Research: effects of shieldwall and schiltrom formations

[econ21]

At the request of Zarax, I am opening a thread to start some research about the shield wall and schiltrom formation, maybe with some comparison versus the finally fixed phalanx.

Zarax writes:


What we know is:

-Both formations gives a defence bonus against cav

-shield wall is vulnerable to flanking

-schiltrom is very vulnerable to missile fire

-units in schiltrom will always stay on their primary weapon

What needs more research on imho is:

-overall defence bonuses

-suspected extra schiltrom vulnerability versus inf

-possible shield wall bonus VS missile fire

-increased tendency to switch on secondary weapon when in shield wall

[The_Doctor]

Is there anyway I can help?

[econ21]

Is there anyway I can help?

Well, if you have the appetite, you could run a few custom battles seeing the effect of having a unit in and out of its formation, e.g. against AI archers etc.

I confess I have never done such experiments, although the explicit refusal of CA to provide the formulae and numerical information they provided with STW and MTW is making me contemplate doing so.

[Zarax]

Allow me to expand the topic a bit...
The data I gathered is derived from the experimentation I did in custom battles, often while porting RTW unitsto the BI environment.
My test unit was composed by a line of greek, hoplites modded to use shield wall instead of phalanx.
Usually I pitted the line against some heavy infantry using the moon river map to test the wall front bonuses.

First rule of thumb with shield wall: Make it thick.
The units in shield wall have a pretty good defence bonus, but everything relies on the fact the wall is not broken, so 4 units deep is a good measure imho.

Once some enemy units gets too close everyone will switch to the secondary weapon if available, depriving the whole unit of the anticav bonuses.

If the enemy gets inside or flank the wall you should consider putting as much support as possible to pull the gap or deactivate the wall formation as the soldiers cannot really fight inside the wall.

Paradoxically a rear charge is less impacting, as often the rear units will turn and form a defensive line, though the morale hits for being surrounded will make a rout very likely.

That's pretty much all I can say for shield wall.

Schiltrom on the other side disappointed me a bit.
While it's very effective against cavalry, it's almost a suicidal move if you face heavy infantry, as units will stick to their primary weapon, making them very vulnerable once a close melee starts.

Add this to the fact that unlike shied wall there is no group bonus, making schiltrom a very specialist formation imho, excellent for holding bridges or gates against cav or light inf but not much more.

On open field it might have an extra use though: senda lone unit near the enemy cav, schiltrom it and you have a pretty good decoy, capable of holding enough to allow flanking actions for the freed friendly units.

I haven't tested those formations against a phalanx yet, so I'm going to port some extra units and keep experimenting.

Last detail I noticed is that once you remove phalanx spears are held by a unit in different ways, usually towards the middle of the weapon instead of bracing one end of it.

[Zarax]

Did anyone had some time to verify the gathered data?

[Vincent Butler]

A note on the Schiltrom. It works very well in a town if you can position it where the enemy will be funneled between two of them, especially right behind a breach in a wall. Discovered initially as a desperation tactic during a horde attack, it seemed to do very well against a lot of different units. The spear wall behind gates of a stone wall is very effective against the hordes as well.