Is cavalry weak?

[KillingMeSoftly]

I kinda agree the mounted units are a bit weak. Not useless, but fairly marginal.

One of the main issues is that Spearmen and Pikemen are a "Bread & Butter" unit; they are cheap to produce and require no strategic resources. They are also very effective to one of the key types of offensive units in the game (mounted units). Mounted units aren't even too effective against swordsmen style units because their strength is equal.

This means Mounted units are only really effective for a few things. They are decent scouts to "feel out" the enemy. Their high mobility makes them useful for reinforcing an area, especially where they are no roads. They are also good for taking out wounded units, or ranged units. Mounted units are also useful if you have no Iron but have Horses... at least then you will have some high strength units.

The core weakness of the Mounted unit is the lack of defense. Without promotions it gains no bonus defense from terrain. Mounted units don't have a huge mobility advantage either and are pretty much bogged down badly in rough terrain-- in which you receive no defensive bonuses.

Armor units later have much more mobility and have a lot more strength than their infantry counter parts so this mostly makes up for their shortcomings. But Horsemen and Knights are only really useful if you have no Iron. Cavalry don't have much of a use period, but at least by this time there wont be many Pikemen left. Lancers are just plain pitiful and are only any good if you plan to upgrade them to Anti-tank Guns and eventually Helicopter Gunships-- you keep the "Move after Attacking" promotion.

I think giving some of the Mounted units +1 movement would help a lot. Perhaps also give them a +25% strength bonus when attacking units to cement their role as "shock troops", essentially charging and devastating a line of infantry all historical-like.

 

[apocalypse105]

Well if they just didn't nerved the horseman then it would be more balanced..

They should increase the pikeman and spearman strenght to counter the strenght of the horseman...
Just simply remove the penalty against cities it doesn't make any sence..
Yeah I thinx it was better balanced in vanilla civ...


The only reason why they nerved horseman (adding a penalty against cities) Is because the AI couldn't handle it. If they just tweaked the AI by let him build more pikeman and spearman the issue was fixed the human player would not be able to use only horseman to conquer but they are still prety effective.

 

[Kyp Durron]

The way to use Cav is to have double upgraded units being produced. +40 open terrain bonus cav one hits artys.

 

[Skibbi]

Just simply remove the penalty against cities it doesn't make any sense..

It actually does! Because attacking cities is going into the city and attacking!
Cavalry is disadvantaged in it because it can't maneuver in a city so easily!

 

[elprofesor]

I would actually remove the penalty against cities, and add a bonus to walled city strength against mounted units. That would both boost horsemen (maybe even knights) and walls.

The problem with mounted units is that they are geared towards land control, not city attack, and the AI very rarely poses enough of a threat when defending for mounted units to be more useful than (long)swordmen or cats.

And note how they have boosted armored units: tanks and modern armors are actually better at attacking cities than infantry or mech infantry, respectively! That makes me think whether knights and cavalry wouldn't need a buff (but not really horsemen, they were way too powerful before the nerf).

 

[qutsemnie]

They grew on me. I would say "they grow on you", but apparently that isn't the case!

1) Unit preservation. Mounted units can attack and back out. That means you can exchange with the AI without actually losing your unit. This is handy when the AI is in somewhere where you were hoping they wouldn't be. They protect your ranged units by exchanging life with something threatening your ranged units and then getting away without dieing themselves.

That really grew on me.

2) Speed for just getting around means they are where you need them and not a turn late. A lot of times it is just opportunity. AI leaves things in stupid spot you are good to go.

3) Different then 2. They can attack a city without ever having the city fire on them which is handy right when cannons come out I find. When I don't really have a unit that can really take a cannon to the face.

4) They have a 3 visibility upgrade. Kind of goes back to unit preservation. The more you see the less you get caught by surprise, the more efficient you are about killing, etc. Units die efficiently, ranged units don't go over hills and discover they are right next to a melee unit, etc.

I am not saying make your army all out of mounted, but I have no trouble finding combined arms worth it in civ 5.

 

[Buccaneer]

Even in my last game, I found Knights/Mandekalu/Cavs to be good in attacking cities after the ranged units. They can do good 4-8 damage per hit (early-mid game) and I can get them in (and out) faster than Swords/Longswords/Rifles. I know they have a penalty but getting that 1 extra movement around an enemy city can mean the difference between success and failure.

 

[elprofesor]

I think knights are pretty close to be good enough, but they suffer a bit too much from being less accessible for a rush than longswordmen; on the other hand, you get to education sooner if rushing them, so you have that.
Mandekalus are another story: +10% against cities instead of -33% make them very worthwile, since the city attack penalty is the major drawback of knights (they go from the regular 12 st to 19.8).

Cavalry suffers from the horrendous penalty against mounted units (which includes knights...), and the fact that riflement get a massive improvement from longswordmen (from 16 to 25, while not requiring iron anymore!).

 

[MadDjinn]

Even in my last game, I found Knights/Mandekalu/Cavs to be good in attacking cities after the ranged units. They can do good 4-8 damage per hit (early-mid game) and I can get them in (and out) faster than Swords/Longswords/Rifles. I know they have a penalty but getting that 1 extra movement around an enemy city can mean the difference between success and failure.

if you've got enough of them, then sure, stacking knights 2 deep (open terrain only) around a few tiles on a city will do the job faster.

It does help for those city placements where you an only get 1-2 tiles adjacent to the city (peninsula city sort of deal).

