New units add suggestion

[MVP7]

If another ranked added, I am afraid it will affect the impact result. I'd rather let archers shoot overhead with less damage effect. But I don't want the animation vision ruined by arrows flying across the front ranks.

Buy Rise of Persia dlc,then play the assyrian infantry,and you'll see how will it runs.(means how will the infantry units with back rank archers runs)

I already won the dlc and played it. Assyrian mixed is set as 50% bows and 50% spear. Thus we have 4 models of spear infantry and 4 models of archer. And because of this the melee capability is compromised. If you want to keep one unit as 8 models, you will change perhaps two models into archer, which will compromise the melee capability of comitatensis. I doubt you want to make comitatensis weaker in melee for the archer capability. If you want to add a third rank, I am afraid it will affect the impact capability as the rank is deeper. It makes comitatensis stronger but I doubt it reflect its historical role.

What do you mean by models being changed into archers making comitatenses weaker in melee? The visual models (or just the animations of those models afaik) don't have any effect on unit performance.

[melm]

Sorry about it. The description already give 20% bow and 80% light spear. You are right. Nothing will change but only the models. The melee result should remain the same.

[Dux Limitis]

If another ranked added, I am afraid it will affect the impact result. I'd rather let archers shoot overhead with less damage effect. But I don't want the animation vision ruined by arrows flying across the front ranks.

Buy Rise of Persia dlc,then play the assyrian infantry,and you'll see how will it runs.(means how will the infantry units with back rank archers runs)

I already won the dlc and played it. Assyrian mixed is set as 50% bows and 50% spear. Thus we have 4 models of spear infantry and 4 models of archer. And because of this the melee capability is compromised. If you want to keep one unit as 8 models, you will change perhaps two models into archer, which will compromise the melee capability of comitatensis. I doubt you want to make comitatensis weaker in melee for the archer capability. If you want to add a third rank, I am afraid it will affect the impact capability as the rank is deeper. It makes comitatensis stronger but I doubt it reflect its historical role.

Add another (the third) rank of archers who can active shoot to the comitatensis will not make them weak in melee combat ,beacuse the archers will not join the melee combat when the armys impact.

[Dux Limitis]

Earlier I made a small mod that let late Romans shoot their bows with range of 2 like horse archers and I think it worked quite nicely.

With limited range the damage remains similar to that of the horse archer units and it definitely better shows the reasons behind the otherwise quite harmful change in the Roman equipment by giving them a bit more initiative against mounted units without making them overpowered or primarily ranged unit.

Still hoping that this might be re-visited at some point.

Speak honesty,I wanna wait for the offical upgrade about this.(and with archers' modles)

[SnuggleBunnies]

I wouldn't expect the game to change in this respect. As Richard said, it's a design decision. Even if you decided you preferred the shooty interpretation of these units, you would then have to accept that the archers were not reserving ammo for Impact, so instead of defensive Impact of +200/166 vs armored, you would have to take away the 20% bows, making it +180/152 vs armored. Also, adding shooting capability, even a minimal one, might call for revisiting the pricing of these units.

[MVP7]

I wouldn't expect the game to change in this respect. As Richard said, it's a design decision. Even if you decided you preferred the shooty interpretation of these units, you would then have to accept that the archers were not reserving ammo for Impact, so instead of defensive Impact of +200/166 vs armored, you would have to take away the 20% bows, making it +180/152 vs armored. Also, adding shooting capability, even a minimal one, my call for revisiting the pricing of these units.

The late Romans are pretty expensive for what they do as they rarely benefit from their defensive impact POA. Since they don't have ranged weapons and they are underwhelming when attacking there's rarely a good reason for the enemy to engage them in melee which is a unavoidable issue with non-ranged defensive unit in any game. It's probably also the reason why Romans historically integrated ranged weapon to their late infantry formations in response to their mounted (and ranged) adversaries. I think it's fair to say that comitatenses not being able to fire at the enemies cripples the entire concept of the late Roman infantry and consequently defeats the purpose of the transition away from legionary style shock infantry.

But yeah, this was discussed in some length earlier but I hope the decision is reconsidered at some point. Personally I don't think that the amount of "ineffective shooting" with range limited to 2 (and possibly the amount of archers increased to 25%) would be any worse than with any other horse archer, light infantry/horse or mixed infantry heavy army in the game.

[jomni]

If you allow them to shoot (just 20%) power, their impact POA should be removed. Now they deal mosquito bites against incoming cavalry and they get slaughtered upon impact. A double whammy. If you let them retain the impact, there it’s unfair for 50% bows who doesn’t have it.

[MVP7]

If you allow them to shoot (just 20%) power, their impact POA should be removed. Now they deal mosquito bites against incoming cavalry and they get slaughtered upon impact. A double whammy. If you let them retain the impact, there it’s unfair for 50% bows who doesn’t have it.

