Horsemen vs. Cavalry

[SJC]

When you start a new game, one of the early decisions that you will need to make is whether to build cavalry or horsemen. The limited number of battle slots means that you probably should not build both unless your civilization is very small.

At first glance, cavalry seem like the obvious choice, since their offense and defense are double that of horsemen. With offense/defense of only one, horsemen tend to die in job lots when in battle, especially if they are in heroic stance. A hit that will 10 cavalry will kill 20 horsemen.

However, cavalry also cost twice as much as horsemen -- so if you lose 10 cavalry or 20 horsemen, this represents 1000 hammers in both cases.

The math turns in the favour of horsemen quite substantially if you add in any +1 offense/defense wonders or civics. A +1 to a horsemen brings it from 1 to 2, doubling its strength. A cavalry unit is only improved from 2-3, a 50% increase. If you have +2, your horsemen are tripled, while cavalry are only doubled.

As well, horsemen are pretty much the only unit that can benefit from snow (at least after the early game until fighters show up and I have never seen fighters). This can be used to your advantage, but it also means that they are less useful in other weather situations. Cavalry can at least stand up against spearmen.

The biggest issue is that it is really hard to sit there and watch your horsemen die in large numbers, which leads people to tend away from putting them in heroic stance. Unless they are there as a placeholder, why use units that you are unwilling to fight with?

From a market point of view, cavalry are usually more expensive than horsemen. You can often find very good deals on horsemen, while cavalry usually cost more than hammers. Even if I have chosen to build cavalry, I usually end up with a bunch of horsemen because I couldn't resist a good deal.

What do others think? Are horsemen better than cavalry?

EDIT: or just get enough of one of the other to warm a slot until you can get knights?

[robin74]

Horsemen are better than cavalry because you only need one mobile unit to deny your opponent the bonus, and putting in one horseman is cheaper than putting in one cavalry.
Other than that to the question "which should rather be built, horsemen or cavalry" I would answer - neither. At any point in the game there are better units that you can spend your hammers on.

[ShuShu62]

Horsemen are better than cavalry because you only need one mobile unit to deny your opponent the bonus, and putting in one horseman is cheaper than putting in one cavalry.

What he said!

Horsemen are better than cavalry because you only need one mobile unit to deny your opponent the bonus, and putting in one horseman is cheaper than putting in one cavalry.
Other than that to the question "which should rather be built, horsemen or cavalry" I would answer - neither. At any point in the game there are better units that you can spend your hammers on.

I too believed this until the eldar imparted wisdom in an earlier thread. Horses are better than infantry ifff...

1) The weather is right
2) The enemy likes Secret Weapons/Call to Arms
3) You can safely leave them on Heroic

[robin74]

1) The weather is right

Cavalry works with fog - you can do better with legions (offensive) or longbow (defensive)
Horsemen work with snow - and OK, I can buy an argument that under some circumstances you may want to or need to risk it and go for snow. Though I still believe it has some very limited use.

2) The enemy likes Secret Weapons/Call to Arms

That is a good point. However, once you reach Monarchy, you can spend 50 hammers to buy a Man at Arms (3 attack) or a Longbow (3 defense) at the same price as a horseman (1 attack and 1 defense). Wonder event would have to be used twice against you for horsemen to be better. Even if you get decimated once, it's still cheaper to go for infantry / ranged. Even with legions and phalanges, horsemen are only better if you are subject to Secret Weapon / Call to Arms twice (or more )

One possible advantage of horsemen may be that indeed it may be cheaper to leave them on heroic because they seem to be hit less often that melee. But the algorithm which selects a stack to take the damage is not clear to me, so it may be that I observe them to take damage rarely because of my gameplay style.

[SJC]

But the algorithm which selects a stack to take the damage is not clear to me,

There is a theory that the most powerful section of battle (melee/horses/ranged/naval) will be most likely to attack its opposite. If the opponent is 75% melee and 25% horses, then 3/4 of his attacks will be against your melee. If you fortify your melee, then you can make most of your attacks with your horses and wipe his mobile units out quickly.

Wonder event would have to be used twice against you for horsemen to be better.

Over the course of several battles, this is not unlikely to happen. With horses, you can place them well before the battle and not worry about being blasted by Call to Arms/Secret Weapon - particularly useful with the 20 hour waiting period. In a battle a couple of days ago, I used Call to Arms twice (and would have done it a third time if I hadn't lost the kingship at an inopportune time). Remember that if you are fighting a small country, it might only take 2 GPs to trigger an event (and the people who are active will be more likely to be able to place multiple GPs -- its a lot harder to keep king/minister in a large civ).

