Sweboz (Germans) slightly underpowered

It seems to me that the Sweboz units in general are a bit underpowered. Im only comparing the Sweboz units to the Roman units as I feel the Celtic units are way overpowered. I think that the Swaiut(tribal) units in general are well done with the exception of maybe a bump in morale. I also think that the Merjoz (elite axe) should have an increased attack value. I would like to see a few more elite units though none should surpass the stats of the hundaskapiz or the Gastiz. I think these are well done and should be the best Sweboz infantry units.

I stated in https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=83475 that I thought the Celt cavalry was weaker than it should be. I didnt see the Remi Mairepos (Belgae heavy cavalry) or the Brihentin (Gallic noble cavalry), therefore I stand corrected that they do have appropriate cavalry. The Sweboz on the other hand do not have adequate cavalry. The Sweboz are missing both heavy and noble cavalry. Ariovistus was mounted and had cavalry with him in his meeting with Caesar. While the Celt cavalry mostly defeated the Roman cavalry up till the Romans started using Celt cavalry, the German cavalry consistently defeated the Celt cavalry. The Sweboz heavy and noble cavalry should be better then the Celt cavalry. I understand that the Germans historically were mostly infantry, but they did have outstanding cavalry and was hoping that they will be added.

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Originally Posted by Frostwulf

It seems to me that the Sweboz units in general are a bit underpowered.

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Keep in mind that the Sweboz have access to a line of religious buildings that can give their units a +2 experience boost (in addition to the +1 boost from the game fields). Of course, if the romans have access to a similar boost, that can be ignored when comparing the two (I haven't played as Rome yet in EB). Though I do think the basic clubmen are overpriced (or should have their stats upgraded to be closer to the spearmen).

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The Sweboz on the other hand do not have adequate cavalry. The Sweboz are missing both heavy and noble cavalry.

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From what little I know of the subject, I must agree. There was a little discussion of this in this thread.

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Originally Posted by Orb

I think a new German cavalry unit is being added, but that's a 'wait-and-see' issue ;)
The ridoharjoz aren't actually bad, they're just lighter than the hippophiles among us would like.

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Originally Posted by Watchman, on the Ridoharjoz

...they should do well enough on flank and rear charges and as router-chasers, and ought to be able to cream the Celtic Leuce Epos types in a straight fight due to their higher base combat skills (the latter are of the underhand cav spear type with very low base attack, high delay, high charge and AP - not a very good combination against high-skill low-armour enemies like the Sweboz obviously).

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...they should do well enough on flank and rear charges and as router-chasers, and ought to be able to cream the Celtic Leuce Epos types in a straight fight due to their higher base combat skills (the latter are of the underhand cav spear type with very low base attack, high delay, high charge and AP - not a very good combination against high-skill low-armour enemies like the Sweboz obviously).

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Hmm, I always figured the Leuce Epos would win because the lethality of overhand spear attacks like that of the Ridoharjoz have a low lethality, wich makes the base attack value deceptive. The only way to be sure is to fire up a custom battle, though.

Leuce Epos are still much better at skirmishing though IMO, the Ridoharjoz
have a higher missile value, but their range is considerably shorter and they carry only 2 javelins versus 5 for the Leuce Epos.

Based on my experience as Aedui: the Leuce Epos are just as advertised, a somewhat undervalued light cavalry force which can go toe to toe with most medium and light cavalry and even beat them.

Ridoharjoz aren't that good. Not at all: they appear to break much faster. However their wedge formation should make up for this in the dense forests: it already is considerably difficult to maintain your battle lines with units that can do the shieldwall formation - so any good charge, even from the lightest of cavalry in the rear is just enough to split your lines apart.

Everyone always knocks the Ridharjoz and Clubmen; I dunno why. I'm not a historical expert, but I can't recall any tales of the Fearsome Germanic Heavy Cavalry Charges, its more the Fearsome Whacked-Out-Berserk Infantry Charge. Ergo, at BEST, they should only get a "medium cavalry" that would be roughly on par with, say, Hippeis, since Hippeis perform well enough, but definitely not anything like Successor cavalry. Also, my in-game experience with Ridharjoz and Clubmen is nothing but positive. Even without a charge bonus at all (my only complaint, since even sword cav get a charge bonus of some type) Ridharjoz eat Leuce Epos alive and spit the remains back out. And I like Leuce Epos, too, but Ridharjoz are much better at dealing with the enemies for which they are surrounded by. The clubmen, too, are pretty darn awesome. That AP places a hurting on folks like the Romans, and they are FAST. In fact, most of the German army is FAST. Which is awesome in so many ways.

I know enough about Caesar's Gallic campaigns to know he tended to rely pretty heavily on Germanic mercs and allies for his cavalry arm - and those were apparently usually more than able to whip markedly superior numbers of their Gallic peers. Not that he didn't employ a lot of Gauls for the same purpose too, but the Germans were apparently of markedly higher calibre all other things being equal.
:thinking:
Wonder if you could scratch-build a decent heavy-cavalry placeholder from the Gastiz model and pulling them stats out of Tha Sombrero...? :sombrero:

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Originally Posted by ElectricEel

Keep in mind that the Sweboz have access to a line of religious buildings that can give their units a +2 experience boost (in addition to the +1 boost from the game fields). Of course, if the romans have access to a similar boost, that can be ignored when comparing the two (I haven't played as Rome yet in EB). Though I do think the basic clubmen are overpriced (or should have their stats upgraded to be closer to the spearmen)

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I was going by the base morale, as Im sure most factions have some sort of morale boosters such as buildings etc. etc. As far as the pricing of units, some do seem more expensive then should be but Im not familiar enough with the issues that go into it to make much of a statement.
Also thanks for the info on the other thread :yes:

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Originally Posted by LordCurlyton

I'm not a historical expert, but I can't recall any tales of the Fearsome Germanic Heavy Cavalry Charges, its more the Fearsome Whacked-Out-Berserk Infantry Charge. Ergo, at BEST, they should only get a "medium cavalry" that would be roughly on par with, say, Hippeis, since Hippeis perform well enough, but definitely not anything like Successor cavalry.

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I agree with Mightypeon when he says:

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Originally Posted by Mightypeon

What I think is historically incorrect is the pathethic german Cavalry.
Historically, Caesar made great use of German mercenary Cavalry units in his Gaullish wars, where they proved to be significantly better than their Gaullish equivalents.

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Caesars cavalry while in Gaul were attacked by 800 German cavalry. The 800 Germans charged the 2000-3500 Roman cavalry, routed them and chased them all the way back to Caesars base camp 2 miles away. Caesar used the Germans in their own fighting style (as did other Roman commanders in later dates) to great effect as shock troops. The German cavalry was better then the Gallic cavalry which in turn were generally better then their Roman counter parts.

Surely the Germanics never fielded anything even closley on a par with the Brehihntin and the Belgae heavies (can't remeber the name) though?

Why not ? They had both a well-equipped if small warrior aristocracy, a decent equestrian warfare tradition (and regarded saddles as being crutches for weenies who couldn't ride properly...), and bad attitude a-plenty which is quite important particularly in cavalry warfare. Fewer than their Gallic peers perhaps, but I don't really see any reason why they would've been any worse.

I don't realy know why not, all I know is that I've never heard of germanic heavy cavalry.

Anyway, I'm sure I saw somethoing somewhere about the Seboz getting a few more cavalry units, prehaps even some heavies, and maybe even in the next release, but I can't rememember where, or even if, to be honest...

Unfortunately, it's not possible to make the famous Double-Riders, but surely the Germans deserve a better cavalry. From what I recall, Ariovist's cavalry has beaten the hell of a twice as strong celtic cavalry unit during Caesar's campaign in Gaul.

One of the major advantages of the Germanic cavalry was just that, the double riders. 50 Horses meant 100 men, which is a hell of thing. We actually tried to implement them in game with a light, super fast infantry unit, but had no luck. Who knows, maybe we'll try again. Also, the Ridoharjoz have a charge bonus, it's in the mid 20s iirc. In the unit card you see the charge for the primary weapon (jav) not for the secondary (spear).

"We actually tried to implement them in game with a light, super fast infantry unit, but had no luck".

I think I recall the unit in question (assuming it was included in an official release)...bare chested with light blue trousers aremd with a short sword, or possibly a seax-type long knife?

At either rate I was somewhat dissapointed to find their absence in the latest build. I found them to be quite useful in their intended role, as well as for flanking and routing pinned enemy light and medium infantry. If I remember correctly these units were listed as the Hundaskapiz no?

Returning to the subject of the Ridoharjoz, I find them to be a superior cavalry and make very ample use of them in my german campaigns. They are superbly quick footed, and when combined with their great stamina are often able to exhaust even superiorly armored medium and heavy cavalry. Once exhausted of course it's a simply matter to turn and attack with the enemy routing quite quickly.

Being able to drive or divert enemy cavalry away from the infantry lines usually leaves the enemy dangerously vulnerable to the superior speed and/or stamina of german infantry (at least in the case of the romans). The celts, once enticed to charge without cavalry support, usually succumb to the barrage of frame or the returning german cavalry.

The Ridoharjoz might do well to be supplemented by a suitable medium infantry with an increased staying power during melee to approximate the two-riders tactics the germans used...but I don't think of it as required in order to balance the german faction. If I may offer a tip to other players...learn to fight effectively in the forests, allow heavier cavalry to engage while keeping the Ridoharjoz hidden. Once the enemy cavalry is pinned and tired hit them...well the rest is obvious.

p.s.

Hopefuly without sidetracking the topic too far i'd like to air the very few of my complaints thus far with the german faction. First would be the depiction of certain units, for example the current Hundaskapiz and Gastiz. They seem very migration period to me. This is based purely on a gut feeling more than any sort of evidence. With what evidence or inspiration is this sort of heavy chain wearing infantry unit borne out, or is that even chainmail?

Also the Gaizaharjoz just seem...off. Would red have been such a commonly available color for them by means of Madder or Red Alder? What was the inspiration for the depiction of vivid green on the shields? I am unfortunatly ignorant of the plant or mineral from which vivid greens can be extracted although i suspect it's mineral based.

The only cited work I see in the biblio is Mr. Schutz's "The Prehistory of Germanic Europe" but I'm sure there must also have been marvelous turns of phrase from contemporaneous sources that inspired the look of the above mentioned units.

Also, perhaps a proper elite infantry type would be helpful in balancing the faction with late period romans and other mediteraneans. Whether that be the Merjoz, Sahsnotoz, or the Wodanawolfoz (a reskin of which might also be nice as they seem rather less than intimidating at present) while retaining the herthoz and gastiz as heavy line infantry.

The current candidates for an elite infantry group suffer when engaged with even rank and file enemy infantry for any amount of time and, in my experience, lack a certain punch.

If the lack of any germanic heavy hitters is intentional (and I can certainly win campaigns without one) then perhaps a readjustment of unit price and/or unit numbers would be helpful?

...Oh, and i'm greatly looking forward to the german ethnic traits and unit readjustments already hinted at. Great job guys, you are my daily history lesson!

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Originally Posted by Lowenklee

Hopefuly without sidetracking the topic too far i'd like to air the very few of my complaints thus far with the german faction. First would be the depiction of certain units, for example the current Hundaskapiz and Gastiz. They seem very migration period to me. This is based purely on a gut feeling more than any sort of evidence. With what evidence or inspiration is this sort of heavy chain wearing infantry unit borne out, or is that even chainmail?

Also the Gaizaharjoz just seem...off. Would red have been such a commonly available color for them by means of Madder or Red Alder? What was the inspiration for the depiction of vivid green on the shields? I am unfortunatly ignorant of the plant or mineral from which vivid greens can be extracted although i suspect it's mineral based.

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I can't find the topic right now, but Safe once stated that both Hundaskapiz and Gastiz are overarmoured for the early period. He mentioned that the team discussed an Iron age reform for the Germans that would enable the current armoured Gastiz. The Gaizaharjoz skin is IIRC being redone.

Thanks for the reply Ludens. I'll dig around for the mentioned thread once I have a free moment. Hopefully these changes will make it in for the next release...although I am somewhat confused about the iron age reform concept for the german faction.

Certainly protogermans had achieved iron age technology centuries before the beginning of the EB timeframe as it was my understanding that limited scale production of poor quality ironware began relatively early in protogermanic scandinavian cultures.

The only germanic iron-age reform I can think of would relate to the increase in ironware production following technical know-how introduced by contact with gallic peoples, but I think that was centuries before the EB timeline as well?

I guess I should start digging for that particular thread from Safe for answers :book:

good points, guys.

thank you for taking the time to write out some constructive criticism!

I noticed the comment "lack of heavy hitters" but this follows the idea that the Germanic nobility is anachronistically overarmored- it seems to me that these ideas are contradictory. Either they are all similarly basic and bare, or the elite units have armor which is questionable. Mail is relatively easy to make and not so unique and hard to replicate a smithing process like pattern-welding, the Germanics happened to live in areas of Europe with less resources than their Celtic neighbors but that does not mean they were more primitive in intellect or less developed culturally. La Tene-Carpathian cultural interaction and influence would have been relatively common, so I do not see any reason why elite Europeans of warrior aristocracy of any ethnicity would not have mail, which would have been acquired from warfare and trade. I would completely agree that the units are too Migration Age if these were not elite units.

I completely agree on the Gaizaharjoz color- it has been brought up before, hopefully changed for the next build.

Keep up the comments!

Thanks for the informative post Blitzkrieg,

However I never intentionally characterized the early germans as "primitive in intellect or less developed culturally". The stone age and bronze age scandinavian-baltic history and it's evolution into the early germanic people is a favorite historical topic of mine. I am quite aware of the wealth of culture associated with this period and place. However this does not translate into material wealth for this cultural group during the EB timeframe.

