FOTS Cavalry

[Captain Clueless]

i have 2 Questions.

Does it make sense to take Cavalry other than Yari Ki or Imp. Guard Cav ?

How is the best way to spend 1 or 2 Skillpoints on Imp. Guards Cav. ? I dont want them to cost more than 1100 ( i dont know but "higher projectil damage" sounds best in my ears )

[Thorien Kell]

It does if you know what you're doing. Imp cav? Leave them vanilla, no need for anything else. If you insist then lvl9 and improved range is quite sweet.

[zaript]

Shooting stats of imperial guard cav are good enough, and you get moral aura for the price, no need to upgrade it. If you really want it - I would favour accuracy over reload on cav, since it rarely keep shooting from one place.
Shogunate Imperial Guard are very good against other cav and have moral aura. Almost must have in cavalry heavy compositions.
Sabre cav is a sick unit, if you cav get it in melee with opponents line without taking a volley. So, kind of surprise/shock unit.
Revolver cav - super-deadly, but difficult to use. Need a lot of skill to pay for itself.

Carbine cav seem useless, imperial guard cav is all around better for just 100 koku.

[Captain Clueless]

thx for the replies. I guess i will use the veteran slots for other units then.

Sabre cav is a sick unit, if you cav get it in melee with opponents line without taking a volley. So, kind of surprise/shock unit.

isnt that the goal of every Cav Charge no matter which Cav unit is in use ? Do you have some situtations in mind where Sabre Cav is better than Yari Ki?

[zaript]

Well, for example, when all of your opponents cav dealing with your yari ki, you can deal a great damage by your saber cav. 4 unit hard cap on yari ki makes saber cav viable choice.

[Thorien Kell]

Viable choice nobody uses : ) Thing is, you can with minimal investment have Ki with similar attack stats, more speed and anti cav bonus. They have no better armor or insane high attack stats of vetted katana cav. Problem with sabre is that other cav is just too good.

[zaript]

Yes, you can have yari ki. 4 of them.

[Thorien Kell]

Yes, you can have yari ki. 4 of them.

See? Your're just confusing the noobs zaript : ) Why you posted that clip? Ducky using them in some tournament finale? It proves nothing and it means nothing. You wanted show me they can be useful, on occasion? Every unit can, I already knew that. Yes Ki limitations can impose desperate measures (like hunting rev cav with sabre cav) but in general you won't find too much of this unit in MM, in less then 5? 10% of games? It also means something. They are slow, vulnerable and not that numerous, not very popular unit.

[Captain Clueless]

@ Thorien Kell

what do you mean with anit Cav bonus ?


@ Zaript

I will try and vet up 1 sabre Cav. In the Video they looked great vs Revolver & Tortise

[John Adams]

@ Thorien Kell

what do you mean with anit Cav bonus ?

Yari Ki excel as anti-cavalry. Without training they cannot go up against melee infantry as well as Sabre Cavalry can. However, Yari Ki can take on enemy cavalry much better.
So in short, what he means is that, in this game, Yari Ki are naturally better against cavalry.

@ Zaript
I will try and vet up 1 sabre Cav. In the Video they looked great vs Revolver & Tortise

I have used Sabre cavalry in battle against line infantry. Even if they get one salvo off against your cavalry, assuming you are sending two or more against a single line infantry, the Sabre cavalry can still engage (and win), typically.

To answer your first question; it depends on the rest of your army. What is your goal? What is your preferred strategy on the battlefield? And so forth.

Yari-Ki are best used only as an anti cavalry force at the start. So if you assume your opponent is going to field a large cavalry wing, then it would be wise to bring them.

Sabre cavalry can quickly and easily decimate an opponent’s infantry (assuming they are not armed with spears). Allowing you to roll up one flank in an engagement. You should almost always avoid engaging them against other cavalry, however, they can still charge in the rear of an enemy unit that has already engaged, depending on the circumstances.

~John

[zaript]

@Captain Clueless
But make sure you use them in right situation - no reason to take sabre cav, until you want more than 4 cav in your composition, because first 4 should be yari ki^^

[zaript]

You see, I don't think someone can improve a lot, if he only seeks for "commonly optimal" way of play. Personally, I improve the most by looking at higher level games and by constantly asking myself how players on those games think, why they choose units and timings the way the do, and why it is working for them.

