Is cavalry weak?

I'm not talking about the unit "cavalry", but mounted units in general and the armor type units they upgrade to.

In my opinion these units are just so weak, that there's no incentive to take them. It starts with horsemen, who are just as strong as their contemporary infantry counterpart (swordsmen). However, they have a disadvantage against cities and spear units, weaknesses they don't share with swordsmen. The situation remains the same with knights and longsworsmen, save for the fact that knights have a trivial +2 strength on their contemporary infantry counterparts. Riflemen and cavalry are once again equal, but the cavalry still has more weaknesses.

In the industrial era things change a bit: tanks and modern armor are stronger than infantry and mechanized infantry respectively, but are still weak against cities, anti-tank units and helicopter gunships.

This means that mounted units are useless becaus anything they can do, infantry can do better. Armor units are a bit better off because their increased strength actually gives them an advantage over contemporary infantry units, but this is countered by the existance of a fair ammount of anti-tank units.

Let's not forget that all cavalry and armor units not only don't get a defensive bonus, but actually require a strategic resource to construct. This means they're more expensive in addition to being less versatile, making their usefulness rather limited.

Even the GDR, the supposed end all, be all unit, is weak against cities and anti-tank units. This is ridiculous, the GDR uses the same resource as a nuke so one would think these things would change the entire field of battle. IMHO this futuristic unit should be so strong that only other GDRs should be able to go toe-to-toe with it.

Do you guys agree, or is there something I'm overlooking here?

One major thing you're missing is the mobility factor. Melee units are great for having upfront and for taking cities. Cavalry can on the other hand be effectively used to take out ranged and siege units and afterwards quickly withdraw. The higher mobility also makes it possible to create and move them to the front a lot faster.

You don't want an army consisting only of cavalry (unless it's a great UU) but you certainly want them in there for a mixed and dynamic force.

Are we talking single player or multiplayer?
The problem with the AI is that it makes very bad decisions in warfare. These are such that you really do not need anything but infantry and artillery for most of the game. Ranged infantry like archers is beneficial, but the value of cavaly comes from the possibility to pick a target of choice, attack and withdraw to relative safety. You simply do not need that in SP.

Cavalry is meant to take out already weakened troops and ranged weapons. A cavalry charge against a prepared tech-parity opponent, like in real life, wouldn't work.

Cavalry is weak 'till it gets to mechanized infantry!
I use them to conquer cities all the time!

Hmm, I must be using them wrong.
I like lurking around borders and sniping workers/settlers.
Also, burn and turn ... they pillage better than any other unit.

Mounted units dominate the field until Infantry, though admittedly their use is diminished with Rifles.

Seriously, the human can take advantage of their mobility to de-fang the loose conglomerations of AI units that pass for its field armies quickly. You do need siege units and infantry to take enemy cities, though.

I only really build them when I'm having to defend; unless I'm on an old map with no vegetation they're too awkward to handle when attacking.

Am I the only one who sees AI rushing me with huge armies of Spearmen/Pikemen all the time? I find that this makes cavalry pretty ineffective, especially past Horsemen when you cannot even retreat out of counterattack range.

I tend to agree, the AI has an irrational love for anti-mounted units. A couple of mounted troops can be useful for picking off weak units and heading back to safety, but that's about it unless they are a good UU

Mounted units are good for pillaging, flanking and finishing off wounded units and ranged/siege, as been stated above. I don't like cavalry itself very much, but knight replacing UU's are fantastic. The best out there, IMO. They're easily used as main conquering force, unlike 'regular' knights. Attacking and retreating is very powerful. And despite the fact cavalry/tanks are not incredibly strong as is, if you upgrade knights early enough and by that time they have enough promotions, you still get units that are much stronger than anything AI has.

(I'm talking about Multiplayer, in single you can do anything you want and still do good)

Mounts are VERY weak. They have too many drawbacks and provide not much compared to melee. Terrain rarely allows convinient flank attacks and rough terrain completely kills their hit-run tactics. Their aims in warfare are less important as well. Roles that mounts have are too hard to achieve even with move3: pillage, flanking, finishing. Compare with melee that can very effectively hold position both in defence and in offence and it can be very crucial.

Here are more detailed explanation and some more ideas to discuss:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=437947&page=2


Shortly: Overall, all mounted units/tanks are worse than melees. They are harder to get, they all require strat res, they are weaker against cities, and the worst is that they do not recieve rough terrain bonus and cant be fortified. What we get in exchange? +1-2 move and ability to move after attack... Not that cool actually, compared to +75%CS of fortified in hills melee... Sophisticated combat plans are harder in MP because of double turn and click fest (you need to click fast to retreat after attack, and you need to be careful watching over your mounts, because they are less reliable in defence). Melees also dont have a counter unit... (they really dont, ranged is not quite counter to them)


BUT, compare infantry with tanks. Tanks have much bigger CS. They are almost as strong as infantry with +50% CS fortyfying. And have very good move 5 that REALLY allows them to perfom various actions. But tanks are harder to get, they require strat res and more hammers to build. I think that tanks become even better than melees due to too big difference in CS (50/36=1.5).


Anyway, for more detailed info see the previous link, for changes there should be to balance out melees and mounts/tanks see this link:

http://forums.2kgames.com/showthread.php?108061-Unit-types-and-their-roles

Shortly its about lowering melee's CS and separating siege from ranged, making the latter have +33%CS against melee (they should also have units in reneissanse, industrial and modern). And several less significant changes.

Everytime I think of building horsemen/knights, I remember those dreaded pikemen and give up on them.

Jodien37 said:

Everytime I think of building horsemen/knights, I remember those dreaded pikemen and give up on them.

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actually, pikes aren't 'that bad' vs. knights. It's about even in combat strength, depending on terrain/promotions. If you can weaken them with ranged attacks first, you can do some decent damage and get away.

* unless of course you're fighting Germany and they've covered the map in LKs... then it's a pain.

Mounted units are effective against units who don't have spears/pikes.
Cavalry is effective against spears/pikes/rifles but weak to other mounted units.
And Mounted Units are useless against cities!

Mounted units are relatively weak but useful. I usually have a few to keep a reserve and kill off enemy archers. But the main combat force will be swords class with a few spears/pikes backed by archers. Except of course if I have a UU.

Tanks, on the other hand, simply rule. By then, you have art or aircraft to really hurt a fortified position, use tanks to kill the units, then pull back so not to die. Rinse, repeat with Mech Inf providing the meat shield.

But at best, they form about 25% of my force.

Except for UU's, I don't find myself using mounted units that much. However, units like Conquistadors can be really game-changing once they appear. Of course there's the Keshiks as well, best damn unit in the game.

Regular mounted units simply don't have enough going for them, but at least it's better than back when the game was released and you could conquer the world with like 4 horsemen.

Mounted appears to be an efficient way to increase military might to deter wars.
Soldier Rating

vexing said:

...
to summarize, for posturing ships are weak and mounted are strong, and abombs blow away the competition

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They're pretty useless, there isnt much room to maneuver in my opinion, just put your Cannons in line and fire! Use your workers to build a road so all your units can move faster.

Most of my non-UU domination/warfare efforts center on Knights and Cavs, as since Civ2. Mix in a few good city-damaging and siege units and I can wipe out any AI army (unless they are an era ahead). An army of half Rifles and half Cavs (all usually upgraded) have been the most powerful non-UU forces I've had in numerous games.