Building a cavalryman vs. building a charioteer

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

Doesn't the cataphract belie the stirrup -> heavy lance charge step there?

GURPS Low-Tech has using a lance without stirrups as possible, but done at Lance-2. It might be more appropriate to just make Lance prior to the adoption of stirrups a DX/H skill instead of a DX/A one and ignore this penalty - nobody is going to have it without also having a Technique to buy off that penalty, which would cost [3], close enough to the ~[+4] to get a Hard skill to the same level as an Average one. Although personally, I feel Lance should just be a Technique of Riding to start with.

Originally Posted by Anthony

I would be very surprised if there isn't some sort of technological advancement that made it become practical, even if we don't know exactly what that advancement was. Using riders instead of chariots is too obvious a concept to remain unused for a thousand years, there has to be some sort of problem preventing it from being feasible until that problem was resolved.

As obvious as it is in retrospect, LTC2 notes the early instances of cavalry, as depicted in contemporary artwork, was still a two-man team, with one rider controlling both mounts while the other used his bow. Of course, LTC2 also adheres to the idea that Bronze Age horses were smaller, suitable only for scouts or to pull chariots as a team rather than for cavalry, with the latter coming about thanks to larger horses being bred.

[DanHoward]

Originally Posted by Varyon

As obvious as it is in retrospect, LTC2 notes the early instances of cavalry, as depicted in contemporary artwork, was still a two-man team, with one rider controlling both mounts while the other used his bow.

This was the transitional period between chariot archers and horse archers. That illustration was Assyrian and dates to the 9th C BC

[Michael Thayne]

Originally Posted by Varyon

As obvious as it is in retrospect, LTC2 notes the early instances of cavalry, as depicted in contemporary artwork, was still a two-man team, with one rider controlling both mounts while the other used his bow. Of course, LTC2 also adheres to the idea that Bronze Age horses were smaller, suitable only for scouts or to pull chariots as a team rather than for cavalry, with the latter coming about thanks to larger horses being bred.

While the TL system is obvious somewhat artificial, it's worth noting that LTC3 gives TL1 horses ST 20, has ST 22 cavalry horses appearing at TL2, and doesn't have ST 24 heavy warhorses appearing until TL4. That's consistent with TL3 (medieval) horses not being massively larger than Bronze Age horses, but also having the horses readily available to Alexander being able to carry about 20% more than the ones pulling New Kingdom Egypt chariots, which could be enough of a difference to be significant.