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Thread: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

  1. #1

    Default MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    In Medieval II Total War, playing as one of the Eastern factions had an incredibly unique feeling, as opposed to playing as their European counterparts. In Europe it was all about heavy infantry and cavalry, whereas with the Eastern factions, playing with lighter, faster, skirmishers and horses, you could play the game very differently but with the same or perhaps even greater efficiency.

    Now we come to ETW. While their new game mechanics (firing arcs, range, etc) have made artillery and musket infantry MUCH more useful, they have seriously neglected the use of mounted ranged units, wielding bows or muskets.

    The whole PURPOSE of ranged horse units is to allow them to move quickly around and among enemy formations, all the while firing their weapons. This is how it was in MTWII, and this is why horse archers were so deadly. Now, in ETW, we have Dragoons, Carabineers, and even some horse archers, but none of them fire while moving, which almost cripples their usage. It would be one thing if they fired right when they stopped, but they must first do this little "dance", if you will: Run up to the enemy, stop, spend agonizing seconds reforming their perfect line, since they all got broken up running, wait a few more agonizing seconds, take aim, fire a volley, reload (which will have to be restarted if they move at all during that time).

    Within that time frame they will get murdered by any competant infantry commander who could probably position and fire before the enemy can even run away. Horses should be able to run around and flank units, firing into sides and backs on the move, really becoming a nusiance to the enemy battle line. That would make them USEFUL. Yes they have uses now, but they are severely gimped by not being able to fire on the move.

    Now, in any case, does anyone think that there is any remote possibility of modding this in in the future? From the way the new ranged mechanics work (with the little "cone of fire"), it seems like were are doomed to having useless ranged cavalry, but I don't have much modding experience with ETW specifically, so I'm wondering if anyone thinks we might be able to change this in the future and how we might be able to go about doing so.

    Throw some thoughts my way, people!

  2. #2

    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    Wow I haven't used horse archers until just now and I see what you mean.No cantabarian circle, they don't fire while moving, and they have a fixed firing arc D:

    The fixed arc is probably what bothers me the most though because it is possible to turn your body and shoot and limiting their shooting capabilities means they have to fight like infantry.I could understand stop and shoot for gunners (get rid of their fixed arc at least) but horse archers should be a mobile weapon.
    Last edited by skullman86; March 29, 2009 at 04:14 PM.

  3. #3

    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    Quote Originally Posted by skullman86 View Post
    Wow I haven't used horse archers until just now and I see what you mean.No cantabarian circle, they don't fire while moving, and they have a fixed firing arc D:

    The fixed arc is probably what bothers me the most though because it is possible to turn your body and shoot and limiting their shooting capabilities means they have to fight like infantry.I could understand stop and shoot for gunners (get rid of their fixed arc at least) but horse archers should be a mobile weapon.
    Agreed exactly. The only possible solution I'm seeing if we can't actually get them to fire on the move is possibly widening the arc, maybe even widening the arc to as big as 360 degrees or 300 degrees or so. That way you spend less time positioning the direction of the cavalry (tedious), and more time maneuvering them (tactical)

  4. #4

    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    Agreed exactly. The only possible solution I'm seeing if we can't actually get them to fire on the move is possibly widening the arc, maybe even widening the arc to as big as 360 degrees or 300 degrees or so. That way you spend less time positioning the direction of the cavalry (tedious), and more time maneuvering them (tactical)
    But that doesnot make them shoot while moving does it?
    Am i missing something? cause i understand it in the way that this improves the time they need to start firing alot, but dont make shooting while moving available.....

    Btw It would also be nice to get that for dragoons also, cause whats the point about beeing mobile if the time get lost on positioning...

  5. #5

    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    on a similar note, infantry has to completely position before they fire too. Of course it makes more sense it their case, but you'd think that the part of the unit that was positioned could fire and not wait for the rest.

