How to be a good Cav?

[Armpit_Sweat]

This seems to be a popular thread, so i want to ask something without making a new one:

Does anyone know if the speed required to couch a lance vary, for different lance types?..
Yesterday, it felt as if i need more speed to couch a Great Lance, compared to Light Lance...

[Chagan_Arslan]

In Europe, we ride for kills, not advance tactics.

speak for yourself please, not everybody like to kill easy targets just like you, some are for the challenge and want to kill some high priority targets rather than that afk guy on spawn

[Spawny]

Can somebody tell me please? By good I mean can kill Tommy and Oberyn all the time, as opposed to picking up easy kills (though which I think is the true job for cav).

Practise. Hours on end, for weeks. Timing is king.

The reason Tommy is such a good cav is his very good timing. He hardly misses thrusts and he can reliably aim for the head, killing in 1 hit most of the time. Add to that he won't get himself into too much trouble.

The main problem with tommy is that it doesn't seem to matter wether he's on horseback or on foot. He'll get the 30/4 or whatever scores anyway.

The most reliable way to kill Tommy I've found are throwing lances. 1 in the horsie and 1 in his back when he's down.

[Vibe]

speak for yourself please, not everybody like to kill easy targets just like you, some are for the challenge and want to kill some high priority targets rather than that afk guy on spawn

Easy kills do not necessarily mean AFK or "noob". Easy kills are also: unaware, people fighting in melee combat, shield+1h. It doesn't have anything to do with your "high priority targets", mr assassin.

Also, would you risk going 1v1 vs a pro polearmer/2h as a cav rather than easy killing 5 mediocre players, therefore helping the team more?

[Chagan_Arslan]

Easy kills do not necessarily mean AFK or "noob". Easy kills are also: unaware, people fighting in melee combat, shield+1h. It doesn't have anything to do with your "high priority targets", mr assassin.

Also, would you risk going 1v1 vs a pro polearmer/2h as a cav rather than easy killing 5 mediocre players, therefore helping the team more?

hell yeah, keeping occupied some good 2h or polearmer is better than killing 5 medicore inf, and its so much better to see you killed guys like Bjord or Phyrex ;] and you will have plenty of unaware people to kill while riding around looking for them melee pro's ;]

[Christo]

Thanks Christo,Phazey, Daergar, KaMiKaZe_JoE & Tears_of_Destiny for the tips as well though, even if they aren't directed to me they will surely help!

You're welcome. 

[Casimir]

Seen plenty of tactical cav charges on EU. Unfortunatly the vast majority of village maps are far to hilly for real cavalry tactics.

[Phazey]

Cav tactics for me are often quite simplistic: stick with the infantry!!!

Really, i can't stress this enough. I know it's really cool and fun to ride with a cav formation of 10 guys and charge the enemies... but it's usually a bad idea.

Instead, try this: get the whole team to defend a position (hilltop, village, etc). Get your ranged guys into good positions, get te footmen to defend the ranged and the cav to defend the footmen. Then wait for the enemy infantry to engage your team's footmen and only then charge them from the side or from behind.

Cav in small numbers (less then 10%) is much more effective supporting the melee instead of going off on some charge.

I can't even count the number of times my team lost, even though the ranged guys had discipline and set up a good position, offering a nice area of 'friendly ranged coverage'... shielders and other footmen that patiently wait and protect the ranged guys, thus making sure they get to do what they are good (shooting enemies and denying an area for them) without being rushed by some infantry or cavalry... only to see our cavalry rush out and first chase the enemy cav all the way to their main force and see them get dismounted due to ranged enemy fire, pikes and enemy cav.

I guess the point i'm trying to make is this: unlike the hollywood-style cavalry charges we've all seen in cartoons and movies, cavalry in cRPG is mainly a support class. We cav are great at quickly and efficiently killing unaware or distracted enemy players.
The one way to guarantee they are distracted is to wait untill they are a) within range of your team's archers, throwers and crossbowmen and b) are engaging your team's infantry and locked into melee fights.

Be careful not to run over too many friendly players when doing this. But with a bit of fancy maneuvering, you'll do fine and you'll rack up 5+ important kills every round.

Good cav is patient cav. Good cav supports melee.

In the above scenario i've assumed a map where your team is being defensive. When your team attacks or charges, the same principles apply. Wait until they are engaging your infantry and attack them from the side or from behind.
The one big difference when attacking is that you'll want to make sure their attention is divided between your team's footmen and you. So you can be slightly more agressive. Still, harassing the enemy team as cav doens't have to involve you charging into them. Instead, be a threat by getting behind them but don't get into range until the moment they are fighting your team's footmen.