This would have it's effects on the scale of production for certain iron works such as iron armor wouldn't it? Specifically with regard to chainmail and it's place in early germanic culture, I just wouldn't care to characterize chainmail as commonplace enough even among the aristocracy to warrant being able to field numerous premigration era units of chainmail wearing infantry.

I can imagine aquiring mail from beaten enemies would have viable but not large scale, afterall swords alone were uncommon amoung the early germans. I can also imagine that, much as it is in the present day, one is not likely to trade high quality armor to a potentially dangerous neighbor one may soon end up fighting. To regularly be able to equip aristocrats in mail the early germans would have needed a mean to domestically produce it.

There must certainly have been a high cost associated with the import of large amounts of the required higher grade iron ore than the domestically available bog iron and the time/labour required for it's manufacture (which would not have been something within the means of just any iron smith) which might have made mail prohibitivly expensive for even many of the germanic chieftains?

As I understand it, the relatively high level of armarment made available to celtic aristocracy was in part made possible by the system of large farm estates that yielded much in the way of personal wealth to celtic nobles. Unless I am incorrect no such system existed in early germanic culture?

I'm not entirely sure the early tribal political system and land resources of the ancient germans allowed for that degree of personal wealth to field whole units of chainmail clad infantry. I'm always interested in having my opinion persuaded though.

If a reform reflecting an increase in available wealth (perhaps triggered by expansion into celtic or italic lands) is afforded the Sweboz in the next EB release than I'd happily concede the plausibility of the Herthoz as mail clad. But the current graphic depiction of the Gastiz and Herthoz seems out of place with the other depictions of germanic units.

In the meantime I wouldn't care to associate the comment "heavy hitters" with a heavily armored infantry. The Gaesatae are evidence enough against this.

What i'm hoping for (and only if the historical evidence supports this) is an improvement in the charge effectiveness and defensive staying power of certain units in keeping with their unit card descriptions. Maybe not so much the Merjoz (as others seem to have more success with them) but the Sahsnotoz just seem a little underpowered for a "fierce and valiant" sword bearing war band fighting in dense formation.

Pardon my confusing english, it is not my first language :clown:

It's so bloody good to read a discussion going on like this, especially when compared with some other threads. Keep it up guys, I'll be here to read it. :book:

Your English is flawless, sorry Lowenklee- I didn't mean to imply that you were saying the Germanics were primitve, but I find it to be a common judgement since they were largely dependent on Celtic metalworks, so that was not a specific comment to you. You have a great point about fielding a large scale RTW units-worth of mail which I can not immediately explain concerning EB and their depiction because I am relatively new to the team and that aspect was unaccounted, but I will try and find that information out, so I can defend those units, besides supplement with anything else ~:) it very well might be something we need to address, but it certainly is a delicate and difficult balance to keep the Germanics from being generic and weak, yet accurate- LUCKILY, thanks to the active interest of players/testers/forum'ers we can beat it into bloody submission until it looks right ~;) I have been recently trying to brainstorm some ways to re-invent some of the less unique units like the tribal units so the Sweboz can have comparably diverse units to the Celts, Greeks, ect... also I really like the ideas suggested of another calvary unit, and I would LOVE for the Germanic med/elite foot-units to have their stats increased, so I'll bring up all of these great points mentioned by all of you throughout the thread.

As I said before, keep the suggestions flowing... sorry I don't have anything just yet to keep a debate going- but I'll try ~;)

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Originally Posted by Lowenklee

I can imagine aquiring mail from beaten enemies would have viable but not large scale, afterall swords alone were uncommon amoung the early germans. I can also imagine that, much as it is in the present day, one is not likely to trade high quality armor to a potentially dangerous neighbor one may soon end up fighting. To regularly be able to equip aristocrats in mail the early germans would have needed a mean to domestically produce it.

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The funny thing is, in practice the potential future issues inherent in trading away advanced military gear to a potential foe didn't actually bother people. Or rather, they might bother rulers and suchlike, but their enterprising underlings tended to be only too happy to sell them off anyway.

The way Frankish kings repeatedly banned the sale of high-quality swords to Vikings (to little effect) is a poignant illustration of this phenomenom. People are greedy little buggers.

Moreover, if I've understood correctly it wasn't too unusual for Germanic mercenaries to fight for Celtic paymasters (among others), which would be another source of armour - both as loot, and as tokens of gratitude and friendship from the employer. Given the prestige associated with such gear, odds are they'd occasionally be given away as diplomatic gifts to foster goodwill in allied chieftains etc. Didn't the Celtic big shots pretty much have a practice of demonstrating their wealth and power with lavish gifts to followers, clients and so on ?

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There must certainly have been a high cost associated with the import of large amounts of the required higher grade iron ore than the domestically available bog iron and the time/labour required for it's manufacture (which would not have been something within the means of just any iron smith) which might have made mail prohibitivly expensive for even many of the germanic chieftains?

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If the smith knows how to draw wire, then he can make mail. It's not so much difficult as rather tedious and very time-consuming. And as for the iron, I'm under the impression you want it to be pretty soft (ie. the opposite of what goes into cutting edges) since the whole point of the stuff is that it deforms under the blow and absorbs its energy while simultaneously preventing the sharp stuff from getting as far as the meat under the armour where it could do major harm.
I've no idea of the quality of raw iron available to the Germans at the time, but if it was good enough for spear-and axe-heads it ought to make the cut for mail too.

It'd have to be damn near uselessly low-grade if it didn't, anyway, AFAIK.

Thanks for the replies Blitzkrieg and Watchman,

Hmm, it's an interesting point Watchman. While i'm familiar with the extensive use of germanic manpower for mercenary work in later Roman times i'm not so sure at what point in history this became a widespread phenomenon. Perhaps you could shed some light on this for me?
I doubt the Romans made much use of them prior to their expansion northwards into Gaul, so that leaves the Gauls themselves and perhaps eastern european elements.

I'll also have to plead ignorance as to the exact nature of trade between early germans and neighboring celts or eastern cultures. Blitzkrieg did mention the carpathian cultures. What high value items would the germans have traded to procure large amounts of mail or weaponry other than baltic amber? The idea of large scale trade for mail or weapons also seems to contradict the notion of the scarcity of iron weaponry and armor within early german society.

Perhaps an answer to the above to points could lead to the basis for a germanic reform sometime within the Eb timeframe? The idea itself is quite exciting.

As I mentioned earlier, i've no doubt that an ironware industry was in place early on in scandic-germanic society buts it's the scale and sophistication during the start of the EB timeframe that I question (chain wearing Gastiz and Herthoz are recruitable from the very beginning).

To my knowledge, ironware manufacture increased in volume following the introduction of technical know how from celtic neighbors centuries earlier. This information concerned the extraction of small amounts of iron ore from bogs and swamps in which deposits form due to exposure of iron elements in the water to air. Traditionally it is considered quite soft and poor stock as it contains many impurities. It also happens to be painstakingly tedious and unpleasant work.
I'd be interested in knowing the actual nature of early metal working among germans...such as what folding or laminant process may have been used to make better use of such poor quality iron.

Watchman i'm under the impression the over lapping ring design of mail is whats intended to provide the bulk of the protection from missile fire, spears, and knives/swords, this would require that the rings stay interlinked even under stress. Given the unrivited nature of early mail i'm actually quite curious to what extant soft iron mail would provide adequate protection before "splitting"?

Also I suppose it really depends on the answer to the above question concerning early german methods of removing or compensating for ore impurities. An unaccounted for concentration of impurities in an axe head or
spearhead can lead to disastrous structural weakness as i'm sure you know, but that same possibility for structural weakness could lead to the drawing of iron wire as an impossibility without great losses due to breakage no?
If later germanic sagas and mythos are indicative smiths were a very secretive group that kept ore extraction and metal working techniques very secret.

I wonder how many smiths actually could refine poor quality ore enough to be drawn into wires. I also wonder if large industrial smithing complexes were present within early german society as they were among the celts? I happen to know for bronze age materials that a large bulk of bronzeware for military use actually came from only a handful of places. Presumably these were the only places where the sufficient technical know how or natural resources existed.

This is a very interesting topic of conversation and I don't mean to pester with these inquires. I'll willingly concede my ignorance on many of the finer points! This just happens to be a great forum on which to air my curiosity.
I wouldn't wish to hold you up from EB work, I look forward to the fruits of your labor Blitzkrieg.

Perhaps if your time permits you could shed some light on the above questions Watchman?

I have just recently brought up the idea of a late reform for the Sweboz, (many of us like it!) so that could partially qualify the armored units like [edit] the Herthoz and suggested the creation of a new heavy-ish cavalry unit for the Germanics that will be on par with the Greek/Celtic heavy cavalry- mailed with charging-spear/sword. There is some archaeological evidence of lance, spurs, sword- possibly implying such a cavalry force. Only time will tell if this becomes real :7fortuneteller:

The other unit concerns have been made more aware also, such as with the Merjoz.

Aww man my favorite faction getting mauled .


Curse ye bastards!

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Originally Posted by Lowenklee

Thanks for the replies Blitzkrieg and Watchman,

Hmm, it's an interesting point Watchman. While i'm familiar with the extensive use of germanic manpower for mercenary work in later Roman times i'm not so sure at what point in history this became a widespread phenomenon. Perhaps you could shed some light on this for me?
I doubt the Romans made much use of them prior to their expansion northwards into Gaul, so that leaves the Gauls themselves and perhaps eastern european elements.

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Naturally. And they'd make use of mercenaries and allies like everyone else according to situation, whatever their lofty warrior ideals might theoretically have against the idea.

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I'll also have to plead ignorance as to the exact nature of trade between early germans and neighboring celts or eastern cultures. Blitzkrieg did mention the carpathian cultures. What high value items would the germans have traded to procure large amounts of mail or weaponry other than baltic amber?

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The services of skilled and willing fighters have usually been regarded as valuable you know... But other stuff I can think off the top of my head include various furs and hides (sealskins were exported from the Baltic already around Stone Age - and finds of Aegean bronze swords ought to suggest what kind of stuff might filter the other way - and some Finns were still paying their taxes in squirrel hides by the Early Modern period), walrus tusks from the far north, and probably also assorted craft products already for their exoticism. Salt from some regions too, probably. Less high-profile but rather larger-volume stuff would include things like fish, wool, metal (such as Swedish copper) both raw and worked, maybe honey... all the odds and ends common people now traded.

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The idea of large scale trade for mail or weapons also seems to contradict the notion of the scarcity of iron weaponry and armor within early german society.

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Large scale, hardly. Enough to outfit some of the senior nobility and their retinues, why not ? (Remember that the Gastiz/Herthoz are actually the only ones in armour; the current Gastiz-model Hundaskaspiz are a placeholder AFAIK, and the Ridoharjoz are also nobles...)

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To my knowledge, ironware manufacture increased in volume following the introduction of technical know how from celtic neighbors centuries earlier. This information concerned the extraction of small amounts of iron ore from bogs and swamps in which deposits form due to exposure of iron elements in the water to air. Traditionally it is considered quite soft and poor stock as it contains many impurities. It also happens to be painstakingly tedious and unpleasant work.
I'd be interested in knowing the actual nature of early metal working among germans...such as what folding or laminant process may have been used to make better use of such poor quality iron.

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From the museum here I got the impression ironworking spread into Scandinavia already before the main Celtic expansion across Europe - the most logical route would be the very ancient Amber Road, as that one went directly into the proto-Celtic heartlands. The Germans could hardly have failed to pick it up as well. Anyway, by what I know of it whatever its quality issues might be bog iron (slightly a misnomer - around here at least you coud fish the stuff up from lakes too) formed a perfectly serviceable basis for the Northern European Iron Age. If it's good enough for spears and axes and eventually swords, it's sure as Heck good enough for mail.
Heat and hammer iron enough, and most of the impurities go as far as I'm aware of. Apparently the iron-prospectors carried out a preliminary reduction on-site in small furnaces (to get rid of crystallized water and such) so they wouldn't be hauling overmuch useless slag back home.

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Watchman i'm under the impression the over lapping ring design of mail is whats intended to provide the bulk of the protection from missile fire, spears, and knives/swords, this would require that the rings stay interlinked even under stress. Given the unrivited nature of early mail i'm actually quite curious to what extant soft iron mail would provide adequate protection before "splitting"?

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"Butted" mail only really has trouble with pointy things, which obviously have a relatively easy time forcing a link open. Much Celtic mail was left that way by what I've read (although the Romans apparently insisted on properly closing all the links in theirs), and far as I know it performs against most things beyond the pointy stuff essentially as well as "closed" mail does. Mail largely relies on the sheer difficulty of cutting through the overlapping links, the diffusion of the impact energy into the yieldings but difficult to breach structure, and the fact it becomes functionally a smooth surface if the blow comes in at too shallow an angle, and thus glances off.

And you want the links to be soft and flexible, iron or mild steel (bronze behaves much the same AFAIK). If they're soft and tough, they'll just deform under a blow for the most part. That's okay, since it's more or less part of the whole "absorptive" operative idea of the armour. If you make them hard - high-carbon steel and such - you strip them of their ability to "give in" under a blow and instead render them brittle - and that's Bad News because not only will they shatter, they will also be driven into the wound that much easier which isn't exactly pleasant.

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Also I suppose it really depends on the answer to the above question concerning early german methods of removing or compensating for ore impurities. An unaccounted for concentration of impurities in an axe head or spearhead can lead to disastrous structural weakness as i'm sure you know, but that same possibility for structural weakness could lead to the drawing of iron wire as an impossibility without great losses due to breakage no?

