Winged Hussar too weak!

[Lonecat Nekophrodite]

I think (also from rereading it a couple of times) that he is saying that the Winged Hussars were exceedingly effective against contemporary (16th - 17th century) armies and units, even the Swedes under Gustaphus Adolphus, who are generally considered one of the best armies of the mid-17th century. This is accurate, but totally irrelevant to the OP and the discussion, which references using them against units from two Eras ahead of them.

So actually when should Winged Hussars appears? Late Medieval or Renaissance? (AFAIK in game this unit appeared in Medieval Era, available with Mercenaries civic)

 

[TreVor_ish]

They were used since around 1500, so yeah game wise, i think they appear a little too early.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

Polish "Hussars" appeared in the late 15th century, so right at the beginning of the 'traditional' dates for the Rennaissance Era. Those were light cavalry, mostly Serbian or Hungarian mercenaries. They didn't adopt the heavy armor and lance until sometime around the reign of Stephan Batory (1576) and about then they also adopted the 'wings'. Definitely a Renaissance unit. See my post in Humankind - Poles Discussion Thread in the Humankind section of this Forum for more details and reference.

 

[Lazy sweeper]

Polish "Hussars" appeared in the late 15th century, so right at the beginning of the 'traditional' dates for the Rennaissance Era. Those were light cavalry, mostly Serbian or Hungarian mercenaries. They didn't adopt the heavy armor and lance until sometime around the reign of Stephan Batory (1576) and about then they also adopted the 'wings'. Definitely a Renaissance unit. See my post in Humankind - Poles Discussion Thread in the Humankind section of this Forum for more details and reference.

Early light cavalry hussars had no guns but curved bows, swords and scimitars. Late Heavy Hussars, as you say, Batory (1576), very interesting indeed, to approximately Siege of Vienna time, 1683; got guns (15 mt. range) also in addition to curved bows, long swords, scimitars, and lances, armor and the wings, of course.
Maybe Hussars could get a special upgrade perk to optimize their firepower at Elite?

Sure against dismounted cavalry army with carbine rifles it would still be a massacre, but I don't see how the range is affecting fights in a melee attack in game. I must be missing something.

Winged Hussar corp is 65 strength. Cavalry Army is 79, 71 if it's at 20 hp.
I think you must be overlooking something there. Defender of the Faith? Fortified? Promotions? Strategic resource shortage? Diplomatic visibility?
And no, don't bring history into a game discussion where WH is a medieval unit fighting against industrial unit.

 

[Kupe Navigator]

View attachment 578532

You are just proving his point mate

 

[Lazy sweeper]

You are just proving his point mate

He asked for proofs, I gave him. Nonetheless the Army corp is at 10 hp at most, so I think I'm still making a point here saying Major defeat doesn't look allright.

 

[Equilin]

He asked for proofs, I gave him. Nonetheless the Army corp is at 10 hp at most, so I think I'm still making a point here saying Major defeat doesn't look allright.

It is still 15 strength difference, almost 3 times stronger than you. And unlike you claim initially, your WHs are not 100%.

 

[Uberfrog]

He asked for proofs, I gave him. Nonetheless the Army corp is at 10 hp at most, so I think I'm still making a point here saying Major defeat doesn't look allright.

I would encourage you to look up how combat works in Civ 6: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/hans-lemurson-figures-out-the-combat-formula.606147/

The damage your unit deals and receives during a melee attack is based on the difference in combat strength.

You can see it all broken down for you in that screen shot. The cavalry army loses 9 from being at 10% health. Your hussar corps loses 3 from being at 70%. But with all the other bonuses and penalties factored in they are still up 15 on you.

A combat difference of 0 means you deal 1x the normal amount of damage for one round of combat (30HP) and take 1x (30HP). Stalemate.

A combat advantage of 10 means you deal 1.5x (45) the damage and take 0.67x (20). Major defeat for your enemy.

A combat advantage of 17 means you deal 2x (60) and take 0.5x (15). Major defeat.

 

[almughavar]

Have you also factored in the terrains? That Arabian Cavalry Army is also in a tile with hills and woods.

 

[UWHabs]

Have you also factored in the terrains? That Arabian Cavalry Army is also in a tile with hills and woods.

Yeah, +6 ideal terrain and +5 Defender of the faith make big differences too. So makes sense that combat is heavily tilted.

 

[AntSou]

Maybe Hussars could get a special upgrade perk to optimize their firepower at Elite?

Sure against dismounted cavalry army with carbine rifles it would still be a massacre, but I don't see how the range is affecting fights in a melee attack in game. I must be missing something.

