Really looking forward to your mod, I have a few suggestion but not sure how hard it is to implement:

- I agree that you cannot quite use a 2-handed axe or war hammer effectively while mounted, but to give some love to the 2-handers, maybe you can add some polearms to the game that correspond to each type of 2-handed skills such as halberd for 2-handed axe, glaive for 2-handed sword, Bec-de-corbin for 2-handed blunt (flail would be best but oh well) which are better suited to mounted combat? In addition, these weapons can be given to NPCs as well as they have longer reach and are more effective in countering the mounted player.
- I also agree that casting spells while mounted would make kiting too easy, to balance it, you could force the horse to walk when the player is casting or powering up spells. It makes more sense this way as a mage need to concentrate while casting spells so he could not possibly be steering the horse at the same time. However firing a staff should be treated in the same way as mounted archery as they seems similar in terms of power level.

Don't worry about balance, please. Forcing a horse to walk just because you're casting a spell is ridiculous. You get up to a gallop using your legs...

^^ Yes, gallop/canter is achieved by leg aids/voice aids. We even have some of our school horses to know that one voice aid means walk, 2 mean trot, three or more - canter. We also have corresponding voice aids to make them slow down.
Steering can also be done by leg aids/seat/rider's center of gravity in relation to the horse's center of gravity/upper torso movement.

There is no need to trouble yourself with "How am I going to steer the horse if I don't use my hands?" like I said, steering is done with a multitude of ways on a trained horse. And all war horses should be trained.

****

Really looking forward to this mod! Good luck!

This is one of the type of mods I would use for sure. I was hopeing for mounter combat with swords a bows but you went a step further and added trampling, that is ausome. Maybe you should also make it too where it is a perk to even use and go up the perk tree as you called Horesmen. Now i didn't read everything so if you already came to that conclusion, then cool... Thank You for doing this mod it is looking great from what I seen in the videos this is going to be a treat...

I definitely think you shouldn't worry about balancing the mounted combat, but instead get it to a basic usable state and then perhaps release whatever source files there are so that other modders can incorporate mounted combat itself and/or balancing versions of it. That will help offload some of the work from you OP, while giving players options. You could of course provide your own balancing later on as the mod progresses, but I think having a stable base that works is the most important thing.

i realize that ure really bsuy and all(life pshhh) but i was just wondering if you had ann eta on release for this, because i can't wiat. my favorite part will be the bows on horseback. I would really appreciate an eta on this as i look forward to ti excitedly

I second that thought

Hey guys, this is a quick update on the progress:
- I have most of the said features working. The first beta will include melee weapons (one-handed swords, axes, and spears)
- Bows will need to wait until later release (as I must have SKSE's getCameraAngle to determine the coordinate player is looking for archery)
- Magic, well, I will be thinking about the use of Voices, thou I haven't looked into it. The major problem is that, casting any spell on horse will be difficult, because in order to cast any spell in the game, the actor must have clear LOS (line of sight) to whatever target (even the self-casting). Sitting on the horse, LOS will be obscured because the horse basically block the LOS of its rider.

Release date (estimated)
- I'm aiming for closed beta this coming weekends. Now I have more time to work on this project. The only thing I need to sort out is IsKeyPressed & Papyrus's Threading. Threading is a pain in the butt, especially running OnUpdate Event, it creates unwanted threads for my script. So pressing a button once, it actually send 3-5 keypress notifications (and animation accordingly)

Pretty awesome. But put me on the list of players wanting mounted spellcasting/staves.

Oh my gosh, please, I need this!

That's great !

I can't believe this is happening so soon. You've robbed Bethesda of a DLC. Meanwhile everyone one else is still struggling to even use custom animations.

ow yeah...

Are spears also playable as unmounted weapons? If so, do they have bonusses against horse riders?

I suggest you post this on the skyrim nexus! yours will be one of the most popular around, as there are no other mounted combat mods yet. and I can endorse it then

I love it already! If this mod is publiced I will echange my mage for a warrior just for this mod! XD

Hmm, spear thrust is for horse uses only, sorry guys Spears on-foot is being worked on by some other talented modders, don't worry

The next step is probably how to make NPCs do mounting combat, so it will balance things out a bit. I'm thinking of making a random-encounter, which player will have to fight a group of 3 raiders on horses. It would be fun

Rongphale you genius. Please include me in your beta test! This mod...will complete me.

Mounted archery is happening right??? I'd be sad if it didn't happen....please, make it happen . I'm an archer.

Does closed beta mean not availible for everyone? If so, when IS this mod coming out?

This is a major thing I want for my plans too, both melee and ranged cavalry.

If no serious bugs are found, i would say few days to a week at most

Mounted Archery is happening, but not on first release, I'm afraid.
I already figured out how to aim/shoot whilst mounted. The only thing holding me back is to detect the camera's angle, (in order to play aiming animations correctly). Hopefully, the SKSE team can come up with a GetCameraAngle & GetMouseMovement functions

Atm, I'm writing readme/instruction for the Close Beta, and adding some finishing touch to the mod. Please note that this is a closed beta, and bugs are inevitable. Some of the features are probably missing, so please bear with me

Will it be available for NPCs?

read the discription and the comments

not at the moment, but it is a high priority, next to mounted archery.

I have got three questions:

1) can you do a backhand slash (to the left of your horse)? Somehow I have got the feeling that wolves always attack from the left... maybe because I dismount that way?
2) Do spears train a skill? I so what skill? 1handed is logical, because 1handed is the only weapon style allowed at the moment (not to mention im 1handed ) but it would give 2handed guys an oppertunity to try this mod too.
3) Where is this going to be released? I recommend the Skyrimnexus because you can automatically see new files (if any pics are uploaded)

My warrior guy I created for this mod is almost ready for this mod! He has a horse and skill enough at least XD.

Thanks for the sarcastic reply.

1. There's nothing that I can see in the OP that says anything about NPCs riding horses, only the player character. Neither do the pictures nor the vid show anything other than the PC using a horse.

2. I'm not studying through 5 whole pages of text in the hope that someone asked the same question.

7 (8 after your comment) comments up
I did it

sorry, didnt mean to be rude (that is why I put a smily down)

Dude just saw this today... had to create an account just to follow it. This feature was an absolute necessity for the game and I am really glad you thought of it and even better went through all this time and effort to realize it. Hope I can be able to try it out soon. Please please pleas post a release date