Scary units, how do they work?

Hi,

I've been playing EB for a bit, and all I know about scary units is that they reduce the morale of the nearby enemy units. However, I'd be really interested to know how much do they drop the enemy's morale and how exactly does the routing mechanic work.

I'm asking this because I've just have witnessed a pretty weird event in combat. The greeks are besieging one of my cities(I'm playing Epeiros). It's them with a FM, one unit of Mercenary Classical Hoplites and one unit of Galatian Wild Men vs. me with a FM, one unit of Classical Hoplites, one unit of Akontistai and one unit of Hoplitai Haploi.

I decide to draw the Wild Men away with my skirmishers while the rest of my army focuses on the FM and then the Hoplites. It works, the Galatians are pursuing my skirmishers (but they are still close; not sure if close enough for the other units to be affected by their fear effect though) while my 2 units of hoplites are charging the greek FM. And then the WTF moment happens: the Classical Hoplites engage, lose one man and rout(the levy hoplites are just fine, they didn't rout for the entire battle, even when reduced to 15/160 men).

Levy hoplites never rout unless charged by 3 heavy cavallery units :book:
No just kidding, but most time they dont rout.
For the scary thing.
I dont know how much the morale drops (I doubt anybody does), but there mere presence is enough to let units rout. So maybe the wild men were closer to the back of the hoplites, which made them run.:juggle2:

A quick question, how many chevrons that the Hoplitai, and Hoplitai Haploi did? It wasn't surprising if silver chevroned haploi stand better than unchevroned Hoplitai

I do not know either, and am curious about the answer so I can use them in the optimal tactic myself. All I know is

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Scary units, how do they work?

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Well!!!

Ambushes as Sweboz and Getai with scary units and an archer with flaming arrows work frighteningly well. Surprise + scaryness + panicked by fire attack = "Aaaaa Run away! Run away!! it is almost as good at bombardment with livestock

On a related note I would be interested in a list of what units are actually scary.

Online I use the local outnumber bonus, flank bonus, fire bonus, scary infantry bonus, scary chariot bonus, and maybe a charge from behind bonus to pretty much win games in 2 minutes. You basically make a short thick line, hit on the enemy flank using a mass run behind(it causes your units to engage rather than stop short), push some spearmen behind the enemy to defend against cavalry as well as reinforcements and start hitting the corner with cavalry charges and fire.

That or you can sit them behind your battle line inf you're a sedentary faction.

Usually to combat this you need a massive chevroned up army of 'excellent morale' troops in a very tight and deep formation since that gives bonuses and helps reduce the outnumber bonus. But that's MP. You probably just need to keep your units close to each other to not get that insta-rout effect.

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Originally Posted by Cute Wolf

A quick question, how many chevrons that the Hoplitai, and Hoplitai Haploi did? It wasn't surprising if silver chevroned haploi stand better than unchevroned Hoplitai

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Haploi had one bronze chevron while the Hoplitai had none.

That's 11 Morale (Haploi) vs 12 Morale (Mercs) though mercs I think I have slightly lower HP.

:inquisitive: HP...?

If I remember right, morale bonus on chevrons works as sliding scale, first get +3 morale, second get total +5, third get total +6 and fourth get total +7, the fifth and sixth didn't get any more than prev +7, and the seventh give total +8.

That means the haploi had more morale

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Originally Posted by Watchman

:inquisitive: HP...?

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Was playing Torchlight at the time. I could use so extra HP...

And no, Haploi morale is 9, I thought the increase was 2 instead of 3. So since 9+3 = 12, the morales are equal.

I believe the only units that are affected by the scary traits of enemy units are the ones that have 'freightened by nearby enemy/elephants/chariots' in their description (when you hoover with your mouse over them). If you encounter these units in battle (or if you deploy them yourself), just check how far their range goes. In huge battles, I prefer to keep Galatian wildmen (or other infantry of that kind) behind the center of my falanxes to maximize the amount of terror they spread. If you have an abundance of scary units, their deployment matters less, as most enemy units will probably be affected anyways.

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Originally Posted by Cute Wolf

If I remember right, morale bonus on chevrons works as sliding scale, first get +3 morale, second get total +5, third get total +6 and fourth get total +7, the fifth and sixth didn't get any more than prev +7, and the seventh give total +8.

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Where did you find this? I thought it was similar to previous total war games with +2 for every chevron.

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Originally Posted by Ludens

Where did you find this? I thought it was similar to previous total war games with +2 for every chevron.

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Sliding scale morale on either Scriptorium here, or TWC, it was a long old thread..

Really don't know what happened there. Never had an unit rout so fast, not even vs. Carthaginian elephants. Thanks for your answers though.

