~Pro Cavalry Balance~

[Berserkadin]

Nerfing alrdy killed most of the fun/mod. Plz stahp.

[CrazyCracka420]

Haven't read this thread, but IMO the only cavalry balance I'd like to see is that if you survive on your horse you should have less chance of upkeep.  I think this would enable more people to ride the heavier horses (which I think are inferior for speed/mobility reasons than the destrier, courser or arabian warhorse).  Right now the best horse is the arabian, but I think the heavy horses should have a place on the battlefield as well.

IMO the lancers should really be on heavy horses and making couch passes at enemy infantry lines.  The lighter horses would only be ideal for chasing down other cavalry or specialty things like xbow or archer on horse.

[San]

I think that's reasonable as long as chances are increased if you are not on YOUR horse by the end of the round (which means getting off your horse even if it is alive subjects you to penalties if you don't get back on by the end). I don't really think upkeep is really a huge issue except for those heavy horses, since you can still be plenty effective on a rouncey if you care about upkeep.


As far as damage to horse goes, I would still like it if the leg weakness was removed, but there is an extra damage modifier on the head, only. That reduces the chance of a teammate 1shotting your horse by accident and gives a bonus to melee who take risks against a charging horse. There are more classes than greatswords and super long polearms that do indeed take quite a huge risk against those cav instead of just simply dodging. Often times, they hit the horse without damaging the rider, letting the rider get a free hit on them. Plus, it's easier to move the horse's head, so you have some control over getting shot there sometimes.

[Kafein]

The problem I have with the bump is that past a certain velocity, it's 100% knockdown "chance", whether the person you hit is friend or foe, and the bump itself does too much damage for what is just pressing W at someone.

It's more than just pressing W at people you know. I remember a while ago sometimes even bumpslashing certain archers even though they were completely unaware of me was not that easy, simply because of their constant dodging that my horse, despite having the highest maneuver stat, was too sluggish to track. The best unaware target always remained the typical STR crutching 2h or polearm, walking in a straight line. Bumping enemies near your teammates isn't trivial either, especially when the aforementioned teammates just keep circling around the bad guys.

[Spa_geh_tea]

If cav is so OP, and upkeep is negligible......

why aren't we having massive 40 v 40 cavalry charges?

Cause that sounds rather fun.

[Malaclypse]

It's more than just pressing W at people you know. I remember a while ago sometimes even bumpslashing certain archers even though they were completely unaware of me was not that easy, simply because of their constant dodging that my horse, despite having the highest maneuver stat, was too sluggish to track. The best unaware target always remained the typical STR crutching 2h or polearm, walking in a straight line. Bumping enemies near your teammates isn't trivial either, especially when the aforementioned teammates just keep circling around the bad guys.

Yes, sometimes you have to press A, D, S, and it can be hard to hit people. But no other weapon in the game has such a high knockdown chance on a successful hit is my basic gripe. Whether you're hitting a teammate or an enemy, if you're above trotting speed, it's going to knock them over without fail, and that's pretty ridiculous.

[KaMiKaZe_JoE]

I think bump should have its damage decreased under a certain speed. But, if your horse is gunning towards somebody at full speed the damage should still be significant. I mean, holy shit, you just hit somebody with a horse running at like 30 miles an hour, it should hurt.

Also, I would love having ranged damage nerfed for cavalry, because as things stand I can't just rush more than one archer at  a time. If cav's supposed to be a counter to ranged, then this change would make sense.

Jesus christ don't buff melee damage to horses. That's retarded. I'd just spend each and every round chasing archers around and killing peasants. God, that's fun. Melee damage is good for horses right now, imo.

Cav players should take some fall damage when their horse dies, imo. It shouldn't be enough to just kill them outright, though, because that would suck. I'm not a developing fetus attached to my horse via an umbilical cord that, if severed too early, results in my untimely death and/or retardation. Besides, cav player's horses die from under them all the fucking time. Dying early on in the round sucks, brah (yeah yeah, I know, "tell that to the afk's and peasants you lance at spawn, JoE, you bundle of sticks").

