Evading

[Cunningcairn]

I got a Nomad horse archer in a bit of trouble so turned his back to an enemy chariot thinking if I was charged I would evade. He charged me in the rear and I stood and lost a cohesion level. He then charged me with a light horse and I fragged. In the picture below my other Nomad light horse evaded to that position after the combats to which I refer. I would have thought my horse archer would have evaded directly away from the drection of the chariots charge. Why didn't it?

No evade.jpg (378.23 KiB) Viewed 1697 times

[melm]

In my knowledge, it may depend on how much AP left for evade. 0 AP left at your turn may make your cav stand. I had experience that my cav charged by opponent's unit and evade using all its AP. In my turn, unit AP is 0. I can do nothing. Then for opponent's turn, he can charge my not able to evade horse.

[Cunningcairn]

In my knowledge, it may depend on how much AP left for evade. 0 AP left at your turn may make your cav stand. I had experience that my cav charged by opponent's unit and evade using all its AP. In my turn, unit AP is 0. I can do nothing. Then for opponent's turn, he can charge my not able to evade horse.

All I did was turn the cav in my turn. No other movement. I have had enemy cavalry do much more and then evade when I've charged them. I have experienced your example myself and think that that is also a bug. I can understand an end/beginning of turn evade using up AP's but after not moving in your turn the cav should be able to evade in your opponents turn.

[rbodleyscott]

In my knowledge, it may depend on how much AP left for evade. 0 AP left at your turn may make your cav stand. I had experience that my cav charged by opponent's unit and evade using all its AP. In my turn, unit AP is 0. I can do nothing.

This will happen only if they evaded from a pursuit charge, which technically counts as part of the upcoming turn, hence a second evade in the turn is not allowed.

[rbodleyscott]

I got a Nomad horse archer in a bit of trouble so turned his back to an enemy chariot thinking if I was charged I would evade. He charged me in the rear and I stood and lost a cohesion level. He then charged me with a light horse and I fragged. In the picture below my other Nomad light horse evaded to that position after the combats to which I refer. I would have thought my horse archer would have evaded directly away from the drection of the chariots charge. Why didn't it? No

It looks like he might have charged you with another unit before the chariots. If they are light horse, your non-light unit would not automatically evade, thus effectively pinning them for the chariot charge.

This just happened to me in an MP game.

This is not in fact working as intended, because normally a unit tests to see whether there are nasty units capable of charging it, to prevent this sort of thing. However, the evade AI was recently changed to stop Cavalry from automatically evading from light horse that charge them from the rear, and I suspect that the test for other nasty units isn't getting done in that case.

I will look into it.

[melm]

In my knowledge, it may depend on how much AP left for evade. 0 AP left at your turn may make your cav stand. I had experience that my cav charged by opponent's unit and evade using all its AP. In my turn, unit AP is 0. I can do nothing.

This will happen only if they evaded from a pursuit charge, which technically counts as part of your turn.

Okay, now I know better of the rule. It seems OP's case is not the same.

[Cunningcairn]

It looks like he might have charged you with another unit before the chariots.

[b]The chariot definitely charged before the light horse.[/b]

This is not in fact working as intended, because normally a unit tests to see whether there are nasty units capable of charging it, to prevent this sort of thing. However, the evade AI was recently changed to stop Cavalry from automatically evading from light horse that charge them from the rear, and I suspect that the test for other nasty units isn't getting done in that case.

There is definitely something strange.

I will look into it.
[/quote]

Thanks!

[MVP7]

It looks like he might have charged you with another unit before the chariots. If they are light horse, your non-light unit would not automatically evade, thus effectively pinning them for the chariot charge.

This just happened to me in an MP game.

This is not in fact working as intended, because normally a unit tests to see whether there are nasty units capable of charging it, to prevent this sort of thing. However, the evade AI was recently changed to stop Cavalry from automatically evading from light horse that charge them from the rear, and I suspect that the test for other nasty units isn't getting done in that case.

If cavalry tries and fails to evade light cavalry will it take the automatic cohesion drop on rear charge or is that subject to the same rules as normal flank charges?

Gameplay-wise, pinning down cavalry with light cavalry is one of the few ways to get cavalry into decisive melee with infantry army (although even then they will often detach after bad impact or melee) and evading might still leave the cavalry in way of the nasty cavalry unit. Is this really something that needs to be fixed? Delaying and disrupting the enemy's movement also seems fitting capability for the light cavalry.

[rbodleyscott]

It looks like he might have charged you with another unit before the chariots. If they are light horse, your non-light unit would not automatically evade, thus effectively pinning them for the chariot charge.

This just happened to me in an MP game.

