Cavalry Unit Speed

[militaryman]

Could we go back to the original EU III game where each type of unit had different speeds. I like the forced march system but having cavalry travel faster than infantry and artillery was great. It gave awesome pursuit and exploitation ability and wouldn't give too much of an advantage as retreating armies move faster anyway. Large pure cavalry armies were awesome, the panzers of the 1600's.

 

[King Moonfish]

But historically, this never happened outside of steppe nomads. I could be wrong, but do you have any sources of an entire unit composed just of cavalry that was used to pursue armies?
In this time period cavalry was very strong, but it needs the support of the rest of the army. If an unsupported cavalry unit attacked infantry they'd just form into a square and the cavalry would be useless. You could make a point of cavalry catching unprotected artillery, but I think that's simulated well enough with the current battle system.

I would also argue that a large, 1000+ strong cavalry unit would not move as fast you think they would. They need supplies, provisions and the like just like infantry, and these provisions travel only as fast the wagons would let them.

 

[militaryman]

I see your point and agree with you that unsupported cavalry could not win a battle but they were extremely effective even when operating by themselves for a time.

The battle of Rossbach started with a pure cavalry engagement between Prussia and France where the rest of the armies showed up later and fed reinforcements in. The Prussian cavalry overtook the French cavalry then attacked the supporting infantry and were making gains when the Prussian infantry arrived to deal with the rest of the arriving French infantry. Also the Battle of Hohenfriedberg saw Prussian cavalry break into Austrian ranks and decimate the line. You also have the most well known Battle of Eylau where Murat broke the Russian line with a massive cavalry charge to relieve pressure on Augereau's corps but this wasn't typical and that's not what I'm going for (although if that was a side effect I wouldn't complain).

The thing I am going for isn't battles won by cavalry, it is the movement and maneuver they brought after a battle. Once it was won the cavalry would be the ones to pursue and harass the enemy and even try to get ahead of the retreating army, cut off their retreat and delay them long enough for the main body to catch up and finish the job. This is seen in some engagements during the early and mid 1700's but especially during the Napoleonic wars. I will concede though that by that point in time there was fast horse artillery for support but Murat's cavalry corps would always pursue and ride ahead of the French main body after a battle.

A large all cavalry army would still be able to surpass the main body fairly easily as they could practically ditch the supply columns when in Europe as they would have the first pick of the countryside historically but I also see your point.

Isn't there already a stipulation in the game where the travel time between provinces increases as army size increase? If so this can still be the case for a concentrated cavalry army they would just move faster then a comparable combined army, especially one with artillery. If you don't want to increase cavalry speed I would understand but then decrease artillery speed especially early in the game.

 

[Illianor123]

I used to want this, but only so I could use can to loot and escape any perusing armies. Now that looting has changed I don't really care.

 

[Ashantai]

In EU3 this created silly, crazy situations where one would have vast armies of cavalry in western europe cutting down the fleeing infantry and artillery like they were Mongols.

It created far too many issues, and was completely unrealistic for anyone which wasn't steppe nomads too.

 

[militaryman]

Okay, I see your guy's point and the game does a good job with pursuit as is, but I do think artillery should have a reduced speed effect at least especially early in the game when historically artillery was huge and cumbersome. Usually the only time artillery would not slow down an advancing army from their pre-artillery speed was when armies advanced parallel to a river and could ship them downstream and meet up with them later. This changed later on with the introduction of smaller and then light pieces but artillery trains early on did slowed down armies.

 

[Elryos]

I think it would be nice to have, but then you would also have to include other things, like infantry being faster at crossing rivers, swamps or mountains than cavalry or artillery.

Another idea would be to scale the movement speed to the army size.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Cavalry at the strategic level could not out-march infantry. Cavalry at the tactical level is already (heavily) abstracted by its extra maneuver + flanking statistics when it comes to combat. You could make a case for cannon-based armies moving much more slowly than either infantry or cavalry, but that would create some real problems in the game and induce micro hell.

 

[Wizzington]

No.

 

[Denkt]

What would be good is if cavalry could sometimes attack artillery even if it is in the back row.

 

[Wizzington]

What would be good is if cavalry could sometimes attack artillery even if it is in the back row.

Potentially an interesting idea here.

 

[Denkt]

Potentially an interesting idea here.

My idea is that cavalry could have a breakthrough value of like 10% with each manuver score of your general increasing it by 2% per point and enemy general manuver score reduce it by 2% per point.

Cavalry do damage to artillery on the tile behind is: cavalry damage*breakthrough
Damage on the unit that guard the artillery is: cavalry damage*(1-breakthrough) so cavalry don't do more damage just attack a more valuable unit, however if this become a disadvantage you could just remove the damage reduction on the front unit.

That way we solve 3 things in a nice way, first we give cavalry a unique battle ability of becoming something of like opposite artillery. Secondly we make artillery counterable. Third we give general manuver a decent battlefield purpose.

Artillery and even infantry could also have breakthrough.

 

[Granite]

My idea is that cavalry could have a breakthrough value of like 10% with each manuver score of your general increasing it by 2% per point and enemy general manuver score reduce it by 2% per point.

Cavalry do damage to artillery on the tile behind is: cavalry damage*breakthrough
Damage on the unit that guard the artillery is: cavalry damage*(1-breakthrough) so cavalry don't do more damage just attack a more valuable unit, however if this become a disadvantage you could just remove the damage reduction on the front unit.

That way we solve 3 things in a nice way, first we give cavalry a unique battle ability of becoming something of like opposite artillery. Secondly we make artillery counterable. Third we give general manuver a decent battlefield purpose.

Artillery and even infantry could also have breakthrough.

I like this. I've always thought it was odd that at the end of a battle, 90% of the surviving forces would be cannons. Anything that cuts down on that is fine with me.