The Legions: A collection of retards when they no longer have pila

[andrewt]

With thanks to Colovion for creating a nice topic title format.

This always happens with my legions. I put them on fire at will, stop near the enemy, unload all my pila, then charge. The stupid thing is that they don't seem to notice that they've run out of pila. The icon already changes to a sword icon indicating they don't have any pila anymore but they always pause, try to fire a pilum (and they have the firing missiles icon in their unit card), find out they no longer have any left, then charge. It always delays my charge because they go through the whole aiming animation before charging. It happens when I charge a legionaire with no more pila.

Ummmm, guys, you only have two pila. How hard is it to learn to count to two anyway.

[Colovion]

Yeah I've seen this happen before - I've mostly given up on Pila besides these instances:

1. Standing outside of the town square, firing at the stationary gaurds who will not move no matter how many porjectiles you send their way.

2. Standing outside of the town walls firing over at the gaurds running in circles back and forth letting your pila hit tham over and over. I once destroyed an entire Warband (120 Men) by doing this when my Hastati.

3. Attacking a defending enemy. They never move anyway so this is really the only semi-real life situation you can use it in.

[Morindin]

With a bit of micromanagement pilas are the difference between defeat and victory vs hoplites.

[Colovion]

I haven't fought Hoplites so I guess that's why that isn't in my list.

[Inuyasha12]

This hasn't happened to me, however sometimes when i've clicked on the fire at will button and i march my men up close to a enemy unit(defending) they just charge them instead of throwing their pulims.
:inquisitive:

[hoof]

So you put your soldiers on "fire at will", gave them no attack order, and expected them to automatically charge? I've never seen a non-impetuous unit charge an enemy w/o explicit orders (unless they're attacked first).

I had a problem for a while where I'd order the solders to charge a unit, but they'd stop, wait, throw, wait, then charge. Life got much better for me when I learned to use alt-click to order a charge vs a regular click. Then the Soldiers went straight in (same technique used to make archers attack in hand-to-hand combat). I ended up using the pila-then-charge approach only when attacking units that weren't headed my way.

[andrewt]

Nope. It happens when I order a legionaire who has run out of pila to charge. Instead of charging immediately, they try to fire off some pila, realize they have no more, then charge.

[hoof]

Ah, I see the issue. I don't recall having that issue during my Gaulish campaigns, but that could be because I got in the habit of alt-clicking to attack (they don't pause when you do that, even with pila).

[Spino]

Ariovistus over at twc made a very interesting post which reveals why pilum equipped troops pause in combat the way they do...


Before I start, just want to say I conducted a search of the forums and I found no thread on this what so ever - just people complaining about it. So I thought I'd share it with everyone incase nobody knew. Ever wonder why your Hastaii/Princes or your Legionnaries just stand there oblivious before you order them to charge? I figured out why. Before anyone jumps on me about how this is old news, or everyone should know this - I'm sure a lot don't - and there's no thread on it. It's because of their projectiles. After investigating the unit files, and editing the description files for the archers and javelins I figured out that the Pilum is infact their primary weapon. That's why they conduct their assault much like archers/vels/auxilia etc etc. Either you have them target a unit with pilums, they toss them; pause for a second or.. 5.. and then charge. Then, when you're engaging another unit without any pilum ammunition, they still pause a bit before the charge - this is because they're carrying over their "delay" stat before switching to their secondary weapon which is their gladius even though they don't have pilum ammo in the first place. Easy solution without editing the files - when you charge just do the secondary attack much like missile troops. Hit alt and then attack. If they're close enough they'll charge right away with only the slight of a second pause. If you want to be fancy, you can have them throw their pilums, then right after the last volley, alt and click to have the activate their secondary "mode" quicker. Hope this helps, as sometimes it can be very frustrating. Those seconds sometimes are invaluable ones. (Can we say multiplayer?)

Happy hunting - although I'm on the receiving end of those pilum/charge mechanics since I'm a barb by nature.

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/index.php?act=ST&f=42&t=9908&st=0#entry192065

I don't know how this affects the AI's ability to handle pilum equipped troops but it certainly deserves further investigation!

[TinCow]

I had this problem a couple times. It's easily fixed though. After you're done throwing, just take them all off fire at will.

[Kraxis]

Indeed Spino... However good that Alt-tactic is, it is not enough for MP is it now. And it shouldn't be required for SP'ers to pause to get their legionaries to work properly.

Add to patchlist.