Do you mean the defensive impact POA from bows? I personally wouldn't mind if it's removed, actually reduced POA might even allow AI to attack them.

Currently Superior armored lancers have about 0-60-40 chances against Legio Palatina and Auxilia palatina on impact in the open and odds aren't much better against Comitatensis. Even catapracts have only 3-65-33 chances against Palatinas and 11-77-11 against Comitatensis. I have never seen cavalry charge at these units unless they are flanked or disrupted, I don't think the AI is currently even mathematically capable of charging Legio units frontally and will instead stop right in front of them and wait for the Romans to charge.

The only way to initiate a combat against cavalry with the Romans is to either to charge the cavalry with terrible odds or bring out some Limitanei to trigger a charge by the cavalry so you can flank charge them with Legios without having to worry about evasion or the awful offensive impact POA. In practice they are overpriced swordsmen and light spear unit that always has to start the fight. This is of course incredibly gamey and utterly backwards dynamic.

Even if their price was increased and defense impact POA reduced by 20 it would be well worth it to have the ability to project their presence at the battlefield which would drive the enemy to attack, give way or suffer the casualties which is why the bows were integrated to the Roman formations in the first place.

[rbodleyscott]

Even if their price was increased and defense impact POA reduced by 20 it would be well worth it to have the ability to project their presence at the battlefield which would drive the enemy to attack, give way or suffer the casualties which is why the bows were integrated to the Roman formations in the first place.

This, of course is supposition. The use of archers as rear ranks behind legionaries was detailed in Arrian's Order of Battle against the Alans, where the archers were there to damp down the Alan charge, not to provoke it. (As the Roman line was static so there was nothing to force the Alans to move into bow range). If they had wanted to provoke a charge, it would have been better to send the archers forward as skirmishers.

The issue of small numbers of archers in heavy infantry formations is one that does not just affect the Late Romans, but also Dark Age Shieldwall formations and Arab/Berber Spearmen formations, all of which often included a small proportion of archers in the rear ranks.

Our view remains that their main purpose was to help damp down an enemy charge, not to provoke it.

Putting it in "by public demand" (of a very small number of posters on the board) is something we would have to think long and hard about. And of course, as soon as we did, someone would argue equally vehemently that the darts ought to be allowed to distance shoot too, which would certainly make Late Romans OP (as they were in some previous Ancient tabletop rules), and would not be realistic anyway as they only carried 5 darts each so could not use them for a prolonged shooting exchange. And then we would be on to "why can't Cavalry with javelins shoot?" and so on.

All of which misses the point that FOG is a top down simulation, not a bottom up simulation, and the design philosophy is getting the overall effect right, not showing every nut and bolt.

[MVP7]

Even if their price was increased and defense impact POA reduced by 20 it would be well worth it to have the ability to project their presence at the battlefield which would drive the enemy to attack, give way or suffer the casualties which is why the bows were integrated to the Roman formations in the first place.

This, of course is supposition. The use of archers as rear ranks behind legionaries was detailed in Arrian's Order of Battle against the Alans, where the archers were there to damp down the Alan charge, not to provoke it. (As the Roman line was static so there was nothing to force the Alans to move into bow range). If they had wanted to provoke a charge, it would have been better to send the archers forward as skirmishers.

But the Romans also didn't get harassed by enemy skirmishers out of their reach and the enemy cavalry didn't just taunt them and wait for them to make mistakes like happened at Carrhae. Imagine how differently Carrhae would have played out if Roman army had a significant portion of archers that would have been able to fire back at the light cavalry and keep the heavy cavalry at distance instead of the entire battle being played out at the Parthian's terms. It's a perfect example of what happens when infantry tries to fight a cavalry force defensively without having sufficient tools to harm them from distance.

[rbodleyscott]

Even if their price was increased and defense impact POA reduced by 20 it would be well worth it to have the ability to project their presence at the battlefield which would drive the enemy to attack, give way or suffer the casualties which is why the bows were integrated to the Roman formations in the first place.

This, of course is supposition. The use of archers as rear ranks behind legionaries was detailed in Arrian's Order of Battle against the Alans, where the archers were there to damp down the Alan charge, not to provoke it. (As the Roman line was static so there was nothing to force the Alans to move into bow range). If they had wanted to provoke a charge, it would have been better to send the archers forward as skirmishers.

But the Romans also didn't get harassed by enemy skirmishers out of their reach and the enemy cavalry didn't just taunt them and wait for them to make mistakes like happened at Carrhae. Imagine how differently Carrhae would have played out if Roman army had a significant portion of archers that would have been able to fire back at the light cavalry and keep the heavy cavalry at distance instead of the entire battle being played out at the Parthian's terms. It's a perfect example of what happens when infantry tries to fight a cavalry force defensively without having sufficient tools to harm them from distance.

