Stirrups

[Palurgee]

The stirrup changed mounted warfare for all of history. I think that it should be represented in this mod. Here are two suggestions for how it could be implemented.

1.) Every horse in the marketplace is copied and pasted, only the new copy has the ending "with Stirrups." Horses with stirrups gain additional maneuverability and (though this might be too much) require 1 less riding skill. However, they are more expensive (perhaps by around 20%) and require 1 slot of inventory space.

2.) A unique pair of boots is added to the game called "Stirrup Boots" or something to that effect. They provide the same benefits as before (additional maneuverability) but require 1 slot. They are fairly expensive and may not provide much armor, forcing horsemen to use long surcoats for leg protection.

Thank you for reading and please give feedback.

[San]

I was pondering the concept of armor/horse taking up an equipment slot, but this is definitely more fleshed out. It will be interesting if it's possible. 2 sounds more difficult.

1. I think that only the 6+ difficulty horses should have this alternative mode. For example, Desert Horse With Stirrups would beat out the standard arabian in almost every practical way. A % increase would favor those lighter horses quite a bit, how about a flat +10k?

2. Because this would be usable on every horse and replaces boots, it would need to be very expensive. 20k.

1 can include all horses and 2 be reduced to 15k if the desert horse gets 41 speed/45 maneuver instead. Also, I am assuming that this would give +2 maneuver.

[Thryn]

I can see a few good things and worrying things going on here with this idea;

For instance, people will bitch to no end when some guy on an Eastern Warhorse with Stirrups out maneuvers/plays them with an "overly agile armored horse". They'll say that "horse armors should restrict movement, remove/nerf stirrups." Then you'll have the other side saying "stirrup horses are expensive, this is balanced since they're losing money to play". (you see where I'm going with this)

I'd love to see the idea develop more and get played with eventually. Right now, though, ranged is priority #1.

Also, I'd like to see more reason to play light cav on the battlefield if cav gets looked at in the near future