Loricati Scutari... how to use them?

G'day everyone! Your friendly resident Potato here today with a question that I have asked myself many times in my Carthaginian campaign.

How is one supposed to use these chaps effectively?

They have been designed as a low lethality, ap and reasonably armoured heavy sword infantry and taking these attributes into consideration I primarily use them as flankers and wall takers with a secondary use of them as line infantry if I need something heavier vs the Romans.

However I have found them to be underwhelming in all of these roles.

As flankers they are too frequently bogged down by their low lethality. I have often had two units of these guys sandwiching a unit of Ambakaro only to have both units get severely mauled and exhausted before the Ambakaro breaks. Heck. For slightly more upkeep I can hire a unit of elite african infantry or a unit of Dunaminaca that can do the job much more effectively.

In sieges they seem to be really hampered by their stamina. In a battle for Mastia against the Lusotani they were outfought by a unit of Ambushers on top of large stone walls. They are supposedly 'hardy' in terms of stamina but they seem to tire very quickly compared to the Ambushers who are 'very hardy' granted (The Loricati Scutari were exhausted while the Ambushers just got to the end of being winded and into tired territory). Neither side had a general and I attacked after one turn. Neither unit involved had any upgrades nor chevrons and each had approximately 10% losses before they engaged. The Loricati Scutari broke a few minutes later while the Ambushers had 88 men left. Heck, Scutari and Caetrati do better than them.

As line troops they consistently lose against Loricati Caetrati on flat ground. Hell, they will even lose against normal Caetrati.

Am I doing something wrong or are these guys just not so good?

The thing about the Lusotana army is that their stats do not conform with the cost effectiveness. For like in online battles then nobody plays as them, but people either pick Gauls or Carthage to be the 'Barbarian' army.

Carthage has a better unit roster than the Lusotana, for the Carthage receive all the good Lusotana units but none of their bad units. Like Iberian assault infantry is the upgraded version of the Loricati scutari and the Elite african infantry are the upgraded version of the Dunamica.

The Best Lusoatan units are propably:

Asturian axemen as the heaviest AP unit.

Dunamica/Scortamareva as the best line-holders.

Iberian scutari as the best flankers.

Lusotana light infantry should also be good for they have both AP attack and 6 javelins, so they can use their swords against heavy opponents (Rome, Greeks) and their javelins against the light opponents (like Gauls).

If you ask me then I think that the Averni and Carthage should rather be picked. Gauls can employ Rhaetix axemen whom are better than asturian axemen, Milnaht/Neitos whom are better than Illergetan soldiers, Alpine phalanx/Mori gaesum as a flankers. But alas, Iberian scutari are my favourite but belong to the wrong faction.

They have almost unbreakable morale. So definately Line infantry

They either cost nearly the same or even cheaper than their lighter version. Who I'm not certain they can even beat. Lusotana have a roster of great units who perform better than you expect. But these guys just stink. Regular scutari do the same job, but more, from a smaller MIC.

I use them for line infantry too... they are heavy infantry, i have my Ibiriai Milities to do the moving part (exept adjusting my main line)

The regionals from Iberia are good enough to take over the world!

Falcatae/kopides are strictly worse than axes/maces in EB. I would change all falcata/kopis lethality to 0.15 to balance it out.

They have tree bonuses and are imbalanced in trees enough.

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Falcatae/kopides are strictly worse than axes/maces in EB. I would change all falcata/kopis lethality to 0.15 to balance it out.

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Would you then still keep "ap" attribute? @gamegeek?

Would it be an idea then to increase the attack value of falcata armed infantry but leave the lethality and the armour piercing attribute as is? It seems strange if we take into account of the fact that a unit using a more cumbersome longsword like the Neitos possess a base attack value of 11 while the Loricati Scutari that use a much quicker and dextrous weapon only possess a base attack of 10.

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Originally Posted by gamegeek2

Falcatae/kopides are strictly worse than axes/maces in EB. I would change all falcata/kopis lethality to 0.15 to balance it out.

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One thought that occurred to me was if it could be viable to decrease the length of the pause between strikes of units armed with short blades to compensate for their lack of lethality and to reflect their quicker strikes... Or does the actual animation of the swing make this a moot point?

You can do that.

Attack delay values are 0 for most weapons - you'd have to change animations. fs_fast_swordsman would make their attacks faster, though.