Armour POAs

[JaM2013]

Thorakitai were armored, Thureophoroi were not.. Thorakitai were actually men who Romans called Imitation Legionaries.. even though they fought as Spearmen.. anyway in this game Imitation Legionaries actually represent those who used Roman equipment (like Carthaginian infantry did during Second Punic war under Hannibal in Italy)

[nikgaukroger]

Thorakitai were actually men who Romans called Imitation Legionaries.. even though they fought as Spearmen..

Not sure I've ever come across the idea that the Romans thought the thorakitai were imitation legionarii

[JaM2013]

They were the only units resembling Roman units in Greek world.. they used thureos, sword and spear, and javelins (thorakitai practically mean "Armored Infantry"). Thureophoroi the same - some greek historians even called Roman Legionarii as Thureophoroi.

[Cumandante]

This is a game, not a simulation. We do not have enough data to actually simulate ancient warfare. The importance imo of any wargame is to offer a roughly balanced game while honouring the authenticity of the subject matter at hand. I don't think whether up armoring spearmen should be 12 points or 6 points or whatever is really relevant to that issue.

My point was that you can not create a fully historically accurate game. We have a much better idea of how an ancient army was composed than we do of the specific costs of its troops. Therefore, I believe the army list is a good tool to achieve historically accurate army compositions, but the unit points cost is not.

I think the unit cost should be used to create choice. After reading your points, perhaps 1-1 cost effectiveness in every unit is not the best solution. Perhaps tailoring the unit cost to each specific list would be the ideal solution. I don't think it is a feasible one, though.

[MikeC_81]

This is a game, not a simulation. We do not have enough data to actually simulate ancient warfare. The importance imo of any wargame is to offer a roughly balanced game while honouring the authenticity of the subject matter at hand. I don't think whether up armoring spearmen should be 12 points or 6 points or whatever is really relevant to that issue.

My point was that you can not create a fully historically accurate game. We have a much better idea of how an ancient army was composed than we do of the specific costs of its troops. Therefore, I believe the army list is a good tool to achieve historically accurate army compositions, but the unit points cost is not.

I think the unit cost should be used to create choice. After reading your points, perhaps 1-1 cost effectiveness in every unit is not the best solution. Perhaps tailoring the unit cost to each specific list would be the ideal solution. I don't think it is a feasible one, though.

At the end of the day, as a developer posted already in this thread, don't get caught up in minor details on exact cost vs benefits gained. Its really doesn't lead us down any productive roads. Are there anything inherently broken with game balance at the moment? Massed Bows seem very strong at the moment and people with experience playing Parthia say it is too weak, but other than that I can't think of anything that comes to mind as serious outright balance issues. Does the game play out largely how we expect it to play out? I think it does. Core interactions seem plausible.

Maybe overtime as the player base grinds through more games, a trend will emerge where something clearly needs to be tweaked but I don't think we are close to that yet.

[JorgenCAB]

At the end of the day then auto select your troops and fight with what you get are the MOST realistic way we can currently achieve close to historically accurate representations. Commanders could not really select what troops to bring to a a fight, the only thing he could control was the deployment and usage of the troops he was dealt.

With this in mind troops should be valued from their worth not some arbitrary luxury tax. If players wish to game the mechanics and choose troops based on the map they play on or opponent they know they will face that is up to them. I for one would never agree to a tournament or competition if armies was not randomly selected for everyone (perhaps even around a specific date or period in time), I would not appreciate the gamey nature of the whole thing, for me each battle is an experience in something historic and armies should feel historical. Even Roman armies was a mix of what auxilia or allies they could get their hand on. How often where Roman legions actually at their theoretically full strength?

I would also like to see a general in ancient times stop before deploying a battle just to argue that the judge of the battle rated his troops too high and magically transported a few of his units to the scrap heap... just so the battle is fair and balanced.

[Nijis]

From realism point of perspective - legionary in his mail shirt, helmet and shield, would be extremely hard to kill frontally with any ranged weapon, and even more problematically with melee weapon.. Mail shirt itself was capable stopping any one-handed melee weapon of ancient era, it was humanly impossible to penetrate mail with either slash or stab/thrust. Only chance to get killed in it, would be if you got hit in unprotected areas, but those would be usually arms or legs, or if enemy managed to thrust his weapon in neck or armpit area..

