Can't lvl up horseman

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Saturos789
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Can't lvl up horseman

Post by Saturos789 »

Sorry for asking, but i'm doing the heir to the throne campaign, and apparently i can't seem to lvl up horseman. I'm on the scenario where Konrad meets L'sar. Any tips? I tried and i got one of my horseman to about 22 exp but he died due to his charge attack which i don't like. Is there any way to disable that skill? :)
Velensk
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by Velensk »

I've always found that horsemen are one of the easiest things to lvl up in campains because they are very good at killing things.

The trick to using horsmen, is to not use them where you will kill yourself if you miss. It is also best to use them on enemies you can kill in one blow so that if you kill them they never have a chance to get their doubled retaliation against them. Try to not rely on getting both hits. With good risk manangement, and proper attention to what enemies can attack you with, horsemens skill at killing things makes them easy to lvl up.

The lvl you are on is not a good lvl to try to lvl horsemen in, because lisar has many units that are good at killing them. However if you have played the right way throughout the campain then you could easily have a store of knights and/or lancers.

There is no way to not charge, untill you lvl up.
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Federalist marshal
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by Federalist marshal »

Try looking at this: http://www.wesnoth.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=11409

It's a bit dated, but the overall idea should still work well.
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Sapient
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by Sapient »

Allow me to disagree with the majority opinion. Risk management with horsemen is DIFFICULT! The unit has easily exploitable vulnerability to pierce and also low DEF, so if you fail to kill your target, then you are pretty much guaranteed to receive massive amounts of retaliation: first from the target itself on your turn, then from the target's allies on its turn. Add to that, it is a very expensive unit that you are gambling with. Sure, it can be great when everything works, but when it misses oh boy I hope its HP was full and it gets some luck on the defense.

I think the people who really love horsemen the most must be save/loaders ;)
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Velensk
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by Velensk »

I honustly say that I don't have any trouble managing risks with horsemen in HttT, and have no trouble geting a large force of knights, without save loading. It's a bit harder in harder campains I'll admit, but in HttT it's realy not that hard. I did mention in my post that that wasn't a good lvl for horsemen due to an adbundance of enemy peirce, however when you're fighting orcs with many grunts/trolls and a few archers, then you can weaken the archers to the point where one horseman shot will kill them, try to do that, and if you miss you'll take little damage at day. If you succeed, at day the grunts/trolls have no power over you, and the archers won't do enough damage to kill you.

Using horsemen against melee units takes extra consiteration, but is often worth it if you can kill in one shot, or if your enemy is in water.

When using horsemen against ideal targets, you'll not receive much retaliation, just twice what you would have ordinarily, which is often not much.
"There are two kinds of old men in the world. The kind who didn't go to war and who say that they should have lived fast died young and left a handsome corpse and the old men who did go to war and who say that there is no such thing as a handsome corpse."
vicza
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by vicza »

I rather agree with Sapient here. I don't much like the horsemen, because they are very luck-dependent. As a "workaround", I usually use them in pack: two, tree horsemen together. If first horseman misses, there is another one etc...
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zookeeper
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by zookeeper »

vicza wrote:I rather agree with Sapient here. I don't much like the horsemen, because they are very luck-dependent. As a "workaround", I usually use them in pack: two, tree horsemen together. If first horseman misses, there is another one etc...
It's not a workaround, but more like how you're supposed to do it in the first place.
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Iris
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by Iris »

Sapient wrote:Allow me to disagree with the majority opinion. Risk management with horsemen is DIFFICULT! The unit has easily exploitable vulnerability to pierce and also low DEF, so if you fail to kill your target, then you are pretty much guaranteed to receive massive amounts of retaliation: first from the target itself on your turn, then from the target's allies on its turn. Add to that, it is a very expensive unit that you are gambling with. Sure, it can be great when everything works, but when it misses oh boy I hope its HP was full and it gets some luck on the defense.

I think the people who really love horsemen the most must be save/loaders ;)
I agree with Sapient. Horsemen are very frustrating. When I have the luck of getting one to level-up, oh great, I level it to Knight and stick to the simple sword attack from there on.
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Max
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by Max »

horsemen can be really useful in some campaigns. sometimes you can get to the (last remaining) enemy leader and kill him with only two knights (although there are still some other units around which prevents your slower moving units to do the job). finishing a level two or three turns earlier is sometimes worth 80-100 gold (especially if you overrecruited and didn't manage to capture most of the cities to make up for it).

it's also nice to use them as bait for bats. get them to a place where your knight is the only unit that can be reached in one turn. due to their high hps they usually survive even 6 bat attacks. most bats loose half there hps and in the next turn its much easier to finish them.

you can also use them to hunt down enemies that get behind your lines and try to capture your cities.
Nirual
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by Nirual »

I'd have to agree, horsemen are rather tricky to level. Their advancements all have a normal, not charge attack that makes them much easier to use, but getting the advancement can be rather frustrating without abusing save-load.
I found myself sticking with Elvish Cavalry instead, which are great in forests and have a ranged attack. Sure, Horsemen and their advancements can be much more powerful, but the elves are much more balanced overall (also regarding time of day, obviously).
Lorbi
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by Lorbi »

86% chance to kill the average guy on gras ( 40% def ) if he has 18HP left.
Depending on resistance and ToD the 18 may become something like 28.
So how would i NOT use charge ?
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wy29
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by wy29 »

The horseman has 2 strikes, and unless you are attacking a non-aquatic unit swimming in water(20-30% def), usually only 1 hit is expected.
Thus you should try to attack units that can be killed in 1 hit.

That means in general, you shouldn't charge into units with 50-60% def, or units with first strike, or units with high number of melee strikes.
Archers/Mages are the frequent targets for horseman, but not when they are standing on mountains or hiding inside castles/towns.

Oh yeah, the horseman is a pure offensive unit and cannot hold a line in defence.
The knight is good enough to hold the line, but not against archers and spearmen.

However, if you like high risk and high rewards, you can ignore all the above and try save/load.
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Jozrael
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by Jozrael »

How is that 'high risk'?
uzy5o
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by uzy5o »

I don't see how horseman are so hard to use. I'm a mere novice, yet I have no problems leveling them up while taking minimal damage. All I did was read Elvish Pillager's horseman guide and used a little bit of common sense...
Trau
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Re: Can't lvl up horseman

Post by Trau »

I find that the easiest way to level up Horsemen is, ironically, to not dedicate yourself to it.

If you just kept a few horsemen around and went for targets of opportunity, you would find yourself repeatedly nailing weak enemies left and right simply by virtue of the horsemen having a niche that nearly no other unit can fill - killing weak ranged units.

If you dedicated yourself to levelling up your horsemen, you might be tempted to take a lot of unnecessary risks with your horsemen and lose more xp to deaths than you gain.

... just my take on it.
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