Why was cavalry ever used in battle, apart for reconnaissance...

T. total war pro

I don't know what that is. If you disagree, maybe you could use your words instead of memeing like a retarded infant?

Because it was heroic.

not a troll post but did western European armies use horse archers in the same way that say, the mongols did?

There is some usage of them, but of a far more limited extent, mostly in Italy.

I'm not really sure why they developed one way and other people developed another, to be honest.

>There is some usage of them, but of a far more limited extent, mostly in Italy
Wut

interesting

I google'd and came up with a post from reddit

"The issue with horse archery is that it has some major downsides. Foot archers tend to outshoot them and massed horse archers tend to lose against combined troops. European armies also had fairly good success against horse archers as the Romans defeated the Parthian horse archers on many different occasions. Europeans knew about horse archery for a relatively long time but never really chose to adopt in to the extent of other societies.

Horse archers excel at harassing the enemy and engaging in skirmishing tactics. This adoption of skirmishing tactic is also one of the main reasons why you don't see horse archers in most of Europe. Skirmishing requires fairly open areas to allow the harassing troops to retreat. Large parts of Europe are heavily forested / hilly and are not open plains meaning that horse archers could more easily be charged and defeated.

That being said, some medieval European armies did utilize mounted crossbowmen. Later European armies would also use mounted gunmen in combat which is also similar in ideology to horse archery."

>implying you ever read this book
kys

Have you ever seen a horse charging against you? It is a big animal, you know. Most famous horse "breed" (I use commas, because people in the middle ages were generally not breeding horses for any specific purpose) are destriers (pic related) which are a bit short, but also incredibly heavy, muscled with tremendously strong legs and backs. Now imagine those beast of the horse heavy armored with a guy who is trained to kill other people from seven years of age and thoroughly enjoys it and bam, you've got a bit vapid impression of how it looked.

Heavy cavalry charge was pretty hardcore psychological effect, there were many upon many battles which ended by the initial charge, which made the enemy panic and rout. And of course, people were not dumb (French sometimes) and did not charge against pikesman regiments. Many instances of historical battles, where cavalry was used in a way we could today call "surgical strike".

But yes, there were also many instances of "FUCK EVERYTHING, CHARGE AND STOMP THE FUCKERS TO HELL" which either got really bad (Unorganized French knights at Agincourt) or really, really good (Poles at Battle of Vienna, who literally started biggest cavalry charge in the human history and rode through the Turks all the way to their base camp).

Golden age of heavy cavalry charges ended in the Europe with the Hussite wars, during which Czechs (my direct ancestors!) deployed firearms in large numbers and used battle-wagons with defensive strategy (sit behind a wagon on a very clever strategic position and shoot everything that moves) as well.

t. Czech.

Cavalry was generally used to take out the trash after the infantry had engaged

White people have honor and arent cowardly hit and run faggots like the mongols

:^)

...

No. The steppe tradition of firing from your horse while at full speed was a far superior tactic. Scythians, Huns, Persians, Parthians, Mongols and Turks would keep themselves in constant motion and were often quite close to the enemy. They would ride up to them and ride along them, turning away when the enemy tried to charge them. During all this they would constantly fire arrows at their enemy's lines or even cavalry. A force of just 500 horsemen, each firing an arrow every ten seconds or less, would thus fire 3000 arrows a minute. The pressure and casualties would be immense, and once they ran out of arrows they rode back and picked up more from their squires.

Total War games have made people think that horse archers just stood and fired volleys, like ordinary archers do, but this is not the case. That's what European horse archers did however and they were of much lower quality as a result.

Also to correct a bit: Destriers were most sought after, most prized warhorses, but also the most expensive ones. Most of the knights used Coursers (not as muscled and sturdy, but taller). Pic related.

good post Czech user. jesus Christ that horse is jacked

Thanks. Also to mention, pure destrier breed is today non-existant. What you see there on the picture is descendant of that breed. Therefore we can picture them even more muscled.

