Upkeep

[Rumblood]

Since last patch, the HA build I used that broke even over time has started draining my bank. What gives? I have exactly 1 mid tier item, and that is the Arabian.

I use a ragged outfit (low end item), eastern lamellar greaves (low end item), nomad bow (very low end item), arrows x 2 (bottom tier item), and a sword (low to mid-tier at best) + the aforementioned Arabian.

This is a bad game decision to have such a loss with this build. I can see a couple of ways to get around it, and they are all bad for the game. You will be encouraging the very behavior that you should be discouraging.

1: Drop the sword. I don't use it much, but I do use it in close quarters occasionally and quite often when dismounted. But I would rather do without it than lose money and have to switch to a low tier horse in addition to every other low tier piece of gear I use.
2: I can stop charging melee and bumping them, which allows them a chance to attack me when rolling a multiplier. It is fun for both of us and gives us both a chance at getting the other. But with upkeep and losing money, and therefore the ability to play my low end build, well, I'll just have to circle as far away as I can get and snipe at them from range to keep getting ticks at a greater multiplier and try to recoup my gold.

Not so fun for melee, and not as fun for me, but hey, apparently this is what the balance team wants to encourage. Or is it? If you don't want to encourage this type of playstyle (and you better not, if you do you need to step down from the position), then fix the upkeep so that a build with 85% low and bottom tier items and 15% mid-tier does not lose money.

[San]

I wouldn't call an arabian a mid-tier item when 22k costs more than any weapon/almost any armor and its break chance isn't affected. It's like this for most cav, you need to have a consistently high multiplier to get by. I've seen you get lots of points from attacking other horses, even if you don't kill that much, so getting valor is well within reach.

Are you arguing for less of a loss or making money?

I would drop to an arabian straight sword or nomad sabre (arabian better on cav, nomad sabre better on foot). A desert horse or rouncey might also be a more cost efficient horse that are still great when loomed, and just use some better archer gear. It's slightly more difficult to bump people now than before with the server update.

[oprah_winfrey]

You could try using a steppe horse or a desert horse instead of the arabian.

[Joker86]

Or the fucking upkeep system could finally get replaced with something working...

[Rumblood]

I wouldn't call an arabian a mid-tier item when 22k costs more than any weapon/almost any armor and its break chance isn't affected. It's like this for most cav, you need to have a consistently high multiplier to get by. I've seen you get lots of points from attacking other horses, even if you don't kill that much, so getting valor is well within reach.

There are 10 horses with greater upkeep than the Arabian and 7 with less. That puts it smack in the mid-tier range. I see melee cavalry running around with horses that cost 50-250% more and that is with top tier melee weapons and top tier armor to boot. And armor for tincans is the same cost or greater by 50%.

I'm not asking to make money, like you can make with nearly every other class hand over fist. I'm asking to break even, rather than losing 20k a night.

I see no reason why I should change the build to deal with upkeep when it is 85% low to bottom tier equipment. Would you tell a lancer cav using a jousting lance and light leather with a courser to just start using a desert horse instead? Tell a Tincan to use a scythe?  Because that is the equivalent here.

[Ronin]

I agree with the OP there. It is the high break chance of ranged cavalry equipment that draws him down, not specifically the arabian warhorse. and the fact that he also has to pay even more and very frequently to his sidearm -a sword- makes him rather not spend money on sidearm and avoid melee at all costs, which means kiting.
I always think that hybrids should be encouraged for ranged classes. They should be better at melee and maybe carry less ammo, to prevent kiting. Very similiar to throwers maybe.

By the way, arabian horse is not mid-tier. It is one of the top tiers. Anything higher than eastern warhorse is a money trap at the moment, not that much decent horses. That doesn't mean you should be losing gold to it though.

[LordRichrich]

Well how much does all your gear cost?
And you gotta take into account, you've got something in EVERY slot.

So you with nine slots of stuff, cost say 30k
A 2h with 5 slots of stuff also costs 30k

But because you have more slots, higher chance that SOMETHING will break (not as a coded feature, but the law of averages (or something))
Might wanna think about that

[Rumblood]

Well how much does all your gear cost?
And you gotta take into account, you've got something in EVERY slot.

So you with nine slots of stuff, cost say 30k
A 2h with 5 slots of stuff also costs 30k

But because you have more slots, higher chance that SOMETHING will break (not as a coded feature, but the law of averages (or something))
Might wanna think about that

30k with 22k of that being the horse and no, I have 7 pieces of gear (which is 7 slots, 6 if I go with one of the 0 slot 1 handers). A two hander cavalry has 6 pieces of gear, which is 7 slots (6 if they use the mace). There is no practical difference between the two.
No other cavalry suffers from that type of penalty. My xbow alt can run around with 38k in gear and make gold and that is with better armor and the top tier bolts with the same Arabian horse between his legs.
So nerf xbow cavalry? Hell no. Lower the upkeep for HA so I can actually play with low tier gear and a decent horse without being forced to either drop my sword, drag out the rounds by plinking from across the map away from melee, or drop to a lower tier horse than the xbow cavalry that already are a difficult class to compete against in the field. Give them superior armor, superior aiming, and superior horse too? People already ask why someone would be stupid enough to play HA when HX is superior in nearly every way. That would simply seal the deal.