Also, putting all your units into melee/ranged makes Call to Arms all the more likely -- how can they resist using it?

However, once you reach Monarchy, you can spend 50 hammers to buy a Man at Arms (3 attack) or a Longbow (3 defense) at the same price as a horseman (1 attack and 1 defense).

Once I have Monarchy, the question becomes irrelevant since at that point I will be saving all my hammers to build knights (which is next up). I won't build any horsemen/cavalry after that, although I may pick some up on the market if they are selling for cheap -- even if they don't end up getting used, they will combine themselves with the knights into tanks in due course.

EDIT: An another point that hasn't been raised: there are limited slots on the battlefield - not everyone can place infantry stacks. Someone needs to build horses.

EDIT: Of course, if it is a consideration for you, in the event that you aren't hit by Call to Arms, the defense minister position will probably go to the guy that spent all his cash on melee units. Idea for future addition: Subcommander posts that go to the leader in mobile/ranged/etc that can control the units in those slots.

[robin74]

There is a theory that the most powerful section of battle

There are different theories as to what would happen, but I'm not fully satisfied with either.

Over the course of several battles, this is not unlikely to happen.

In all the games I played, the only side that would ever use miniwonders multiple times is me. It was never used against me more than once in a single battle, and usually it isn't used even once. So of course, whether it happens or not depends on how good the players you play against are, but overall I would say that yes, it's rather unlikeyly.

Also, putting all your units into melee/ranged makes Call to Arms all the more likely -- how can they resist using it?

Because they are often large, unorganized civilizations, for whom miniwonders cost a lot, and you need to build in the six hour window before it drops off the list. And before anybody else does - I would usually remove it from the list before my opponent can. It's cheaper than building horsemen.

EDIT: An another point that hasn't been raised: there are limited slots on the battlefield - not everyone can place infantry stacks.

I think I ran into this problem only once. But that's because I a) spend a lot of time at the game, so it's likely all slots will be taken before I can put mine (especially since I usually try to coordinate the time when the vote ends) and b) I usually am a defense minister and often king, so I can make room for my units.

[SJC]

I think I ran into this problem only once.

Many players do run into the problem of limited slots and not everyone can be defense minister or king. The best strategy for someone that plans to be defense minister might not be the best one for others in the civ to follow if they wish to add troops to the battle.

Particularly for any large civ, it is best if most people focusing on building only one stack of units. Some of those stacks are going to have to be mobile units. The question comes back to: if you are going to build mobile units, should you build horsemen or cavalry?

EDIT: I'm starting to think the answer to my question is to save my hammers and research ceremonial burial (on the way to getting knights as soon as possible). But that doesn't help in any battles that come before you can get feudalism (and it might take a while in a slow game).

[robin74]

The question comes back to: if you are going to build mobile units, should you build horsemen or cavalry?

Then I would say - horsemen, because of their unusual weather bonus.

[SJC]

Certainly very early on it can be fun to defend with militia, natives and horsemen. Especially if you have 2-3 civbucks and can keep a blizzard going.

Another point to horsemen - they generally cost around 200 on the market, while it usually costs 500-800 for cavalry.

[Moonlghtknt]

Horsemen are better than cavalry because you only need one mobile unit to deny your opponent the bonus, and putting in one horseman is cheaper than putting in one cavalry.
Other than that to the question "which should rather be built, horsemen or cavalry" I would answer - neither. At any point in the game there are better units that you can spend your hammers on.

Right until you come upon the battlefield that has 6 mobile slots, and only 3 melee and 2 ranged.

This is probably the worst advice I've ever seen for battlefield strategy, as it complete eliminates a potential opportunity to destroy your enemies without them being able to touch your units with CTA or SW.

Feel free to keep building all your melee and ranged. I'll just cut them in half and drop my 100+ stack of cavalry down on you and rip through your army while I watch you waste hammers building your one horse over and over again.

I too believed this until the eldar imparted wisdom in an earlier thread. Horses are better than infantry ifff...

1) The weather is right
2) The enemy likes Secret Weapons/Call to Arms
3) You can safely leave them on Heroic

This is the correct answer, and any intelligent general is not going to let you have YOUR optimum battlefield. Your assumptions are based on a civ that plays the "drop and go" game. Place thier units into battle, and then not log in until tomorrow and just hope they won. You come up against someone like me, and I'll destroy your horses, drop CTA/SW on you as many times as I can, and make the weather work for ME.

