Why bother with LF?

[grahambriggs]

What to make of Thracian tactics as described in Osprey's Men at Arms series? They are described as easily evading the Greek hoplites and showering them with missiles, often leading to the defat of the Greeks, who lacked missile weapons. Surely this has to be the LF and not the MF which can't evade. It could be a function of the LF drawing out the OSp, possibly causing cohesion losses as well, followed by the charge of the MF to finish them off. The question is, how to accomplish this in game terms?

I a game on Sunday my armoured hoplites were ground down by skirmishing Thracians. We charged but that led to more ganging up. On the other flank the same happened to my persian cavalry and Sparabara.

[bigdamnhero]

Wow! There are a lot of point sot cover based on only five games of experience. I have a NUmidian army and have found them a great army to play with. Sure, they dont have much hard hitting power, but add some legionnaries as allies and you can pack a punch!

Light foot are rubbish in combat unless verses other like troops - which of course is the whole point of having them. Secondly, they seriously bug poeple off when you swamp them with skirmishers! They cant contact easily, and they nip pasy to steal two points on a camp to boot! Also ther are many occasions whereby i have seen formed troops break because of massed skrimish archery/javelins. It also pulls formed troops out of position, having to charge the skirmishers if they are shock troops. Light horse can speed up the field and stop poeple from double moving and thus securing better positions for your own formed troop - such as taking a hill before others do. They also secure flanks from other light troops. They are versatile, annoying to the max and quite frankly, i would not do without them! Ive tried taht and got whupped truly!

Use them correctly and they rock. Oh, and if they attack fragmented formed troops (which they can), they gain two dice for two ranks - just like formed. Dont get caught out by that one!