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So ? One very convenient thing about metals is their recyclability - if a part of the iron wire turns out to have an unacceptably high slag content (likely going to become apparent already during the drawing process), just put that bit aside, work with the rest, and melt and remake the deficient part later. It's actually much less a problem with wire than it is with weapons (nevermind, God forbid, long swords) far as I can figure, since you're here cutting the wire into short segments and the process of working it into thin bars for drawing ought to already get rid of much of the slag deposits. With the weapons you're making a more or less big lump that really should not have weak spots if possible, but I would imagine there is rather less concern with mail given the small size of the component parts and the way it works by "cumulative" effect.

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If later germanic sagas and mythos are indicative smiths were a very secretive group that kept ore extraction and metal working techniques very secret.

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I wonder about that ore extraction bit. I'm under the impression that part of the process was usually handled by other folks, the smith's main concern being working the metal rather than producing it. But certainly it has always been very typical that specialists who covered and important and demanding profession were regarded (and regarded themselves as) somehow special or downright arcane in premodern societies, with all kinds of ritual and sundry being tacked on both their status and work. (The cathedral-builders' fraternities the Freemasons grew out of would be a Medieval example, not that most craft guilds did not have their elements of mysticism.) In many sub-Saharan African cultures the blacksmith was regarded as a kind of shaman or witchman all but equal to, if different from, the primary specialists of the supernatural for example.

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I also wonder if large industrial smithing complexes were present within early german society as they were among the celts? I happen to know for bronze age materials that a large bulk of bronzeware for military use actually came from only a handful of places. Presumably these were the only places where the sufficient technical know how or natural resources existed.

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Bronze isn't readily comparable as with that stuff you had the peculiar availability issues of tin and copper to deal with (namely, the two rarely turn out in the same region). Iron is by far more abundant in many parts, or in Northern Europe anyway (although Sweden is rotten with copper, and the "tin isles" of Britain weren't that far away by sea...). Specialist stuff like swords would almost certainly have been mainly Celtic and other imports (although doubtless a powerful king or prosperous chieftain or community could also sponsor the presence of a specialist with the necessary skills - just think of the profit they could turn from selling his wares further, or the presitge and followers the head honcho would get by giving real swords as gifts...), but as things like axes and spears and arrows were both by far easier to make and vitally important to everyday life their production would by necessity already have been handled locally.

"I have just recently brought up the idea of a late reform for the Sweboz, (many of us like it!) so that could partially qualify the armored units like the "Hundred" (upscaled for use as a late reform unit?) and suggested the creation of a new heavy-ish cavalry unit for the Germanics that will be on par with the Greek/Celtic heavy cavalry- mailed with charging-spear/sword.
Only time will tell if this becomes real.
The other unit concerns have been made more aware also, such as with the Merjoz".

I am very excited about a Sweboz reform, it really does sound like a terrific idea.

As regards the Hundred, I shouldn't think there is a need to make them exclusively a late reform unit. There's no reason to believe the system of military recruitment among the germans changed significantly during the three centuries covered by EB.

If anything i'm curious about which element of the sebjo the hundaskapiz represent, are they the greater body of the gau's lower nobility gathered into a single unit? Or perhaps each unit represents an elected erlaz (if that word should be appropriate) of the sebjo assembling the household men and the extended kin group?

If the latter is the case then it's worth mentioning that not all of the men fielded within the unit would have likely been aristocratic with access to the more extravagant arms and armor.

The tendency of such peoples to fight together in extended kin groups would seem to suggest the latter was perhaps more likely? It is however somewhat vague with what was meant by Tacitus. Whatever the case I rather like the idea of the early hundaskapiz being fast moving close infantry support for advancing cavalry.

Speaking of cavalry, i'm quite happy with the Ridoharjoz but would relish the chance to use a prereform medium/light-medium german cavalry. Lances would initially seem more appropriate for the early period, although I'm not up to date on the developments of early iron age cavalry swords among either the germans or neighboring people. Perhaps someone has some insights?

Your posts are always informative Watchman,

But I must say that I'm not sure how much we are in disagreement concerning mail armor. Perhaps my posts have been poorly illustrative of my position. I initially regarded the large scale availability of mail clad german units as perhaps more of a migration period phenomenon somewhat out of place during the beginning of the EB timeframe. I still stand by that position, my concern is primarily one of scale.

As I posted earlier, I am well aware that rudimentary iron age technology was available quite early on among scandic and baltic peoples. In fact, I believe some quite old finds of iron implements were discovered in your area of the Baltic. Certainly the protogermanic iron age predates most significant contact with mainland La tene peoples. I'm also aware of role played by certain mineral additives and smithing techniques in contributing to a superior alloy and flexibility in iron weaponry. What i'm not so sure about is how well aware the early germans were of this!

However, I digress...

"Large scale, hardly. Enough to outfit some of the senior nobility and their retinues, why not ? (Remember that the Gastiz/Herthoz are actually the only ones in armour; the current Gastiz-model Hundaskaspiz are a placeholder AFAIK, and the Ridoharjoz are also nobles...)"

Hmm, I don't have a problem at all with the Ridoharjoz. I'm not sure why they were brought up? Concerning my use of the term "large scale", that is in my opinion what is currently depicted in the EB mod. I have many many family members in my Sweboz campaign and each of them takes to the field with his numerous herthoz fully clad in mail. Even if we discount the Gastiz and Hundaskapiz this to me constitutes "large scale" availability.

Of course I also posted...

"If a reform reflecting an increase in available wealth (perhaps triggered by expansion into celtic or italic lands) is afforded the Sweboz in the next EB release than I'd happily concede the plausibility of the Herthoz as mail clad".

The above remains my position although I should have included the Gastiz in that statement as well. A Sweboz reform would change everything as a gradual transition to greater material wealth due to territorial expansion, trade, prizes won through military service to foreigners, or whatever historical changes occurred as german populations expanded and came into greater prominence can be more accurately represented. Such wealth would have probably made the manufacture or purchase of mail armor more plausible.

However, I maintain 272bc is simply too early for such advancements. Perhaps it is here we must simply agree to disagree?

I spent several hours yesterday searching for evidence of mail wearing germans during the EB timeframe, the closest I arrived at was the following account from Tacitus.

"Neither in truth do they abound in iron, as from the fashion of their weapons may be gathered...In their equipment they show no ostentation; only that their shields are diversified and adorned with curious colours. With coats of mail very few are furnished..."

I know it's Tacitus so we must be careful. But this account gives a first century c.e. view of the germans as still being defficient in iron arms.

This is consistent with my reading on archeological findings and classical writings which seem to strongly suggest, for whatever reason, a significant scarcity of iron martial implements for early germans. This makes, to my thinking, the current depiction of the Herthoz unlikely from a historical standpoint.

Consequently for a future EB release I suggest it may be a fairer compromise to have the pre-reform Sweboz general's skin remain a depiction of a mail clad aristocrat while changing the accompanying herthoz skins to something more along the lines of heavy leathers or furs. I'll no longer address the current depiction of the Gastiz or the Hundazskapiz given their status as placeholders.

Your common sense insights are very welcome and perhaps you are in possession of more specific information that compels your position. Do share if so! I am presently reading an interesting article on the Jastorf culture documenting recent grave excavations as well as several articles on the history of balto skandic metallurgy (regretably all are short but do provide interesting leads). Perhaps if new pertinent information arises it would be worth starting a new thread?

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Originally Posted by Pharnakes

Surely the Germanics never fielded anything even closley on a par with the Brehihntin and the Belgae heavies (can't remeber the name) though?

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Goldsworthy “Caesar”-The Germans had some 800 horsemen still guarding their encampment. Caesar had 5,000 cavalry, although if these were performing their duties as a patrolling and screening force properly, then they would not all have been concentrated in one place. Even so, the Gallic auxiliaries probably had a significant numerical advantage, and were mounted on larger horses than their opponents, which makes it all the more notable that the Germans quickly gained an advantage. In Caesar's account the Germans charged first, chasing away part of the Gallic cavalry, but were in turn met by their supports. Many of the Germans then dismounted to fight on foot-perhaps with the support of the picked infantrymen who regularly supported the horsemen of some Germanic tribes. The Gauls were routed and fled, spreading panic amongst a large part of the auxiliary and allied cavalry who galloped in terror back to the main force, which was probably several miles away.” pg.274

Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"Although not more than eight hundred German horsemen were present, as soon as they caught sight of Caesar's cavalry they charged and 'soon threw them into disorder'-all five thousand of them. The Celts did not break immediately, 'but in their turn, made a stand' and a sharp fight ensued in which the Germans, 'overthrowing a great many of our men, put the rest to flight'. pg.230-231

Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"Caesar sent out his Gallic cavalry to engage them but these, being identical to the enemy but far fewer in numbers, quickly got into difficulties. Casesar now sent in his four hundred German riders, whom he had held back as a reserve, and 'their charge overpowered the enemy, who were put to flight and fell back with heavy loss on their main body'. The town surrendered." pg.232

Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"It was the German cavalry, possibly with their own light infantry in support even though they are not mentioned, who made the breakthrough.
At length the German horse gained the top of some rising ground on the right, dislodged some of the enemy, and chased them with heavy loss to a river where Vercingetorix's infantry was posted. At this the res of his cavalry fled, afraid of being surrounded, and were cut down in numbers all over the field.pg. 234

Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"Once more Caesar had kept his German cavalry back as a reserve for the crucial moment; when these were committed, the enemy was quickly routed." pg.234

Michael P. Speidel-"Riding for Caesar"-"Caesar threw his Germani into the fray-'some four hundred horsemen he had with him from the beginning'. the Gauls, unable to withstand their onslaught, broke and fled. Caesar's horse guard thus saved him from being trapped in certain defeat.
Holding back reserves until the decisive moment, Caesar had won by tactical skill. It is nevertheless astonishing that only four hundred men made such a difference. They must have been the kind of men Caesar's own army feared, 'huge, unbelievably bold and expert fighters'."pg.12

Goldsworthy “Caesar”-"Throughout the Gallic campaigns German warriors consistently defeated their Gallic counterparts, each success adding to their fierce reputation". Pg.274

Goldsworthy “Caesar”-“The tactics and the quality of the Germanic warriors usually gave them the edge over the Gaulish cavalry”. Pg 229

Michael P. Speidel-"Riding for Caesar"-"The emperor chose Batavians not for being foreigners, but for being the finest horsemen anywhere. His legate in Lower Germany no doubt picked them from tribal warriors who as allies had proven their horsemanship and fighting skill."pg.16 This quote is speaking of Augustus.

You will notice that some of these are the same stories told by the different authors, I just figured it would be good to see the different perspectives from each. Goldsworthy and Sidnell deal with J.Caesar when talking of the Germanic cavalry during EB's time frame. Speidel takes it further down the line with the varying "Caesar's" with the same kind of results as you have read here. Each of these authors have other exploits of the Germanic cavalry in their books that Im not going to bother with as this should be enough examples. So as far as the Germanic cavalry being on par with the Brihentin or the Remi Mairepos I would say that are not on par with them. I say they are much superior!

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Originally Posted by blitzkrieg80

There is some archaeological evidence of lance, spurs, sword- possibly implying such a cavalry force.

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Speidel talks about this in his book "Ancient Germanic Warriors". He says "Tacitus, as we have seen, says that some first-century Germanic warriors fought with long spears, but scholars wondered whether he meant only foot or both foot and horse. Scene 5 of Trajan's Column answers that question, as do lance blades found in graves containing spurs:"pg 136
Also of mention is that there are many "charges" done with Germanic cavalry that disperses their enemies. Some of the conflicts mentioned seem to promote at least to me the idea of heavy cavalry.

Other things of note for the cavalry is:
Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"In 55 BC two German tribes, the Usipetes and Tenctheri, migrated into Gaul. They scored an early success when their cavalry demonstrated the great stamina of their shaggy little mounts by making what would normally have been a three-day march in one night. The Gallic Menapii were taken by surprise and slaughtered."pg.230
Also there is mention by both Sidnell and Speidel of the cavalry fording rivers in full armor in both Britain and Egypt.
I agree with Watchman for the most part on distribution, though I am terribly weak on that subject. Be as it may and regardless of the situation of the armor, the Germanics still overcame their enemies and at greater odds.

I was wondering what time period the reform for Sweboz would take place? I also was wondering if the barratus(sp?) or war chant was going to be used. If it is going to be implemented will it morale or other things?

The following passage is pasted directly from the wiki article on "Germanic peoples". I think it may lay interesting groundwork for establishing a Sweboz reform date.


"The development of La Tene culture extended to the north around 200-150 BC, including the North German Plain, Denmark and Southern Scandinavia".

"In certain cremation graves, situated at some distance from other graves, Celtic metalwork appears: brooches and swords, together with wagons, Roman cauldrons and drinking vessels. The area of these rich graves is the same as the places where later (first century AD) princely graves are found. A ruling class seems to have emerged, distinguished by the possession of large farms and rich gravegifts such as weapons for the men and silver objects for the women, imported earthenware and Celtic items".

Sources as follows,

Parker Pearson 1989:202

Runes around the North Sea and on the Continent AD 150-700 - Looijenga, Jantina Helena - II.2, From the pre-Roman Iron Age to the late-Germanic Iron Age, University of Groningen, 1997.

The dissertation piece written by Dr. Jantina Helena Looijenga goes on to state,


"This process continued throughout the beginning of this era and is especially noticeable in Jutland and on Funen. The first historical contacts with the Romans took place during this period. The journey of the Cimbri and Teutons from Jutland, at the end of the second century BC, possibly resulted from different motives: e.g. internal struggles for power, overpopulation, climatic changes and long-distance trade, which included the import of prestige goods.