To the OP: Horsemen and Cavalry are basically the same cost. The have the same cost to hammer ratio. You cannot rely on the market to give you a general cost of these units, since the hammers and units fluctuate wildly at times. The only thing you can do is watch the market and play these the same as the commodities, buy low, sell high.

The thing you have to think about, is what does my opponent like in weather, and how can I use that against them? Do they still have natives or basic bows? Maybe a bunch of militia? I can safely use horses and the weather still helps me. Are they using legions, maybe catapults? Cavalry are my friends. Phalanxes or Men At Arms? Knights are what I'm after.

In most cases you will never have as many mobile units as you do melee or ranged, but discounting them altogether before gunpowder can be a death knell against a general that knows their stuff. It's only AFTER gunpowder that I would say mobile units aren't as effective as before. I haven't bothered researching Combustion in a long time. Tanks just don't seem that important once you have guns, artillery and steam ships. (ships are situational as well, but dropping a 50 stack that you build when they were 100 hammers and are now worth 8/10 really opens your opponents eyes wide, get them in wind and watch them rip apart the other army!)

[ShuShu62]

Thanks Moonlight, a situation came up yesterday, and I couldn't figure out how to set the context for the conversation.

Both Robin and Moonlight are right and the dance of which applies is very subtle. The current game I am playing is a great case in point. When I took on the bloat civ, they had superior numbers, but I had tactical advantage because I could.
1) Go in and out of gladiator.
2) They were infantry biased

As a result I could always get my strength to trade shot at worst, because my cavalry was always heroic and often Super heroic without risk of getting hit. In this case, I was able to clear out their cavlry while they pounded fortified spearmen. They were doomed and they correctly retreated... and joined my civ.

We then had to take on the civBuck Guild. Now we were at tactical disadvantage, because the civBuck guild had tactical advantage.
1) The civBuck guild army was balanced, so I could not safely keep any troops on heroic
2) The best I could do was trade shots with the battle going to the army best equipped to withstand a war of attrition... the other side.

The way to win that battle is as Robin said. Build the most efficient troops (man-at-war) and fill ALL the other slots with single fodder. I had pushed the civBuck guild from the field two days earlier with this strategy. Now, as long as I can guarrantee to trade shots, I will win because I will pound their line troops while sacrificing 50 hammers every other turn. The balanced army loses in this scenario, because if they try to do the same thing I am doing with fodder on the line, I can stay heroic on the line and take multiple shots. In this scenario, all troops are heroic on both sides because we are both hitting the other side's fodder, but my troops are more efficient, so my heroic bonus is greater than their heroic bonus and I will take more shots.

both are right, given the proper setting.
retreat is sometimes right too...

I couldn't figure out how to explain that on global chat last night. Now I have a link to send teamates to.

[SJC]

I haven't bothered researching Combustion in a long time. Tanks just don't seem that important once you have guns, artillery and steam ships.

Combustion can be very useful in consolidating the stacks of horsemen, cavalry, knights and horse archers that you have accumulated during the game, especially if you need them for defense.

Every game I've been in has ended not long after combustion has appeared anyways -- at most it has affected the final round of battles. I've only seen Steel researched once and never seen battleships actually brought into a battle. I've been playing slow games, so maybe its different in fast ones.

Secondary question: Horse Archers.

[ShuShu62]

...Secondary question: Horse Archers.

'sno good reason for horse archers...

well other than weather...
... or cheap purchase price to use as fodder

[robin74]

Feel free to keep building all your melee and ranged. I'll just cut them in half

As I already said - even if you cut them in half (which you wouldn't, because I would never allow it. I wouldn't actually put my troops in before before the battle starts, and if the miniwonder is available during the actual battle, I wouldn't allow you to build it, but build it myself instead), it's still cheaper to build melee/ranged and let half of them be destroyed than build cavalry or horsemen.

[ShuShu62]

As I already said - even if you cut them in half (which you wouldn't, because I would never allow it. I wouldn't actually put my troops in before before the battle starts, and if the miniwonder is available during the actual battle, I wouldn't allow you to build it, but build it myself instead), it's still cheaper to build melee/ranged and let half of them be destroyed than build cavalry or horsemen.

Robin... I definitely agree with you to a great extent. Cavalry is a luxury to be indulged in after the infantry is in place but I would like to mentiion some mathematical considerations that ensure your position isn't a absolute.

