Can Cav armies work?

Smackyderm · Post by **Smackyderm** » Mon Sep 22, 2008 4:32 pm

I was wondering what experiences people have had with mostly/all Cav armies. I was thinking about Sarmatians myself, along the lines of 5 BGs of superior armored cav lancer/sword and 3 more of foot (2x LF, 1x MF).

What I'm mainly wondering about is how a Cav-heavy army like that deals with massed spear and pike armies. You're not real shooty like Parthians so you can't expect to disrupt the enemy before the charge. Do you just have to wheel around and get a bunch of flank charges (while being undrilled)?

ethan · Post by **ethan** » Mon Sep 22, 2008 9:30 pm

I fought Early Sarmatians with Early Achaemenid Persians in a very infantry heavy configuration (FC,3xTC)

1 Javelinmen LF Unprotected Average Undrilled Javelins Light spear - - 6
2 Javelinmen LF Unprotected Poor Undrilled Javelins Light spear - - 4
3 Greek Cavalry LH Unprotected Average Undrilled Javelins Light spear - - 4
4 Bactrian Cavalry LH Unprotected Average Undrilled Bow Light spear - - 6
5 Medizing Greek Hoplites HF Armoured Average Undrilled - Offensive spearmen Spearmen - 8
6 Medizing Greek Hoplites HF Armoured Average Undrilled - Offensive spearmen Spearmen - 8
7 Sparabara MF Protected Average Undrilled Bow Light spear - - 8
8 Sparabara MF Protected Average Undrilled Bow Light spear - - 8
9 Horse Archers LH Unprotected Average Undrilled Bow - - - 6
10 Immortals MF Armoured Superior Drilled Bow Light spear - - 8
11 Persian Cavalry Cv Armoured Superior Undrilled Bow - Swordsmen - 4
12 Persian Cavalry Cv Armoured Superior Undrilled Bow - Swordsmen - 4

The Sarmatians didn't do too badly and did exactly as you describe, we ran out of time in what was probably going to be a win for the Persians, but it would have been close. The Sarmatians had an IC and aggressively wheeled all the Cv lancers onto one flank to try and mass a decisive charge. I think the "one flank" was actually a bit of a mistake and they should have split 2/5 to one side the rest to the other but it had a chance of working. The Sarmatians also had quite a number of LF archers which I think are important to try and keep the enemy form reacting as well. Certainly there are some very bad match-ups for this kind of army, knights are probably much worse than spear or pike actually...

Scrumpy · Post by **Scrumpy** » Mon Sep 22, 2008 9:37 pm

Undrilled Cv is not as bad as other undrilled non-skirmish troops, you do get the advantage of some moves being easier for the Cv.

I do wonder though how armies with massed non-evading Cv can cope with Kn armies, I am looking forward to using Andalusians when the official list comes out, and will be dealing with the pesky Spanish Kn in historical match-ups.

willb · Post by **willb** » Tue Sep 23, 2008 2:26 am

see viewtopic.php?t=7051 also see the other posts by nik in the AAR section

ethan · Post by **ethan** » Tue Sep 23, 2008 3:58 am

I don't think anyone doubts that shooty cav armies can work, the question is can lance armed cav "work?"

marty · Post by **marty** » Tue Sep 23, 2008 4:47 am

Check out the general discussion topic entitled "cav with lance" from a month or two back on this very issue. I personally suspect armies with lance armed cav as the core of their army (as opposed to a mobile reserve or similiar) are going to be fairly ineffective. There are just too many fights they cant avoid and cant win.

Martin

expendablecinc · Post by **expendablecinc** » Tue Sep 23, 2008 4:53 am

Perhaps playing the defensive game would work.

IE hanging back in front of the line so you can get another group in possition for a flank interception charge or at least intercepting so that only one base contacts, taking the sting out of the impact advantage.

anthony

Smackyderm · Post by **Smackyderm** » Tue Sep 23, 2008 5:06 am

marty wrote:Check out the general discussion topic entitled "cav with lance" from a month or two back on this very issue. I personally suspect armies with lance armed cav as the core of their army (as opposed to a mobile reserve or similiar) are going to be fairly ineffective. There are just too many fights they cant avoid and cant win.

Martin

That was an interesting thread... I just looked it over.

Looking at say Early Sarmatians, the Superior Lancer Cav absolutely has to do the heavy lifting. There's nothing heavier or more viable in the list. I can see them doing pretty well against armies with lots of MF, but besides that I'm not too sure.

rbodleyscott · Post by **rbodleyscott** » Tue Sep 23, 2008 7:43 am

An army based on lancer cavalry is not going to work too well in an open (i.e. anachronistic) environment, because of Knights in particular.

