Wow, a detailed review and recommendations! Thanks!
I could give their 1 base pierce armor back, but the poor metallurgy and efforts to compensate by skill (higher rate of attack) should stay, unless we want to make them appear malnourished this early instead (i.e. Unit has -5 base HP relative to Men-At-Arms but a bit higher attack rate, barely loses head-to-head)
I can certainly give them gambesons, because padding under armor is not a sophisticated concept, and the climate isn’t too hot to allow it.
No, they are very strong against other light cav in Castle Age, unless the enemy brings onager-line units or has bonuses.
-20% food discount means you can bring 25% more units.
Let’s run the calculations:
Base Light Cav: 60 HP, 7 melee, 2 reload, 0/2 armor, 1.5 speed
Upgraded Light Cav: 80 HP, 9 melee, 2 reload, 2/4 armor
Japanese Light Cav: 60 HP, 9 melee, 2 reload, 2/4 armor.
Both do 7 effective damage, so Upgraded dies in 12 hits, and Japanese dies in 9 hits.
4v5 fight Upgraded vs Japanese
First to die is the Upgraded that got doubled, let’s call this #4 at the end of the line, it died in 6 hits, leaving the Japanese #4 opposite it at 3 hits (assuming no micro involved and the Upgraded got final hit off) and one full-HP Japanese light cav (#5). At this point the three other Japanese light cav are at 3 hits, and their opponents are at 6 hits.
Second death is Upgraded #3, which–accounting for movement time, traded 2 hits with Japanese #3, but got hit twice from the side by Japanese #4 and #5 coming in (just after it got its second hit off).
At this point, Japanese #1-3 are at 1 hit each, #4 is at 3 hits, and #5 is full HP. Upgraded #1 and #2 are at 4 hits each.
Then Japanese light cav #1 and #2 die. This leaves Upgraded 1 and 2 at 3 hits each, against Japanese #3 at 1 hit, 4 at 3 hits, and 5 full HP. Japanese #3 trades with Upgraded #2 and Upgraded 1 gets in a free hit on 4, then Upgraded 1 and 4 die at the same time while Japanese #5 survives unscathed, in theory.
In practice the outcome probably depends on Player number for hit priority, and wouldn’t be this clean.
Let’s try with both sides showing perfect micro. Upgraded dies in 12 hits, and Japanese dies in 9, assuming the lines curl around each other Yin-Yang style, and all units are perfectly efficient at doing damage, and each gets in a hit before dropping.
4 Upgraded, 5 Japanese.
On third strike, both sides lose one unit, with Japan 1 and Upgraded 1 both dying. Japan 2 takes 3 hits of damage, Upgraded 2 takes 3 hits of damage.
There are now 3 Upgraded and 4 Japanese
Fifth attack, Japan 2 dies, no spillover, Upgraded 2 has 1 hit HP left.
Sixth attack, Japan 3 took 3 damage (6 hits of HP left), Upgraded 2 dies with 2 hits spillover.
Now there are 3 Japanese (one at 6/9 hits) and 2 Upgraded (one at 10/12 hits).
Ninth attack, Japan 3 dies with no spillover, Upgraded 3 has 1 hit left
Tenth attack, Upgraded 3 dies with 1 hit spillover. It’s now 2 Japanese (one at 7/9 hits) versus 1 Upgraded at 11/12 hits.
Japanese win, again.
We know that their available metallurgy was noticeably weaker than European or Continental. So what would you recommend? I could let them have gambesons and let that apply to their cavalry (even light cav would have to be nobility in Japanese society so could afford padding under armor) if that would resolve the problem.
We know Japanese armor was not as good as a well-made suit for a knight, due to metallurgy issues.
The much lower HP is so that it doesn’t vastly outstrip everyone else when in cav archer mode. Obviously, I miscalculated a bit since Turks exist, hence I gave Japan-Historical Parthian back so they could at least compete with Magyars for second-best (depending on resource valuation).
I do not recommend HP conversion according to ratio, otherwise a 1 HP melee mode pulling out its bow will instantly drop dead, as Spirit of the Law covered in his video, mentioning how 1HP Loom villagers being converted and then switching jobs in a loom-less player’s hands instantly die because HP went below 1.
The 1.35 speed is exactly the same as knight line, and they do get Husbandry so can keep pace. The reason I didn’t give them 1.4 is because that’s the cav archer speed, and I didn’t want them to be too good at range-edging against (AI or un-microed) cav archers who don’t know to ride closer before starting to shoot.
Considering the firing delay in ranged mode though, it should be alright to give 1.4 speed.
Why not?
Food and gold is how I fit them in under the umbrella of “dubious nutrition + plenty of armor scales replaced by lacquered leather (which is about as good as iron weight-wise but…)”.
I could always reduce their base cost a bit.