Slitherine

Hi, These are the organizations I use with the Scenario editor.

1) Standard Roman Legion: a) 1 unit of 600 Triarii, Superior but rarely Elite, usually armored, Of. Spear, = 600 Triarii.
b) 2 units each of 600 Principes, 1 or 2 armored or 1 armored & 1 protected, both Impact Foot & Sword+, & either Average or Superior, = 1,200 Principes.
c) 3 units each of 400 Hastati, protected with every now & then armored & Sword+ if a leder is present with a unit, with no leader then protected and Sword regular, Average but with a leader then Superior, Impact Foot, may also use 3 units, 2 with 360 troops & 1 with 480 troops, with the 480-man unit having better values & sometimes an attached leader. Could also use 4x 300-man units or 5x 240-man units, = 1,200 Hastati.
d) Velites/LF units can be 3x 400-man units, 4x 300-man units, or 5x 240-man units, = 1,200 Velites. From about 213BC, some people state 211BC, add to the Velites regular Swordsmen status. They could be rated usually as Average, with maybe 1 as Poor & 1 as Superior per legion. All would be unprotected with javelins. I have used 6x 200-man Velite units & that makes a whole bunch of LF in a consular size army - 24 LF units.
e) Equites,1 unit of 150 to 300-troops, usually 200 or 300, armored or protected, Average, Light Spear & Sword, = 150 to 300 Equites.
f) Light Horse, yes the Romans did ocassionally or rarely in fact, have their own LH, 100 to 300-troops per unit (total with Equites should not exceed 300 to 500-troops), Poor to Average, Light Spear & Javelin.

Excluding the LH that was rather rare, & using 300-Equites, the standard 2nd Punic War Roman legion has 300 Cavalry, 600 Triarii, 1,200 Principes, 1,200 hastati, & 1,200 LF/Velites. To enlarge the legion up to 5,000, 5,200 or even 6,000 simply add more Hastati, Principes, or Velites per unit & maybe a small LH unit.

If one wanted to, for smaller engagements anyway, the manipular system could be presented as it actually was, with 10x 120-troop Hastati & Principes maniples with their LF/Velites represented by 120-troop units, & 60-troop Triarii maniples although 5x 120-troop Triarii units may be better to use since then all close order HF units would have 120-troops each. Following the ratios of troop type to troop type as explained in FoG then LF/Velites would be in 40-man units if actaul 120-man maniples were used. That would be a lot of units in a legion,, maybe too many.

Hi, Cont'd.

2) Allied Ala, no standard size, cavalry of all types usually equalled 1.5x to 3x the number of Roman Equites in a legion, therfore there would usually be 450 to 900-Allied cavalry in an ala if there were 300 Equites in a legion. Many if not most Ala infantry seem to have fought in larger cohort sized units rather than the smaller Roman/Latin/Volsci/etc. maniples. Allied infantry always at least equalled the Roman infantry in numbers & usually exceeded it.
a) The Extraordinarii foot comprised ~20% of the Allied foot, & I use varying percentages to make the game playable yet retain some historical accuracy. They can be both protected & armored HF or MF, superior with sometimes a few elite, regular Sword or Sword+, Of. Spear, Light Spear, or Impact Foot. Both the HF and MF may have javelins as missile weapons if they also have light spears. HF units are 600-troops & MF units are 400-troops.
b) Extraordinarii Cavalry, both armored, protected, & LH, are mainly Average with only a few Superior rated units. They can all have javelins as missile weapons if desired, & a few LH can be protected rather than unprotected. All have Light Spear & Sword as their standard weapons. Cavlry units are 300 as are LH units, & LH may be protected. Smaller unit sizes may be used if necessary.
c) Regular Foot, both HF & MF, & either armored or protected, exhibit the same characteristics as Extrodinarii Foot except they are all Average unless a leader is part of the unit, then they are classifed as Superior and maybe Sword+ if applicable. While reading Livy etc., I discovered that the Marsi were considered the best of the Allied troops, so if any Marsi are included hen they are automatically graded as Superior. Of the 5 original majpr tribal groups of the Oscan Samnite League, only the western-northwestern most Pentri remained loyal to Rome, although as time went on towns & subtribes of the other major tribes switched their alliegance back to Rome from that of Hannibal.
d) Regular Cavalry, both armored & protected, exhibit the same characteristics as the Extrodinarii Cavalry except they are all Average unless a leader is part of the unit. Unit strength is 300 for Cavalry & 300 for LH, although smaller troop numbers can be occasionally used if necessary.
e) Light Foot, as the Roman Light Foot, Average or Poor, maybe 1 Superior per Ala, 300 strong units, sometimes 200 strong, with a few slinger units thrown in.

