Light Horse

[tortugapower]

Hello fellow generals,

I have been enjoying a series of victories in my current campaign as the Swedes against the Russians. However, I am finding the Russian Tatar (light ranged cavalry) to be impossible to deal with in an efficient manner. I seek the advice of the masses.

My army only has access to the Dragoon, and I'm having a devil of a time trapping the Tatars (similar with their Cossacks) in order to eliminate them. Also, this appears to be a problem that grows in severity because as the campaign goes forward, the Russian forces increase their light horse composition in their army (because I can't rout the previous ones, so they stick around).

Many thanks for helpful tips.

Cheers,
Tortuga

[SnuggleBunnies]

Well, there isn't really an efficient way to get rid of them. On the other hand, they're incapable of quickly inflicting damage on you, either. I would say don't use dragoons though. Although they can evade, they are classified as medium foot when it comes to getting shot at. This, combined with their small unit size, makes them very vulnerable to disrupting from missile fire. Instead, if you must fight them, I would simply engage them with your Pike and Shot units; these have enough manpower to endure the arrow storm and still come out on top. Otherwise, if you win the cavalry fight on the flanks, you can try to charge them with your cavalry so they evade into the path of other troops. Being light horse, even non keil infantry can charge them and make short work of them in a melee.

[urkki63]

Massed firepower. That´s how the Russians themselves defeated the Tatars before incorporating them into their armies as auxiliaries.

Finns were very successful in ambushing Russian cavalry forces in forests armed with hunting crossbows and heavy spears. They skied around the flanks faster than the horses could ride in deep snow hitting and disappearing again as they pleased (Joutselkä 1555). Not sure how to portray this convincingly in the game though..

Henry

[tortugapower]

Thank you both for your replies. They are a troublesome foe to deal with. I actually have a follow-up to this, or an extension of it. It plays off of what you were saying, urkki.

In a recent battle, I lined up my pike and shot to oppose the enemy light cavalry (me as the Swedes, them as the Russians). In the direct exchange of fire, my pike and shot were losing the overall exchange against an equal number of units of Tatars and Cossacks, even some Russian "traditional" cavalry.

My first impression of this was this may be a game balance thing, but it feels horribly unrealistic. I couldn't bend my mind around ~400 musketeers losing to ~200 mounted archers. A lengthy discussion ensued on my videos, and it has been mentioned that archers are faster-firing and more accurate than muskets of the time. I can't argue against this, but I still feel that mounted archers (being a larger target, and less stable so less accurate, also finding it slightly more difficult to reload so slower-firing) should not be inflicting greater casualties than a line of musketeers at relatively close range.

If there's a decisive source on the issue, I'd be curious to know what it is. Again, if this is game balance, I'm happy enough about it. Basically, my initial reaction was the same as urkki -> I will send my muskets at them. But this, it turns out, was not successful! I was left very confused.

[jomni]

Chinese had trouble fighting the Mongols too.

These mounted archers are very good at shooting on horseback. Rate of fire and loose formation tactics / skirmishing will give the some edge against a more cumbersome infantry block as they can engage at will and have the initiative. You should imagine that the light horse unit is quite dispersed and performing hit and run (guerilla tactics) rather than a conventional "block" vs "block" engagement as unfortunately depicted by the animation. Massed fire from a single formation will not score much hits but as mentioned earlier they will succumb to heavy fire from mutually supporting infantry blocks.

Also the casualty numbers you see on screen are relative based on unit size. This means that even if you are seeing less horsemen getting killed, a dead horseman is worth more than a dead infantryman.

[rbodleyscott]

In a recent battle, I lined up my pike and shot to oppose the enemy light cavalry (me as the Swedes, them as the Russians). In the direct exchange of fire, my pike and shot were losing the overall exchange against an equal number of units of Tatars and Cossacks, even some Russian "traditional" cavalry.

Much depends on which Swedes you were using. If you were using the ones just prior to the Swedish entry into the TYW whose foot are Salvo but are not Superior and do not have Regimental Guns, they do indeed have very poor close range firepower relative to other pike and shot, and hence relative to mounted archers. This would not be typical of a pike and shot vs mounted matchup in the game.

(The lower close-range firepower for Salvo troops is to represent them keeping men loaded prior to a salvo and charge. Arguably it should not apply vs mounted troops. Something to consider for future updates. However, the point is that over the whole game, the advantage lies with the Pike and Shot in a shootout vs mounted troops).

[SnuggleBunnies]

I also have to add that when playing multiplayer, i generally feel very confident when i roll a pike and shot army against a missile cav army. Sure, i may lose a few more men, but their units will break first. At least playing a ton of multiplayer, I've heard no complaints of missile cav being OP. Those armies actually tend to perform better against earlier western army lists using large pike blocks than against missile heavy pike and shot armies.