The pre-Roman Iron Age Germanic society hardly knew any private property (perhaps apart from cattle), and certainly no privately owned land, since this was common property (Hedeager 1992a:245). The agriculture of the celtic fieldsystem could not expand much and an increase of agricultural production was not possible, which put a strain on society. The first four centuries AD saw a reorganisation of the villages, the redistribution of land, improved tools and a larger produce of the fields.

Hedeager (1992a:245) conjectures that the early weapon deposits, and perhaps also the bog offerings of people in the north of Jutland, bear witness of internal conflicts. The differentiation process that may have started at around 150 BC continued till the development of royal power centres centuries later (Hedeager 1992a:244ff.).

With the increase of the number of landowners (and private property), new tensions and conflicts could originate within the community. The accumulation of property produced a new elite. Social status became important, which was expressed by the possession of prestige
goods (Hedeager 1988a:137ff.). Literacy, used for spiritual or profane purposes, may be expected to have developed among high-placed persons or privileged groups".

The dissertation is available as a pdf download if anyone is interested in reading it in full. A simple google search should suffice.

Thanks for the info Lowenklee, :beam:

This is VERY, VERY interesting stuff.

I will echo Sarcasm here, and congratulate all of you on excellent comments made.

Thankyou for the excellent read gentlemen.

So, from reading Caesers account of the germanic mercs in action(been a while since I read his account), what sort of stats would make germanic cav fair, a higher charge and attack, to represent what appears to be their obviously superior ferocity?

Seen as germanic cav didn't seem to be available in large numbers, would a smaller unit size of say 80 men instead of 100(huge unit size) be in order? Perphaps this is better than just making them expensive(to keep the numbers low)?

Im a bit hesitant to reply as I dont know how the stats are applied or what they are based on. If the stats are straight forward then I would base the German cavalry similar to the Remi Mairepos but I would give them a stronger charge and attack factor as well as higher morale. I didnt find anything on how many casualties the Germans took but there must have been enough of them left to continually chase off the Gauls. If this is the case and with the number of Gauls they were facing I would give their defense at least on par with the Remi Mairepos if not higher.

This discussion and supplimentary citations are indeed very interesting :thumbsup: thanks to you guys who spend time carefully supporting your arguments with real evidence and clear logic. This thread does much to support the continued development and evolution of the Sweboz faction, so great job people! Keep up the good work done by supplying proof whether it be logic (as most of the time we must go on with so few sources) or actual references, for these kinds of changes we're actually noting to consider/propose to the team, such as with the new cavalry and reform. The Sweboz have been neglected in the consuming greatness of so many other great elements of EBness but not for long! :yes:

If anybody wants to disagree, POST IT! We need information, we need dialogue and comments and the synthesis that can only come through the interaction of your great minds, devout and casual, fan and historian alike. Please try to base your argument on game balance or historical/archaeological evidence because that will be most effective.

:7fortuneteller: Good news! Thanks to the great generosity of Shigawire, I will have additional resources so that I may truly begin translating/reconstructing ProtoGermanic for the Sweboz voice mod

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Originally Posted by Frostwulf

Im a bit hesitant to reply as I dont know how the stats are applied or what they are based on. If the stats are straight forward then I would base the German cavalry similar to the Remi Mairepos but I would give them a stronger charge and attack factor as well as higher morale. I didnt find anything on how many casualties the Germans took but there must have been enough of them left to continually chase off the Gauls. If this is the case and with the number of Gauls they were facing I would give their defense at least on par with the Remi Mairepos if not higher.

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Why do you use the Remi Mairepos as your base? They weren't fighting them in any of the examples you mentioned.

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Originally Posted by QwertyMIDX

Why do you use the Remi Mairepos as your base? They weren't fighting them in any of the examples you mentioned.

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Quite. Wouldn't the Brihentin work better, if indeed Celtic heavy cavalry needs to be the base used?

In fact in most of the examples we're not even talking about heavy cavalry, but about light cavalry like the Luce Epos (that unit is actually sort of a conglomeration of the light and medium cavalry of gaul, but its the closest we can get).

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Originally Posted by QwertyMIDX

Why do you use the Remi Mairepos as your base? They weren't fighting them in any of the examples you mentioned.

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Originally Posted by Laundreu

Quite. Wouldn't the Brihentin work better, if indeed Celtic heavy cavalry needs to be the base used?

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The reason for using the Remi Mairepos is for their defensive skill based on skill not on armor as well as their high moral. The stats for the Brihentin are very similar to the Remi Mairepos. Also there were Belgic troops at Alesia though I do not know if they were mounted or not.

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Originally Posted by QwertyMIDX

In fact in most of the examples we're not even talking about heavy cavalry, but about light cavalry like the Luce Epos (that unit is actually sort of a conglomeration of the light and medium cavalry of gaul, but its the closest we can get).

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Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"Given the Celtic reputation as mounted warriors and of Gaul as a source of horses, it was inevitable that cavalry should play a major role in Caesar's campaigns there. His Gallic auxiliary cavalry fought in their native equipment in units led by their own chieftains, although large groupings of units would be put under a Roman officer. Most would have helmets of various designs, the best of which formed the basis of Roman legionary helmets, having cheek-pieces and good protection for the back of the neck. Those that could afford them would have chain mail shirts, and this would apply to an increasing number of warriors as the rewards of Roman service were accrued. All would have carried shields and various styles of spear, many of them suitable for both throwing and thrusting, in addition to long-bladed swords." pg.220

Caesar started with his cavalry in 58 BC. and it was in 55 BC when the Germans defeated Caesar's cavalry. The Gallic cavalry had roughly 3 years to better equip themselves with Roman war materials. Mail shirts, shields, various styles of spears and long-bladed swords sound like heavy cavalry to me.

Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"He completed the initial conquest by the end of the following year, 57 BC, by defeating a confederation of the Belgic tribes of the north east. Learning that the combined Belgic army was approaching the River Sambre, he crossed and fortified a strong position on the far bank to await their attack. Greatly outnumbered by enemies with a 'great reputation for bravery', Caesar began tentatively by sending out the cavalry to test them and 'soon found that his troops were as good as theirs'." pg.221

Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"Caesar sent out his Gallic cavalry to engage them but these, being identical to the enemy but far fewer in numbers, quickly got into difficulties. Sombre now sent in his four hundred German riders, whom he had held back as a reserve, and 'their charge overpowered the enemy, who were put to flight and fell back with heavy loss on their main body'. The town surrendered." pg.232

Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"a tendency encouraged by the fact that his cavalry were usually fighting against identical opponents (his auxiliaries had to bare their right shoulders in battle to distinguish themselves from the foe)." pg.223

These statements seem to me that there was Brihentin as they had the same equipment as Caesar's cavalry. Im sure not all were Brihentin but there must have been many that were. Vercingetorix had around 15000 cavalry at his disposal, many of them had to be chieftains and their body guards just as in Caesar's cavalry.

Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"Caesar reinforced his outnumbered cavalry with light infantry, hurriedly trained to cooperate closely in amongst the squadrons. Here Caesar was clearly drawing on his experiences in Gaul. For his German horseman, at least, this was merely a return to what had been their mode of operation before Caesar had turned them into his reserve shock force." pg.248

This last statement shows that under Caesar they didnt always have the light infantry with them.

Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-One might expect that the combination of the long-famed Celtic prowess as mounted warriors with this new state-of-the-art military equipment (to which add spurs, superior ironwork in their weapons and armour and, at first, larger horses) would have proved unstoppable, yet it is the German cavalry who really stand out in Caesar's accounts and we are specifically told they did not have the advantage of saddles. Indeed, Caesar makes clear that the Germans positively scorned such aids as a sign of weakness:' In their eyes it is the height of effeminacy and shame to use a saddle, and they do not hesitate to engage the largest force of cavalry riding saddled horses, however small their own numbers may be'." pg.228

Just a general reminder, but the distinction between "light" and "heavy" cavalry isn't really one of equipement but of primary tactical role - "heavies" being those trained and intented for shock action rather than skirmishing and such. It's just that the heavier equipement tends to be concentrated among the shock types for some fairly obvious practical reasons.

Remember also the Equites Auxilia Gallorum - much of Caesar's better-equipped Gallic cavalry would in EB terms be that rather than full-blown Brihentin.

Note also that in many instances the Germans were employed as a reserve that was only committed after the enemy cavalry was already fully engaged - and in cavalry battles it by and large tends to be the side that last has uncommitted squadrons that wins. Could really just be that old Julius didn't relly trust his Gauls all that much and thus used them for the somewhat attrition-heavy duty of tying down the enemy horse before sending in his more reliable Germans to smash the engaged and disordered foe with minimal casualties to themselves...

Anyway, in general I'd say that the Ridonharjoz do not need to be able to beat Brihentin or Remi one-on-one (which would be pretty difficult anyway given the importance of armour in the RTW system, and the fact the RHs wear just shirt and pants against the Gauls' and Belgaes' mail and helmets...); they just need to be able to reasonably reliably beat the lighter Epos, after which they can proceed to swamp the presumably rather few Gallic heavies by numbers. After all, you don't need to be better than the enemy elite so long as your rank and file is sufficiently superior to his rank and file...

Which is really probably the same thing as happened with the infantry during the more succesful Germanic invasions. The better Celtic warriors were probably rather superior to the majority of the invading tribesmen, but that didn't really matter as the rank-and-file Germanic tribal warriors were better than the low-quality militias and greenhorn lower warriors that made up the majority of the Celtic armies at that point... once the chaff had been dealt with the few harder nuts were easy enough to get rid of.

Well I guess this is were we start disagreeing Watchman.

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Just a general reminder, but the distinction between "light" and "heavy" cavalry isn't really one of equipement but of primary tactical role - "heavies" being those trained and intented for shock action rather than skirmishing and such. It's just that the heavier equipement tends to be concentrated among the shock types for some fairly obvious practical reasons.

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Michael P. Speidel "Riding for Caesar"-"Caesar's German horsemen had served well as a crack battlefield unit and an escort."pg.15

Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"Caesar reinforced his outnumbered cavalry with light infantry, hurriedly trained to cooperate closely in amongst the squadrons. Here Caesar was clearly drawing on his experiences in Gaul. For his German horseman, at least, this was merely a return to what had been their mode of operation before Caesar had turned them into his reserve shock force." pg.248

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Remember also the Equites Auxilia Gallorum - much of Caesar's better-equipped Gallic cavalry would in EB terms be that rather than full-blown Brihentin.

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Why? These units did have chieftains and their retainers, they had the arms and armor of the Brihentin. If we are talking historical here, there isnt any difference that Im aware of. Caesar did use his Gallic units in many ways, raiding, mop-up,charging other cavalry and infantry etc. etc. The Germans were simply better.

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Note also that in many instances the Germans were employed as a reserve that was only committed after the enemy cavalry was already fully engaged - and in cavalry battles it by and large tends to be the side that last has uncommitted squadrons that wins. Could really just be that old Julius didn't relly trust his Gauls all that much and thus used them for the somewhat attrition-heavy duty of tying down the enemy horse before sending in his more reliable Germans to smash the engaged and disordered foe with minimal casualties to themselves...

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Goldsworthy “Caesar”-The Germans had some 800 horsemen still guarding their encampment. Caesar had 5,000 cavalry, although if these were performing their duties as a patrolling and screening force properly, then they would not all have been concentrated in one place. Even so, the Gallic auxiliaries probably had a significant numerical advantage, and were mounted on larger horses than their opponents, which makes it all the more notable that the Germans quickly gained an advantage. In Caesar's account the Germans charged first, chasing away part of the Gallic cavalry, but were in turn met by their supports. Many of the Germans then dismounted to fight on foot-perhaps with the support of the picked infantrymen who regularly supported the horsemen of some Germanic tribes. The Gauls were routed and fled, spreading panic amongst a large part of the auxiliary and allied cavalry who galloped in terror back to the main force, which was probably several miles away.” pg.274

Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"Although not more than eight hundred German horsemen were present, as soon as they caught sight of Caesar's cavalry they charged and 'soon threw them into disorder'-all five thousand of them. The Celts did not break immediately, 'but in their turn, made a stand' and a sharp fight ensued in which the Germans, 'overthrowing a great many of our men, put the rest to flight'. pg.230-231

This battle happened before the Germans were with Caesar, they didnt have attrition units here and all units were committed from the begining. It was strictly the Germans vs. the numerically superior Gauls, and the Germans won.

Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"It was the German cavalry, possibly with their own light infantry in support even though they are not mentioned, who made the breakthrough.
At length the German horse gained the top of some rising ground on the right, dislodged some of the enemy, and chased them with heavy loss to a river where Vercingetorix's infantry was posted. At this the res of his cavalry fled, afraid of being surrounded, and were cut down in numbers all over the field.pg. 234

This is one of the instances where there was a non-charge, non-reserve situation. There are others. You are correct in that Caesar was lacking in trust in the Gallic cavalry during the Vercingetorix uprising. Prior to and after there doesnt seem to be the lack of trust as before.

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Anyway, in general I'd say that the Ridonharjoz do not need to be able to beat Brihentin or Remi one-on-one (which would be pretty difficult anyway given the importance of armour in the RTW system, and the fact the RHs wear just shirt and pants against the Gauls' and Belgaes' mail and helmets...); they just need to be able to reasonably reliably beat the lighter Epos, after which they can proceed to swamp the presumably rather few Gallic heavies by numbers. After all, you don't need to be better than the enemy elite so long as your rank and file is sufficiently superior to his rank and file...