The biggest and hardest lesson for cav, i think, is restraint. Taking less risks and staying alive. Any cav that's alive in the 'endgame' of a round is often worth it's weight in gold, if you get my meaning. 

A last thought: cav formations are not useless at all! But try to use those cav formations to charge in at the right time (when they are engaging your team / when in range of your archers etc).

[KaMiKaZe_JoE]

Phazey speaks the truth

[Tomas_of_Miles]

Phazey speaks the truth

+1 from someone who noobcharges on horseback too many times.

[kongxinga]

But then you come into situations where there is a big cav furball happening off the side away from the main lines. Some of your team cav are engaged. Do you wait by the ground pounders or do you jump in to tip the odds in your favour? After all, whichever team wins the cav skirmish gets total cav superiority afterwards.

Obviously it is better if all stayed with the inf, but if it's 5-4  at the cav furball, it may rapidly become 5-3 then eventually 4-0 if you stayed with the infantry. Joining even late can allow your cav to disengage more or less intact if they were getting overwhelmed. Dedicated anti cavalry cav shine in these messes, while infantry support cav might not want to get involved. No self respecting cav is going to fall for being lured to pikes or archery range so these fights tend to happen off to the sides. Of course if its one of those cramped "LOL" cav/city maps you will not see the cav skirmish.

While ping and timing (but I repeat myself) are important for cav, what I really want is for someone to come up with a guide to maneuvering and positioning so friendly cav can work together properly. I have seen some clannies work as a two man element, most notable to pincer horse archers, to cut off retreats or to deliver one-two blows. Cav only really work well with other cav for the most part due to friendly bumps and differing dispositions. For example, infantry will want to climb ledges and stay in some cramped place. A cavalryman near them is not really contributing and will get picked off first by concentrated force before the enemy assaults the high place. An infantryman is too slow to follow cav to the cav skirmish area, and is just a speedbump there even if he did make it, as his teamates did not follow him.. So much for combined arms. If infantry were willing enough to follow to the clear area, cav could and would offer support. But since most inf just town/building\ladder\stair\corner camp, cav have a tendency to go off into the cav furball. The winner of the furball usually wins the round just by virtue of having more people around. Thus a guide for cav to work together with cav is needed, especially to win the cav skirmish.

This lack of infantry supporting cav and vice versa is not a problem with the mod, but with the maps. If map makers continue to put awkward buildings and terrain for no good reason, infantry cannot resist the temptation to go there. Cav can't follow the inf onto the roofs or into the marshy woods for example , and will die off in the far off skirmish on more reasonable terrain. If we had more maps that even looked the slightest bit like a semi plausible battlefield instead of something from counterstrike, we would have what phzah wrote about, cav supporting inf in the correct manner. With the current line up of maps in most servers that is just not possible.

[Kophka]

But then you come into situations where there is a big cav furball happening off the side away from the main lines. Some of your team cav are engaged. Do you wait by the ground pounders or do you jump in to tip the odds in your favour? After all, whichever team wins the cav skirmish gets total cav superiority afterwards.

Obviously it is better if all stayed with the inf, but if it's 5-4  at the cav furball, it may rapidly become 5-3 then eventually 4-0 if you stayed with the infantry. Joining even late can allow your cav to disengage more or less intact if they were getting overwhelmed. Dedicated anti cavalry cav shine in these messes, while infantry support cav might not want to get involved. No self respecting cav is going to fall for being lured to pikes or archery range so these fights tend to happen off to the sides. Of course if its one of those cramped "LOL" cav/city maps you will not see the cav skirmish.

While ping and timing (but I repeat myself) are important for cav, what I really want is for someone to come up with a guide to maneuvering and positioning so friendly cav can work together properly. I have seen some clannies work as a two man element, most notable to pincer horse archers, to cut off retreats or to deliver one-two blows. Cav only really work well with other cav for the most part due to friendly bumps and differing dispositions. For example, infantry will want to climb ledges and stay in some cramped place. A cavalryman near them is not really contributing and will get picked off first by concentrated force before the enemy assaults the high place. An infantryman is too slow to follow cav to the cav skirmish area, and is just a speedbump there even if he did make it, as his teamates did not follow him.. So much for combined arms. If infantry were willing enough to follow to the clear area, cav could and would offer support. But since most inf just town/building\ladder\stair\corner camp, cav have a tendency to go off into the cav furball. The winner of the furball usually wins the round just by virtue of having more people around. Thus a guide for cav to work together with cav is needed, especially to win the cav skirmish.