[urkki63]

Horse archers WERE a formidable foe. See what the Mongols or Timurids did with them. In addition to higher rate of fire and better accuracy even when moving, the range was greater - anything up to 1 km (18th century Ottoman). Surely not the effective range but still. Tatar battle tactics were also utterly bewildering, swarming around the enemy in great clouds of dust (often artificially created) shooting arrows from every direction with deadly accuracy in total ghostly silence. Man for man, armed with a Central Asian composite bow, a mounted horse archer was superior to a European musketeer. Modern studies suggest that a much smaller group of Tatars could inflict Somme-like casualties (Sic!) on a stationary infantry target.

The only advantage the early firearms had was simple economics: it takes a few weeks to train a peasant to handle a musket, a lifetime to train a horse archer.

According to contemporary sources (Giovanni Carpini I think) the only weapons Tatars feared were a crossbow and a long hook that could be used to pull them down from the saddle in an ambush. They greatly respected Egyptian Mamluks (even greater rate of fire) and forest-dwelling Finn tribes of northern Russia (expert light infantry).

I would hide missile troops in woods and try to chase Tatars towards the tree line with cavalry or perhaps lure them there with a low cost bite (haven´t tried that one yet). Ambush. Not very cost-effective, perhaps, but fighting off them Tatars never was.

A good authoritative source on the subject: A History of Warfare by John Keegan. Good read in general.

Regards,

Henry

[tortugapower]

Thanks Henry/urkki et al.

So it sounds like things are working as designed. I'll just have to figure out a way to deal with the ever-increasing light cav threat. There is a tipping point where too much light cav (or in the extreme, a pure light cav army) doesn't hold any water, since they all evade off the map against heavies, or evade into a group that can attack. I can use the information here to provide a rationale for my defeats and to console myself a bit.

Keegan is a good recommendation, thanks.

[TheGrayMouser]

No doubt horse archers were quite fearsome troops but they seem to have been eclipsed quite rapidly when firearms came into play. Look at the rapid demise of all the Khanates in the 1500's and the expansion of Moscow all the way to the Pacific with small groups of arquebus armed adventurers. The Tatar Khanate only lasted as it was a buffer state of both Moscovy and The ottomans. In the 1600's it is well documented that when firearm cavalry clashed with bow cavalry, the bows generally lost. That being said sometimes I wonder if those pesky carbine armed light horse can be a little too powerful in P&S

[urkki63]

Steppe nomads were largely tamed by cultural assimilation: easy life, sophisticated religions, advanced production technologies, that sort of thing. In military terms, it was increasingly a game of numbers. By our time period, European nations were already able to field very large well fed armies, and while a European peasant soldier, armed with a cheap mass produced and easy to use musket, was inferior individually, ten of them put together were able to defeat the fiercest single steppe nomad available. Quantity has a quality all its own (presumably Josef Stalin).

Yet, the Tatar military spirit lived on. Hungarian hussars, Polish Uhlans and Russian Cossacks and many other forms of light cavalry were a mainstay of European armies for centuries to come. Understanding Tatar/Mongol military thought is, in fact, the key (or at least one of them) to understanding classic Russian generalship until WW1.

I find the pesky carbine toting light horse fun to play with. Cheap and merry, they can sneak through enemy lines to create a great deal of confusion and, without actually killing anybody, tie up a considerable number of enemy troops while you seek breakthrough elsewhere. Sort of asymmetrical warfare Renaissance style I guess..

Regards,

Henry

[olddog52]

I Enjoy your YouTube video!
I like every other game like to do some YouTube videos on Gaming.
I would like to comment on your Pike and Shot Video .
1 - your use of your Dragoons is a little off. They function best in rough terrain. They are mounted infantry on rather poor quality horses(think plow horse). Their best use is as support for your cavalry.Especially your cavalry that lacks gunpowder weapons.
They can also support your artillery if placed in rough terrain.( That would be the dragoons more so than the artillery. )
They can also act as reconnaissance units and or outposts but do not have much staying power without support . If they're in open they are in maximum danger from being overrun.
2-Woods or Forest Tends to disorganize units and therefore reduce is there combat effectiveness.
This is especially true of your Pike and shot formations. Pikes of that time could be up to 18 feet in length. Trying to maintain proper formation even if you were caring only a 12 foot Pike in a wooded area would be tough enough- let alone using it to attack someone.
Rough terrain is also a problem for pike and shot units.
You would really like to be on terrain that was like a billiard table or football field when maneuvering Pike units.

Cohesion is the key concern for the units of this time.
The PDF that comes with the game gives you quite a bit of good information like What constitutes being on someone's flank. Terrain that is beneficial- like the rows of trees along the roads indicate that it is a sunken road.