My father trains horses for riding, got a nice childhood with those animals.

>anglo charging his allies and making it seem as if he was brave

holy kek meme magic

There have been several good answers that I'd like to expand on a bit.

Through the early middle ages, during the rise of the "knight" as is often imagined in American media, the bulk of most European armies were poorly equipped levies of farmers. In this environment, an elite cadre of knights (professional soldiers trained from a young age, and well armored, as another person mentioned) could often expect to rout the peasant rabble of their opponents.

When states started accruing the resources to field professional heavy infantry with spears and pikes is exactly when cavalry began its decline in the West. So your original assertion is actually correct.

This trend continued until, by the 18th century, cavalry was mostly just used for the opportunistic charges described by some other answers.

Such bold claims that the tank of medieval battlefield would primarily engage something as lowly and pathetic as an archer need a sauce to be even taken in consideration.

Unless of course you are talking about more modern cavalry than depicted in OP.

well...

Is it much to say Veeky Forums discussions on armor and historical combat always are pants on head retarded filled with personal opinions and little else?

>Infantry pikes were longer

Hussar lances were hollow and were quite light, they were designed to break on impact. Furthermore they could use their pistols to shoot at some pikemen before impact.

I wish you fucking clueless mouth breathers would fuck off
WHEN USED RIGHT THEY WERE EFFECTIVE, NOW FUCK OFF WITH YOUR SHIT THREADS

you need to calm down user

No one had pikes for a long time in Europe, they came back with the Scotts and the Swiss at the end of the 13th century, before that heavy cavalry ruled the battlefield.
Also the armies back then where not that organized, moving in formation was not known.

That pike is too short to be a tercio pike.

Also I cannot believe people are literally arguing for directly charging into pike lines with cavalry for winged hussar meme. If the pikes didn't work against cavalry, they wouldn't be used.

Why must people go full retarded in either direction about this? Either people claiming cavalry is literally useless or that they were juggernauts that charged into heavy infantry head on.

The use of horse archers is integral to nomad way of life. The inverse was also true, you already started training for it when you were a child, because that's simply the way you move around and acquire food in those parts. With horse and bow.

Europe proper could never replicate that level of ability, not anymore than mongols could make an effective military force out of ranks of armored footsoldiers that wreck you completely if they catch up to you.

I literally posted the source you cretin. And yes, cavalry could and did engage infantry, but its primary use in Western warfare has always been to destroy enemy archers and skirmishers. If you think that's a trivial role, then you don't understand how vital archers are in winning battles.

selfie stick

If you look at the distribution of horse-archer societies, you will see that they are mostly confined to the steppes. Why is this? Simply, because you can't grow much in the way of crops in the steppe, so using the land to sustain horses is the optimal economic strategy. The reason why horse nomads invariably abandon thier horse culture very quickly after conquering settled peoples follows from this: If you rule a nice bit of European farmland, and use it to breed horses, you will be out-competed by your neighbours who use the good land to grow crops and hire horse nomad mercenaries with the cash this brings in. Europe never had a notable horse culture because the land is simply too good to "waste" on horses, and without a horse-focussed economy, you can't maintain a horse culture.

The notable exception to this is Hungary, which DID maintain its horse culture much longer than elsewhere, but again if you look at a map, you'll see that the Pannonian plains are the only sizeable bit of steppe inside Europe.

9 times out of 10 the horse was only ever used as a weapons platform. Heavy armored cavalry, in which the horse is used as a weapon itself, was very much the exception.

Closest thing I can think of is Iberian men at arms using javelins before charging.

At the time pikes were not the only weapons used for defending against cavalry. Tercio formations most definitely used arquebusiers which could be used to whittle down charging cavalry formations.

This was important because Pike-men had to deploy their pikes in the ground at an approximately 40 degree angle, which effectively reduced the effective length of their pikes.
Pike-men could only effectively use the proper length of their pikes in infantry combat.

