Decrease the frame delay of the cavalry archers

Cavalry archers used to perform very poorly novadays. The unit feels weak in general, zero use in big tournaments like the recent Kotd3, even cavalry archer civs like huns or mongols go with the archer or knight line more often. Tatars are considered a very weak civ by the vast majority of the people in the community.

I’ve seen in previous posts that many of us agree that a frame delay reduction would help to bring them to a decent position in terms of unit balance. Cavalry archers meant to be a micro-intensive unit, utilizing the hit and run tactic, but crossbows do that WAY WAY better thanks to their lower frame delay. They literally have half the cavalry archers’ frame delay (frame delay is the amount of time while the unit prepares its shot, basicly the time between the player’s click and the moment when the unit shoots the arrow).

I think decreasing it from 10 to 8 will bring cavalry archers to a decent level. Maybe increase their accuracy a little aswell, so they don’t rely as heavily on thumb ring and it won’t be an essential upgrade.

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A rumour said that Cavalry Archers will be buffed

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Wow awesome! :smiley: Do you have the source?

In Reddit someone posted that Nili leaked a few changes in his VODs, but he deleted all
Here: https://www.reddit.com/r/aoe2/comments/jhpm6e/predictions_for_the_anniversary_update_this/ga1dyyn?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

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I’m almost sure they will adress this issue soon, but also there are other units like hand cannons, war wagons, conqs, that are just underwhelming to use in DE due to the frame delay.

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I don’t think Nili knows about the changes that will come. Probably that is the thing they discussed intern among pro players. Hope they reduce research time for wheel barrow and cost reduction for hand cart.

Yeah more general balance changes like small buff to hand cannoneers, steppe lancers and longswordsmen would be very welcome. I really hope they finally buff cavalry archers

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But why would he erase the leak? Are pro players forbidden to share internal discussions?

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@Lonezwiebel @JokerPenguin593 Nili is part of the balance comité, along with other Pro players, some Forgotten empires people, T90 and a few more. They’re legally bounded to keep the secret about the next balance implementation, so yeah. He know what’s comming, and he can’t talk about it

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Uhhhhhhhhhh hype !!!

We need to bring this up again as there is no change! CA are never used. Not because they are weak (post imp they are strong, but 1v1 they are not viable unless you’re huns)
Solutions and my balance suggestions:

  • decrease attack delay (frame delay x animation duration / frames per angle), reducing the frame delay by about 10 would make them almost shoot as quickly as camel archers but still not near mangudai.
  • if this is too strong, you could reduce their speed to be the same as or slightly faster than knights.
  • if Huns need a slight nerf to their bonus so be it.
  • Tatars could get 1 sheep instead of 2
  • I would like Magyars to make use of CA more often, and their standard bonuses are weak. Make their CA 5-10% faster, or make ranges or Fletching/bodkin/bracer cheaper.

CA are a fun unit and one that greatly alters and diversifies strategy, we need them to be a regular part of the game again. (not like crossbows or knights, but maybe as common as eagles or eles). Please do something Devs in the Lords od the West update!! Please

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Imo gunpowder performs worse due to lower pings meaning its even easier to dodge their slow projectiles. On top of their lack lustre stats.

I dono why anyone ever thinks adding personal touches like this will somehow encourage the devs to respond to their personal plea. Like someone using “devs please read this” and other stuff that will have zero effect…

Since y’all were dandy enough to necro this thread, time to drop this here https://www.reddit.com/r/aoe2/comments/kafti0/proof_that_cav_archers_are_unchanged_from_voobly/

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Since you all were so kind to necro an old CA thread, I’m copying my rebuttal from the most recent complaint thread. It all stands.

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Tbh I can’t see the exact moment the person clicks which really matters, if this “proof” is actually true then fair enough.

1.But I actually never said that it was increased since Voobly, so why argue against me there?? I don’t get it.
2. Bringing up an OLD post doesn’t make it less reliant, especially if nothing has changed, so why be condescending about that?
3. It is a fact that many pros think they need changed
4. CA are used less than they used to, even if they haven’t been changed.
5. Due to lower latency crossbows and arbs have gotten much stronger, leaving CA behind.

I didn’t ask CA to be made stronger, I recognised that they are really strong in post imp TG. What I asked is for a trade off. Right now they are good at being pop efficient in imp TG battles, but that’s not the main point of CA in my mind. They should be able to hit and run, raid and cause disruption. Trade a reduction in frame delay for a reduction in damage, speed, armour, HP etc. Just make them viable again in 1v1 and castle age in low numbers without making them OP in TG. Is there an issue with that wish? How better could that be achieved if not through my thoughts?

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These abilities, by nature, make them good in the lategame. This is practically the reason why they are good in lategame. If we wanted to make them more microable we’d need to hurt these aspects in one way or another.

Also, just because the professional scene thinks they need to be changed doesn’t make them right. I understand weighing their feedback highly, which I certainly do, it’s just not a great idea to take their word as gospel. Just a few months ago Hera was making the case that Scout openings weren’t viable in the meta anymore. We haven’t changed scouts since then, and they’ve become viable with map tweaks, metagame adaptation and build order tomfoolery.

Things change at the high level a lot and it’s not out of the question that CA could catch on with no actual changes. You don’t need to be a conspiracy theorist to acknowledge that.

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1/3rd actually, crossbows have 12 frame delay and cav archers have 36, 3x frame delay

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cav archers are too good in imp when FU and not as fun to micro as they could be.

  1. Lower the frame delaz so the unit behavoius almost like a mangudai, this is FUN and incrases perofrmance against meele units and in catle. in imp units arent microed so muc hand stand still to shoot.
  2. incrase the base accuracy to atleast 70 % since other UU cav archer have a baseline of 90ish and dont need thumg ring, while cav archers have 50% and are borderline useless without it.
  3. Lower the armor from parthian tactics from +1/+2 to +1/+1.

This is to offset the buffs and also to bring FU cav archers a bit down in power. It lowers the gap for civs without parthian tactics too and encourages use. For any UU we do not want to nerf and lower the pierce armor we can buff the elite uprade to grant +1 pierce armor to keep the final states the same. This would only be mangudai and cumans UU out of my mind as no other UU gets parthian tactics. (corect me if wrong)

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Cavalry Archers are much more expensive than usual archers, they have more HP, more armour and more attack but they have 1 less range and longer frame delay and more upgrades.

Cavalry archers (attack delay 1) needs to be micro able, like in historical battles. But we mustn’t go to Mangudai-Kipchak level (attack delay 0.50), they need to be a little bit slower than Camel Archer’s attack delay (0.53). My recommendation make attack delay about from 1 to 0.80, I don’t know the equal value for frame delay. They will be hard to micro but much easier.

In all honesty, what isn’t too good in imp for you?

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