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I agree that the Ridonharjoz do not need to be able to beat Brihentin or Remi one-on-one, there should be a heavy German cavalry as well as a Noble German cavalry and each should be stronger then there Celtic counterparts. One thing you seem to be neglecting is that the Gauls seriously outnumbered Caesars cavalry. If you will look at the above quotes the Gauls had the same type of units that Caesar did. Caesar's Gallic cavalry would get swamped and have to be rescued by the Germans. The Germans though greatly outnumbered would attack and chase off the Gauls, including the elites. Some times this was done with charges other times it would be stand and fight situations, and the Germans always came out on top even though inferior in numbers.

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Which is really probably the same thing as happened with the infantry during the more succesful Germanic invasions. The better Celtic warriors were probably rather superior to the majority of the invading tribesmen, but that didn't really matter as the rank-and-file Germanic tribal warriors were better than the low-quality militias and greenhorn lower warriors that made up the majority of the Celtic armies at that point... once the chaff had been dealt with the few harder nuts were easy enough to get rid of.

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15,000 German warriors(Suebi) were dominating several Gallic factions and thats why they called for Caesar. The Germans were outnumbered and still managed to win. There should have been at least that many elites from the Gauls.

Goldsworthy “Caesar”-"Throughout the Gallic campaigns German warriors consistently defeated their Gallic counterparts, each success adding to their fierce reputation". Pg.274

Well, I'm back after having been gone for a very long time 'looong story, don't need to bore the EB team and others with details' but I'm here to lend my weight to this particular issue.

Now, my knowledge of the early Germanic peoples is modest in comparison to many here but I daresay I have something of a working knowledge, that said, I think it would be fair to give the Sweboz a significant bump in calvary and I more or less echo Frostwulf's sentiments/arguments on this point.

I also think it makes sense for the Sweboz as a faction to have a rather large berth of sorts between their units I.E. well armored heavies and not so well armored lights with little in between. I feel this would best echo how the Germanic peoples tended to fight and operate I.E. with a large number of light infantry/calvary/general soldiery supporting a smaller 'core' armored noble elite. If one examines how the Germanic peoples of later ages fought and how that tradition influenced the later medieval periods they more or less followed that model, and I see no reason why earlier 'proto' Germanic peoples would deviate much from that, indeed, there is even evidence supporting just an assumption.

I bring this up also because it makes sense from a gameplay standpoint, having a sort of tribal and forested faction centered around northern Europe with a force consisting of a large number of unarmored but nevertheless skilled and reliable light infantry supporting a crack force of heavily armed/armored nobility would balance out the region nicely with the more 'balanced' infantry-centric Romans to the south and less extreme in their unit division Celtic counterparts to the west.

To address this issue I would suggest leaving such units as the Gastiz and Sweboz general as-is, maybe even make them a little stronger, BUT, making them FAR FAR FAR more expensive to reflect how rare and valuable they were as well as their noble status, as well as adding a similarly armed/armored calvary compartment which is equally expensive. Personally, I'd like to see this as more of something you have to 'build up' to and less of a 'reform', it seems to me that the development of these forces could be better represented through old-fashioned building upgrades, time and effort rather then with a hard capped 'reform date' as such.

Just two cents from a long time fan coming back from a far too long absence =D.

Thanks for the info Frostwulf.

Let me ask for a bit of clarification on a few points.

Would it be accurate to characterize the use of the double rider as a cultural norm among native Germanic cavalry? Should the Ridoharjoz in fact be represented this way...technical limitations not withstanding?

There seems to be conflicting accounts. Were these two men sitting in tandem atop the horse? Or, was there a single rider alongside which ran another? Tacitus' account seem to suggest the latter. In the case of Caesar we have the Sweboz specifically mentioned as frequently dismounting from their horses to engage the enemy, conspicuously absent is the mentioning of a second rider or galloper. However I have a feeling I'm missing a source...in fact I know I am.

Also, what are your thoughts on the evolution of arms and armament among the German cavalry as frontier tribes increasingly found themselves rendering military service to Gallic and Roman employers? More specifically, within the EB time frame would it be accurate to characterize the standard Germanic cavalry in use as lightly equipped? Or, do you see a trend toward, or is there evidence to suggest the existence of more heavily armored (i.e. expensive) Germanic cavalry?

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Originally Posted by Zero1

Well, I'm back after having been gone for a very long time 'looong story, don't need to bore the EB team and others with details' but I'm here to lend my weight to this particular issue.

Now, my knowledge of the early Germanic peoples is modest in comparison to many here but I daresay I have something of a working knowledge, that said, I think it would be fair to give the Sweboz a significant bump in calvary and I more or less echo Frostwulf's sentiments/arguments on this point.

I also think it makes sense for the Sweboz as a faction to have a rather large berth of sorts between their units I.E. well armored heavies and not so well armored lights with little in between. I feel this would best echo how the Germanic peoples tended to fight and operate I.E. with a large number of light infantry/calvary/general soldiery supporting a smaller 'core' armored noble elite. If one examines how the Germanic peoples of later ages fought and how that tradition influenced the later medieval periods they more or less followed that model, and I see no reason why earlier 'proto' Germanic peoples would deviate much from that, indeed, there is even evidence supporting just an assumption.

I bring this up also because it makes sense from a gameplay standpoint, having a sort of tribal and forested faction centered around northern Europe with a force consisting of a large number of unarmored but nevertheless skilled and reliable light infantry supporting a crack force of heavily armed/armored nobility would balance out the region nicely with the more 'balanced' infantry-centric Romans to the south and less extreme in their unit division Celtic counterparts to the west.

To address this issue I would suggest leaving such units as the Gastiz and Sweboz general as-is, maybe even make them a little stronger, BUT, making them FAR FAR FAR more expensive to reflect how rare and valuable they were as well as their noble status, as well as adding a similarly armed/armored calvary compartment which is equally expensive. Personally, I'd like to see this as more of something you have to 'build up' to and less of a 'reform', it seems to me that the development of these forces could be better represented through old-fashioned building upgrades, time and effort rather then with a hard capped 'reform date' as such.

Just two cents from a long time fan coming back from a far too long absence =D.

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I'll respectfully disagree, a reform suits the situation better I should think. If a sudden pronounced increase in material wealth and the concentration of that wealth in the hands of an aristocracy was made possible by increased contact with Celtic neighbors then we are talking about sudden external stimuli and not a natural progression of the earlier social customs.

The egalitarian nature of early Germanic society and the rudimentary nature of Germanic agricultural practice made it very unlikely that an affluent land owning aristocracy could have emerged and amassed the personal wealth required to field such infantry as the current Gastiz and Herthoz without this external stimuli. It's only after this stimuli that we begin to find signs of the immergence of a priveleged aristocracy, and then only in those tribes that occupied the frontier with Celtic lands.

The "pre-reform" nature of germanic society would also suggest less of a gap between the haves and have nots in terms of how warriors were equipped on the battlefield. Small but significant differences probably abounded, such as sword and horse ownership. But I doubt differences in armament were that severe. Just my opinion though!


P.s.
welcome back!

This is great discussion here, please continue. Thank you so much for your interest and devotion! :applause:

I would say that any culture who practices agriculture around 300BC is not very egalitarian, because agriculture in practice makes those who hoard and own "haves" and those of less means "have nots" and thus aristocracy begins to grow and have influence rather quickly- I think the typical depiction of the Germans as democratic and egalitarian is really more of a "noble savage" characterization that was invented to contrast the Romans' sensibility.

On the other hand, I think the material wealth of the Germanics was a result of Celtic influence, but wasn't a result of cultural/societal influence unless we're speaking militarily, because the loan-word vocabulary we find in the various old Germanic languages shows a steady flow of brunjo "mail/body-armor", isarna "iron", "wire", rik "power/authority" but not land-use or aristocratic composition. The Sweboz reform we're proposing would be more directly because of increased pressure/migration coupled with increased mobilization/militarization which would bring about the conquest and acquisition of metallurgical sources that would allow heavier armor and a larger warrior aristocracy. I am hoping we can make the conditional reform dependent on the Sweboz possessing 1 city in a mountainous/ore-rich region with significant MIC, besides large markets to simulate the trade network necessary to equip the new Sweboz nation. The two times are currently dubbed by me, Druhteztîdiz - "Time of the Warband" (only Sweboz Reform) and Theudôztîdiz - "Time of the Tribe" (pre-Reform period for Sweboz). This is based on the vocabulary of "king" that originated in primary usage as Theudanaz "Lord of the people" then became less used while Druhtinaz "Lord of the warband" was more popular later, this before the "of the kindred" dynasty/lineage-based title seen finally in Kuniz/Cyning. The unconditional reform date will be 140BC so the AI can actually take advantage of it and the conditional reform date will start 190BC... I find it awesome that these dates seem to coincide with the dates Lowenklee mentioned from the Wikipedia information (not that I'll ever claim that is a valid authority).

One of the considerations we have to make within the unit list is space and so that might limit some of the heavy infantry even though I would fully support the idea of a heavy infantry/retinue. The early sword-unit is going to be renamed to reflect their status as thegnoz/retinue so this sort of class differentiation is going to be implemented- I am so very happy to hear your own comments that this stuff is missing.

I think the Ridaharjoz is the only unit which shouldn't get its' name changed by me and I feel that it doesn't need any stat change either because it is an effective unit but not incredible, similar to the Leuce Epos which shouldn't outshine other cavarly but shouldn't be worthless.

The initial heavy cavalry unit I have proposed is actually a noble cavalry or as I call it for now (until I have my additional Proto-Germanic sources): Ehwathegnoz (Companion Cavalry) :grin: because I think the idea that they would be retinue, thegnoz or gesithas is implicit and of course they would be very similar to Brihentin, being the forebearers of knights, although the standard thegn would not be mounted, as seen in the Harthaz/Sahsthegnaz. Indeed, much of the time cavalry did not fight from horseback, Celts included, because the stirrup was not invented so the ability to have a "platform" is much reduced, but this reasoning allows me to justify within my mind the idea of a Sweboz heavy cavalry, despite records stating infantry being more common. Unfortunately the RTW engine does not allow dismounting for combat of noble cavalry, but if the Brihentin exist, so too would the elites of the Sweboz, but they will definitely be a reform unit. I think they need to cost a lot (elephantish) to reflect their rarity in large-scale army-use. Another possibility is to half their troop number, but this might not be possible.

I am also thinking of adding a medium cavalry unit, so I am wondering what you guys have in mind for the heavy cavalry/noble cavarly that is not the unit I just mentioned? The idea of a regional Tencteri unit has been discussed and this could be a medium cavalry (unarmored) type similar to the Remi. Is there another idea you guys have in mind?

The Merjoz will definitely be changed since 2-handed Huscarl axes were not in use, so the question is whether we keep a shock axe unit or use that space for another? I would really like to keep 1 axe unit, give it 1-handed axe with shield and make it naked ~;p but I know I will always have trouble defending the use of axes in "ironless" Germania even though they had to chop wood somehow and the fact that Bronze Age cultures had had them in use for a long time. I have found some information about axes found in the Netherlands and of course in the Carpathians, but is there anything that you guys know that could be added? Feel free to tell me how much you don't like the idea.

I have no idea if this will get me beheaded, although these are just ideas being thrown around anyways, but I just felt excited enough to let you guys have a sneak-peak and am interested to know what you guys think ~:)

I don't think there have been serious arguments put forth for the Germans having been economically equal - which is indeed virtually impossible anyway, even if actively attempted. There would naturally have been those who owned richer farmland (or more of it), were more succesful in trade, invested the "spoils of war" wisely or just luckily, and so on and so on. The point is that they were politically equal - all free men had the same basic political rights irrespective of wealth level and such, although naturally the prosperous had that much easier time amassing influence through all manner of clients and followers.

Given the importance the culture by all accounts attached to warfare, it would also seem perfectly logical that the wealthy invested in gear that both made them better at it, and showed off their prosperity - "luxury" items like swords, horses and armour, not as such available to the common tribal warrior owing to their ruinous expense.

Although it can be argued that no government fits the mold I refer to, I still cannot agree with the idea that egalitarianism was truly existent in ancient Germania, although I pretty much agree with everything you say. So compared to other cultures it can be said they were more politically equal before their assembly and had higher social mobility, but the usage of "wise" men" as the priest-like judicial authorities (who could be influenced) and big men / lords who rallied followers and kin for the majority of votes, then so family and status meant a great deal regardless of equality, as recorded by Tacitus in his relation of how they chose their kings. I would say that describes an aristocracy exactly, especially considering the idea that participation in battle was required when called upon. The "thing" although seemingly a democratic assembly was in practice more an affirmation of society and government, ritual participation that satisfied disconent through its seeming fair distribution of rights to the common man, who as always is the backbone of society. Just like a "pep rally" at high school, the morale of the people is heightened by its encouragement and pretend participation of everyone within its activities but the true benefactors and deciders are a select few. The more tribal the government the more equal it will seem but in the end the wise men / most influencial (chieftain and bodyguard, elders, priests) always decide how things turn out even if a common man can lead a decisive battle and possibly move up in station. I know, it's a petty argument, but the idea of a "noble savage" is just that kind of romanticism that distorts perception from practice. If other cultures' societies have stricter caste structures and less social mobility then shame on them, but that doesn't change the inequality of Germanic society which was very Indo-European and quite developed even in 300BC.

Meh. That's how it always ends up working out in democratic systems anyway - when everyone has one vote, the guy with the real power is the one who can one way or another convince the owners of those votes that his idea is the best etc, just as in autocratic systems the power lies with whoever has the ruler's ear (or acts as his brain). The Graeco-Romans for example (what they now actually bothered practicing the "one man one vote" stuff) tended to do that with good old-fashioned rhetoric and general BSing. Far as I know things hadn't changed much by the American and French Revolutions...

