Art De La Guerre

[MarkK]

At 9pts they are the same as impetuous HC and no-where near effective. Yes they can evade and yes they can shoot and if they could do both at the same time I'd say yes, but you can't evade forever and at some point you need to fight and if your shooting has been in effective (which can happen more often than not) they don't stand up to being worth 9pts.

[AlanCutner]

MC Bow are manouverable, can evade out of trouble and can ping shots at least every other round.
HC impetuous have great difficulty in getting out of trouble, are less manouverable and require 3CP to avoid charging.

9AP for each seems about right to me.

[SteveR]

They are priced correctly.

Thank you for attending my TED talk.

The ability to evade should not be so lightly dismissed. So, for example, they can actually do something against knights where the impetuous HC will be forced to stand and fight at a disadvantage.

They have the same factors as HC Impet when charging spears frontally! See? a bargain

And this is setting aside the entire ability to manipulate impetuous troops issue.

Points are always going to be situational. And MC bow do very well until they run into Nubians or the like.

But the bottom line is this - do you see people buy them? People vote with their feet and they are a popular troop type which should indicate they are well priced.

[MarkK]

I did mention that they can evade, but just because they can run away does that make them worth 9pts? I'm not convinced they offer value when you can get heavy sword impact support for 10pts, even if they Elite MC that makes them only 1pt cheaper than a Cataphract.

[KevinD]

I buy a lot more MC Bw than HC Impetuous…

[ethan]

With only a couple of exceptions I generally feel the points costs in this game are correct and internally consistent. MC Bow are not an exception. I see vastly more MC Bow on the table than HC Impetuous.

[MarkK]

Maybe's aye and maybe's no, I honest don't see the attraction

[Mike Bennett]

For me impetuous cavalry are over priced, especially when compared to impact or impact 1/2 bow. Their biggest issue is that when tbey charge it must be full distance if enemy evade.

[ethan]

[Longtooth]

Heavy cav bow and med cav bow elite are both popular unit types and I am more than happy to pay 11 points for them. As such, it makes sense that ordinary med cav bow would cost 9 points.

Being a bit crap and reasonably priced are not mutually exclusive

[MarkK]

Anyway my point was  MC = are LC with a slight uograde, ‘They are quite similar to light cavalry, but fight in a more compact formation’ p.15 

HC = ‘are noble or elite horsemen well protected, sometimes with caparisoned horse’ p.15

So yes I would have though being a bit crap and cheap was exactly the point and the fact they are popular is neither hither nor thither. They are LC at the same points cost of HC. 

[AlanCutner]

You clearly don't think MC bow are worth the points. So don't use them. Those who like the troop type can continue to take them. Free choice, not really a problem.

[Ramses II]

Positioning is important if not key. Placed at an angle to the target, the cav can evade and then move forward to another angled position. Doing this repeatedly can prevent them being forced off table, while potentially allowing other units to flank the chargers. . . 

[MarkK]

[Mark G Fry]

The other point about points costs is their relationship to the cost of other units.

So, with basic LH bow/jav etc. @ 6pts (with 2 lives, not a 'heavy' unit, and no 'upgrade' for fighting enemy MF/LMI in the open, but a move of 5UDs & a free turn at the beginning of movement) and basic MC @ 7pts with an additional +1pt cost for impact or javelin etc, MC bow are going to come out at 9 points regardless.
They have 3 lives, they can evade and whilst they don't get protection against enemy shooting, they are 'heavy' units and they do get the positive effect fighting MF/LMI in the open.

If you drop MC bow down to (say) 8pts, you'd need to drop the base cost for plain MC to 6pts and base LH to 5pts. If you then consider that LH can in some lists be dropped to LC mediocre (@ -2pts) you've now got LC @ 3pts and cheaper than base LI (which also have 2 lives but the LC gets ferocious charge fighting against them).

Adjusting just 1 unit cost can throw the whole system out of balance, it's a delicate eco-system of cause and effect - that I think ADGL manages exceptionally well.
For example: it could be argued that the latest changes to Polearm make units armed with them exceptionally good value. However, some of these effects only apply to certain categories of troops or in certain circumstances, so actually the points cost works out fairly to both the polearm armed unit and its opponents (IMHO).

Come up against an experienced player with an Hunnic or Mongol army full of MC bow and I suspect they will cause most other armies a real challenge.

Just my 3pence worth
Mark
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'He could have lived a risk-free, moneyed life, but he preferred to whittle away his fortune on warfare.' Xenophon, The Anabasis