In the early middle and early Warring States period, the strength of Zhao was actually not strong, and it belonged to the weaker category among the Seven Heroes. And the prosperity of Zhao began after the reform of Hufu cavalry and archery of King Wuling of Zhao.

In fact, in the early Warring States period, cavalry has appeared on the battlefield, and a small number of cavalry units have been established in all countries, mainly used for auxiliary work such as patrolling, reconnaissance, news transmission, and small sneak attacks, but the cavalry is very primitive in quantity, quality, and tactical use, and it cannot play a major role in determining the outcome of the war.

After the reform of the Hufu cavalry and archery of King Wuling of Zhao, the cavalry began to officially develop into an independent army, and a large number of cavalry armies began to be assembled among the countries, which were composed of tens of thousands of cavalry from Qin and Zhao. Because both countries are bordered by nomadic areas in the north, they can not only learn the art of riding and archery from the nomads, but also possess a large number of areas where horses are raised.

The role of Hufu cavalry and archery is not only to establish a strong army for Zhao State, but also to greatly expand the territory of Zhao State to the north, not only annexed Zhongshan State, but also incorporated the areas of Linhu, Lou Fu, Donghu and other nomadic peoples into Zhao State, not only so that Zhao State expanded thousands of miles, increased the population of one million, but also occupied a large number of high-quality horse farms, in addition to most of the nomads are brave and warlike, after joining Zhao State, it also brought a martial and brave spirit to Zhao Yuan, so it also greatly improved the combat effectiveness of the Zhao army, In this way, Zhao State has jumped from a weak country to a second strongest seat of the seven heroes in just over ten years. And other countries have also imitated Zhao and formed their own cavalry troops.

However, Qichu, Wei, Han and other countries lack excellent horse-raising areas, and do not have the conditions for large-scale formation of cavalry, and Yan is close to the north, but the national strength is too weak, and it is difficult to occupy the horse-raising area from the nomads, so the cavalry has only achieved great development in Qin and Zhao, and although the countries in its land have also established some more cavalry armies, they are still lackluster.

In addition, at this time, the cavalry was still in the initial stage of development, on the one hand, because the horse furniture was not perfect, which limited the development and growth of the cavalry, and on the other hand, the tactics, theories, and experience of the cavalry were also insufficient, which also made the combat effectiveness of the cavalry not yet fully brought into play, so although the cavalry had shown great potential, it still could not completely replace the role of the chariot, and a large number of chariots were still assembled in various countries. The battles between the nations were still dominated by chariots or infantry, and the kind of battles in which large-scale cavalry charged each other did not yet appear.

Moreover, although the number of cavalry troops increased greatly at this time, the proportion was not high compared with the total strength of each country. Li Mu was guarding the north side of the town, and when the Xiongnu attacked, the army reorganized by his subordinates was: 1,300 chariots, 13,000 cavalry, 50,000 brave infantry, and 100,000 crossbowmen.

Now the Zhao army is stationed in Fanwu, with a total of 150,000 troops, including 1,500 chariots and 15,000 cavalry. However, the number of war horses in the whole army reached more than 70,000, because in addition to the chariots and cavalry, there were also a considerable number of war horses for the infantry, who first rode to the battlefield and then dismounted to fight. This is also the norm in this era.

Since getting Li Mu's authorization, the plateau also immediately began to work, first of all, to select soldiers and war horses, to pick out a thousand people from the fifteen thousand cavalry, and Li Yinghong to help, it is not difficult to arrive, but it is a little troublesome to choose horses, because at this time the size of Chinese war horses is not large, the average back height is about one meter three, in fact, not much bigger than a donkey. It is not at all comparable to the high-headed horse of Nako that the plateau has ridden in the past.

Although Gao Yuan has not trained cavalry, he also knows that when the cavalry fights, the strength and impact of the war horse are more important than the people, and when it is in frontal combat, the large war horse has a much advantage over the small war horse, so the plateau can only try to choose some relatively large war horses for this new cavalry.

Three days later, the first batch of 200 sets of new horse furniture were sent, and the people and horses were all selected, at this time, the establishment of the cavalry and the infantry is about the same, according to the fifty establishment, that is, five people for a team, ten people for a tithe, fifty for the uncle, one hundred for the Lu, five hundred for the captain, for the combination, a thousand cavalry is divided into two lieutenants, the two lieutenants are Du Yi and Ji Hua, both of these two are from the Chinese military camp, and the relationship with the plateau is very good.

With the new style of horse furniture, Gao Yuan's riding skills also improved rapidly, so that there was not much difference between him and other soldiers, and he was more familiar with the characteristics of the new horse furniture, so it was enough to teach the soldiers. Therefore, after the arrival of the horses, the plateau also began to train the soldiers, first of all, of course, suitable for the new style of horses. In fact, the foundation of this group of soldiers themselves is good, they are used to riding the saddle without pedaling on a single low bridge, and they have turned to the saddle on a double high bridge pedal saddle, as long as they adapt to it a few times, they will basically be able to master the balance of the body on horseback, of course, all the soldiers also think that riding this new style of horse furniture is indeed much more stable than in the past.

Then I began to practice some skills on horseback, such as single hanging, changing horses, pedaling to hide, fishing for the moon and the like, in fact, there are some actions plateau has only seen others do, but they have not practiced, so every night, plateau has to work overtime for himself, practice these skills, in addition to practicing riding and archery skills, in this regard, plateau is also very humble to learn from Li Yinghong.