If you have a clan/tribal social structure on top of that (not that comparable institutions were exactly uncommon in the Mediterranean republics either), well, duh; all other things being equal relatives tend to stick together, especially when the clan and family are ultimately the root sources of security and support in the absence of proper impartial authorities. Didn't the Athenians employ a corps of Scythian mercs as a kind of communal police independent of local tribal and family loyalties for one example ?

Yeah, it's true I am very bitchy when it comes to democracy and it's false representation, especially in America where there is no democracy at all yet we say we have it more than any other- rather pathetic... and it's true that the nature of man is to give up power to leaders and be swayed and for some to sway others and manipulate them... so, pardon my passion for arguing ~;) because I think we agree, actually.

The benefit and virtue of a military democracy is the fact that those in power actually do a great deal of service unlike modern day politicians who are leeches... but some might try and manipulate the military system regardless, yet the basis is much more proper than being a draft-dodging, spoiled, oil-tycoon

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Originally Posted by Lowenklee

Would it be accurate to characterize the use of the double rider as a cultural norm among native Germanic cavalry? Should the Ridoharjoz in fact be represented this way...technical limitations not withstanding?

There seems to be conflicting accounts. Were these two men sitting in tandem atop the horse? Or, was there a single rider alongside which ran another? Tacitus' account seem to suggest the latter. In the case of Caesar we have the Sweboz specifically mentioned as frequently dismounting from their horses to engage the enemy, conspicuously absent is the mentioning of a second rider or galloper. However I have a feeling I'm missing a source...in fact I know I am.

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Phillip Sidnell "Warhorse"-"The Germans were trained in the use of a special battle technique. They had a force of six thousand cavalry, each of whom had selected from the whole army, for his personal protection, one infantryman of outstanding courage and speed of foot. These accompanied the cavalry in battle and acted as a support for them to fall back upon. In a critical situation they ran to the rescue and surrounded any cavalryman who had been unhorsed by a severe wound. They acquired such agility by practice, that in a long advance or a quick retreat they could hand on to the horsees' manes and keep pace with them.
Caesar reports this tactic as something novel, but his descriptions of later fights demonstrate that some Gallic cavalry were familiar with the practice, and he would employ it himself in the Civil War. Of course, similar methods had been employed by various people over the centuries, notably the Numidians but also the Romans themselves at Capua in the Second Punic War." pg. 229

Cultural norm Im not sure, as there were many tribes,Sugambri,Ubii,Tencteri, Batavi and others of whom I havent found out about their battle styles.
For traveling they may have rode together on the same horse but when it came to battle they did not. The runner would grab the main and enter battle. It has been said that the Romans liked to use the native units in their native fighting style, including Caesar. Their are times when Caesars troops would attack without the runners, times when they would dismount to fight and times when they would charge headlong into battle. In the second encounter Caesar had with the Germans, the Germans charged his cavalry then dismounted. This is the 800 vs. the up to 5000 battle already described in this thread.

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Originally Posted by Lowenklee

Also, what are your thoughts on the evolution of arms and armament among the German cavalry as frontier tribes increasingly found themselves rendering military service to Gallic and Roman employers? More specifically, within the EB time frame would it be accurate to characterize the standard Germanic cavalry in use as lightly equipped? Or, do you see a trend toward, or is there evidence to suggest the existence of more heavily armored (i.e. expensive) Germanic cavalry?

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My guess to this would be the same as what was going on with the Gallic cavalry. They would eventually be better armed and armoured in Roman service.
Ill have to return to this later as Im being pressed for time, I did want get to the Teutons,Cimbri and Ambrones and their arms and armorment, but that will have to come later.

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Originally Posted by Frostwulf

15,000 German warriors(Suebi) were dominating several Gallic factions and thats why they called for Caesar. The Germans were outnumbered and still managed to win.....Phillip Sidnell-"Warhorse"-"Greatly outnumbered by enemies with a 'great reputation for bravery', Caesar began tentatively by sending out the cavalry to test them and 'soon found that his troops were as good as theirs'"....Goldsworthy “Caesar”-The Germans had some 800 horsemen..Caesar had 5,000 cavalry, although if these were performing their duties as a patrolling and screening force properly, then they would not all have been concentrated in one place. Even so, the Gallic auxiliaries probably had a significant numerical advantage, and were mounted on larger horses than their opponents, which makes it all the more notable that the Germans quickly gained an advantage."....

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LOL ... Frosty still propagating the same line huh!? I commend you on your labours but I'm sorry mate, this and much of the other material you cite in defence of your argument is just so contextually wrong. Suffice to say, if you took the time to actually read all the material / consider all the data and see the bigger picture, you wouldn't keep making all these ridiculous statements. Trying to take select points out of any semblance of context and extrapolate that to support some hypothesis is just bolox!


my2bob

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Originally Posted by PSYCHO V

Suffice to say, if you took the time to actually read all the material / consider all the data and see the bigger picture, you wouldn't keep making all these ridiculous statements.

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To disagree and say so is one thing, but making judgements that you have no authority on (like what someone would think if they read something) is inappropriate.

By what I've seen mentioned of it the horse stock available to the Germans wasn't exactly awe-inspiring (Caesar apparently remounted his mercs on imported Spanish beasts at one point), which might actually directly explain the relative lightness of equipement of their cavalry - the poor beasts may well have already been heavily enough burdened by the warrior and his weapons without the weighty metal body armour being added into the equation.

On the same vein it would seem unlikely that their "horse runners" were carried by the animals except in dire emergencies, to conserve the already-taxed stamina of the animals and maintain a reasonable turn of speed.

Anyway, I'd hazard a guess that such hamippoi-type light support infantry and their equivalents (such as the "chariot runners" of old) normally operated behind the squadrons they were attached to for entirely practical reasons.
First off, if they were directly mixed into the ranks the formation of the cavalry proper would have to be left rather loose to accommodate the men in the intervals, which would seem to go directly against some of the very basic principles of how close-combat cavalry is formed into squadrons.
Second, the speed the cavalry could maneuver in would be directly dictated by the top running speed of the infantry, and while a fleet-footed human does accelerate faster than a horse the latter tends to be by far faster over any longer distance. Moreover one suspects it would create problems of maneuvering, as the mens packed in the intervals would quite likely get in the way if the horses had to wheel or turn this way or that.
Third, when the infantry are one mass behind the squadron they can in certain situations give the horses the impression that they are being chased, which may trigger one interesting facet of the animals' herd instinct - the stampede. When the herd is on the move, and they can clearly feel the anxiety of both their closely packed peers and their riders, and closely "pursued" by smaller creatures, it should be rather obvious what sort of scenarios the horses instinctively associate the situation with; and the safest thing for them to do in such cases is to keep on going forwards, even over obstacles they would normally flatly refuse to have anything to do with... like closely packed bodies of infantry. I understand this sort of creative use of the skittish animals' natural "fight or flight" responses is just about the only way to get them to physically charge into close-order infantry en masse, and given the general extreme importance of psychological factors in cavalry attacks (particularly against infantry) has a number of other benefits. ('Course, if the waiting infantry nonetheless hold steady without wavering and have spears, the front rank horses will still get skewered...)
Fourth, mixing the infantry among the horses would not seem terribly useful most of the time. Not only would, as already mentioned, they be frankly getting in the way of both the horses and riders much of the time, they'd force the cavalry to adopt a looser order than is really good for shock actions while contributing little "weight" and impact (both physical and psychological) to the mixed formation, and conversely detaching them for other duties - close terrain combat, flanking, pinning etc. - ought to be quite complicated. On the other hand if they acted as a distinct unit both they and the cavalry they supported could go their separate ways if tactically necessary, and on the attack the massed horsemen would deploy their full physical and psychological weight with the added bonus of the horses being hopefully convinced they must keep going forwards. Naturally they are going to outpace their support infantry at high speeds (the stuff about hanging onto tails and manes sounds primarily like a good way to get kicked by accident or out of sheer irritation...), but it is questionable if this were exactly a problem during such maneuvers anyway. If the cavalry then gets locked into a pitched melee, be it against horse or foot, the infantry could then try to wrap around the flanks or work their way through the ranks to pitch in the melee among the horses once they catch up. In battles between cavalry units the latter was AFAIK often decisive, if one side lacked such support - the nimble infantrymen being able to duck between and under the struggling beasts and do all kinds of nasty things. Conversely against infantry that refused to present a suitable weak spot in the line for the cavalry to attack (the usefulness of the cavalry wedge against infantry being, AFAIK, that the whole thing could be easily steered into just such a soft spot) the light infantry could be sent forth to pin the enemy formation down at the front, while the cavalry swung around and struck at their flanks - a mounted attack against an unformed side having a tendency to trigger mass panic but fast, particularly in already engaged formations.

Or that's my take on it anyway.

When it comes down to that there's actually a whole lot of units in EB that could be used for such hamippoi duty, the most obvious requirements being fast legs and preferably a decent moral backbone for frontal pinning. Actual fighting ability of course hardly hurts, and should they have spears for anti-cavalry bonuses all the better.
...which description really more or less covers most Sweboz infantry when you think about it. The Swainoz would appear to me like a particularly good choice though - being skirmishers rather than real line infantry they'll mostly be running all around the place and flanks anyway, and will obviously benefit from close horse support; on the other hand they seem tough enough that their presence in support of friendly cav should be well able to have a decisive effect, especially against enemy horse.

Most other factions have something comparable available. The Celts could do worse than using Lugoae or those shortsword guys for similar purposes, or just about any fast infantry not immediately needed in the main line really. Iberia is just rotten with suitable troops - even the local spear-carrying light skirmishers might well do the job - while the Koinon ought to be able to get some decent mileage out of the Ekdromoi Hoplitai...

Good points guys,

"I would say that any culture who practices agriculture around 300BC is not very egalitarian, because agriculture in practice makes those who hoard and own "haves" and those of less means "have nots" and thus aristocracy begins to grow and have influence rather quickly- I think the typical depiction of the Germans as democratic and egalitarian is really more of a "noble savage" characterization that was invented to contrast the Romans' sensibility".

Well here's what Caesar had to say,

"The nation of the Suevi is by far the largest and the most warlike nation of all the Germans. They are said to possess a hundred cantons, from each of which they yearly send from their territories for the purpose of war a thousand armed men: the others who remain at home, maintain [both] themselves and those-engaged in the expedition. The latter again, in their turn, are in arms the year after: the former remain at home. Thus neither husbandry, nor the art and practice of war are neglected. But among them there exists no private and separate land; nor are they permitted to remain more than one year in one place for the purpose of residence. They do not live much on corn, but subsist for the most part on milk and flesh..."

I'm not prepared to call Caesar and romantic but I do understand your point.

Even in using the term egalitarian I do make allowance for a healthy dose of cynicism, human behavior doesn't differ that dramatically regardless of the political structure in place. But there does seem to be a consistent characterization of the Germans that, a description of which other than egalitarian, I haven't sufficient eloquence to give justice to. At any rate Watchman did a fine job of that in an earlier post.


"...The Sweboz reform we're proposing would be more directly because of increased pressure/migration coupled with increased mobilization/militarization which would bring about the conquest and acquisition of metallurgical sources that would allow heavier armor and a larger warrior aristocracy...".

...I am hoping we can make the conditional reform dependent on the Sweboz possessing 1 city in a mountainous/ore-rich region with significant MIC, besides large markets to simulate the trade network necessary to equip the new Sweboz nation...I find it awesome that these dates seem to coincide with the dates Lowenklee mentioned from the Wikipedia information (not that I'll ever claim that is a valid authority)...

I'm in total agreement with that suggested implementation of a Sweboz reform! This to me makes the most sense in terms of the development of the German faction. While I am in no position to discount the importance of more peaceful means of cultural cross pollination I do concur that military expansion more likely contributed to the rapid development of a large affluent aristocracy. Thank you for the insights into Germanic linguistic developments, thats very interesting indeed. Do you recommend a single reference book on proto-Germanic/old German languages as a starting place for further study?

About the Wiki source, I referenced only two specific quotes.

But, those quotes weren't posted here until after I checked the sources myself. I first read the dissertation piece in full and verified Dr. Looijenga's credentials. I also tried to be clear in presenting the work as a thesis dissertation as opposed to a formal academic publication. Dr. Looijenga's thesis is available in full as a pdf and is sponsored by Prof. Dr. T. Hofstra professor of protogermanic languages and literature at the university or Groningen.
Prof. Pearson is well known enough, professor of archeology at Sheffield...but I did order his book for context's sake before posting here. I don't trust Wiki at face value and mainly use it for it's bibliography:beam:

Next on my list is the article "Early Germanic Warfare by E. A. Thompson" a twenty-eight page article first published in 1958. It's available from the Oxford University Press, I'm just reluctant to spend money on it sight unseen. Has anyone by chance read this yet?

In terms of unit stats and composition I should perhaps point out a certain thing? Ignoring the Brihentin and Remi Mairepos for the moment, if it should be accepted that Germanic light cavalry was superior to at the least it's light counterpart among the Celts then I believe it a worthwhile effort to continue looking into the creation of a suitable light infantry compromise to approximate the German cavalry tendency of dismounting or bringing an accompanying warrior racing on foot into combat.

While the Celts seem to be mentioned as not unfamiliar with this practice the Germans are distinctly noted for it. I apologize for seemingly harping on this but I believe this to be a potentially important cultural trait.
As is the Ridoharjoz will fail in direct confrontation against an equal number of Leuce Epos. This does not seem to be an accurate representation of the superiority of Germanic light cavalry or?

The LE also possess the “fast moving” stat. Perhaps the Ridoharjoz should have superior mobility and perhaps even stamina in the absence of stats to properly approximate a dismounted combatant or much in the way of armor in their graphic depiction? I was actually shocked as I assumed they already possessed these advantages.