BTW, when designing units, don't give Impact Foot javelins because Impact Foot are already considered to have short range javleins or pilums & those missile weapons are included in the math for determinng the power of Impact Foot.

I don't make the Allied Hastati as Impact Foot since I feel it makes the Romans too powerful, so Allied hastatii are MF, usually protected with an occasional armored unit only if a leader is attached, & they are armed with Light Spear, Sword, & Javelin. Hastati units with leaders can also be rated Superior with Sword+ if so desired. The little & near silent sound of the javelins being thrown & hitting is too low though, & it would be nice if the sound level was increased since the slings & arrows are much louder. Plunk.

Roman leaders: 1 Army Commander in a Cavalry unit, 1 Legate assigned to the Triarii unit(s) per Roman Legion in the 2nd Punic War but none in the 1st Punic War - use a tribune to command the Triarii in the 1st PW, 1 Tribune for the Hastati, 1 Tribune for the Principes, & 1 Tribune for the legion(s) Cavalry unit(s). There were 6 Tribunes in each legion. It may be that a 7th Tribune was attached to the Consul or each legion, but that is specualtive methinks, but I am not sure ATM.

Allied leaders: 6 Roman Praefects (praefecti sociorum) available as leaders for each Ala, so, I give 1 each to a Hastati, Principes, & Triarii unit & also 1 or 2 Praefects to the Allied cavalry of both Alae. Allied Praefects - they usually commanded each allied cohort but were subordinate to the Roman praefects, so I usually don't use them except for maybe 1 with one of the Etraordinarii units. Some sources refer to only 3 Roman Praefects for each Allied Ala. The Roman Praefect commanding all the cavalry of one Ala was called the Praefect Equitum.

Carthaginians based on Hellenistic organization & national/tribal characterists up next ...

So far this organization & variables of it have worked well for both the Romans & Carthaginians. FoG recomends - & the math is probably based on this - that the MF & all Cavalry units be ~2/3 the size of a HF unit, & that LF (& maybe LH) units be 1/3 the size of a HF unit. Therfore, with Roman HF being 600 troops/unit, the MF hastati etc. are ~400/unit or between 360 & 480/unit. Velites can be 200, 300 or 400/unit depending on your preference as to just how many LF units you want running about your battlefield. I find that in larger battles & in rough terrain & woods the more LF units the merrier.

Carthaginian units use strengths of 256 to ~ 370 to 400/MF unit & ~ 512 to 1,024 troops/HF unit as was the norm in Hellenistic nations (ranks & files based on multiples of 8's & 16's), & it is very probable that Carthage had adapted this system in both the 1st & 2nd Punic wars. ~256/LF unit and LH unit. Cavalry units can have ~ 256 to ~ 320/unit. Making all the horse types ~300/unit works out well for both Carthaginians & Romans. Tribal units use 600 or 500 for HF, 400 for MF, 200 - 300 for LF, & 300 for all Horse units. Simple, realistic, & it works fine in the game.

Sometimes you may have oddball smaller units than the norm, & these I tend to usually make Average with little or no other increases in ratings, unless they are a Consular Guard or General's Guard, or Extraordinarii etc. type unit, then I give them Superior or rarely Elite, Sword +, etc. ratings. Some of these oddball sized units, say a Roman LH unit, may have only 100 troops & those I make as Poor, especially the rare Roman LH, to reflect the smaller size of the unit & also of course its lower quality. Some were lousy & some weren't.

Another small, but interesting Roman unit was the Celeres, or fast troops. Remember the Italian Celeres Division that fought in the USSR during WWII? It was named after these ancinet Roman Celeres. It seems the Celeres were more prevalent in times preceeding the 1st Punic War, but could have been used up until the end of the Republic by some Roman CinC's. The Celeres appear to have been volunteers & may have been Horse or Foot. They were elite. Perhaps in the Late Republic they had evolved into the units of Evocati(i) that were raised from veterans & usually provided a consular etc. guard.