Rambo should always be a part of captain to an extent

[Kanabei]

Today I was playing against a team of at least 3-4 premades of who at least 3 ramboed. I played as empire archer militia.
I killed those rambos at least 5 times per round in 1v1 or 2v1 while I never died in those scenarios, only dying to masses of bots or couch lance etc.
It still isn't about "who is good at pvp". It has never been the point and will not be. It's that I literally have to focus all my efforts to kill a single cav player since my bots can't do it. Still my bots are there getting killed every second since I can't land a high-momentum headshot every single time to either kill the player or his horse.
It takes away too much from the game.

That is why the solution to the rambo problem is increasing archer's accuracy against moving targets. I really get that cav unit is anti-archer, but let it be whole unit, not 1 guy killing 16 archers while they can't hit him even once.

 

[Jesus__is__Lord]

Why can't they just remove the ability to respawn from your remaining units. It is supposed to be captain mod not skirmish with extra lives lol. It baffled me, when I first played Captains mode, that you could just respawn if you had units still alive. They could make it so Captain players could customize their captain player so their player is unique compared to the units that are commanded (better armor/weapons and a horse if you want it)

i think this is the solution

 

[Incanuth]

i think this is the solution

Removing respawns from Captain Mode would be the opposite of a solution. There would be even more of an emphasis on rambo because it would be all about sniping the enemy captains right away.

 

[Suspicious_Man]

Removing respawns from Captain Mode would be the opposite of a solution. There would be even more of an emphasis on rambo because it would be all about sniping the enemy captains right away.

I think I'd be more OK with that than what's been happening in my experience. I can beat the guy that's charging ME, I can't beat the guy that's on a horse running away from me all the time and just whittling down bots on the opposite end of my formation.

With the way things are now if he gets reared and I kill him, it doesn't matter, he'll just come back with another cav unit and try again. If he's only allowed to try it once it becomes much more of a risky proposition and I think fewer people will do it.

 

[[AG] Heir of Aenarion]

Rambo is essential to captain as long as factions remain so woefully imbalanced. People forget why rambo started in the first place; prior to Khuzait getting the buff to spearmen (like 7-8 months ago) they were considered one of the worst factions in captain, and the only way to win with them after khans/archer kiting was nerfed (~summer 2020) was efficient cav play. The best way to do that by far was to rambo your lancers, the best unit for an individual to control in captain when played as rambo.

Today, and for the past several months, Khuzait has been the best faction, with Sturgia a close second. Empire has fallen from its glory days and is now arguably the worst with Aserai and Vlandia also in contention. Battania is firmly entrenched in the middle though struggle mightily in some matches (like Sturgia) on certain maps. Rambo is always the answer when rolling or choosing one of the lesser factions against a top faction, where one mamuluke played effectively can wipe an entire group of OP lancers if the players' skill is good enough. The longer spear on battanian cav is a great tool to have where 2-3 player lives can make the difference against lancers, which have a significant advantage against the batt cav AI. With a ridiculously unbalanced game ramboing is legitimately the only way to win in many situations, especially considering that so many factions lack hard counters in a number of matchups on infantry (vlandia and aserai lack quality blunt weapons, for example, so get absolutely destroyed in melee against khuzait).

Personal skill should matter in captain and better teamplay can overcome rambo. Archers weren't a great pick in captain even before rambo cav became the predominant meta as the infantry rush meta would just counter archers anyway. And to be honest archer gameplay in captain is exceptionally boring; it's relevant and to a degree exciting in skirmish because it actually works as a support unit there and not as the gigantic liability it usually is in captain.

 

[SuperBroHeroFella]

it's probably fair to say archers are probably the defining unit that enriches an armies strategy more than anything else in captains mode. They completely change the way an army begins to play in both attack and defence... Unfortunately this update came around the same time as the frequency of Ramboing started to get crazy and really out of hand.. Which almost immediately meant archers were too great a risk and once again the inf ball returns to power.

Absolutely agree. Archers can make the game, they really need good positioning and also need to keep up pace – they force the enemy player to think smartly about their angles – they need clever handling and a proper support troop – with a smart ally you are unstoppable as an archer. Unless there's a glaive cav rambo in sight, OR you are being snowballed by INF (which shouldnt happen ideally with mates around).

I really found my love for fast bows as well, in the right range they can decimate an enemy legion – but as soon as melee happens in front of you and allies are chasing the enemy, your guys are constantly hitting your friends, so they are once again useless. In public games I rarely find a spot with people that give me the time (and their patience) to position properly and make it rain. In a way, its too fast paced and rush oriented, and rambo underlines that.

 

[VicbossOG]

There were some Commander Battle servers for NW that had a setting where you could do no damage as a player if you were too far from your troops. This does alleviate ramboing quite a bit, but it also had some issues as cavalry where you would have given a charge command and some of your bots end up too far and you can no longer do damage without intending to be so far from your unit. This could be a possible solution to ramboing but personally I would much prefer it if they just made the AI units a lot more combat capable at dealing with ramboers themselves. There is no reason why a line of archers shouldn't be able to shoot down the single horse of a cavalryman trying to charge them. It should be downright suicidal for a single cavalryman to attempt to take on 15 archers by himself but at this point it's just the meta.