I've read nothing yet to suggest that the early German cavalry mentioned in the classical texts were heavily armored as they scored victories against greater numbers of Celtic cavalry. So, any later evolution of Germanic heavy cavalry doesn't address the current deficiencies of the Ridoharjoz.

Speaking of horses, an interesting thread came to mind as I thought about a possible post reform heavy cavalry for the Germans. Psycho V, perhaps you recall this thread?...

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=42138

Here is a teaser, courtesy of Frisian28ad,

http://www.home.zonnet.nl/postbus/images/rom6.jpg

What ever became of this? Was it decided that the Batavian elite cavalry was simply too late a development within the EB time frame? Beautiful picture though.

The basic idea behind the Marjoz seems fine to me even if we accept the theory of iron scarcity among the prereform Germans. Although it would be ideal to find a historically verifiable unit, given the scarcity of detailed information, you may simply have to suffice with sn educated guess in the name of playability? Besides, the axe is an efficient and effective use of iron. Any discussion on the size of the axe is another matter and reminds me of an amusing thread pertaining to Ethiopians and dinosaurs:laugh4:

Sorry for the comment about Wikipedia, it is more of a disclaimer for criticism against me than anything ~:) because I find many people use Wikipedia like it is the ultimate authority and I myself love to use Wikipedia for easy reference. Thanks for pointing out those specific references because I will probably be using them as basis for the reform dates and having real work/thesis to quote is much better than general Wikipedia so I am glad you did the work of tracking down the information already ~:thumb:

There are specific texts which are best for learning the various old Germanic languages (Old English, Old Norse, Gothic, ect.) but I assume that you don't want such a long-term and challenging endeavor but rather "a single" book which might have elements of the linguistic similarities but be an easy ready and have some interesting information. My Old English professor reccomended this book to me at one point, which I got easily from Amazon: D.H. Green's Language and history in the early Germanic world Cambridge University Press 1998. Although this book might not be the easiest read, because it is packed with information and highly academic, it is possibly the best book I've ever read on the subject. He uses the various old Germanic cognates and texts as much of his basis (rather than conjecture) and he stays true to what can be proven while still elaborating much detail that is otherwise overlooked, such as the fact that the true Germanic word for lord was similar to OE frea, ON Freyr rather than Herr, because Herr originally means "hoary" or "grey" and is directly from the influence of Latin senior, whereas Frau comes from the IE root pro- similar to Latin Principes, "(one who propels) foward", or "first". The book has devoted sections pertaining to loan-word traffic in Contact with the Celts, the migration of the Goths, Germanic loanwords into Latin, and Latin loanwords in Germanic. There is even some Proto-Germanic discussion in the book, but not so much, because most Proto-Germanic isn't widely accepted in the academic world, but what can be claimed to be known is used by him, although he never states it as fact but rather as different possibilities of word transformation.

I find many other books on Germanic history, warfare and such to be rather general, always talking about the same basic and easy to find information of late Germanics and never really using any evidence that can prove anything meaningful. Herwig Wolfram's History of the Goths is pretty awesome though and there's others that don't come readily to mind, but Malcolm Todd is one I do not like much at all. It's funny because I think most would like the easy general reference of Todd and hate Green- but that's exactly why I like Green, because I don't need to read Wikipedia-type information in a volume.

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The LE also possess the “fast moving” stat. Perhaps the Ridoharjoz should have superior mobility and perhaps even stamina in the absence of stats to properly approximate a dismounted combatant or much in the way of armor in their graphic depiction? I was actually shocked as I assumed they already possessed these advantages.

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Both the RH and LE ride "light" or "medium" horses, which both use the fs_fast_horse skeleton. :shrug: Lightly equipped guys on quick horses tend to be pretty fast. Moreover, making the RH faster and/or more "enduring" would hardly appear logically justifiable given the rather small and unimpressive horses they had to make do with most of the time. Deep forests with scant good farmland kinda suck for horse breeding after all.

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Both the RH and LE ride "light" or "medium" horses, which both use the fs_fast_horse skeleton. :shrug: Lightly equipped guys on quick horses tend to be pretty fast. Moreover, making the RH faster and/or more "enduring" would hardly appear logically justifiable given the rather small and unimpressive horses they had to make do with most of the time. Deep forests with scant good farmland kinda suck for horse breeding after all.

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Dear Watchman,

I'm sorry, but most of what you write in this thread is more a guess than anything else. Size of the horse has generally not much to do with its endurance, or speed, or durability (hope this words applies to animals in the english language~D). Ever heard of the Iceland-horse? I know it's a breed not existant in EB-timeframe, but these horses are very durable, and quite speedy as well - and all that despite of the harsh and cold climate, the long periods of darkness and the presumably meager pastures available to them.

The "Pro-better-German-Cav-Faction" in this thread has delivered a quite sufficient amount of proof for the need for a better cavalry. I understand that, concur and I kindly ask the mighty EB-Thengaz for better Ridoharjoz, a German reform and heavy cavalry.:yes:

Thanks for the information Blitzkrieg80. My thanks to you as well Watchman, i suspect how the Germans may have implemented close infantry support for thier cavalry will involve lots more information to know with any degree of certainty. I grew up around horses..well ponies actually, and can certainly speculate how it may have been done. But speculation is a facr cry from factual knowledge.

Where we disagree however is with the inferiority of the native mounts available to the Germans. If these early mounts were anything like the native ponies and pony-like horse still used in rural communities of the Alps, Germany, and Scandanavia, then I must come to their defense.

“small and unimpressive...” is highly subjective. Ponies and pony-like horses (henceforth I will use the term pony for all small breeds for simplicity although I understand it to be inaccurate) are the aboriginal horse type and make excellent mounts in their larger varieties. These small shaggy mounts come precisely from lands unsuitable for the cultivation of large herds of standard horse and yield a superior animal for rough broken ground.

Speaking from personal experience, my village breeds ponies which I have much experience being around and observing during our spring festivals. I've also ridden Halflingers many many times as a younger man while in the Italian Tirol, these small animals have no problems carrying a rider at a brisk pace. I've also have seen first hand the hauling strength of Scandinavian ponies and the Icelandic pony during my stays at farm hostels while traveling farther north from home.

These native types of ponies are wonderfully hardy and even tempered. They have great stamina, disproportionate strength from their sturdy muscular bodies and short legs, are sure footed and quick footed. Ponies are capable of admiralable bursts of speed as well as they are better able to leverage their strength due to being closer to the ground and having more compact builds. Its for this reason I suggested the superior speed, not to suggest ponies are “faster” than horses but I wouldn't know how else to represent the quick turning ability and agility of a pony or pony-like horse not impaired by an armor wearing rider or, as is currently not implemented, a second infantryman holding on to the mane.

Ponies also tend to be more durable to inclement weather and able to live off a far less nutritional vegetation than finely bred horses, so for luggage transport you just bring more ponies! They do quite fine ranged in the open and left to graze. So perhaps the Ridoharjoz should have a lower upkeep cost! Or perhaps I'm getting a little carried away now:laugh4:

The German cavalryman carried little else than his spear and shield, rode saddleless, and was documented as covering large tracts of ground quickly,

“They (Caesar refers to the Usipetes and the Tenchtheri), finding themselves, after they had tried all means, unable either to force a passage on account of their deficiency in shipping, or cross by stealth on account of the guards of the Menapii, pretended to return to their own settlements and districts; and, after having proceeded three days' march, returned; and their cavalry having performed the whole of this journey in one night, cut off the Menapii”

Sounds like a light highly mobile cavalry to me, a cavalry not impaired by any inferiority on the part of their sturdy ponies? Whatever advantages spanish mounts may have provided the Germans seemed to have done quite well for themselves with their smaller shaggy mounts.

And, it makes more sense to me that a lightly armed rider riding bareback on a pony makes a quicker (not faster, just quicker) and more nimble opponent.

Anyway, I'm a little defensive perhaps as I grew up around such animals. But I maintain that the stamina of the Ridoharjoz should be superior. Small legs may make for a slower animal but a ponies big barrel chest and compact musculature, I might argue, makes for larger lungs and greater stamina.

I also have articles from a travel log (some entries dating to the 19th century) with very interesting accounts of local breeds of horses as far east as the Himalayas. Time and again and from several differing western authors, the stamina of small shaggy horses is related as being superior to all but the most exceptional of more “noble” breeds. I shall search for this article tomorrow if anyone is interested, it may be a bit off topic though?

All this aside the documented evidence suggests that Germanic light cavalry, for whatever reason, were able to consistently defeat larger bodies of Celtic cavalry in direct combat. Presently the Ridoharjoz are handily beaten by the Leuce Epos in direct conflict.

It's not really that important if a reform introduces a superior German cavalry. I'm simply nitpicking potential historical inconsistencies as a means of possibly opening up new ideas for units and unit balance. I'm happy with the Ridoharjoz as is.

Here's a small shaggy pony for reference. It's an Icelandic pony.

http://www.joesz.com/im/IcelandicPony.jpg

photography by Joe Szurszewski.

I think that certain club soldiers should be definitely more powerful, because according to what I've read on the subject, it wasn't so much a lack of weapons technology or resources for club warriors, but in many cases an actual natural preference for the advantages of the weapon, for example, the Eastern Romans recognized its potential and used Germanic club warriors against various Sassanid Cataphracts to stunning effect, though this was much later on than the period in EB, this ancient weapons potential would not have changed.

Also the Germans seem to lack berserker elites wearing wolf hoods or bear hoods which were actually pretty common believe it or not.

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Originally Posted by the_handsome_viking

Also the Germans seem to lack berserker elites wearing wolf hoods or bear hoods which were actually pretty common believe it or not.

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Sources please?

My God man! It was in vanilla RTW! Get your act together!





:clown:

Btw, I should probably drop a line or two about ponies here.

During the Cantabrian wars, the natives used ponies rather than proper horses as their primary mount. And it was not because of it's speed but rather for their stamina, resistance to the bad weather and ability to operate successfully in rugged terrain or even low vegetation.

The more southerly Iberian breeds were certainly much faster and could catch the ponies that the Cantabrians used, or even the small horses the Numidians rode when Hispanic Auxilia campaigned in Africa. The trick in both cases for the locals was to use rough terrain as a place to strike and which to retreat afterwards.

Anthony can probably also tell of stories of Irish ponies giving headaches to more heavily armed cavalry (like late Armorican cavalry, or Norman knights) by operating in wooded or boggy country.

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Originally Posted by PSYCHO V

LOL ... Frosty still propagating the same line huh!? I commend you on your labours but I'm sorry mate, this and much of the other material you cite in defence of your argument is just so contextually wrong. Suffice to say, if you took the time to actually read all the material / consider all the data and see the bigger picture, you wouldn't keep making all these ridiculous statements. Trying to take select points out of any semblance of context and extrapolate that to support some hypothesis is just bolox!

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First of all your throwing quotes together and Im not sure which one(s) your having problems with. The ones on this thread answer here but the others you must be talking about lets discuss this on this thread https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=83475

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Originally Posted by blitzkrieg80

To disagree and say so is one thing, but making judgements that you have no authority on (like what someone would think if they read something) is inappropriate.

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Agreed and thank you.

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Originally Posted by the_handsome_viking

Also the Germans seem to lack berserker elites wearing wolf hoods or bear hoods which were actually pretty common believe it or not.

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Sorry, as much as I would like to see a beserker style unit I have a hard time believing there were enough around to produce even one unit. I have to agree with Lowenklee and would like to see the source. I hope your not referring to speidels "Ancient Germanic Warriors".

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Originally Posted by Lowenklee

All this aside the documented evidence suggests that Germanic light cavalry, for whatever reason, were able to consistently defeat larger bodies of Celtic cavalry in direct combat. Presently the Ridoharjoz are handily beaten by the Leuce Epos in direct conflict.

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I completely agree with Lowenklee's above statement

To all the EB guys please answer these questions.
First of all what is the arms and armor of the Luece Epos?
Second Where are all the chieftains during these battles? Were they all on foot? Did they simply not engage in fighting therefore losing prestige in the eyes of their followers? If they did fight woundnt they be Brihentin and therefore engage the German units?
Third what cavalry units use these arms and armor - Mail shirts, shields, various styles of spears and long-bladed swords?

Lastly as far as Germans and armor it seems the majority went without armor.

Malcolm Todd "The Early Germans"-"Body armor was virtually unknown among the German people in their early contests with Rome and indeed for centuries after that." pg.39

John Warry "Warfare in the Classical World"-"Nor were the Germans ill-armed. Their cavalry wore lofty plumes on helmets grotesquely shaped like animal heads. Their breastplates were of iron and they carried two javelins each and heavy swords for hand to hand fighting." pg.132

John warry is speaking of the Teutons,Cimbri and Ambrones here. With this I think that the reform of 190bc seems fair. But again Im weak on this subject.

my current idea on the addition of a new MED-ish cavalry is an alternate skin for some horseman model (we have no space for new units) which will be a "proven" or "champion" rider or early "horse retainer" unit. This horse unit will represent the superiority of the higher class Germanic horsemen over the standard issue Leuce Epos and yet still be very similar to the Ridoharjoz. The regular Ridoharjoz should not be automatically superior, because the examples of Celtic defeat against German cavalry was not a representation of the Celts during their heyday and the Germans at that time suredly had experienced units on that front rather than conscripts more accurately portrayed by the normal Ridoharjoz.