The Polish commonwealth had exceptional cavalry because they had to face off against mostly cavalry cultures, such as the Russians, Tatars and Turks in wide open spaces.

The Western Europeans have a primarily infantry tradition with some cavalry as fast-moving, heavily armored shock units. As pikes came into play cavalry became less important.

Jinetes? Yeah they had to fight moors.

The archers were definitely vital in historical Japanese warfare. I heard that about 70-80% of battle casualties were from arrows.

If you have no horses, then archers will win every battle. Your heavily armoured guys might be highly resistant to arrows, but if they get too close to the archers, they can simply run away. The same armor that protects you from the arrows weighs you down and prevents you from catching them. This is why cavalry is so useful, it can outrun the archers and let the heavy infantry do its thing.

Iirc Japanese cavalry was also primarily bow cavalry?

Well as Lindybeige said "cavalry is a stupid idea".

youtube.com/watch?v=1uUk5WGAydI

It was mixed. Katana, Yari and Yumi

Man, Lindybeige trying very hard to create a controversial video that will get him many views like that katana one so many years ago. In any case I remember reading that the Assyrians were one of the first people to use cavalry and they used it as scouts, no idea if it was old, middle or neo kingdom though. I guess they figured out pretty quickly that calvary had its uses.

He does this for our views doesnt he???

you really can't handle any kind of nuance can you?

/thread

What the fuck, that's not a video game, where you can kite your enemy.
youtube.com/watch?v=qzTwBQniLSc

Wasn't every professional soldier in the Byzantine empire trained to be a competent horse archer. and shock cavalryman?

>hurrr the archers are gonna be 50 yards away I can easily sprint 50 yards and catch them

Archers still have lighter equipment and so can run faster and for a longer time.

>Anonymous 11/07/16(Mon)19:04:42 No

I love you.

I'm not talking about kiting, I'm talking about literally running away until you;re far enough to stop and start shooting arrows again. If you think this is impossible, or that a fully armored knight could somehow outrun an unarmored man, then you're wrong.

>Byzantine empire
>Professional soldiers

Weren't they mostly just Militia and Mercenaries?

They used tactics to "soften" the line before the charge.

A total war pro would've mentioned hammer and anvil tactics. Which is actually a very valid awnser to OP.

First post best post.

Horse archers do move and fire in Total War.

Not saying the games are accurate, for starters the numbers are ridiculous, but don't use them as a punchbag for no reason when you already were making a valid point.

Jinete is just horseman in spanish.

>talking about byzantine army without mentioning a date and scenario

Would you do this for pre-5th century Rome? I hope not.

You're mobile in it, but you're not going to be exerting effort for a prolonged time without risking heat exhaustion. People tend to assume that you have about 10-15 minutes in combat conditions at absolute most.

>If you have no horses, then archers will win every battle.
That's retarded and I'll explain why.

Usually a battle happens because there is some objective like capture a bridge or a hill or another strategic important area. This means that whether attacking or defending in the battle archers by themselves are going to be pretty crap.

If archers are defending said strategic area and the enemy infantry arrives to capture and then the archers run away then they failed their objective. Now the enemy holds this strategic area so they don't need to chase the archers.
If they stay and defend then they'll probably loose since the enemy heavy infantry has better equipment and training.

If archers are attacking this means that the enemy infantry is defending a strategic area so they're holding their ground meaning you have to attack. And you can't just shoot arrows at them until you kill all of them because it's very likely they have shields and other fortifications as well as their own archers and other skirmishers.

So either way an army of archers is a terrible idea. And yes sometimes a force with the majority being archers won the battle but that's not the norm and they also had heavy infantry and cavalry.

Archers can be a vital part of an army (such as the English ones) but assuming that they could win a battle against infantry (with no cavalry involved) is just stupid.

Fair, medieval in particular around 800-1100, but it was a continuing problem, training was a long and expensive process for the core professionals and they just couldn't afford to keep doing it over time.

As opposed to knights.