If you play enough, you see this every so often. Its rather frustrating sometimes.

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Originally Posted by Drag0nUL

Really don't know what happened there. Never had an unit rout so fast, not even vs. Carthaginian elephants. Thanks for your answers though.

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I repeat, its when units have scary enemies behind them.
Sometimes you cant charge the back of the enemy line because your cav rather flees.

You sometimes need to be very careful using scary units.

I've got two units of Worgozes in one of my Roman stacks and found that the river crossing battles where I hoped to slaughter huge numbers of the German army (how did such a £poor faction get 15+ full stacks...).

I thought I'd be cunning and place them in a line behind the main point of contact at the crossing to break the charging Germans morale and cause a faster rout...but the combination of dozens of javelins, slingers and Worgozez meant that the Germans broke on contact (when normally they'll all pile over the river in the packed melee) and as fresh Germans were coming across still I couldn't pursue and so rather than 3k+ enemy causalties and utterly wiping out the stack I only killed about half...

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Originally Posted by Scutarii

how did such a £poor faction get 15+ full stacks...

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Scripted money bonus for the AI.

Does anyone know whether scary units stack?

For example, if you have three Wild Men units near an enemy unit does the enemy unit suffer three times the morale loss it would if there was only one Wild Men unit near it.

A related question is whether the morale loss stacks for different scary units even if it doesn't stack where you have many of the same scary unit. For example, if you move a scythed chariot, a Wild Men unit, and a Worgoez (sp?) near an enemy unit, would that enemy unit suffer a morale loss for each type of scary unit near it? Or does it just suffer a morale loss equal to the effect of the scariest of the three scary units?

I assume this would be fairly easy to test in a custom battle but I don't know how.

Thanks,

woirble

I don't think they stack. Imagine a Gaesatae-Fullstack. You would not even come close enough to kill one enemy, they'd rout earlier.


In a Bridge-Battle archers are very effective. Station them a bit away from the brigde, at the river-shore, and let them shoot fire-arrows in the enemy's flanks. Once the first enemy-units begin to rout soon the whole army will run.

As for the scary units like elephants: They are best used as flankers. Let the enemy engange your infantry-battleline and after a short time let your cav. together with some elephant units engange their flank or rear. The whole army will break

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Originally Posted by SwissBarbar

I don't think they stack. Imagine a Gaesatae-Fullstack. You would not even come close enough to kill one enemy, they'd rout earlier.


In a Bridge-Battle archers are very effective. Station them a bit away from the brigde, at the river-shore, and let them shoot fire-arrows in the enemy's flanks. Once the first enemy-units begin to rout soon the whole army will run.

As for the scary units like elephants: They are best used as flankers. Let the enemy engange your infantry-battleline and after a short time let your cav. together with some elephant units engange their flank or rear. The whole army will break

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Actually, they DID stack... my late game campaign when I play Aedui prove otherwise, as I really have one Battle line exclusively made by 12 unit of Gaesatae, only some certain elite enemies can (barely) touch the center of my line, they can, however, flinging their pilum and try to charge, only to become routing afterwards. (the other are 1 Brihentin BG, 2 leuce epos, 3 sotaroas, and 2 Massaliotai Hoplitai as backup)

Well that's interesting. I'm playing as Pontos and have basically been playing as if I were a successor faction with phalanxes. I haven't tried to load up a stack with scary units like Tinandotae (Wild Men) and scythed chariots. Sounds like it could be an exploit if overdone. Especially since both the Wild Men and the chariots are good at running down routers.

Thanks,


woirble

am sure the bonuses stack .. and it can be quite an exploit at times.

Don't they stack due to there being more of them?

Anyway, one unit of Gaesatae almost routed my three units of Hastati sent into Bononia to take the town - Scare factor + High morale = Kickass

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Originally Posted by mountaingoat

am sure the bonuses stack .. and it can be quite an exploit at times.

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Same units don't stack, different types of scary stack.

Categories are:
Nakeds
Chariots
Elephants
Fire

Casse for example rock on the morale causing troops both positive for their own and negative for the foe.

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Originally Posted by antisocialmunky

Same units don't stack, different types of scary stack.

Categories are:
Nakeds
Chariots
Elephants
Fire

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Then explain why pantodapoi will be instant rout, even before touching the center of the line full of 10 uirodusios?

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Originally Posted by Cute Wolf

Then explain why pantodapoi will be instant rout, even before touching the center of the line full of 10 uirodusios?

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Because they are numerical inferior to a scary unit and have them also on the flank. (A long line has the effect of flanking the unit in the middle, if it has no friendly troops there):book: