Vlandian Pikemen fixed in one easy step! Khuzaits HATE him!

[Big_Guy_4_U]

Go for it!

forgot to add the Battanian tree screenshot, its there if you click the link itself.

 

[five bucks]

Khan's guards become Kuzaits only real shock infantry when they're on foot - not quite as good as dedicated shock infantry, but good enough.

You'd be surprised, they're actually better.

 

[anoddhermit]

They do fill a niche for the Empire... the only real anti-cav infantry hen they're dismounted. And I do like the idea of troops having additional tactical utility when dismounted, otherwise why allow us to dismount them?

I think all cavalry troops should have some purpose dismounted... Khan's guards become Kuzaits only real shock infantry when they're on foot - not quite as good as dedicated shock infantry, but good enough. That's similar to Cataphracts.

Dismounted cav in both those cases take on a role that otherwise is under utilised in those factions.

Their equipment makes sense conceptually, but Glaives are currently way too good compared to melee weapons other Cavalry get. Their handling stat or something should be way lower at least, since they do way too much damage up close for a swinging polearm.

Basically, they should be good at "hit and run" style with glaives, but for cavalry clashes they should get wrecked in massed close combat with melee cav. Since that is pretty much the only strategy (aside from cheesing the edge of the map and breaking their AI) available to deal with them - cut them off with faster cav then hit them with heavy cav. Especially while archer AI effectively doesn't work against horse archers.

Right now, they will beat pretty much anything at melee, as a mounted ranged unit. It's a little bonkers. You can play the game with no other units aside from them, and still be more successful than playing with almost every other unit combined, without needing any special tactics - in fact it's easier since horse archer AI does almost all the work for you.

I get that horse archers were incredibly tough to deal with historically - but not because they stomped things as infantry - and I'm also not against dismounted units having utility, but Khan's Guard are a boring "I WIN" button with no hard or even soft counters as they are currently.

 

[TheJumboman]

maybe voulges and spears should also be able to be couched, then you wouldn't need 2 polearms.

 

[five bucks]

forgot to add the Battanian tree screenshot, its there if you click the link itself.

Sturgia: I feel like Sturgia having two varieties of shock infantry and shield infantry makes them too similar to Battania. Having a "foot Druzhinik" is nice and a good idea, though possibly the name could be better and the branch could start earlier in the noble line. In fact it would be nice if every faction's noble line had two possible branches, would add nice variety.

Empire: Cataphract having a proper lance is great!

Vlandia: I'm behind that change to the Pikeman giving them the 2h sword.

Aserai: I like the Aserai having a 5th troop line, gives them more choice.

Battania: If you were suggesting your custom troop tree should be made part of vanilla, I'm opposed to Battania having archers in their standard troop line for a variety of reasons (the main two being that it isn't representative of their Celtic inspiration to have so many bows, and it makes them too similar to other factions). The name Ranger is cool though, and should get used in the game somewhere.

 

[geala]

I find it extremely hard to understand why nobles of a culture use bows while the rest of the people don't. Battania is an attack to common sense and historical facts. Luckily we have a fantasy environment.

Interesting to hear about the imperial Cataphracts, I actually never dismounted them. Such units should generally not work so well on foot because of the heavy armor and unpractical helmet. But to start like this would open a can of worms, of course. If they would get a different polearm, please not the cataphract lance, because it's twohanded only.

 

[five bucks]

I find it extremely hard to understand why nobles of a culture use bows while the rest of the people don't.

You could use that argument to say "I find it extremely hard to understand why nobles of the Empire use lances from horseback while the rest of the people don't".

Longbowmanship is something that takes a lifetime of training to master - Welsh archers were required to train weekly from the age of seven - and a lot of strength, and longbows were the absolute epitome of archery technology in the 1000s, requiring skilled bowyers to create something that could output so much force. They weren't widespread, until the English finally started training up their own longbowmen they were forced to hire Welsh ones because it isn't something anyone can just do easily.

With these barriers to entry that mean you have to train your whole life to become a longbowman, it's plausible that common recruits wouldn't be able to upgrade into longbowmen, only specialised elite ones.

Battania is an attack to common sense and historical facts.

I think the common sense argument is solid enough, as for historical facts, Battania is based on an assortment of Celtic peoples: the Ancient Celts (known for shock infantry), North Welsh (known for pikemen), South Welsh (known for skill with longbows), Irish (known for light javelineer skirmishers), and Scots/Picts (known for shock infantry).

Out of all Celts, only the South Welsh used bows in significant numbers. All other Celts favoured the javelin far more than the bow. The Irish almost didn't use bows at all until the Viking invasions, and even after that not in large numbers.

So Battania's current state well represents the historical use of longbow among Insular Celts as a cultural group; a small amount of them used it very well, the rest didn't really use it at all.

Luckily we have a fantasy environment.

Yes. Or ahistorical fiction/super-low-fantasy at any rate.