I enjoy your work and feel that you have a good grasp of strategy and tactics but feel that you do not understand this particular time in history.
The early gun powder era lacked quality control. Many of the weapons were unreliable and the concept of what it meant to be a soldier was still a work in progress. Warriors were on their way to being marginalized but we're still a real danger because of their lifetime of practice. There in lies some of your difficulty with the tartars and other step cavalry.

With the deepest respect your fellow gamer ,
Olddog52

[tortugapower]

Thanks for the comment, Olddog. You hit the nail on the head: I don't have a good grasp of warfare in this era. My use of dragoons prior to this series and also at the start of this series was very bad, I agree, and I think I'm just finally learning how to use them in this current Sweden vs. Russia playthrough.

Thanks for the assorted tips.

I like every other game like to do some YouTube videos on Gaming.

If I interpret this correctly (I'm not sure I understood you), you say you'd like to do your own videos on YouTube? I'd encourage you to get your own YouTube channel up and running and do it! It's not hard, they will probably be very poor quality at first (mine were), and you may not even publish many of them, but it is a fun exercise to try to commentate your own gameplay.

[urkki63]

Olddog,

What´s your take on other types of light horse, horse archers, carbine armed hussars and light lancers? How to use them and how not to use them?

Henry

[olddog52]

Thanks Tortugapower
Voice to text without editing can create nonsense. I am most assuredly guilty of not doing proper editing.
I was trying to say that like most gamers I too would enjoy doing some videos on games that I love. I do plan on giving it a shot, hopefully I won't sound like Elmer Fudd.

Thank you for understanding what I was trying to do was help.
Yours
olddog

[olddog52]

Urkki63/Henry
I suspect there are many more knowledgeable players in this forum that may have more specific answers.
For me is more of an art than a science.
But I'll give you my basics .
When I am weak I mass all my cavalry on one flank or the other or in the rear at the center. If I have lite infantry and or dragoons I add them to the second line of cav to add fire support. Using woods or rough terrain or sunken roads
to my advantage .( light infantry or medium infantry need to avoid being attacked in open terrain when possible )

Part of my Calvary will pin The enemy while the other part moves to flank them. Patients can be a powerful force multiplier, moving to their rear instead of their flank will give you a much more powerful attack. It is a matter of judging if you have TIME to do it that will separates victory from defeat. As far as who does what in the attack -that will become obvious with a little practice. Some units are better at softening up, others at shock attacks, others at delaying. The difference between gun powder and bow and arrow is minimal in most situations.
But I suspect gun powder may be more effective at the demoralization. You just want to remember to keep some ranged weapons in support of your cavalry who do not have any as they are probably pure shock and need the support.
Gunpowder weapons including cannons attack first Then shock attacks come next. Lite cavalry can-do hit and run sometimes. It is the whole sometimes thing that only practice in this game will give you any chance of understanding.

If you use your cavalry in the center it needs to be behind a gapped row of your heavy infantry so that it may pass through in order to charge infantry that becomes disruptive or fragmented from volleys of your gunpowder weapons. Maintaining the gaps in your line is important for attack and retreat purposes without gaps your units will blow up if routed . The AI does not do a good job in allowing it's units to retreat quite often it will form almost a solid mass trying to get at you. When this happens if you can break A unit and drive it back into that massive of men it will be like a chain reaction.

Protect your flanks +attacked their flanks!

I suspect this is not what you had in mind when you asked but I think it actually tells you more about my approach than if I listed units. I'm away from my computer and therefore cannot access the game or I might have been tempted to be more specific.
Hope this was of interest .
Olddog

[urkki63]

Thanks, OldDog!

Very interesting. The manual has its uses, of course, but I much prefer insightful analysis like yours to legal jargon. Unit specifics would also be greatly appreciated if you have time later on.

Cheers!
Henry

[olddog52]

Urkki63


In this forum/ stickies /P&S Quick reference guide.
Is really important information.You may already have seen it.I just recently started looking at these forums because of my interest in Pike n shot. If past experiences is anything to go by I'm sure that someone in these forums has turned this into a spreadsheet.
Olddog

[KiwiWarlord]

Many useful tips and tricks of the trade mentioned here. You guys might not have seen the post from rexhurley re a P&S friendly comp using the Le Roi Soleil army lists.
A good way to meet other players and learn heaps.

Go to: Pike & Shot : Tournaments & Leagues section of the Forum

http://www.slitherine.com/forum/viewtop ... 65&t=75667

and take a look at what Rex is offering.

[olddog52]

Many useful tips and tricks of the trade mentioned here. You guys might not have seen the post from rexhurley re a P&S friendly comp using the Le Roi Soleil army lists.
A good way to meet other players and learn heaps.

Go to: Pike & Shot : Tournaments & Leagues section of the Forum

http://www.slitherine.com/forum/viewtop ... 65&t=75667

and take a look at what Rex is offering.

Thank you Warlord. I am very interested but unable to at this time. Maybe in a month or two.