All very well, but experience of actual play shows that the Late Romans (when properly handled) very much have the upper hand against (for example) Huns in the game, and this is not because of their cavalry, but because of their infantry. They don't need a boost.

And 20% archers are not going to outshoot enemy skirmishers anyway.

[MVP7]

All very well, but experience of actual play shows that the Late Romans (when properly handled) very much have the upper hand against (for example) Huns in the game, and this is not because of their cavalry, but because of their infantry. They don't need a boost.

And 20% archers are not going to outshoot enemy skirmishers anyway.

I don't know how things are going in multiplayer and personally I care more about single player experience. In singleplayer I have defeated plenty of mounted armies like Huns and Vandals with late Roman and Byzantine lists but those battles have been, without exception, some of the gamiest and non-immersive I have experienced in the game. I won't go into full detail again but it involves a lot of passively cavalry waiting right in front of the Roman line while being slowly surrounded by infantry, plenty of defensive heavy infantry suicidally charging at the cavalry to force them into melee and countless occasions of using Limitanei units as baits to trigger the cavalry into charging and sticking in melee. Maybe I just don't know how to properly handle the Romans but I certainly haven't figured out any better way to force unwilling cavalry into melee using infantry.

I honestly don't understand why balancing shootable bows is perceived as such a massive issue either. Many seem to be afraid that shooting bows would be both game-breakingly overpowered and completely inconsequential, often within the same post.

In my experiments, the 20% shooting archers were fairly effective at disrupting light units working together with the proper ranged units and concentrating their fire. Of course they weren't incredibly damaging and beating skirmishers in 1v1 or disrupting heavy infantry units but then again I think we all agree that's not what late Roman infantry is supposed to do anyway.

The issue of small numbers of archers in heavy infantry formations is one that does not just affect the Late Romans, but also Dark Age Shieldwall formations and Arab/Berber Spearmen formations, all of which often included a small proportion of archers in the rear ranks.

Our view remains that their main purpose was to help damp down an enemy charge, not to provoke it.

Putting it in "by public demand" (of a very small number of posters on the board) is something we would have to think long and hard about. And of course, as soon as we did, someone would argue equally vehemently that the darts ought to be allowed to distance shoot too, which would certainly make Late Romans OP (as they were in some previous Ancient tabletop rules), and would not be realistic anyway as they only carried 5 darts each so could not use them for a prolonged shooting exchange. And then we would be on to "why can't Cavalry with javelins shoot?" and so on.

All of which misses the point that FOG is a top down simulation, not a bottom up simulation, and the design philosophy is getting the overall effect right, not showing every nut and bolt.

I fully agree with the decision to prioritize realistic overall effect over some low level detain and I think that is exactly what is going wrong with the current implementation of 20% bows. If those upcoming shieldwall and spear formations are "defensive" in terms of their impact POA they will have the very same issues as the late Romans currently do.

If the Romans just wanted to damp down charges, why would they have involved archers? Why not just have more infantry with throwing weapons (as the Romans had done for centuries) if all they wanted to do is take a shot at charging enemy before melee. The bows might actually be worse than darts at repelling charges with their flatter trajectories and the archers being positioned behind the swordsmen. The only real advantage bows would have over darts is their range (and ammo, which shouldn't be an issue anyway if they were only used to disrupt charges).

Perhaps I am just making wild suppositions but I think the bow (or just the threat they pose) as an important tactical tool seems like a much better explanation for why they were added to the Roman formations than Romans simply deciding that they suddenly want to have some archers doing the exact same thing that pilums/darts had been doing for centuries for no particular reason.

I think you are putting too much weigh on the enemy being "provoked" into charging. My point was that the archers, even in relatively small numbers, create a hazardous zone that discourages the enemy from just standing there, waiting for the purely defensive Romans to charge at them even if it puts them at great disadvantage (which is what the AI will do every single time). Have you ever charged an Assyrian mixed or Persian bow infantry in a sub-optimal situation where you might have otherwise opted to wait and see if the enemy would ultimately come and fight on your terms or simply tied them in your ZOC and waited for other forces to get there?

I fully agree that full size melee infantry and cavalry units shouldn't be throwing javelins or darts en masse for the sake of gameplay but I still strongly believe that 20% bows arguably ended up on the wrong side when the line was drawn in the sand.

[Archaeologist1970]

I'd just like to add that this comes down the game abstraction levels. It has always felt very arbitrary though and not necessarily history-based such as but not limited to, Why do pike form square, yet the manipular tactics of legion are abstracted? At the least, there are now open discussions about these choices and I hope over time there can at least be a civil discussion over possible requested changes and alteration to the game. In the end, its their game, their vision of ancient warfare, and we ultimately have to accept that or vote with our wallets and find something else to play.