A horseman by traditional Iberian customs would would be lightly armored with a sword and shield. They harassed enemy formations with their javelins and if the enemies showed an opening they charged.
Very effective especially in the ancient era.

"Jinetes" weren't a professional force, they were just Iberian horseman using time honored traditions.

He obviously means in a free-for-all battle you dunce.

>Fair, medieval in particular around 800-1100

So basically the Macedonian era?

In that case, it depends on what you mean by professional. Thematic (regional) forces were paid to some extent but were more reliant on land; essentially they lived on "military land" as farmers and gained their living/paid for their equipment in that way. Not entirely militia, but not entirely "professional" either if that means being a salaried, standing force. The central or "tagmatic" forces were in general professional, although some units would have been nobles who probably bought some of their own equipment with the proceeds of their own estates.

"Militia" in the sense of an unpaid, locally-raised force did exist but such people were probably restricted to local garrisons of cities/fortifications.

The Varangians existed in this era but it's not exactly fair to call them "mercenaries," because as a unit they were permanently in the imperial employ. It's not as if the Guard turned around and sold its services to other powers or something.

The supposed mercenary army of the Byzantines more aptly refers to the post-Manzikert and post-4th Crusade eras when the supply of "native" manpower was severely depleted.

Jinetes were moors

Spanish "people" are all moors aka niggers.

>moors were black
WE

I imagine that if you ran a thousand pound warhorse into a pike block it would open up a sizable hole for your own men to get through.

Did a bit of skim research from some textbooks/ primaries myself just now.
Quality post.

Horse archers are based. The ultimate and definitive cuck army removal unit.

Fortresses and very rugged terrain are the only safe havens for cucks when facing based horse archers.

t. mongke

Would you want to fuck with this?

what kind of retard thinks waving around an axe on a horse is a good idea?

>Is it safe to say that Veeky Forums discussions on everything are pants on head retarded filled with personal opinions and little else?

Yes it is user

No, they only trained their cav as horse archers after the WRE fell up until the arab invasion. After that it as too costly + they didn't face horse archers as much

Real life isn't a videogame, you can't just run away forever. Also maintaining cohesion in an army that's all running away would be very difficult, they'd probably just end up fleeing

The same kind who thinks it is a good idea to wave a lance on horseback, I guess.

Hussars also had guns so that helped.

hussars with guns were rare in 16 century, they only became popular in second half of 17 century or so

Why didn't Continental Europeans try to copy English/Welsh Longbowmen to fight against cavalry?
Protect Longbowmen with pike infantry and there is nothing cavalry can do. This could also defeat horse archers.

Rohirrim style charges were a meme and never happened. Horses won't run headlong into a dense formation, human or otherwise (unless they can see that they can jump over it). That's why most armies put cavalry on the wings, because it was most effective when you got to the flank/behind and made them shit themselves and break formation, allowing the cavalry to move in.

They were rare, but not unheard of.

Battle of Vienna is probably the most notable example.

>An edict of King Stephan Batory in the 1570s required every hussar to carry at least a brace of pistols; 4 pistols became customary fairly early, and carrying 6 was a common practice.
kismeta.com/diGrasse/PolishFirearms.htm

Probably because crossbows did a better job.

And here is that one retard.

Also, was poster earlier

Bet you wouldn't say that to his face. Internet retard.

Jesus Christ the Commonwealth were amazing.

A Russian one.

I love Lindy myself.

>Horses won't run headlong into a dense formation, human or otherwise
Instictavely they want to junp over or avoid. Horses won't step on a man either unless by accident. (under normal circumstances). Of course if said horse is highly agitated or afraid, who knows? They try to avoid shit just like we would.

That's why they were trained to do so. It's just as saying
>cavalry was useless in firearms era, because horses are naturally scared as fuck of explosions, just look at those cats and dogs in New Year's Eve
Or
>Humans can't ride in cars, because they are scared of those fast and loud beasts. Just look at reactions of guys, who never saw cars before