Any tips for horse combat?

[Drakenfel]

I'm finding it really difficult especially tournaments where I am facing off against another horseman and we run around in circles for ever until I get annoyed get off and kill him on foot.

I remember in Warband horses were God Mode but I can't seem to get the hang of how to use them effectively any tips would be appreciated. Thank you.

[devingerald10]

I’m by no means a horse killing extraordinaire but I’ve found that I have to swing earlier than I thought. And you can quick turn to sprint away from them holding ‘s’ and either ‘a’ or ‘d’. That helps me in tournaments.

[HunZolka]

NPC's are annoyingly good at determining the time to attack so they always seem to hit you before you can hit them. In this game the right use of horse is to hit and run.
On the battlefield you can:

- use the longest lance you can find (Cataphract lance?) and with try and error you can eventually determine the right time to attack, so you'll usually hit non-spearmen first, but you may still get hit by sturgian infantry with long spears, or spear cavalry.
Against enemy cavalry it is often better to aim for the horse instead of the horseman, as you can hit the horse's head sooner than the soldier, reducing him to infantry.

- use a long bladed weapon like the long glaive, it is very deadly and convenient to use so much so, it can feel like cheesing after a while.

- My favorite, upgrade your smithing skill and then you can create a far superior couch lance that is much longer than any other lance in the game (320-340ish reach as I recall).
Even though it may do less damage on paper than other spears, it will keep you out of the reach of any other enemy, and with sufficient skill and speed bonus it kills pretty much anything with 1 hit, and feels less cheesy than the long glaive. It is also very satisfying when the couched lance kills 2-3 targets at the same time when charging along the massed infantry. For me it was also the only viable use of couching, as the couched lance has much less reach as the same lance used in a normal stab move (an arm's reach), just enough for NPC's to hit and interrupt you before your couched lance can reach them.

- in tournaments where you can't choose your weapon, just git gud. Really, just keep using the lance and after a while you should also get the feel of timing. When starting the game and low on skill and personal experience the combat can feel difficult, but with much practice I could reliably hit any other horseman. Keep practicing.

[Trashley]

speed > glaive = lawnmower usually go behind the enemy if they have shields and are focussed otherwise hold your swing till your slightly close and wham

[ShadowFox]

Originally posted by Drakenfel:

I'm finding it really difficult especially tournaments where I am facing off against another horseman and we run around in circles for ever until I get annoyed get off and kill him on foot.

I remember in Warband horses were God Mode but I can't seem to get the hang of how to use them effectively any tips would be appreciated. Thank you.

Ironically I had the opposite problem. In warband you end up chasing the guy around the arena for 30 minutes or he follows you like a baby duck and you can't hit him either way and in this one you can actually connect hits.

But anyways it depends on the weapon if you are using a spear or lance then ofc try to get to one side of the area and charge them and if its a sword just sidle up beside them and block then as soon as they hit your sword or shield you counter attack. Rinse and repeat :)

[~ Fabulous ~]

like warband you will get used to it, as for hitting the enemy, I usually swing my blade a few millisecond before clashing unlike on foot, especially on full speed.

[pelerinli]

Addition to other comments, you can double tap W to quickly speed up and S to quickly stop. You can use them to manuever(?)

[R3sistance]

The enemy AI is dumb and will charge directly at their current target, if it's you, you can bait them into running into walls or into parts of the terrain that are slow to turn around in. Generally you want to make your attacks earlier than the AI does, which most of the time isn't hard but you have to remember the animation will delay attacks slightly.

Also in some tournaments you will be given a polearm which can be couched, that does stupid damage when hitting with a couched attack, like 300~400 damage, enough to one shot anything.

[Paddy Wagon]

Practice, practice, practice. I'd use the cavalry training course where you can use a lance or one handed weapon to destroy the targets. That would help with timing and accuracy. Better yet play cav in multiplayer and eventually you will get better vs. the AI. For me I've played M&B warband multiplayer and single player for so long cav is actually pretty easy in Bannerlord. Whenever they put me on a horse in a tournament its basically a wrap. For me the lance is more effective than a sword and shield. Plus I have a ton of perks in polearm and riding, I can one hit most guys.

[Rave Pathfinder.]

Originally posted by Drakenfel:

I'm finding it really difficult especially tournaments where I am facing off against another horseman and we run around in circles for ever until I get annoyed get off and kill him on foot.

I remember in Warband horses were God Mode but I can't seem to get the hang of how to use them effectively any tips would be appreciated. Thank you.

Get horse riding up and pole arms up -Crouch spear- win

[Zeria]

Do the quest caravan ambush, it's good practice and not too dangerous...

[Liro Raériyo]

after getting my riding up to almost 300, i just hold up a shield and charge into foot troops, i do a minimum 30 damage to anything i collide with and i dont even have a horse specifically designed for charging or any skills/banners that boost charging damage.

Because of this i dont actually know how to use melee weapons on horseback, since its not important when your horse has 90 armor and eats damage like its popcorn at a movie theatre.

if i DID use those things... well i could squeeze out 10 more charge damage just from the right horse alone, that 25 skill that boosts charge damage by 20% would add a bunch ontop of that, and lastly i have a banner that boosts charge damage by 30% that im not even using, all of these combined would probably boost my absolute minimum charge damage to... 60, more if the % damage boosts multiply off each other.

[TooMuchCoffee]

Best way to avoid going in circles for 30min is "promoting" your enemy to infantry.
And don't worry about their horse. It's a tournament, horse just goes to sleep.

Also, in case you didn't know, every participant gets a one-handed weapon as a secondary, if they didn't have one as a primary.

[Darlandra]

you need to be strategic, don't just charge at them, but in a tourny especially stop just before the hit so you can turn and follow and get behind. its really easy to fight on horseback once you get used to it.