Regarding melee combat, I don't think it's too unrealistic that armor should not have that much impact. You can easily inflict an incapacitating wound with a solid blow from a bladed weapon on an arm or leg, even a fatal one if you sever an artery.

Even if weapons do not penetrate, there's only so many joules of energy that a human body can absorb before it starts to function at a much-reduced level. John Keegan's reconstruction of Agincourt, if I remember correctly, suggests that heavily armored knights may simply have been battered to the ground. Think of combat between armored troops as a boxing match, except with no opportunity for the fighters to regain their breath. Descriptions of medieval combat frequently go on about champions "raining blows," essentially such fights were usually won by whoever could deliver the most and hardest impacts in the shortest period of time.

While heavy body-covering armor was expensive, it arguably represents more an individual aristocrat's investment in survivability than the state's investment in combat power.

Missile combat is obviously much different, as the frequency of impacts is much more irregular. Hence it makes sense to give armor a big impact on missile combat and a substantially lesser one on melee combat.

[JaM2013]

From realism point of perspective - legionary in his mail shirt, helmet and shield, would be extremely hard to kill frontally with any ranged weapon, and even more problematically with melee weapon.. Mail shirt itself was capable stopping any one-handed melee weapon of ancient era, it was humanly impossible to penetrate mail with either slash or stab/thrust. Only chance to get killed in it, would be if you got hit in unprotected areas, but those would be usually arms or legs, or if enemy managed to thrust his weapon in neck or armpit area..

Regarding melee combat, I don't think it's too unrealistic that armor should not have that much impact. You can easily inflict an incapacitating wound with a solid blow from a bladed weapon on an arm or leg, even a fatal one if you sever an artery.

Even if weapons do not penetrate, there's only so many joules of energy that a human body can absorb before it starts to function at a much-reduced level. John Keegan's reconstruction of Agincourt, if I remember correctly, suggests that heavily armored knights may simply have been battered to the ground. Think of combat between armored troops as a boxing match, except with no opportunity for the fighters to regain their breath. Descriptions of medieval combat frequently go on about champions "raining blows," essentially such fights were usually won by whoever could deliver the most and hardest impacts in the shortest period of time.

While heavy body-covering armor was expensive, it arguably represents more an individual aristocrat's investment in survivability than the state's investment in combat power.

Missile combat is obviously much different, as the frequency of impacts is much more irregular. Hence it makes sense to give armor a big impact on missile combat and a substantially lesser one on melee combat.

problem with this is, that Scutum alone protected large portion of your body and any hit on it, would do nothing.. as long as you stay behind it, and only attack from good cover while cooperating with your coleagues left and right, there is not much enemy can do to you in melee.. and with mail shirt on you, he really needs to go and hit you in face, or neck, or cut your femoral artery (but your legs are behind shield) etc to kill you.. armor plays role as its good enough to stop any possible hits that enemy might land on you bypassing the shield, or if you not manage to block it fully in time.. for these kinds of attack, mail is practical a life insurance policy - most dangerous wounds in ancient times were open wounds that could get infected. internal injuries, while they could be fatal, are still more likely to heal than open wound without antibiotics... and Romans knew this, which is why mail was so popular.. it was great protection to prevent open wounds from happening. Was it completely impervious to all weapons? No. Some could still do damage. But it could stop majority of hits that oculd land on you if your shield didnt fully stopped the attack...

[JaM2013]

Also, if you look at battle casualty info we got for those battles, its quite telling how many casualties there were from initial contact.. Typically, casualties were dealt almost identically to both sides in close combat, then side which was taking more beating (not necessary more casualties) would rout and run.. Only then majority of casualties would happen.. Historians claim that almost 90% of battle casualties happen after one side routs.. If you look at battles like Cynoscephalae or Pydna, its exactly what happened - initial contact, both sides were relatively even and both took some casualties, but once rout started, it was one sided bloodbath.. statistically speaking, typically winning side took about 5-10% casualties, losing side up to 50%, yet its safe to assume both sides took relatively similar casualties in initial contact, which means both sides could lose around 4% at before battle was decided. Thats not that much.. and it shows those melee matches were not as deadly as many think..

