleonic times the way that i have understood cavalry tactics, is that cavalrymen would, could
and did try to charge infantry in formation. but horses would insticaly decline
to throw themselves and impaled in pikes, bayonnets etc.
horses like any creature with survival instincts would deny to continue.
it is reffered in many primary sources (eye-witnesses), that the horse would
full gallop, but once saw the wall of pointy things the would stop gallop,
and then just trott, or completely stop.
i'll try and give an example that happened countless times, in napoleonic
fields. if during a battle the weather was rainy, this would occur:
musquets wouldn't fire, and cavalry would be unable to mount a charge.
so that both type of troops would stand some feet apart, looking at each other.
horses wouldn't dare charge and at other times they would. it's a little
strange that horses would charge pikes and not bayonnets.
it startles me. anyway about f.e waterloo, there are about 700+
primary sources, eyewitnesses. that's why i am confused, as to why apparently
trained horses in the one would charge something that is really
more fearfull, like long forests of pikes of 700AD, and not
small in size riffles with bayonets.
in napoleonic times the way that i have understood cavalry tactics, is that cavalrymen would, could
and did try to charge infantry in formation. but horses would insticaly decline
to throw themselves and impaled in pikes, bayonnets etc.
horses like any creature with survival instincts would deny to continue.
it is reffered in many primary sources (eye-witnesses), that the horse would
full gallop, but once saw the wall of pointy things the would stop gallop,
and then just trott, or completely stop.
i'll try and give an example that happened countless times, in napoleonic
fields. if during a battle the weather was rainy, this would occur:
musquets wouldn't fire, and cavalry would be unable to mount a charge.
so that both type of troops would stand some feet apart, looking at each other.
Textbook says tight formation (shieldwall?) and braced spears against cavalry charges, right? I mean, I've been told that's pure fiction, but that's what fiction textbook says, right?
I don't think I attacked you at all. you wrote this:
"now we go to historic sources. it's a huge topic. who wrote them, why, was something he needed
to report or something he wanted to report."
I interpreted this that you don't trust medieval (pre-Nappy) sources because they are biased.
I don't see what can be considered an "attack" in my post.
I think the answer to that is extremely simple. It's probably not the only reason, but I can only assume to be the main one.
Horse training. The Polish-Lithiuanian Commonwealth was at the time of its height renowned for its military horses, which were well-bred extensively trained.
I can only assume that at the time of the Napoleonic Wars, when the importance of cavalry already diminished significantly, horses were no longer trained to the same standard as before. Especially since their primary role changed from the breakthrough force into more of a support screening one.
ok, ,maybe i'm a bit itchy
what i meant wasn't that i don't trust the medieval\ancient sources.
it's just that after the renaisance, sources increase drasticaly in size.
in medieval battles you would have at most two or three, or maybe even one.
source. in the societes of 1700 until now, source's are more than enough..
yes it might be that. different horse training could make up for.
i don't really know anything about horse training.
what baffles me is that during the battles of 1800, there existed shock-heavy cavalry.
which general directions were not to scout, or run through panicked running troops,
but to destroy ennemy formations. i suspect that battles weren't that straight of with cavalry,
meaning that they didn't just ended with a glorius charge, but was a more
time consuming of setting your pieces correctly.
I do not know much about Napoleonic wars tactics, but I believe that the primary purpose of "heavy" cavalry by that point was to rout enemy light cavalry, and not to engage enemy infantry.
Since light cavalry was mainly a flanking and scouting force, the heavy cavalry would be used to make flanking impossible, and it would use its more robust equipment to cut down the lighter enemy if they managed to catch them.
But that is merely conjecture on my part, as I did not research that time period much at all.
I agree with this point, but there are some other factors too:
- less common cavalry tradition. By the time of the Napoleonic wars, relatively few countries had considerable horsemen population. It is quite easy to point out that Poland, parts of the Habsburg empire (Hungary, Croatia), former Horde territries and Russia still had this, but it was much less common than in the middle ages
- different battlefield usage. With the arrival of guns, and more importantly artillery, frontal horse charges were much more costly. The easy way out was to use your own artillery to win the day, which meant that cavalry was not the main arm anymore, but rather relegated to watch over the artillery, and defend them from enemy cavalry
- because of the difference in doctrine, the equipment was also different. Cuirassers and hussars were not equipped with lances, and hussars didn't get armor either. The only cavalry units which still had some kind of lances were the uhlans, which still had a shorter cavalry spear than medieval knight lances.
It is not really surprising that napoleonic cavalry was less successful in frontal charges than medieval knights. (especially if you factor in grapeshots from artillery and grenades/bullets from infantry. These had a much bigger impact than infantry bayonets)
Someone needs to make an edit where the shields just keep stacking up.
I remember reading somewhere that shield walls were never actually used; it was just a theory which got accepted as historical fact.