What is your favorite unit?

[Kekvit Irae]

Spear Warband.
An army of 16 units of Spear Warbands can march on Rome long before the Greeks can churn out a single Spartan Hoplite.

[Titus Livius]

Cretan Archers, by far.

These guys are available in Asia Minor and parts of Greece, and have the longest range of any foot archers in the game, to my knowledge. They are worth their weight in gold, and when available I always buy them no matter how my coffers are doing. Get three or four units, and missile-centric factions such as the Ptolemiads will no longer bother you.

I sure do wish there was a way to retrain mercenaries, though.

[Viking]

My favorite unit depends on what faction I play; like berserkers, forester warbands, companions and so on.

I simply love artillery; especially onagers and their heavier version.

But my favorite unit is armoured elephants, man they crush everything!

[Dutch_guy]

I sure do wish there was a way to retrain mercenaries, though

well in a way it is possible - not retraining but close enough - you can of course merge 2 units.
Not as good as retraining but it does the job.

[The Stranger]

retraining mercenaries should never be an option. cuz they're hired. but hiring an amount of soldiers to refill the ranks should be one

[Count Belisarius]

When playing vanilla R:TW, I handicap myself by not using elephants anymore, unless I start with them as Carthage or I have that once-in-a-lifetime chance to hire Mercenary War Elephants. So other than that, I would have to say: Cataphracts.

There is something to be said for the regular Greek hoplite (powerful, cheap, and easy to retrain), but I have to go with an 'elite' unit when we're talking about favorites. The Armenian Cataphract Archer is better, of course, but I think they're downright unfair.

Cataphracts are on the expensive side and take 2 turns to train, but they are scary-effective. I have had them get chewed up by spiked chariots and of course I keep them away from elephants, but they are functionally invulnerable to arrow fire and come down on enemy infantry like an avalanche. Unless you're foolish enough to charge them head-on into a phalanx from the front, they're practically unstoppable. And they're only 140 denarii to maintain, which is a bargain!

[Count Belisarius]

retraining mercenaries should never be an option. cuz they're hired. but hiring an amount of soldiers to refill the ranks should be one

I respectfully disagree. What is the rationale for not retraining mercenaries? I mean, as long as your general and the mercenary unit in question are physically located in the correct zone of recruitment, what would be the real-world obstacle to having Agamemnon the Cretan Archer mercenary captain to send off to the home islands for a few of his cousins? Especially if there is another unit of the same type available for hire? I know that it's just the way the game is designed, but it doesn't make a whole lot of sense from a realistic standpoint.

[itsgottabeworthatry]

Cavalry: Companion, Cataphracts and Egyptian Chariots

Infantry: Armoured Hoplite, Phalanx Pikemen, Poeni Infantry, Legionary Cohort, Baestarne and British Swordsmen.

Artillery: Cretan Archers, Archers, Slingers, Pharao's Bowmen and Heavy Onagers.

[Brutus]

Legionary Cohorts. Nicely versatile and reliable. And for cavalry Mercenary Barbarian Cavalry. They are available almost everywhere in Western Europe and if you're not a Barbaric faction (preferably Romans) they really add to the realistic mercenary feel, as well as being actually pretty good. For archers virtually any armoured archer (Auxilia, Chosen) or Cretan unit will do. As long as I have lots of them.

[Aegisthis The Infantryman]

Cataphracts are excelent. They're good at charging in and are not only shock cavalry they also fight very well.

[Arrowhead]

Foresters.

[tibilicus]

Good old legions. Almost good for anything.

[Alien of Germania]

spearwarband no doubt.

[The Stranger]

Foresters.

we all know you like foresters, but we don't wanna know, so next time keep it for yourself

[tibilicus]

You two really should stop stabing each other. I dont know whats hapend in the past but what ever it is if your allways going to be at each other then just dont coment on one anothers coments. Im sorry some one had to say this. Now anyway back to the subject. spearwarbards one of my favourites too. Great starting infantry.

[Garvanko]

Urban Cohorts, Onagers, and any kind of hoplite really.

[Titus Livius]

You two really should stop stabing each other...

I think they should keep fighting. It's all fun and games until you hear that first bone break.

[Diadochoi]

Tanks, aka the armored elephants!

I love to storm cities with them, make them run through streets full of roman legionaries and watch the little men with no where to run, learn how to fly I've had a unit score hundreds of kills that way in one battle

I'm always tempted to do this, and I always lose all my elephants this way. The narrow spaces make them easy targets for missile weapons and dense ranks of spearmen, I guess. Regardless I don't recommend it.

[pezhetairoi]

Ah, yes, the humble Spear Warband. The best starter unit and possibly the best phalanx unit around, because they have 9 in melee, and they don't have a secondary sword weapon so they won't suddenly lose all their spears and go to melee mode like the Greeks once the first hastati gets through their guard, resulting in casualties. Spear warbands are very very nice. Though someone should reskin them so they get some shirts on. I always feel guilty making them stand in guard mode in square formation to await an enemy in a blizzard. I'm amazed they don't shiver.

[Marquis of Roland]

Armored Elephants.

Yes, using them is pretty much cheating all the way, but how many late nights playing RTW have you had and just want to wipe out a 20 unit army or assault a city but only have about 5-10 minutes to do it?