1) Losing half of your infantry is only more efficient when attacking with men at arms and only once, otherwise you are breaking even at best.
2) Having to cast call-to-arms/secret-weapon to prevent someone else from using needs to be amortized to the cost of your infantry units. Especially since you may need to defensively cast it multiple times over the life of the unit (especially if I am in the game... hehehe)


Started differantely: the most efficient unit to purchase for a single battle is infantry, but the entire life span of the game can alter that calculation depending on the skillset of the oppoents you intend to fight.

[robin74]

the entire life span of the game can alter that calculation depending on the skillset of the oppoents you intend to fight.

True, and if I'm ever in a game with players skillful enough I will certainly modify my strategy accordingly.
On average though that's not what happens. Maybe I'm just lucky. Miniwonders aren't really used against me very often. Never more than once in a single battle. Hardly ever more than once over the whole game span. It's hardly ever the case that there is another player in the game who understands the game rules. An average player won't even know what Secret Weapon does.
And if I'm in a game with another good player, we often end up in the same civilization, and then competition revolves around some completely different issues.

[ShuShu62]

True, and if I'm ever in a game with players skillful enough I will certainly modify my strategy accordingly.
On average though that's not what happens. Maybe I'm just lucky. Miniwonders aren't really used against me very often. Never more than once in a single battle. Hardly ever more than once over the whole game span. It's hardly ever the case that there is another player in the game who understands the game rules. An average player won't even know what Secret Weapon does.
And if I'm in a game with another good player, we often end up in the same civilization, and then competition revolves around some completely different issues.

That was my observation as well...

What Random_User failed to point out is that once you let that genie out of the bottle, the people you use it on are fast learners.

[robin74]

That was my observation as well...

What Random_User failed to point out is that once you let that genie out of the bottle, the people you use it on are fast learners.

Quite frankly, I have some very mixed experience with their supposed learning
It's not so rare to observe a large civ that attacks me, get their army decimated (I might use mini wonders, I often withdraw my troops to come back later so that the battle doesn't finish too early and so that losses I inflict are eventually higher. It's especially fun against gladiator civs, short of repealing the civic they can't even do much about it. And often they actually add more troops), and then they vote to attack me and do it all over again.

[ShuShu62]

That was my observation as well...

What Random_User failed to point out is that once you let that genie out of the bottle, the people you use it on can be(?) fast learners.

Granted I was using them a lot in current game.
1) Declare on 10 different civs
2) Wait for big battle
3) Hit em 'all

But in the battle where I got pants'd last night, I saw my opponent's middle reserves sitting on the bench. I had the secret weapon all queued up and ready to go.

The guy didn't let me stance flip him... as I had done to him before.
The guy wouldn't let me fodder flip him... as I had done to him before
And he didn't let me nuke him... as I had done to him before. (he stole the secret weapon just before fielding his middle stacks)

He also snuck attacked me while I was on heroic ... as I had done to him before. (i.e. hold many hammers in reserve, swap stances for a while, then convert hammers and commit troops seconds before next round on other player's heroic 'turn')

I want to say categorically that a fat wallet and the ability to learn from observation is a very scary combination.

[Moonlghtknt]

As I already said - even if you cut them in half (which you wouldn't, because I would never allow it. I wouldn't actually put my troops in before before the battle starts, and if the miniwonder is available during the actual battle, I wouldn't allow you to build it, but build it myself instead), it's still cheaper to build melee/ranged and let half of them be destroyed than build cavalry or horsemen.

Sounds like we have the same battle style. My team is always aware of CTA/SW and builds it if necessary before we commit out troops. Problem is we've seen it roll around again after both were built, and though we built the first one, the second one got used on us.

We didn't lose, because we all know better than to ALL build melee and ranged. A couple of us commit to only mobile units, and one or two will build a large number of ships (we limit ships because they are more situational than mobile). Out of 7 people, if 5 are building melee/ranged, and two are building mobile, we can commit a large battle power without putting in anything that can be destroyed by a miniwonder. Once the offending wonder is gone, we drop the front and back lines in and rip the enemy apart.

[SJC]

After several battles, I have come to the conclusion is that horses or cavalry can have positional use. You don't want to have few when the other guy has lots.

Their problem is that they attack like spearmen, defend like swordsmen and die expensively.

[ShuShu62]

... You don't want to have few when the other guy has lots...

Just the opposite.
I bet Robin will agree with me on this.

[robin74]

Of course I will