This is not in fact working as intended, because normally a unit tests to see whether there are nasty units capable of charging it, to prevent this sort of thing. However, the evade AI was recently changed to stop Cavalry from automatically evading from light horse that charge them from the rear, and I suspect that the test for other nasty units isn't getting done in that case.

If cavalry tries and fails to evade light cavalry will it take the automatic cohesion drop on rear charge or is that subject to the same rules as normal flank charges?

Normal rules

Gameplay-wise, pinning down cavalry with light cavalry is one of the few ways to get cavalry into decisive melee with infantry army (although even then they will often detach after bad impact or melee) and evading might still leave the cavalry in way of the nasty cavalry unit. Is this really something that needs to be fixed? Delaying and disrupting the enemy's movement also seems fitting capability for the light cavalry.

Good question. The fact that they sometimes don't currently evade if there is a heavier unit about is because the code only takes into account the combat chances against the nearby non-charging heavier unit, and not the chances of outdistancing it, for which it still uses the chances of outdistancing the original unit, which aren't high if the light horse start in an adjacent square. This not WAD, and is a bug introduced when Cavalry were stopped from automatically evading from light horse. I am inclined to correct it, as it is an unintended power of light horse, and not consistent anyway as it only works if the LH start close to the target.

Evady cavalry armies are currently underpowered against mainly infantry armies, as the results of the FOG2DL will indicate, however annoying (for heavy infantry lovers) they may be to pin down, so if correcting this bug helps them a little that would be no bad thing IMO.

[MVP7]

Gameplay-wise, pinning down cavalry with light cavalry is one of the few ways to get cavalry into decisive melee with infantry army (although even then they will often detach after bad impact or melee) and evading might still leave the cavalry in way of the nasty cavalry unit. Is this really something that needs to be fixed? Delaying and disrupting the enemy's movement also seems fitting capability for the light cavalry.

Good question. The fact that they sometimes don't currently evade if there is a heavier unit about is because the code only takes into account the combat chances against the nearby non-charging heavier unit, and not the chances of outdistancing it, for which it still uses the chances of outdistancing the original unit, which aren't high if the light horse start in an adjacent square. This not WAD, and is a bug introduced when Cavalry were stopped from automatically evading from light horse. I am inclined to correct it, as it is an unintended power of light horse, and not consistent anyway as it only works if the LH start close to the target.

Evady cavalry armies are currently underpowered against mainly infantry armies, as the results of the FOG2DL will indicate, however annoying (for heavy infantry lovers) they may be to pin down, so if correcting this bug helps them a little that would be no bad thing IMO.

Yeah, I guess it's not as much a question of balance as it is of immersive and enjoyable gameplay. Fighting cavalry army with infantry heavy army (like some of the late Roman list) usually turns into a Benny Hill chase where you have to envelope and charge the ZOC locked cavalry with heavy infantry. I can't think of historical battles where something like that would have occurred in open battle. Of course the pure cavalry or cavalry heavy armies are pretty toothless against well played heavy infantry army but then again a lot of these armies are pretty much hard counters to mounted armies.

What have the typical opponents of cavalry armies been in digital leagues? I wonder how large role the over-performing of raw (and maybe below average) heavy infantry against shock cavalry is currently playing in crippling their efficiency.

P.S., I resent the implication that I'm heavy infantry lover . Any proper army needs a balanced mix of infantry and shock cavalry with plenty of skirmishers on the side (like the excellent City Arab and Assyrian lists), one of the reasons being infantry armies' inability to force a cavalry army into battle.

[Geffalrus]

Interested to see other people's experience with this. In the Biblical bracket, I've been relying quite heavily on my cheapest hoplites to run interference against enemy cavalry on the flanks. Not through combat, but through the ZOC rules. March hoplites up and get face to face with the heavy cavalry, and suddenly, that cavalry doesn't have a lot of great options. Moving out of the ZOC of the hoplite seems to be a combination of risky fall back roll and/or takes a lot of AP. And even undrilled hoplites have enough AP to zone out most cavalry units. And if the hoplites can approach cavalry from the rear, then suddenly the attack odds become SUPER good, allowing that cavalry to maybe be tied up in a hurtful melee.

So now you have a 30 point foot unit locking a 60 point or more cavalry unit in purgatory. Meanwhile, the more expensive hoplites are bearing down on the rest of the army like a wave of armored death.

That's been my experience in the C Division. Not sure how that plays out in the B and A ranks. In general, there does seem to be a.......trend, where infantry fights tend to resolve before cavalry have the time to ride around the flanks. Now, maybe this is more of a strategy/tactics question. Certainly something I'm going to examining quite a bit as I consider tactics and countertactics for tourneys to come.