  6. #6
    Musthavename's Avatar Bunneh Ressurection
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    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    Yes, I also noticed this while playing Georgia. I was actually planning to do a fun campaign trying only to use Horse Archers (well, except for sieges obviously). Annoyingly, they're completely useless when you can't move them.

    What was daft was in the description of the Tatars (from the game!) it read something like "These men are so skilled that they can control the horse only using their knees, allowing them to wield weapons such as bows". Then why can't they in the game!?
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  7. #7
    Aloicias's Avatar Senator
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    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    I agree this really bothers me as well. They are useless in their current state.

  8. #8

    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    Hopefully ETWs engine is flexible enough that in the future, with mod tools, we will be able to fix this, although REALLY, it should have just been made this way by CA. And also I've never seen a game company ever fix/change something like this post release... but if CA does, I will be *very* pleasantly suprised, IE, you can haz my wallets. But I doubt that will happen.

  9. #9

    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    Might be an easy way to change it, under the units tables, maybe look for an 'unknown' column that only ships have 'true' - it may be fire while moving enabled perhaps? As ships are the only units that can currently fire while moving - I checked to see if I could find where the effect for fire_and_advance was located, but no luck

  10. #10

    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    Any progress on this or do we have to pester CA?

  11. #11
    S-te-Fan's Avatar Primicerius
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    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    I really hope we can fix this.

  12. #12

    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    If my memories serve to be correct, i've seen Mysore have such horse archers.
    Last edited by Der_kaiser; May 09, 2009 at 08:10 PM.

  13. #13
    S-te-Fan's Avatar Primicerius
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    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    Eh... I don't think they have .

    Maybe there's a way to combine the animations so they have the shoot animation with their hands and do the horse riding stuff with their feet/legs .
    Last edited by S-te-Fan; May 11, 2009 at 11:36 AM.

  14. #14

    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    Animations don't launch projectiles, I've made sure.

  15. #15

    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    The only solution I have is a very placeholder one, which is to make horse archer's reloading skill be +70 and for the base reload time of arrow projectiles to be 1. In addition, increasing the range with the velocity (You can't have a low velocity and a high range, or the arrows jus don't appear. I've done 150 range with 50 velocity) makes it so when they stand still they kind of have a semi-automatic feel to them.

    I'd pester CA>

  16. #16

    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    I'm working on a personal mod at the moment and this is on the list.If I can find the firing arc in the DB and widen it, I might be able to make cav archers a little better.Problem is I've been digging around through the files for a few days and I have yet to find anything related to firing arcs.I've tested stuff in unit_stats and I've gone through all projectiles tables (multiple times) to see if there was anything useful, but nothing seems to affect the arc or the unit's aim.

    I'm actually starting to wonder if the arcs are tied to unit classes and not individual units themselves; instead of giving each unit it's own unique arc CA could have just made groups and given each it's own arc.So instead of every line infantry unit in the game having a unique arc, all line infantry are put into group "line_infantry" where they all share the same arc (max range determined by the unit_stats table).

    If anyone has any useful info regarding firing arc angles please post or PM me.I would really appreciate it.

  17. #17

    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    If I had to guess (which is usually not a good idea for me), I'd say look at columns 10-12 in battle_entities. They appear to be measured in degrees.
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  18. #18

    Default Re: MTWII Style Horse Archers Possible?

    Yep column 10 determines firing arc angles, thx for the tip. Column 12 has something to do with units keeping formation. At 0 cavalry units scatter the longer they go without stopping and on higher values they seem more disciplined. At 0 infantry seem pretty normal until they get to firring range and..well dont. They just stand there for a few minutes and then..charge!! Couldn't figure the effect of 11. Tried a few firing angles (100, 120 and 360) with Horse archers and dragoons. Didn't really help much unfortunatly. While they could fire at a greater angle they couldn't actually hit the enemy at a greater angle. They don't turn in the saddle and so most just fire straight fowards and the units runs out of ammo really quickly. Might be worth more testing but my suspicion is that 90° is the optimum.

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