Slitherine

Thank you for all the feedback on my posts about a Principate Roman army with an Armenian Ally and a Late Republican army.

I have come to the conclusion the best combination is a Late Republican army with an Armenian Ally. I have posted the army list below my comments on it strengths and weakness. I would appreciate your feedback.


The advantage of this army is:

- it has an initiative 4, meaning it has a good chance of choosing the terrain it fights in;
- the combination of javelinmen and horse archers means has a good chance of disrupting pikes, making it much easier for the legionaries and Cataphacts to defeat them.
- When facing knights the horse archers can pin the knights and I have found the legions can match superior knights. The cavalry and cataphacts can deal with opposing foot or threaten the flanks of the knights, depending on the circumstances.
- Facing strong foot armies my legions pin the strongest enemy foot, while the cataphacts charge the weakness enemy foot or assist in destruction of the enemy horse.

The weakness:
- does not like rough and difficult terrain.
- have to be careful when using it against all horse archer army that cataphacts, cavalry and horse archers don't get detached from the legions and destroyed.

However, the initiative of 4 means I have a good chance of choosing terrain I fight in when facing these armies. With opposing armies that like rough terrain I would choose open terrain. For horse archer armies I would choose lots of rough terrain to limit their opportunity for movement.


Troops Type Armour Quality Training Shooting POA Impact POA Melee POA Special Number of bases
Commander in Chief IC - - - - - - CinC 1
Sub-general TC - - - - - - - 1
Ally general TC - - - - - - Ally general 1
Fortified Camp CAMP - - - - - - - 1
Legionaries HF Armoured Superior Drilled - Impact foot Skilled swordmen - 4
Legionaries HF Armoured Superior Drilled - Impact foot Skilled swordmen - 4
Legionaries HF Armoured Superior Drilled - Impact foot Skilled swordmen - 4
Legionaries HF Armoured Superior Drilled - Impact foot Skilled swordmen - 4
Javelinmen LF Unprotected Average Undrilled Javelins Light spear - - 8
Javelinmen LF Unprotected Average Undrilled Javelins Light spear - - 8
Heavy Cavalry Cv Armoured Superior Undrilled - Light spear Swordmen - 6
Light Cavalry LH Unprotected Average Drilled Javelins Light spear - - 6
Cataphacts Ct Heavily armoured Superior Undrilled - Lancers Swordmen - 6
Horse Archers LH Unprotected Average Undrilled Bow - - - 6
Horse Archers LH Unprotected Average Undrilled Bow - - - 6

Those are just 32cms of Legion frontage; for example my Dominate Roman army has 48 cms at the same quality. Also, BGs of 4 are VERY vulnerable. Sure, being Sup they only break when they lose 3 stands, but after the first loss there's that minus 1 on CTs.

Init 4 is a good thing, but if you face an army that likes the same terrain as you, he'll have a big advantage in troops.

I recommend you try this out on the table.

Interestingly I have just decided on late republican with armenian allies as well.

I would use more legionaries in 8 man units

Looking at it, I'm inclined to think too many allies and not enough Romans. The strength of the Late Republican Romans is the rock-hard legionaries, and you only have four small units of them.

I also wonder if that much LH, especially the Armenian ally, is worth it. My experience so far is that LH rewards a more patient wear people down kind of game. Not the ram home the legions game. I think you risk having one of two things happen:

- The LH (and possibly other mounted) go out ahead and get chewed up trying to fight enemy mounted (they have to be stronger somewhere) leaving your flanks weak or the legions pinned back while the enemy takes the initiative.
- Your whole line goes forward and the LH don't do much on the wings supporitng the general charge, more infantry, heavier cavalry, etc would be more valuable.

What if you took a couple of Elephants and some blocks of Medium infantry instead then bulked up the legion count (maybe making the 4s into 6s)?

I generally agree with Ethan, although I'm not sure the elephants are worth the trouble. Definitely make your units of legionaries at least 6 bases each.

Ironhand wrote:I generally agree with Ethan, although I'm not sure the elephants are worth the trouble. Definitely make your units of legionaries at least 6 bases each.

I am not sure either, but looking at the list it seems like the only way to get some non-legionary punch. I think in practice I would just take more legions and probably some more MF/LF.

Thank you for all the feedback. I understand the point about the 4 base battle groups of legionaries. However, battle groups of this size do have advantage of maneuverability. This useful if you break an opposing battle group and want to attack the neighbouring battlegroups flank. It is also useful if you get overlap.

To see the benefits of LH you have think out how they will work in combination with the other battle groups. The purpose of the LH in the army I have designed is to delay the enemy one flank, while the legionaries and Cataphacts win on the other. Or for the LH to disrupt knights before Cataphachs charge in. The cavalry attempting to hit the flanks of any knights.

I have used elephants and found that they can be easily shot up or outmaneuvered.

I agree about the elephants. Also, the fact that they are limited to BGs of 2 makes them very brittle. I see your points, but I think if you come up against any army with a lot of tough infantry, you're going to be in trouble.

I don't think you gain enough benefit for the IC for it to be worth it.
You only have 24 bases of LH/Cav so only get +3.
I am not convinced by velites as unprotected - either you want to fight with them, in which case protected generally gives you a PoA in melee which is more import than an impact PoA, or you don't in which case slingers cost the same but shoot twice as far - while javelin gets a PoA vs elephants if you are close enough to shoot they are close enough to have a chance of catching you if you evade.
I think the LH is more usefull in 4s - 6 will struggle to force enough cohesion tests, also 3x4 instead of 2x6 means you get an extra BG in your final clump.

Here in LH happy Toronto, we still think LH need to be in 6's because everyone has LH... it's just to easy to shoot up an average LH in 4's.

If I was in a club where most guys had 1-2 units of LH (tops) i might feel differently, but (looks around) everyone here seems to have at least 16 bases of LH... every game....

LOL. Play HYW English then. That should cure them of it.