Of course, you'll still want swords/LSs on the flanks to prevent the knights from being trashed.

the poor part about it is that if you do it too late (Castles go up and/or Kremlin) then the Knights will be trashed by the city.

 

[apocalypse105]

It actually does! Because attacking cities is going into the city and attacking!
Cavalry is disadvantaged in it because it can't maneuver in a city so easily!

I am talking about the game mechanics not realistic things...

 

[chazzycat]

I really like cavalry units in this game. I have always thought cavalry units were overpowered in previous civ games, where they were being used to spearhead assaults on fortified positions. In real life that type of thing is pretty disastrous, and cavalry units for the most part should be a support unit, which is reflected well in civ5. They are quite useful for flanking enemy ranged units, hit and run tactics, pillaging, and generally taking advantage of an opponent's own lack of mobility. But you're not going to do very well against an entrenched enemy with a horse only army, unless you are the Mongols.

 

[bcaiko]

Terrain rarely allows convinient flank attacks and rough terrain completely kills their hit-run tactics.

THIS. Mounted units should get promotions that allow them to ignore terrain and ignore Zone of Control. That would make them much more effective without returning to the days where they were Godly city-takers.

 

[vonbach]

The main problem with mounted units is their mobility strength doesn't translate well
in game. All they can really do is move faster and that mostly translates to either
hunting artillery pillaging or getting killed faster. Mounted units need access to the
move after attacking promotion.

 

[elprofesor]

You must mean something else. All mounted units start with the "moving after attacking" promotion. Do you mean the "attack any number of times" promotion? Something else altogether?

 

[Civsassin]

My favorite use of mounted units and their modern upgrades (tanks) is to place them in my cities that have a hostile border. In this way, I can use them to attack units close to the city and they can be returned to the city on the same turn to begin healing. This works particularly will with Oligarchy. Use the city attack benefit while they're garrisoned, attack after that (often destroying the enemy unit), and return to be garrisoned again.

 

[Knut_Are_M]

One way to boost mounted units would just be to give them mobility 5.
that way there speed would allow them to effectively hit and run on units that are not fortified.
That way they get all there other weaknesses, but atleast they will have a clear mobility edge.

 

[vonbach]

You must mean something else.

I thought they had to earn that one apparently
I was wrong. I never bothered to build the things. They just don't have the punch they used too.

 

[CYZ]

I think cavalry are good at their role. Obviously the core of your army will be made up outof infantry units (heavy infantry if you have iron), supported by ranged (archer against units, siege against cities). Cavalry won't win in a direct fight, but they're not supposed to. Their movement allows you to use them where you need them, either flanking wounded enemies or ranged units, or supporting your infantry when they get into trouble.

I won't say CiV's war mechanic is particulary good. But all traditional roles are represented. Still, I miss the rock-paper-scissors basics. It's too easy to just use infantry and ranged. This is mainly due to poor AI and not so much due to weak cavalry.

But like I said, cavalry should never be the dominant unit. They are supports units (unless you're a mongol obviously )

 

[Silverfuturist]

In singleplayer - I rarely made mounted units, the AI is so horrible at combat that I didn't find mounted units cost effective. An exception was I might have a mounted unit take the city when it was down to nothing.

In multiplayer - mounted units very effective, barring certain circumstances. Humans are not going to let you kill their units for free, removing an army from the battlefiend requires effort, unlike singleplayer.

Uses of multiplayer mounted:

1. Suicide units, such as lancers vs artillary. Using barracks/armory upgrades and fast movement, slam a lancer into each exposed artillary. The artillary will die, the lancer will probably get killed back. Lancers are cheaper, the exchange is beneficial. Works very well when defending on a road network through rivers/hills, your lancers might even survive and retreat.

2. Taking city from afar. Fast mounted unit sneaks in when city is down to its last few hit points (see Mongol scenario and the purpose of horsemen.) For cities that are constanlty changing hands in battle, the mounted unit can take the city, then leave the city. Other player takes city back, your unit doesn't die. In these circumstances your super-strong melee unit will die in the city when the other player takes it back right away.

3. Killing wounded units. Already explained in this thread.

4. The ability to move after attacking - already explained.

5. Surpise-attack. I have done this with knights and Companion Cavalry. Get a group, move around the outskirts out of view of the opponent, then take their city from behind. Yes, mounted get penatly vs city, but CC and knights have no trouble taking a poorly defended city in their era.

6. "Not late to the party" - the battle is far away, reinforcements needed, by the time melee units get there it will be over. Many times you can make a mounted unit and it will arrive in time to be useful.

Examples from games: Many times knights have saved me from cho-ko-nu or longbow attacks; a smart human using them is deadly. Those UUs are tuff, but with roads around your city, knights/horseman can hit them and retreat.

The strong people in multiplayer are able to use mounted unit abilities in even more creative ways than above.

 

[Tabarnak]

The strong people in multiplayer are able to use mounted unit abilities in even more creative ways than above.

There are 2 reasons :

First, the AI like to build spearmen and pikemen. More you jump a level, more they will build them and early.

Secondly, humans just don't build spearmen and pikemen like mad because it's hard to get a useful advantage from them. It's hard to know exactly what your army's ennemy is composed of. What if you build a horde of pikemen and retrive yourself against longswordmen? Oops... That said, it's also hard to build pikemen in a hurry to defend against these guys, unless you play Germany. That's why it's useful to build horses against humans. If you can take advantage of sim. turns, it's even better.