Cerberias wrote:I keep them with swords because if you hit a flank charge you want to only be one poa down at the least, otherwise you could still lose the melee afterwards. You have to play quite well with the unprot cav, but they're easy to keep in one rank with the IC + superior + drilled status. The reason I take them is because i'm veering away from LH nowadays, because they're ignored easily in some situations, cavalry can never be ignored because a flank charge from cav is always going to be devistating. They force the enemy to peel off units to deal with them which splits up the enemy army, or risk a rolled up flank. You cant play them as agressively as light horse, but do more damage, and are quite cheap for each unit (52 pts). I'm tending to just use the light horse to support the cavalry with catching enemy light horse now, and to stop march moves early on so you can pin the enemy in places that you need them pinned.
Also, protected may be better in some circumstances, but in evade formation it makes very little difference, and the unprotected status may tempt enemy light horse to charge you, which holds them up. Protected cav cost more points, will still be a poa down against most enemy cav (which you shouldnt be fighting with these guys anyway, except in a flank charge), still dont want to go into two ranks, and make sure that enemy light horse won't be charging you rashly.
As for the knights and lancers, I always like to have punch in the army and they can be deployed last, exactly where you want them, the enemy cant pull units away from other parts of the battlefield because they need them to deal with the cav, so can smash through a weak point in the enemy army.
Basically, they have more options than light horse, although you cant play them as agressively. They pose more of a threat so they won't be able to leave one unit to deal with two cav because you will get a flank charge if you're patient with it and draw them out. Wheras you can quite often leave one unit to deal with two units of light horse because the threat of a flank charge is greatly diminished. All numbers, meaning that I have 8 fighting bg's, ones that all pose a threat so the enemy must divide up to deal with them, opening up gaps in the process for my much more manouverable forces to go through.
It would be interesting to see how you fare against a LH army.
BTW you don't get many chances of flank attacks against an experienced player in FOG as a percentage of all moves, and single rank cavalry less so, if you do manage it your on a double plus at impact its in melee that you'll stuggle being unprotected you will nearly always be down.
Please do keep us informed it will be interesting to see how you get on, I don't know if your in the UK but your army at Britcon would be an interesting opponent.
