Republican Roman performance?

[Empgamer]

Mainly asking as I am putting the finishing touches to a new order for figures. Mainly interested to hear from those who have used these in test games etc (esp any extensive use) and in particular whether they are performing well in 800 point games with the hastati/principe at close to the maxima (at the expense of optionals) or whether they have tended to be more effective with roman line trimmed to 75% (or whatever) of the max allowing more optional troops.

I' happy to buy and paint the full quota if there are likely to be times I may wish to use the legions at their full quota but would probably not want to waste the time and effort if 25% - 50% of them are going to spend most time in the box.

At the moment I'm inclining towards 16 - 24 bases of hastati/principe combined with the triarii/velites pro-rata.

[hammy]

You will be glad to know that the best troops in a republican Roman army are the legions. They are only OK against late medieval knights and not that hot against massed elephants and pikes can be a bit dicey but other than that they are tough hombres.

I believe that a late republican army placed 2nd in the Leeds test tournament and that had I think at least 24 bases of legionaries.

Early republican is not quite the same beast but you definitely need a decent core of legions.

[Empgamer]

Thanks. I'm planning on basing the army on AT LEAST 16 stands of hastati/principe. I will likely get enough in to run that up to 24 and possibly even 32. Not sure I can see myself needing 40 though. I'm hapy to have spares on a just in case basis but not if there is virtually NO prospect of them being used. That said, I suppose running it to 40 will give the option to participate in larger games. 32 seems a reasonable number though given that it fits in nicely with 4 legions (or more depending on the scale being used for a particular game/battle) at 2 Roman and 2 ally.

[hazelbark]

I think 40 is a LOT but very cool. I have found 16 too few in my test games with this list. I think 24 should be sufficient generally speaking. 32 is sweet.