Officers

[GodEmperorLeto]

Do the officers leading the units have any sort of morale effect on their units, and do they have higher stats (hp, etc?) than the rank-and-file grunts they command?

I was playing as the Romans and noticed how the Signifer and Centurion of this one unit were kicking some serious tail, but the Signifer of another unit was killed, and it made me wonder if that shook up the unit at all.

[BigTex]

They do have different stats. Even a different animation. As to what their stats are, no clue.

I know in the RTW book it mentioned something along the lines of losing them would have a morale impact.

[Ludens]

Nobody really knows for sure. There may be a morale effect, but I doubt it as you never see units that show an "afraid because of officer's death"-modifier. This would also lead to the strange situation that beat-up elite units, who usually have more officers, getting more morale penalties that low-grade skirmishers, who have none. Officers do seem very durable in combat (they never fall during the first charge), so they almost certainly have multiple hitpoints.

[QwertyMIDX]

They don't have EDU entries, and I've never seen stats for them anywhere else. They definatly have a leathality stat of 1 though, one of the reasons they kick so much butt in combat.

[GodEmperorLeto]

Well, that's interesting how nobody knows for certain. I guess the mystery of how exactly officers function is known only to a select few at Creative Assembly. But yeah, your observations to shed some light on it. I imagine losing the centurion/officer and signifer/standard-bearer would have a slight impact on morale (ex. "shaken" or "only a military genius could win this battle"), but not having the same impact as losing a general.

[MarcusAureliusAntoninus]

I had a triarii signifer fight a lone gaesatae guy (off to the side of the rest of the fight) and the naked idiot wouldn't die. They fought for about three minutes and the gaesatae fell down seven times before I had to go deal with some other part of the battle and stop watching. The signifer seemed to have the same lethality as the rest of the triarii.

[QwertyMIDX]

You can still have that happen with 1 leathality it's just less likely.

[Ludens]

You can still have that happen with 1 leathality it's just less likely.
I thought that 1 lethality meant that every succesful hit was a kill, and not a knock-down.

[QwertyMIDX]

It means that every successful hit is a kill, but you can get a knock-down without a successful hit, watch a vanilla battle.

[Ludens]

It means that every successful hit is a kill, but you can get a knock-down without a successful hit, watch a vanilla battle.
I am afraid I don't quite follow. If a knock-down can result from something else than a succesfull hit, how did you establish that officers have a lethalithy of 1? Also, if it's not from succesful hits, than what are those knock-downs produced by?