An exclusive armored elephant army (the first armored divisions?) is best used to wipe anything off the face of the planet, bar none. The impact when they hit the enemy army will probably send the first couple ranks airborne (I love it when I see hundreds of legionnaires trying to be like Mike). They rest they'll use to play football with till they're all dead. While all this is happening, you got two archers on top of each elephant shooting to death anyone in range. Not like they can fight back while being shot, since they're being stepped on by lots of extremely big feet.

Train these monsters in the right cities to start them off with 2 bronze chevron, gold sword and shield, wind them up and watch them go! So far, I've lost only 4-5 elephants max (in a city assault) playing on H/H.

I disagree with whoever said elephants aren't good in sieges. In my experience, no amount of spears/pikes or anything can stop these guys. They're also pretty much immune to arrows (flaming arrows are more effective but I have yet to see one of mine catch on fire). Sure, they might kill one or two of them (by luck) but if you keep your 400 or so elephants relatively close together, there is nothing, nothing that can touch them.

Best unit for fun and laughs, and saving you a long battle when its time to go to sleep. Oh yeah, they're good for building your general's stats too, since every battle you win will almost always be heroic, since you're almost always outnumbered fighting any large army. Make sure your guy doesn't get in the way and get trampled though (and at the same time getting your gen. involved, you don't want him to get "coward" trait)

[pezhetairoi]

...what happened to flaming arrows?

and who's Mike?

[Marquis of Roland]

AI will always select flaming arrows when shooting any elephants (and elephants for the AI are a high priority target: I've never seen them shoot at anything else whenever my elephants are in range, which you could then use your elephants to draw arrow fire away from your main army). If enough flaming arrows hit any particular elephant, they'll catch on fire and die. I don't think regular arrows are effective against elephants.

MIKE is Michael Jordan, he played basketball in America (I'm sorry I forgot I was addressing an international crowd for a moment). Michael Jordan was known for his ability to jump really high (among other things) and there was a shoe commercial I believe in the early 90's that had "Be Like Mike" as the slogan. By referring to Michael Jordan I'm saying the people the elephants send flying into the air can be comparable to Michael Jordan "flying" to the basketball hoop.

[pezhetairoi]

oooh now that pretty much puts things in perspective. It's impressive alright, except when you're on the receiving end (as I was.) I've never used elephants before, and I've only ever faced one unit, which gave a good accounting of itself at the expense of my troops, and then ran amok after losing only about 5. Hate them.

Spear Warbands are still the best.

[The Stranger]

I respectfully disagree. What is the rationale for not retraining mercenaries? I mean, as long as your general and the mercenary unit in question are physically located in the correct zone of recruitment, what would be the real-world obstacle to having Agamemnon the Cretan Archer mercenary captain to send off to the home islands for a few of his cousins? Especially if there is another unit of the same type available for hire? I know that it's just the way the game is designed, but it doesn't make a whole lot of sense from a realistic standpoint.

ok, but then atleast the stats of the units should go down atleast with famous units. (i'm not talking about chevrons) cuz sarmatians were famed for heavy cav, romans/greeks weren't so when you put romans in a sarmatian merc cavalry unit he probably wouldn't be so good.

also when the greeks hired mercs, they probably didn't filled those ranks with their own soldiers but in fact did go get new ones, just as the romans did with all kinds of mercs, i name a few. numidian allies, sarmatian knights, germanic cavalry

[The Stranger]

I think they should keep fighting. It's all fun and games until you hear that first bone break.

and here you're wrong my friend, were both from titanium

[Count Belisarius]

ok, but then atleast the stats of the units should go down atleast with famous units. (i'm not talking about chevrons) cuz sarmatians were famed for heavy cav, romans/greeks weren't so when you put romans in a sarmatian merc cavalry unit he probably wouldn't be so good.

also when the greeks hired mercs, they probably didn't filled those ranks with their own soldiers but in fact did go get new ones, just as the romans did with all kinds of mercs, i name a few. numidian allies, sarmatian knights, germanic cavalry

I agree with you. Ideally, if you were able to retrain mercenaries, their stats should be diluted the same way as if you'd filled out the ranks from another unit of the same type. And you would have to take the merc unit back to a region where the same types of mercs are available: no retraining Sarmatians in Britain for example.

On a related subject, I think that it's a little crazy how a half-strength experienced non-merc unit can be retrained to full strength without losing any of its experience. The old Shoggy unit retraining system made for a much more interesting choice: an experienced few vs. a green unit at full strength.

[Siris]

This topic has brought me out of hiding! Well I've been here reading, but not replying.

Also got my new PC, and it runs RTW on maximum settings no lag, wOOt, only a battle of 26,000 troops lagged it a tad, so I'm set!!!! Sorry, just so excited, got it three days ago, & am enjoying RTW, its like a whole new game compared to my old PC.

Anyways, this is what I had to come & reply about:

SPARTANS!

Why my favorite unit? Well if you remember me, you'll know why lol!

[The_678]

Way to go Siris congrats on your new computer. I plan on buying a new computer after the summerand can't wait to play on huge max settings. And you can't deny the Spartans are the bes infantry unit in the game.

[steve]

i like swordsmen

[pezhetairoi]

nownow, no large font sizes here... the last guy who did 'Foresters!' in big black lettering got told off...