However, if Sarmatians, for example, play in theme, they should be pretty good - especially in the "Legions Triumphant" period. Lancer armies should also be good in the "Decline and Fall" theme.

rogerg · Post by **rogerg** » Tue Sep 23, 2008 9:21 am

Lance and sword versus bow and sword cavalry is not that bad either. A mixture of the two is very strong.

madaxeman · Post by **madaxeman** » Tue Sep 23, 2008 3:45 pm

ARMOURED lance armed cavalry can work, in period, as you can maneuver them to where they need to be - but they are still quite expensive for the frontage, and they do come across a lot of stuff that they simply arent good enough to beat.

PROTECTED ones are much less useful - any armoured foot will be always a POA up against them in melee rounds, and the lancer + at impact often isnt enough to give an advantage at impact , and did come unstuck against knights every time I played them. 6 full match reports on how they fared here

babyshark · Post by **babyshark** » Tue Sep 23, 2008 6:21 pm

My (admittedly limited) experience using lancer cav with various Successor armies and Medieval German is that one needs to get the most out of their--relatively--high maneuverability to be successful. They will rarely ride right over the top of an opponent, but are very capable of outflanking knights and foot, at which point they become deadly.

Marc

jlopez · Post by **jlopez** » Tue Sep 23, 2008 8:13 pm

My experience of protected lancers (2 BGs of 6 superior) was with Huns. They mostly spent their games running away from just about everything that was one POA up on them in melee or looking menacing from a distance. Either way they did the job of tying up large numbers of enemy BG who couldn't afford to ignore them or thought they were easy meat while the Huns did the real fighting.

In the end, in four games, they came into uncomfortably close contact with elephants and janissaries and beat both after a protracted battle and with generals committed from the start.

Taking large numbers of them such as in a Sarmatian army seems a brave, as in bonkers, thing to do. Will have to try it as soon as I can borrow the figures.

Julian

Scrumpy · Post by **Scrumpy** » Tue Sep 23, 2008 8:42 pm

Must admit I am leaning towards the Christian Nubian camels with I assume lances ? Least they will have every mounted opponent down 1/3rd dice in a fight.

nikgaukroger · Post by **nikgaukroger** » Wed Sep 24, 2008 8:39 am

Scrumpy wrote:
Must admit I am leaning towards the Christian Nubian camels with I assume lances ?

I'd assume Light Spear if I were you, and no Swordsmen capability to boot IIRC. They really weren't very good ...

carlos · Post by **carlos** » Wed Sep 24, 2008 9:48 am

Scrumpy wrote:Must admit I am leaning towards the Christian Nubian camels with I assume lances ? Least they will have every mounted opponent down 1/3rd dice in a fight.

On my beta testing of the Christian Nubian list, I found little use for the camels. The only thing they can chase away is LH and even against them they're no better than similar, less expensive, cavalry since the LH can't lose any more dice (unless in a BG of 6, but who uses those?). Undrilled means they can't hunt flanks very well either. A cheesy use for cheap camels is to put them as a 2nd or 3rd rank BEHIND HF that is expected to face mounted. Cheesy and to be honest, very risky as you are placing another BG in a vulnerable position, but it can help stop knight charges.

nikgaukroger · Post by **nikgaukroger** » Wed Sep 24, 2008 9:54 am

carlos wrote:
since the LH can't lose any more dice (unless in a BG of 6, but who uses those?).

Not too uncommon for non Bow armed LH or if you only have a single BG of LH in my experience. I had one of Bedouin in my Seljuqs

4s are still the most common though.

Scrumpy · Post by **Scrumpy** » Wed Sep 24, 2008 10:39 am

nikgaukroger wrote:
Scrumpy wrote:
Must admit I am leaning towards the Christian Nubian camels with I assume lances ?

I'd assume Light Spear if I were you, and no Swordsmen capability to boot IIRC. They really weren't very good ...

I assume then they will be average & protected as well ? Is this another example of dbm getting the classification wrong in their lists ?

nikgaukroger · Post by **nikgaukroger** » Wed Sep 24, 2008 12:24 pm

Scrumpy wrote:
I assume then they will be average & protected as well ? Is this another example of dbm getting the classification wrong in their lists ?

Average and protected indeed - maybe even an option for Poor but I can't remember for sure.

DBM classification was based on the assumption that they were similar to the Tuareg (who would be quite effective) due to a lack of anything specific. Since then evidence has become easily available that they were in fact fairly poor - and they are now Cm(O) as opposed to Cm(S) in the DBMM lists.

A not uncommon case of newer information making lists out of date - it will (has already probably) happen to the FoG lists as well.

Scrumpy · Post by **Scrumpy** » Wed Sep 24, 2008 12:45 pm

That's ok, it means they can skirmish away from those nasty knights then !