[TheGrayMouser]

If the Romans just wanted to damp down charges, why would they have involved archers? Why not just have more infantry with throwing weapons (as the Romans had done for centuries) if all they wanted to do is take a shot at charging enemy before melee. The bows might actually be worse than darts at repelling charges with their flatter trajectories and the archers being positioned behind the swordsmen. The only real advantage bows would have over darts is their range (and ammo, which shouldn't be an issue anyway if they were only used to disrupt charges).

Perhaps I am just making wild suppositions but I think the bow (or just the threat they pose) as an important tactical tool seems like a much better explanation for why they were added to the Roman formations than Romans simply deciding that they suddenly want to have some archers doing the exact same thing that pilums/darts had been doing for centuries for no particular reason.

I fully agree that full size melee infantry and cavalry units shouldn't be throwing javelins or darts en masse for the sake of gameplay but I still strongly believe that 20% bows arguably ended up on the wrong side when the line was drawn in the sand.

A heavy thrown weapon does not have the stand off capability of a dart or a bow. Plus a Pilum required a running start to throw in a high ballistic arc, and the man would need time after the throw to recover balance and draw sword. 100's of men doing that when a determine lancer force is bearing down on a formation doesnt seem likely. I dont think anyone knows exactly how the pilum "firings" were done by a formation anyhow, ( by rank?, all together?, by file?) but it possibly needed some sort of open order to do so. Also I don't believe more than one pilum was carried by each man so after tossing that would leave not much to defend with if the mounted force got thru. Like most games, the ability for infantry to maneuver around or near cavalry, much less "box them" in or "ZOC" them or even charge em is an enhancement of their capacity to say the least.(yet needed in a turn based environment or even weirder/less desirable things can happen)


I really don't have an issue with the "bows" in late Roman units firing per se, but as a balance issue , players would do what the later Roman legions would not... Maneuver and mass fire of multiple units onto one unlucky enemy to cause a cohesion test. I tend to think they are a little too overpowered on the defense as is, this would IMHO certainly make them OP if nothing else was changed.

In FOG1 late roman units had "rear rank light bow support" which could shoot( causing small pinpricks) but could NEVER causing a disruption test, nor would massing shots force a test either as the game did it on a per shooter basis, and the light bows didn't use a enough dice to get the minimum "hits" to force a test. They did give a POA bonus when charged by cavalry from the front ( nothing for infantry)
I never found it to be a chore to shoot with these guys as the attrition they could cause just form shooting could here and there cause/contribute to an autobreak, reduce a POA for "depth loss" to an enemy etc. But in the long run the abstraction of the late Fog2 units seems better as at least they HAVE their darts versus enemy foot too.

I do agree that an AI lancer based force has no ability to deal with a late Roman army... Perhaps aggressive lancer types under AI control should ignore the quality rating of the targets when determining if its a good "deal" to charge home... (They do seem to charge average comitatensus sometimes but freeze up and sit in front of superior ones always...)

[MVP7]

@TheGrayMouer, Yeah the move from pilum to darts seems sensible given the shift from shock foot to more defensive tactics. It's the last rank being bowmen instead of another line of melee infantry with darts that seems unnecessary and unjustified if the bows weren't used differently from the darts.

When it comes to maneuvering and massed fire (based on the testing I did), limiting the range to 2 tiles (like mounted bows) largely prevents significant concentration of fire, in normal situation you wouldn't have more than 2-3 units shooting at the same target and even that alone is not enough to cause cohesion check for most heavy and medium infantry. If Romans lost the 20 defensive impact POA from bows they might actually even work better as a defensive unit since currently their impact defense is so good that they almost never get to use it. With reduced defense POA and ranged attack I think the late Romans would be much more interesting unit that would interact with other units in more believable way.

[SnuggleBunnies]

Hmm. If they lost the bow impact, I would actually favor looking into such a change, but I do appreciate the arguments against too.

[Dux Limitis]

I think you are putting too much weigh on the enemy being "provoked" into charging. My point was that the archers, even in relatively small numbers, create a hazardous zone that discourages the enemy from just standing there, waiting for the purely defensive Romans to charge at them even if it puts them at great disadvantage (which is what the AI will do every single time). Have you ever charged an Assyrian mixed or Persian bow infantry in a sub-optimal situation where you might have otherwise opted to wait and see if the enemy would ultimately come and fight on your terms or simply tied them in your ZOC and waited for other forces to get there?

Agree with this,that's why I wanna @rbodleyscott to make comitatensis' archers can do active shooting.