Using Heavy Chariots/Scythed

Well, i've been reading in the guide forum that not too many ppl find Heavy chariots/Scythed very usefull. As i've been playing a pontus camp for a while and thus had a chance to try out scythed chariots, i thought it would be a good idea to give some info on their use.

This is in normal battle mode, so if you play hard or v.hard results will differ, but i think normal is more honest as no units get bonusses or penalties.

Also i don't pretend to be an expert of any kind, thus if you find this post to be of no use to you, don't reply and just let it slip down the 1st page, it'll go away in a couple of days.

Ok, what i find heavy chariots to be good at, are battles vs cav. They are the best cav killers imho, tho camels are also very good at it, but they usually rout horses, thus not inflicting too many casualties + the routed unit will get it's morale back soon and you have to fight it again.

Anyway, i tried some 1 vs 1 battles with pontic scythed chariots (with +1 attack, as they get it from the blacksmith anyway) and they won against desert egyptian cav, legionary cav cataphracts (and some others). Against praetorian, they lost but with marginal difference, and the preat's were destroyed as well, so they would have made to significant impact to the rest of the battle.

I understand 1 vs 1 isn't the most precise test you can do for determing a units' use, but it's certainly one of them when you want to dictate what to throw it against. Vs infantry, they disrupt the formation, so an inf unit fo your own following can make much more dmg.

I tried pontic heav cav and kataphracts replacing the scythed in the same battles and the results were bad losses in most of the cases.

Furthermore, you get scythed early on in the game and they need a blacksmith which is a usefull building for all your troops (you'll built it anyway) and the +1 attack from that apllies to your scythed. Btw, i tried Brittish Heavy Chartiots vs Praetorians and the Brits dominated them!

As in a real battle (not 1 vs 1) , what i do is receive the charge of the enemy with an inf unit (crappy EI is ok, they are spearmen as well) and then charge the cav with scythed and they 're dead. Moreover i tend to get quite a lot of them healed if something goes wrong and some die during battle. I've also read at some post, that when you retrain them, they don't loose exp, even if 1 chariot survived. Important is not to let them tire too much, as i've found that this also and not only casualties causes them to go amok (not all char's do, but scythed can unfortunately). Heavy/Scythed chariots are slow compared to cav, thus you should be carefull and get your timing right or else the cav may escape. Also if you start a battle with a depleted scythed unit (6 when starting is 18) you'll find they tend to go amok after a while no matter what, so position them away from your army and at the edge of the screen and tell them to withdraw after the battle starts.

That's my 2 cents on the matter, if more ppl want to make more tests and give the results according to difficulty they are wellcomed of course, as is any feedback on how to use heavy/scythed more effectively.

Nice post you've obviously done your research.

And yes Chariots are the best against light cav. and are good to disrupt formations and are also not bad versus elephants.
Never really bothered to use them though, although I have never played as Pontus ~:)
Always found that ( especially the general unit ) die to fast and often run amok when they get casualties , and I don't want them to disrupt My formations ~:handball:

But if I use them ( which I rarely do ) I tend to target the generals cav. or attack from behind into an engaged enemy unit.

:balloon2:

They're very expensive auxillary units, though most people want to use them as primary attacking units. They're good at protecting the flanks since the scythes destroy cav trying to attack. Even if they lose, they will have left the cav weakened for another unit to destoy. A great setup would be chariots with spears protecting their rear. If the chariot decides to attack a unit ahead of it and feints, the attacker will be met with the spears and then hit from behind by the chariot.

Chariots would be best at the beginning to weaken the morale and disorder the ranks and delay the enemy until the army is in position. Use them in comination with missle cavalry/skirmishers &melee cavalry watching over all of them.

On the offensive, I would hold off on them until the enemy is sufficiently broken and exhausted and then use them to create a mass rout.

They're pretty effective but they can cause as much trouble as benefit if they rout into your lines. Therefore, as with elephants, I never used them as shock troops. Instead, I kept them on the far flanks to counter enemy cav and to pincer into the second rank missile units.

Sorry to post in my own thread (upping).

Yes, they need micromanagement, but i think not too much. Also they are expensive (mostly it's their support cost), yet i find them better than cataphracts, which come much later in the game anyway. Most annoying thing is the 2-turn build time but cat's have the same as well. I use them against certain cav heavy factions. That way i don't need too many of them, 2 units are ok +1 spare to fill losses, as they go amok when they start with too few men. Good thing is you can retrain them in almost any town as they only need a blacksmith, quite low tech. Cat's on the other hand are much much higher, tech-wise.

If anyone is interested on results of 1 vs 1's in different difficulty lvl's drop a line telling me vs what unit and i'll run the test some times publishing results, tho you can do on your own anyway.