[Rumblood]

Reduce damage from all types of ranged weapons to horses by 1/2 or more
This might be controversial but I think it is needed if cavalry is to become a real counter to ranged classes, right now a cav player can pretty easily kill 1 solo ranged player, but as soon as its 2-3 or more he cannot go anywhere near them without being destroyed.

Explain to me why you think that ANY class should be able to kill any other class easily solo, and needs to be able to take on 2-3 players at the same time and expect to have an even chance to win? Go look up balance 

And fuck this shit:

if cavalry is to become a real counter to ranged classes

Ranged is needed as a real counter to cavalry, not the other way around!

[Kafein]

Ranged is needed as a real counter to cavalry, not the other way around!

On the basis of what ?

Out of cav and ranged, I only see one class that no class counters easily but itself. Cav is countered by any player with a weapon. You just need to be aware.

Explain to me why you think that ANY class should be able to kill any other class easily solo, and needs to be able to take on 2-3 players at the same time and expect to have an even chance to win? Go look up balance 

Then why can archers do this with 2h and polearms ?

[Rumblood]

On the basis of what ?

Out of cav and ranged, I only see one class that no class counters easily but itself. Cav is countered by any player with a weapon. You just need to be aware.

Then why can archers do this with 2h and polearms ?

Do you even read the opinions you are spewing?  ON THE BASIS OF WHAT? Cavalry is countered by any player with a weapon? Archery is countered by any player with a weapon. And of the two, ONE of them can be caught by a player on foot. The OTHER one can't unless the cavalry decides to cut them some slack and get too close. 

Are you seriously being owned by a (not an archer because he doesn't have any arrows) player with 1 WPF in 2 hander or pole?

Wow.

[KaMiKaZe_JoE]

Either cav should be fucking hard to kill, and tankish, and able to counter ranged by tanking their shots, closing the distance, and fucking them up.

Or, cav can be ninja like, fast, and sneak up on ranged to fuck them up.

Or, OR, you can have both. Some horses tank, and some horses sneak up on people. This, I think, is how it should be done, because it'll allow for more flexibility. This, I think, is already being done, but could be done better. The courser and arabian horses are fast and can sneak up on players for gay kills. The plated horses, and the destrier, are heavily armored and have much hp, and can bum-rush players for gay kills.

I think, however, that the differences between the fast horses and the tank horses should be a bit greater and should be more exaggerated. The faster horses are, I think, fine atm (it's why I ride a courser). The heavy horses are a little too fast, and not quite as tough as I'd like them too be. They're also too expensive, at least if seen as another option for a cav player, rather than as simply "better" horses.

[Adamar]

Just remove archers, put the class out of its pain.

[Sandersson Jankins]

Having played on EU_1 a bit in the wee hours of the morning lately; it seems that EU does not have as much of a problem with cav-stacks and such. This seems to be both because of a larger proportion of pikemen and longspearmen, and because the players are more aware and fight closer together. Really, if there was some sort of way to encourage people to refrain from spawning in, and holding W until they are in combat with enemy infantry, this problem wouldn't exist. However, it seems that a very large part of NA_1 simply refuse to listen to anyone suggesting anything to them. Likely a result of "YOU CANT TELL ME WHAT TO DO" syndrome. It really makes me facepalm when I see (and this happens very literally EVERY round) a horse charging from at least 100 meters away at a person, who continues to hold the W key until death via lance. Horses are a bit quiet and directional audio is funky, but using the louder horse sounds mod surely helps.

tl;dr: I have said nothing productive; clapping amerifats are bad at video games and should feel bad

[Zlisch_The_Butcher]

Then why can archers do this with 2h and polearms ?

And shielders

[Spa_geh_tea]

In the few moments that I play battle I see a max 10 cav. That's five per side, which in a server that's consitently above 70 players is very small.

 Is cav really the problem? Why do so few players use it if its so OP?

 Clearly the issue is not the cav, but how footmen deal with it. In an assumption, cav is much more effective when there are so few. This is the case because players do not focus or pay head, spread out and get ganked. If there were more cav, I bet you they would be less effective because player focus is to wreck them.

Simple eh?

So how do we balance cav? Communication, role dedication, and tight formations.

Sounds like typical reaction to win against cav throughout history.

I'll admit NA on a pubbie level is terribad at formation, team cohesion, and role specification.