Armor or AP dmg - what would you choose?

[Nordling]

Hello all,

I came upon every odd choice during my atropatene campaign - i had 2 options for shock cavalry. I could have gone either atropatene lancers or persian cavalry (AoR). Their stats are exactly the same except two - atropatene lancers have 70 armor and elite AP lance whereas persian cav got 90 armor but normal non-AP lance. I did not which one to pick! They also draw from the same pop class. Persian cav would be more durable and better in fights with enemy cav (i guess) but atro lancers seem a better choice when it comes to smashing enemy infantry. I eventually picked atro lancers but im wondering which would you guys pick.

Cheers!

[KAM 2150]

Atropatene guys do not have elite lance, in case of shock cav their damage is showing you their sidearm so if they have high AP, they have axes and maces rather than swords.

Basically game does not allow to assign different stats to primary and secondary weapon.


Most of the time I would go for more armour but all is situational (for example high AP weapons have lower total damage so sword equipped guys would be better vs lighter units).

[Nordling]

Oh, I see! So every shock cav deals basically the same amount of dmg with their lance on charge and what makes the difference is the other stats?

Does that mean that atro lancers are just straight inferior to persian AoR cav?

[AltanIV]

Not necessarily, you have to take into consideration their charge power as some cavalry do the most damage when when they charge. Though it can be a pain to micro.

[KAM 2150]

Units with high AP will deal more damage but to make things more funny....charge bonus has little to do with charge damage for cavalry units, it used only in 1v1 calculation. What actual cavalry charge damage is comes from horse mass in battle_entities. So for example you can have a units with 100 AP damage and 100 charge bonus but only 100 mass and that units will deal less casulaties than cavalry units with 1 damage, 1 charge bonus but 10,000 mass.

For the sake of transparency, charge bonus is more or less linked to how heavy a horse is.

Weapon damage is used for cavalry for melee combat si if you are about to face cataphracts or Romans, high AP units might be better pick.

[H-Khan]

I picked Atro lancers aswell for the few med cavs I had. I currently don't have really cav heavy armies so they'd end up fighting other cav pretty often. AoR lancers had only 3 melee defence ( like half of baggage train ) and their upkeep was like ~40 more per turn. AoR lancers did seem have the heavier horse from old honga entries tho.

// experience might affect the def.. I got stables set so can't recruit raw ones atm

[AltanIV]

Units with high AP will deal more damage but to make things more funny....charge bonus has little to do with charge damage for cavalry units, it used only in 1v1 calculation. What actual cavalry charge damage is comes from horse mass in battle_entities. So for example you can have a units with 100 AP damage and 100 charge bonus but only 100 mass and that units will deal less casulaties than cavalry units with 1 damage, 1 charge bonus but 10,000 mass.

For the sake of transparency, charge bonus is more or less linked to how heavy a horse is.

Weapon damage is used for cavalry for melee combat si if you are about to face cataphracts or Romans, high AP units might be better pick.

I must admit I didn't check that far. For that matter is the horse's/unit's mass indicated anywhere ingame ? Isn't it linked to the armor ? Logically I'd think that heavier armor means bigger horse mass as the horse needs to be massive enough to support the armor + its rider. And some horses are just better for speed.

[Nordling]

I must admit I didn't check that far. For that matter is the horse's/unit's mass indicated anywhere ingame ? Isn't it linked to the armor ? Logically I'd think that heavier armor means bigger horse mass as the horse needs to be massive enough to support the armor + its rider. And some horses are just better for speed.

I guess that armor is somewhat linked to that but it doesn't work pro rata. In case discussed, i would guess that both atro lancers and persian aor cav have the same mass and therefore deal comparable amount of dmg on charge. If they stay in combat tho, ap dmg and armor come more into play. Shock cav has probably more mass and therefore stronger charge as compared to melee cav for example.

Another thing that comes to my mind - when charging infantry line with cav, cav should do crazy amount of dmg if the unit unloads javs first. The lines would then not be braced and lance cav should chew through that line with ease, however they should break before charge if jav volley is overwhelming. That would be very historically accurate, as seen much later on in gunpowder tactics. If the musketeers line unloaded their volley on short range into cavlary squadron, the charge of cav would almodt always break, except for some rare instances as in somosierra, for example. Having said that, i knoe that it would have a negative effect on ai which would never choose to brace instead of throwing javs - so that will probably stay as only a concept.

[H-Khan]

https://www.honga.net/totalwar/rome2...Medium_Lancers

From the old entries they certainly seem that Persians are better shock cav, while Atro would be better for static melee.

[KAM 2150]

Old entries have no value now since every single stat is new and rearranged.