This lack of infantry supporting cav and vice versa is not a problem with the mod, but with the maps. If map makers continue to put awkward buildings and terrain for no good reason, infantry cannot resist the temptation to go there. Cav can't follow the inf onto the roofs or into the marshy woods for example , and will die off in the far off skirmish on more reasonable terrain. If we had more maps that even looked the slightest bit like a semi plausible battlefield instead of something from counterstrike, we would have what phzah wrote about, cav supporting inf in the correct manner. With the current line up of maps in most servers that is just not possible.

+1 for this, I actually spend a lot of time trying to come up with ways for cavalry to support the team, even if it's just keeping 4 or 5 enemy infantry tied up by riding slowly behind them. The fact that most of the "open" (what happened to random plains, dammit?!? ) end up as "Rush to the nearest roof, tower, outcropping before enemy does!" really limits tactical play. For the rest of the maps, I posted up a "Light Cavalry Tactics Primer", that may be of interest to cavalry people. Some of the info may be out dated, and my attempts at paint.net illustrations are as ugly as I remember, but I hope it helps .

http://forum.c-rpg.net/index.php?topic=488.0

[M_Pully]

Richbaby, ooooo your playing cavalry well atm. Phaz' advice on playing a support role for the infantry works. I usually hang back when a round starts to see where the enemy are going, last night i was clocking where fallen_Torben was going for instance on battle on ice, and where i'm best to sit and wait.

Tears of destiny says its an idiotic cav who circles a single opponent and goes for the kill, but i differ by 'stupidly' sticking to a guy and taking them down ( i also chase horse archers half the time :-/). From my experience using both a MW warspear and balanced heavy lance i'm confident to kill 1h/shield guys with spear circling, which must peeve them off, ready your attack to go down their throat and if they try an attack put it there. Your looking to bump them slightly and thrust through their head box, your riding a sarranid atm which is even more maneuverable than my economy steppe so i'm sure you can master this alternate tactic.

last night i took a plated charger to the top of a gatehouse, never ever do this because its a bull in a china shop and even though its fun hinders your team. Try using a heavy horse and go archer hunting when the enemy cav arn't around, light horse support inf.
-avoid archery ranges-

[Nemeth]

Haven't read very thoroughly, just felt like giving a little advice. Never charge a crossbowman with his crossbow ready and aiming at you or in your general direction. If you really have to, deploy some manouvering and hope crossbowman have a bad day.

There is way too many cav that blindly charges me when I'm aiming at them. All it takes is one shot and they are dead unless wearing somewhat heavy armor. Well, if you're lucky, you'll get your horse killed instead of you.
Still, don't charge crossbowmen ^^

[kongxinga]

+1 for this, I actually spend a lot of time trying to come up with ways for cavalry to support the team, even if it's just keeping 4 or 5 enemy infantry tied up by riding slowly behind them. The fact that most of the "open" (what happened to random plains, dammit?!? ) end up as "Rush to the nearest roof, tower, outcropping before enemy does!" really limits tactical play. For the rest of the maps, I posted up a "Light Cavalry Tactics Primer", that may be of interest to cavalry people. Some of the info may be out dated, and my attempts at paint.net illustrations are as ugly as I remember, but I hope it helps .

http://forum.c-rpg.net/index.php?topic=488.0

This is the kind of guide I was referring to. I remember reading it back on the old taleworlds, and liking it very much. How did this survive the board migration? Your guide goes into depth on large cav versus cav engagements, and is possibly the best primer for clans trying to train together, but I am hoping for a smaller, simpler 2 vs 2 guide that might be more workable and simpler for those without a lot of resources for coordination. We would just need guides to the relative positioning to your friendly wingman and the enemy element. I would write one myself if I were any good at it, but hopefully I can come up with something once I get a few more cav fights under my belt.

The random plains allergy is frankly ridiculous. I remember that even in beta people were voting it off for no good reason except wanting to play village. I agree even medium plains may have been too big for even a full default 64 man game, but crpg has up to 120 people. And it is not flat, and there is cover. I guess the expert 2 hander /2 hand polearm duelists will look kind of silly there and lose their precious k/d on plains, thus they removed it.

Phzah does make one good point. Cavalry are often worth more at the endgame compared to their worth at the opening. In chess terms, cav would be interestingly the bishop, instead of the knight. Worth a lot even alone in the endgame, and worth a lot more if both white square and black square bishops survived.

However, I hate the dilemma of staying to screen the inf or going to help out in the cav furball. Splitting your forces is usually bad in crpg, so it is still slightly better to coordinate.