Human nature kinda goes against putting yourself in danger, combat is practically constant internal fight between your self preservance instinct and your bravado. Of course, some people might fight with practically no self-preservance, but majority would just try to stay alive without actually hurting anybody... This perfectly explain the low amount of casualties from initial contact.. while it also explain the bloodshed that followed, as usually chasing down enemy relieved the stress, and men suddenly had urge to hunt down fleeing enemy. (military historians compare this to gang fights)

Overall, i feel like casualty rates are a bit fast in this game, and battles are fast paced. But at the other side, this is still game and you have limited time (24 turns) at which battle has to resolve, so one turn might represent much longer period of time than players think...

[JaM2013]

some people are comparing it to reenactment duels with blunt weapons, yet comparation is not good, because in those matches, you actually know you wont be killed, therefore you attack without actual fear for your life at all times.. those guys would behave completely differently if their life would be at stake.. (of course, not all of them, as i mentioned, there are people who have no self-preservance instinct)

[Nijis]

I'd think with the scutum that the proportion of blows would fall on legs and arms would increase, not decrease, no?

I think the trick is to imagine such combat less as a fencing match (or sword-and-buckler match) than a battering competition. A lot of disabling blows will happen when a legionary is bashed with someone else's shield and stumbles. Or staggers from the combined effect of fatigue, blood loss, and pain from multiple small injuries.

Overall, i feel like casualty rates are a bit fast in this game,

There are a lot of ways you can be rendered hors de combat in a no-holds-barred scrum with big shields and blades that won't kill you. Blood in the eyes, crushed fingers on your sword-hand, hamstringing, concussion...

I think we can think of some "injuries" as simply troops simply being overcome with fatigue. Since there's no fatigue in the game, casualties are how units are degraded in combat even when they don't break.

mail is practical a life insurance policy

Sure - you definitely do not want puncture wounds to the torso. But in FOG2 terms, this means mail would decrease overall melee casualties only a bit, but perhaps reduce the death : injury ratio more dramatically.

[Nijis]

statistically speaking, typically winning side took about 5-10% casualties

I think if you count just deaths, than that's probably what you'd get even in the bloodiest battles. Say, 40% rout level reached, multiplied by 40-50% to account for routed troops, multiplied by 33% to account for the proportion of wounds that are non-fatal = 5%.

[JaM2013]

for winning side? not really, just check Caesar's campaigns in Gallia or Iberia, he was fighting using same legions over and over.. If losses would be so high, there would be no veterans in his army and he would have to have continuous flow of new men.. instead, at the end of civil war, he had huge amount of veterans who expected to be payed for their service ... It was actually one thing that caused problems to start between Octavian and Anthony - Octavian was supposed to get Ceasars money as his heir, but Anthony didnt want to give him any.. so he borrowed a large sum to pay Caesar's veterans for their service, gaining gratitude of these men, while Anthony had to give him money so he could pay that dept (legally they were Octavian's) HBO TV serries Rome made a lot of mistakes, but this part was actually spot on.. btw those veterans then helped Octavian to defeat Anthony when time came for their clash in Greece at Actium..

[Nijis]

That's the worst of battles. You can often win a battle with 10-15% rout level and the enemy at 40% = maybe 2% deaths on your side. I assume Caesar would probably fight more lopsidedly successful battles than Pyrrhic ones.

If a legionary's serving term is 25 years, that's a 4% turnover year-to-year from retirement alone. Add that to deserters, deaths from illness, fighting during foraging/patrols, troops detached as colonists/garrisons, etc, you'll need a lot of reinforcements no matter what.

[JaM2013]

actually, most of the time it was 10 years, only with late republic reforms (i don't like calling it Marius reforms) it was extended.

[Nijis]

My understanding is that a fair amount of legions were levied from scratch during the civil wars, even in fairly far-flung corners of the Republic's domains. I assume it probably also would not have been too difficult to fill in holes in the cohorts' ranks with recruits from Narbonensis or even conquered Gauls, no? Would anyone have cared too much about the formal citizenship requirements?