It is like "funday monday" by Day9 - he inflicts ridiculous restrictions on how viewers should play, and surprisingly it helps to discover new ways to play and new way to use certain units.

So, Thorien, while you are seeing forum population as a pack of brainless zombies who needs to be lead it certain direction, I prefer to share some mental pabulum^^

[Thorien Kell]

You're certainly believing in it, which is kind of cute, however you forgeting the other side of medal. Matchmade MP is living self correcting mechanism, constantly evolving, adapting and abiding to it's own rules. There ppl have tendency to a) play efficiently/safe with as less of risk involved b) learn from one another and constantly adapt. They have tendency to filter out least efficient /safe unit combinations all by themselves already.

Further more if some unit or tactic works for someone else, it definitely doesn't mean it will work for you. Practice and experimenting are definitely important part in learning process, but learning to play efficiently is far more then looking how others do it. You have to find middle road between army composition doctrine and your personal style and micro skills, ie. the way you know /want to play.

AMP used to rant endlessly in how rev cav horde is OPed, and I've tried to explain to him that until we begin encountering armies like that in MM, fact that he can use them efficiently means absolutely nothing for MM community.

[zaript]

I am not forgetting anything of that, give me some credit, please^^

Question was: "Does it make sense to take Cavalry other than Yari Ki or Imp. Guard Cav ?"
Your answer was: "It does if you know what you're doing."
My answer was more or less the same with additional info on a topic, like when it makes sense to bring sabre cav and how some players do it.
At that point your criticism moved from topic to somewhere else and become counter-productive, I believe.

I mean, why not help people to get better knowledge of what they can do, istead of throwing at them some general amorphous truth?

[Thorien Kell]

At that point your criticism moved from topic to somewhere else and become counter-productive, I believe.

However I believe that your showing of tournament video finale was counter productive. Our friend that asked was obviously a noob, now you impressed him with video of guys who he cannot dream of trying to imitate. There will be the time to learn about new cav, but not yet. First let him cover the basics, advanced things will come naturally later, or won't, it doesn't matter.

[zaript]

Well, you can do that at school, but at University we just throw them into deep water^^ I have no idea about topic starter level, I just assume, that he is ready, because he started asking questions.

I mean, we can not really affect how someone would develop himself as a player - nor me, nor you - so I choose to give people more material, that I didn't had. Getting any hight level replays half year ago wasn't easy, but now people have quite a lot of replays and videos to get ideas from.

[Captain Clueless]

Well, you can do that at school, but at University we just throw them into deep water^^ I have no idea about topic starter level, I just assume, that he is ready, because he started asking questions.

well just to make you stop speculating. I am a TW Veteran but when it comes to S2TW i dont have that much unit knowledge because i play it MP since maybe 4-5 months. I started this thread because of my lack of knowing the units. I just never tried or thought about other units than Yari Ki , imp. guard cav , BB , Black Tortise , Marines , shogitai .
(i have to add that Pariyas tipps about how to upgrade was a great help ).

because of my experience in TW micromanagement and the solid common sense standard army i win alot.
Now im wondering which units beside the standard composition have their use. Units that are not perfect but also not useless like Revolver Cav or Vermillion Bird force for example.

so i guess if noobs read this they might get confused. I admit that my Questions maybe sounded like pure beginner. But for me the info you 3 guys gave was exactly what i wanted.

[zaript]

There are "unconventional" units, that have their use on some specific maps, or in some battle plans. Or against a certain opponent, like in that video I posted - Duck was certain to see at least 6 cav units from MypZuK and his plan evolved around that expectation.

You almost never "forced" to use thos "unconventional" units, but sometimes map asks for it. Like Happo ridge or Jigokudany valley.
Or may be in MM queue you met someone you played before, and want to throw him out of balance?

Sabre cav will nicely complement cav heavy composition, or melee rush build. It can be used as a cheap surprise unit, if you manage to hide it in a forest, before your opponent noticed.

[Fieel]

Well, in ultra large battles i take Sabre cavalry every time.

Usually 2-3 Yar Ki and 1 Sabre, i use the yar ki as counter-cavalry and the sabre, if needed and if i have an occasion to strike enemy infantry.

So, to answer your question, yes, there are infinite uses for cavalry other than Yar Ki, just try them out