Why on Earth would they change the entire game to accommodate one unit?

Cavalry is a unit from the Industrial Era. There's nothing "outrageous" here.

 

[almughavar]

Yeah, +6 ideal terrain and +5 Defender of the faith make big differences too. So makes sense that combat is heavily tilted.

Figuratively and literally an uphill battle.

 

[Banazir864]

Sure against dismounted cavalry army with carbine rifles it would still be a massacre, but I don't see how the range is affecting fights in a melee attack in game. I must be missing something.

For gameplay reasons, the melee/ranged distinction isn’t really realistic in general when dealing with units of different eras (for example, late-game “melee” units have longer range IRL than early-game ranged units, but the gameplay doesn’t reflect this). It’s one of the many abstractions away from reality that are necessary for a game like this.

However, melee attacks still begin one tile apart, so you can assume that the Cavalry begins firing before the Hussars reach them (I don’t remember whether the animations show this, but the animations can’t really be taken as accurate anyway given the small number of people shown in each unit, to say nothing of things like the lightning strikes in Theological Combat that are presumably metaphorical).

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

For gameplay reasons, the melee/ranged distinction isn’t really realistic in general when dealing with units of different eras (for example, late-game “melee” units have longer range IRL than early-game ranged units, but the gameplay doesn’t reflect this). It’s one of the many abstractions away from reality that are necessary for a game like this.

However, melee attacks still begin one tile apart, so you can assume that the Cavalry begins firing before the Hussars reach them (I don’t remember whether the animations show this, but the animations can’t really be taken as accurate anyway given the small number of people shown in each unit, to say nothing of things like the lightning strikes in Theological Combat that are presumably metaphorical).

"Mounted Firepower" is almost always short-ranged. The famous compound or recurved bow of the steppes could shoot an arrow to long ranges, but the arrows were so light that at those ranges they simply were not very effective. Direct fire making use of the bow's power was no longer-ranged than about 50 - 80 meters, and made as much use of the horse's mobility to dart in to close range and dart away as it did the bow's actual range.
And the pistols carried by the Winged Hussars - or anyone else in the 17th - 18th centuries, were Extremely short ranged weapons. Montecucolli, and Italian/Austrian general with some experience in these matters, wrote that the effective range of the pistol was the length of your own horse - as in, fire when your horse's head passed the enemy horse's head. I submit that calling that a 'ranged weapon' is stretching the definition considerably.

And, as all experience from the late 17th century to the mid-18th century showed, cavalry that tried to use pistols against cavalry that charged at speed with swords or lances was almost always a disaster for the 'pistoliers': at the battles of Blenheim, Ramilles, Mollwitz very good cavalry that tried to use pistols were smashed by cavalry charging to contact, even a relatively slow charge at a "good round trot" as at Blenheim. Before the repeating pistols of Sam Colt in the early 19th century, mounted pistol fire could almost be considered a Negative Modifier for mounted troops.

 

[Lazy sweeper]

It is still 15 strength difference, almost 3 times stronger than you. And unlike you claim initially, your WHs are not 100%.

I waited one turn, the army cavalry charged my Winged Hussars corp just beneath them, whilst the upper WH corp was shot by the cannons corp near the occupied barracks, thus the lower strenght.
The first WH corp almost got annihilated by the Arabian Army Cav attack, which was 20hp before attack and still managed to almost kill my WH corp south of them. It was total defeat one turn before and total defeat the later turn. This turn was more 1:3 ratio other than 1:4 perhaps.

Cavalry should have an attack value higher than Knights, Winged Hussars, Cataphracts, that's ok. But on defence, they should get less overall.
I don't know how the power of a unit is calculated and if the attack and defence factors are implemented to match realism. Instead it seems that power of a unit is merged into a single value, which reduces probability factors of attacks and defence to a lesser combination umbrella.
And again, WH were lancers at first charge, meaning, mounted pikemens; which should have an advantage vs any other mounted unit.
They also adopted skirmish tactics, with javelins, inherited from Hussars, which in terms inherited them from the Thracian cavalry, mercenaries of Roman Empire late years, before the Cataphracts entered the scene from the East.
There's so much that doesn't fit the frame that is almost impossible to contain it into a single turn snapshot, don't be too stiff.