Although Li Yinghong is not very old, his riding and archery abilities are quite good, and it is more than enough to teach Gao Yuan in this regard. Of course, during the training, it is inevitable that you will fall off the horse, but Takahara has a strong personality and knows that these techniques are the foundation of his own foundation in this era, so he also practiced very hard. And his own foundation and su zhì are very good, and the start is also very fast, after more than ten days of practice, Gao Yuan also quickly mastered the skills of riding combat, and was able to fight evenly with Li Yinghong on horseback, but the riding and archery ability is not enough in a day or two, and can only be slowed down.

Liu Chuang didn't brag, and on the ninth day, he made all 1,000 sets of new horse furniture, and at the same time made 300 sets of horseshoe. And the soldiers have basically mastered the use of new horse furniture. Therefore, cavalry tactics also began to be practiced.

Although the plateau does not know any cavalry tactics, but in this era, there is no mature cavalry tactics theory, and after all, the plateau is from the modern society, the information is extremely developed, in addition to many cavalry examples, the history of the powerful cavalry army for reference, plus the plateau has also learned some simple military theory knowledge, so the plateau can more or less summarize some cavalry tactics.

In the understanding of the plateau, the strongest place of the cavalry lies in the speed, that is, the mobility, coming and going like the wind, as fast as lightning, and living can attack hundreds of miles a day, a hit misses, immediately far away, by which it is a combination of cavalry and shooting, it can be called the most powerful type of troops in the era of cold weapons, the Mongolian Empire of that year relied on this move, swept across the entire Eurasian continent, invincible, and the cavalry in frontal combat, the cavalry also has a strong impact, by which it is the cavalry army, almost the tank corps of the cold weapon era.

Although the 1,000 cavalry corps now formed are all light cavalry, if the opponent is not well-trained and can maintain a complete formation, it will be difficult to resist the onslaught of the cavalry. At the same time, although the impact power of the light cavalry is not as good as that of the cavalry, it is superior in flexibility, speed, and mobility, and can not only impact head-on, but also intersperse in a roundabout way, and attack in a combined manner. Moreover, even if the battle is lost, the cavalry can also use its speed to quickly get out of the battlefield, and then reorganize the team to find an opportunity to turn defeat into victory.

Therefore, Gao Yuan also decided to use the Mongol cavalry as the main reference, and made some modifications in some places to train this cavalry.

Before training, the first thing was to choose the assembly of the cavalry, since it was decided to use the Mongol cavalry as the main reference, the weapons of the first stack were of course bows and crossbows.

The bow of this era is still dominated by a single bow, divided into two types: long bow and short bow, the range of the long bow can reach more than 100 meters, and the projectile can reach 150 meters, but the body is huge, not more carryable, and it is laborious to pull away, and the general army will only be equipped with a small amount. The short bow is easy to carry and easy to pull, but the range is only 50 to 60 meters, and the distance of the projectile is 80 to 100 meters.

And the crossbow of this era has a great development, made very exquisitely, although the crossbow is not easy to open, but the size is small, the firing range is long, the shooting posture is stable, so it is widely used in the army, the crossbow is divided into two kinds of crossbow and crossbow, the range of the crossbow is about 100 meters, and the range of the crossbow is extremely long, can reach more than 200 meters. But the crossbow cannot be thrown.

Therefore, the plateau finally selected, in addition to the basic armor, each cavalry was equipped with two spears, a long sword, a round shield, two hand-drawn crossbows, two short bows, and six arrows, each of which could hold thirty arrows.

Mounted shooting is divided into straight fire, side fire, turning reflex, etc., and different choices are made according to the actual situation of the battlefield. Positive fire is used when charging head-on, side-fire is used when rounding the wings, and turning reflexes are used when retreating. And the way of archery is also different, before going into battle, first pull the two hand-drawn crossbows apart, and when charging, the hand-drawn crossbows are first shot, and then use the short bow to shoot, the soldiers in the front row shoot flat, and the soldiers in the back row shoot, forming an area strike.

At the same time, there are also training in the queue changes of the cavalry, such as horizontal charge, arrow charge, arc charge, cross charge, etc., and there are many kinds of them.

After more than ten days of training, the newly formed cavalry army, although it has not yet reached a very mature level, has also achieved initial results, after all, after the use of the new horse furniture, the stability of the soldiers on horseback has indeed greatly increased, so they can also complete some complex and difficult movements.

Li Mu also raised two small-scale cavalry confrontation training, each side sent out a hundred cavalry, the actual combat confrontation, to the fruit of the use of the new horse club of the cavalry won a complete victory, and their own losses were almost minimal, and later the number of confrontation doubled, 100 new cavalry against 200 cavalry, the result of the new cavalry although the loss of more than half, but in the end still won the confrontation, but also the initial use of the new horse furniture, the cavalry combat effectiveness has indeed been greatly improved.

At the same time, the artisan battalion also found out some experience in horseshoe fighting, and of course paid the price of injuring twenty horses, and finally put all the horses of the new cavalry army on horseshoes.

And during this period of time, the riding ability of the plateau has also made great progress. And at this moment, the decisive battle between Qin and Zhao also began.