 

[Lazy sweeper]

"Mounted Firepower" is almost always short-ranged. The famous compound or recurved bow of the steppes could shoot an arrow to long ranges, but the arrows were so light that at those ranges they simply were not very effective. Direct fire making use of the bow's power was no longer-ranged than about 50 - 80 meters, and made as much use of the horse's mobility to dart in to close range and dart away as it did the bow's actual range.
And the pistols carried by the Winged Hussars - or anyone else in the 17th - 18th centuries, were Extremely short ranged weapons. Montecucolli, and Italian/Austrian general with some experience in these matters, wrote that the effective range of the pistol was the length of your own horse - as in, fire when your horse's head passed the enemy horse's head. I submit that calling that a 'ranged weapon' is stretching the definition considerably.

And, as all experience from the late 17th century to the mid-18th century showed, cavalry that tried to use pistols against cavalry that charged at speed with swords or lances was almost always a disaster for the 'pistoliers': at the battles of Blenheim, Ramilles, Mollwitz very good cavalry that tried to use pistols were smashed by cavalry charging to contact, even a relatively slow charge at a "good round trot" as at Blenheim. Before the repeating pistols of Sam Colt in the early 19th century, mounted pistol fire could almost be considered a Negative Modifier for mounted troops.

That should also be true for pike and shoot then, instead they got a slight advantage over standard pikemans. One should consider the "fear" factors by using these early pistols into account, sort of "Berzerk" positive modifier to counter the negative modifier, which against melee troops would have to be considered. The same couldn't be said when taking into account Horses or Elephants, or Camels, which has disappeared apparently, which could be fenced off just by the smoke and sparkles; except the Horse in question is not Belophonte.

Battle of Blenheim 1704 seems like there were five armies, with four main cavalry- early curassiers regiments, with the savoy involved... I guess the savoy were the one crushed they were notorious as to have wet powder all along...

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

That should also be true for pike and shoot then, instead they got a slight advantage over standard pikemans. One should consider the "fear" factors by using these early pistols into account, sort of "Berzerk" positive modifier to counter the negative modifier, which against melee troops would have to be considered. The same couldn't be said when taking into account Horses or Elephants, or Camels, which has disappeared apparently, which could be fenced off just by the smoke and sparkles; except the Horse in question is not Belophonte.

There are a mass of tactical modifiers that could be added (or subtracted) from Units, but given that Civ doesn't really show tactics, having unfolded the battles into county-spanning sections of the map, I wouldn't hold my breath.

There was a big difference between a musket, even a slow-firing matchlock like the early Pike & Shot used, and any pistol. Among other things, most pistol balls were too light and too low a velocity to penetrate a cuirass - n fact, French cuirasses were 'proofed' by firing a pistol at them, so every one issued had a little dent in it to prove that it was good enough. Musket balls were about twice as heavy and had velocities a third greater, and could penetrate any cuirass at short range. That meant that trotting up to a pike and shot formation to fire your pistols at them was a losing proposition for the cavalry, and in fact while pistoliers did manage to break up infantry that couldn't shoot back, for 150 years after the Tercios and Squadrons (Swedish) and battalions (Dutch) pike and shot formations arrived on the battlefield, cavalry had a very poor record against infantry. It was only after 1740 when they started charging at a gallop or faster to use the shock effect of massed horsemen that they started running over the infantry again, and infantry starting forming Squares to fight them off instead of just standing in line and shooting them down at leisure.

Battle of Blenheim 1704 seems like there were five armies, with four main cavalry- early curassiers regiments, with the savoy involved... I guess the savoy were the one crushed they were notorious as to have wet powder all along...

There were 4 armies at Blenhiem (or Blindheim, or 2nd Hochstadt as the Germans call it . . .): Marlborough's Army of "the Sea Powers" (Dutch and English and their hired 'allies'), Eugene's Army of the HRE, the French Army of the Rhine and Army of Germany under, respectively, Marshals Tallard and Marsin. Nobody knows exactly how large any of the armies were, because the battle took place in August and they had all been marching and fighting since May, but best estimates are about 115 - 120,000 men on the field, of which about 1/3 were cavalry or dragoons. Of the mounted troops, the only cuirassiers were the Bavarian and Austrian regiments and the Danish contingent of the English/Dutch army, and the Danes were the only ones who actually charged at more than a slow trot and didn't waste their time firing pistols. Most cavalry, in western Europe at least, by this time were not wearing the cuirass at all: it didn't really come back in style until the last half of the 18th century - and that, at least graphically, appears to be what the Civ VI unit depicts.

Which means that, yeah, we've got about a 200 year gap between the last 'knights' and the 'cuirassiers' as the game depicts them, but since the game races through those 200 years in about 30 turns, there's not really enough time to stuff another unit into the mix.