I personally would like a wolf-skin/"werewolf" if you will/berserkr type unit based on common Indo European wolf-cults, shamanistic rituals, totemism. Of course there is no direct evidence of this being in use other than widespread records of Indo-Europeans worshipping the wolf and dressing like them, naming themselves after the wolf, and late Germanics following this practice, I should not have to go into the berserkr which is widely attested (Bǫðvar Bjarki! haha, how's that John) but other examples as such with the "boar" being a representation of a god's protection (Freyr! back to the original Germanic word for lord ~:)) and subsequent decoration/invocation on helmets as mentioned in Beowulf, and many other accounts, and esp. found at Sutton Hoo. The "Seafarer" is an Old English poem with many shamanistic allusions including ecstatic trance and astral travel and if Christian monks are recording theses things which is against Christian teachings, then they must be based on a core practice maintained from those early times. I could scramble together more vague shamanistic/totem worship/shapeshifting references within Germanic and provide the examples I mentioned for Indo-European (such as the infamous Dacians' use).... BUT like I said there is nothing that we can dig up and say "ah hah!" so I won't waste my time at the moment. So, IMO it cannot be argued that it's pure fantasy to have a drugged out naked wolf/berserk type unit for the Germanics, but fiction and unproven enough that it should not be in EB.

blitzkrieg80 If you wouldnt mind I have a question for you on this thread https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=83475 I'm trying to keep this thread to the German topic.

As for your second paragraph I mostly agree with you. I do believe there is enough evidence for what I call the "true" beserker, those of the viking type. I know Speidel in his book has a wider definition of beserker, but just in my opinion the ones he talks about are not in the same mold as the Norse ones. Also just to make things clearer its not just the Norse that have beserkers, they are just the well known ones. My only problem is with what I said earlier that there is just not enough of these type of individuals around to make up a unit. This again being my opinion based on the books and articles I have read.

I agree they would also not be common enough to justify a unit, but I am planning a character trait, although I have not developed the idea yet (like Proto-Germanic or whatnot)- Shapechanger: "believes himself able to transform into an animal, +2 morale to troops on battlefield, -1 command, -1 Management... so it would still exist and no one can claim that that character does not believe it to be so whether it was historically common or not, like madness and Roman Emperors ~:)

Frostwulf, I don't see any question to me on the other thread? Are you asking for me to justify keeping the Ridoharjoz at their current strength? Or the question on this thread concerning weapons, ect... you say "these arms and armor" but then don't specify? I can't really answer for decisions of the Celtic Faction people concerning who has what, nor the specifics of their leadership in battle during that era... otherwise I'm pretty sure the Brihentin are only buildable post-reform similar to the non-existent Sweboz reform and they have a cavalry spear, sword, mail and helm, although generals are early Brihentin... the Leuce Epos (just checking the EDU) has javelins, cavalry spear, leather armor, helm... sorry I didn't think theres paltry answers merited a different post.

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Originally Posted by Lowenklee

Where we disagree however is with the inferiority of the native mounts available to the Germans. If these early mounts were anything like the native ponies and pony-like horse still used in rural communities of the Alps, Germany, and Scandanavia, then I must come to their defense.

“small and unimpressive...” is highly subjective. Ponies and pony-like horses (henceforth I will use the term pony for all small breeds for simplicity although I understand it to be inaccurate) are the aboriginal horse type and make excellent mounts in their larger varieties. These small shaggy mounts come precisely from lands unsuitable for the cultivation of large herds of standard horse and yield a superior animal for rough broken ground.
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It's not really that important if a reform introduces a superior German cavalry. I'm simply nitpicking potential historical inconsistencies as a means of possibly opening up new ideas for units and unit balance. I'm happy with the Ridoharjoz as is.

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No offense, but I'm afraid your analysis is falling prey to what could be maliciously termed "fanboyism" here. To put the counter-argument in very simple and brief terms: historically, nobody ever used them little tough horses as the war-mount of choice if and when something bigger and stronger was available and sustainable. And there were some pretty good reasons for that.

Oh, the little critters may be hardy and enduring, well able to "live off the land" (although grazing takes so much time the usefulness of this to a military unit is a bit debatable), and decent enough for overland transportation; but what is needed of a warhorse is a fair bit different. People did not devote enormous time, attention and resources to producing specialized breeds for the job just for fun after all. The little horses were used when nothing better was available for one reason or another; I don't think anyone ever hesitated to swap when something bigger and stronger became an option.

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Originally Posted by Watchman

The little horses were used when nothing better was available for one reason or another; I don't think anyone ever hesitated to swap when something bigger and stronger became an option.

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I agree. The bigger and stronger horses had advantages of kinetic energy for charges, leverage for the height, speed(most of the time) and later in history strength for the heavier armor and arms. From my readings the viking raiders did the same thing, they would raid or conquer and area and "trade up" their horses. The little horses did their job well, but they just weren't as good as the larger ones with the exception of stamina which generally was impressive.

Sorry blitz I wrote the question to late, but its there now. The question does have an effect on this thread as to the relation of German unit to Celtic unit. I chose to put in on the other thread since that is where it was started. It is an important subject for the German troops, as now they will be guided by the idea that the Celtic "heyday" is over with. It shouldn't be that difficult to come up with the author(s) and book(s) that the team is using that they based the idea that the Celtic "heyday" is over with. I would think this kind of information would be one gladly shared by the team so others who have an interest in this can read it themselves without bothering the team. So if you don't mind could you get us this information?

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Originally Posted by Watchman

No offense, but I'm afraid your analysis is falling prey to what could be maliciously termed "fanboyism" here. To put the counter-argument in very simple and brief terms: historically, nobody ever used them little tough horses as the war-mount of choice if and when something bigger and stronger was available and sustainable. And there were some pretty good reasons for that. Oh, the little critters may be hardy and enduring, well able to "live off the land" (although grazing takes so much time the usefulness of this to a military unit is a bit debatable), and decent enough for overland transportation; but what is needed of a warhorse is a fair bit different. People did not devote enormous time, attention and resources to producing specialized breeds for the job just for fun after all. The little horses were used when nothing better was available for one reason or another; I don't think anyone ever hesitated to swap when something bigger and stronger became an option.

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Hello Watchman,

Thanks for the reply but there's no fanboism on my part. I'm not emotionally invested in any one specific faction or unit. I'm more concerned with the enjoyment and educational merit of the mod as a whole. This forum presents a wonderful chance to explore such subjects and I approach this discussion with a lighthearted curiosity, no offense taken:beam:

On the issue of horses I just happen to have a background growing up with small native breeds and am personally familiar with their historical use in southern Germany and Tirol where, often times, ponies were specifically desired over horses due to their hardiness, stamina, and sure footedness. Ponies also tended to be cheaper for a number of obvious reasons.

I'd also like to mention that I have no evidence to suggest the Germans actually used ponies other then reasonable likelihood and the existence of such small native horses, some with long histories of use, within German speaking countries today. It's conjecture on my part.

My point however was that the use of ponies or small horses does not equal inferiority. The small steppe ponies employed by, among others, the Mongols make as good an example as any to illustrate that. Regardless of the merits of larger horses German cavalry are documented as being quite able to successfully engage and route larger numbers of opposing Celtic cavalry, this isn't currently represented, so to refocus on the original issue with the Ridoharjoz...

As currently implemented within the mod, a player may be led to believe that the ancient Germans fielded poor quality cavalry compared to the Celtic light cavalry. If this is not the EB team's position then perhaps something is amiss with unit balance? Even with the inclusion of a Sweboz reform the ability to recruit heavier cavalry does not really address the Ridoharjoz question.

If an implementation for swift runner accompaniment is impossible, or some novel approach to approximate dismounting during close-in fighting is impossible, should the Ridoharjoz be compensated with a stat adjustment to give them an advantage over the Leuce Epos? If not, why?

*edit*

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Originally Posted by Blitzkrieg80

"my current idea on the addition of a new MED-ish cavalry is an alternate skin for some horseman model (we have no space for new units) which will be a "proven" or "champion" rider or early "horse retainer" unit. This horse unit will represent the superiority of the higher class Germanic horsemen over the standard issue Leuce Epos and yet still be very similar to the Ridoharjoz. The regular Ridoharjoz should not be automatically superior, because the examples of Celtic defeat against German cavalry was not a representation of the Celts during their heyday and the Germans at that time suredly had experienced units on that front rather than conscripts more accurately portrayed by the normal Ridoharjoz".

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Whoops, seems I missed that post. Thanks Blitzkrieg, apparently I have my answer! I still hold out hope that the Hrussáthêwáz might make an appearance and I"m still interested in your thoughts on the Batavian cavalry? Perhaps there is information on the Batavian cavalry thats more within the EB timeframe? It's so hard to find specific unit references for the various Germanic tribes it seems such a waste to not use what little we do have.

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Originally Posted by Lowenklee

Sources please?

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Ancient Germanic Warriors

Warrior Styles From Trajan's Column to Icelandic Sagas

Michael P. Speidel.

I made a thread about it a while ago to see if anyone else has read it.

It was something of a famous Indo-European warrior style, or warrior thing to emulate the wolf and wear wolf hoods.

When it comes to the Germanic people, there are clear depictions of wolf hood wearing germans on trajan's column scene 36, you also see depictions of bear hooded Germans.

As I've said before, it was a very big thing amongst the Indo-Europeans to emulate various animals I suppose they saw something quite likeable in, and this is why you have examples of Romans, Germans, Greeks etc wearing wolf hoods or referring to Wolf skin clad bersekers and elite warriors.

We know that there were clearly Wolf skin wearing warriors in the late Roman empire, and we definitely know they existed to some extent still in the middle ages, the top of a seventh century scabbered from Gutenstein shows a wolf headed warrior with a giant sword, he also seems to be wearing chain mail.

A silver foil from Obrigheim, depicts a wolf skin wearing warrior offering his sword to Woden. A bronze die from torslunda depicts Woden with a twin-dragon helmet and a wolf headed warrior standing near him drawing his sword and holding a spear.

I can understand that a lot of people get wary when it comes to things like depictions of ancient Germanic warriors wearing things like wolf hoods, at least elite berserker types or sort of moral boosting elite soldiers, but it seems evidently clear that not only did they exist amongst the Germans, but that it was something commong throughout the Indo-European world in general.

There should be at least one band of German warriors in EB that wear wolf skins because it seemed to be quite a common thing in general, or at least perhaps the standard bearers in German units could wear wolf hoods.

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Originally Posted by Sarcasm

My God man! It was in vanilla RTW! Get your act together!





:clown:

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It wasn't that far off then. Some German warriors carried war clubs, and EB's revised version has some German warriors still carrying war clubs.

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Originally Posted by Frostwulf

Sorry, as much as I would like to see a beserker style unit I have a hard time believing there were enough around to produce even one unit. I have to agree with Lowenklee and would like to see the source. I hope your not referring to speidels "Ancient Germanic Warriors".

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I am.

And I started a thread on it a while back asking if anyone else had read it. Though I don't agree with everything in it, it did make a pretty strong case for the existance of wolf skin wearing warriors amongst the Germans.

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Originally Posted by blitzkrieg80

This is great discussion here, please continue. Thank you so much for your interest and devotion! :applause:

I would say that any culture who practices agriculture around 300BC is not very egalitarian, because agriculture in practice makes those who hoard and own "haves" and those of less means "have nots" and thus aristocracy begins to grow and have influence rather quickly- I think the typical depiction of the Germans as democratic and egalitarian is really more of a "noble savage" characterization that was invented to contrast the Romans' sensibility.

On the other hand, I think the material wealth of the Germanics was a result of Celtic influence, but wasn't a result of cultural/societal influence unless we're speaking militarily, because the loan-word vocabulary we find in the various old Germanic languages shows a steady flow of brunjo "mail/body-armor", isarna "iron", "wire", rik "power/authority" but not land-use or aristocratic composition. The Sweboz reform we're proposing would be more directly because of increased pressure/migration coupled with increased mobilization/militarization which would bring about the conquest and acquisition of metallurgical sources that would allow heavier armor and a larger warrior aristocracy. I am hoping we can make the conditional reform dependent on the Sweboz possessing 1 city in a mountainous/ore-rich region with significant MIC, besides large markets to simulate the trade network necessary to equip the new Sweboz nation. The two times are currently dubbed by me, Druhteztîdiz - "Time of the Warband" (only Sweboz Reform) and Theudôztîdiz - "Time of the Tribe" (pre-Reform period for Sweboz). This is based on the vocabulary of "king" that originated in primary usage as Theudanaz "Lord of the people" then became less used while Druhtinaz "Lord of the warband" was more popular later, this before the "of the kindred" dynasty/lineage-based title seen finally in Kuniz/Cyning. The unconditional reform date will be 140BC so the AI can actually take advantage of it and the conditional reform date will start 190BC... I find it awesome that these dates seem to coincide with the dates Lowenklee mentioned from the Wikipedia information (not that I'll ever claim that is a valid authority).

One of the considerations we have to make within the unit list is space and so that might limit some of the heavy infantry even though I would fully support the idea of a heavy infantry/retinue. The early sword-unit is going to be renamed to reflect their status as thegnoz/retinue so this sort of class differentiation is going to be implemented- I am so very happy to hear your own comments that this stuff is missing.

I think the Ridaharjoz is the only unit which shouldn't get its' name changed by me and I feel that it doesn't need any stat change either because it is an effective unit but not incredible, similar to the Leuce Epos which shouldn't outshine other cavarly but shouldn't be worthless.

The initial heavy cavalry unit I have proposed is actually a noble cavalry or as I call it for now (until I have my additional Proto-Germanic sources): Ehwathegnoz (Companion Cavalry) :grin: because I think the idea that they would be retinue, thegnoz or gesithas is implicit and of course they would be very similar to Brihentin, being the forebearers of knights, although the standard thegn would not be mounted, as seen in the Harthaz/Sahsthegnaz. Indeed, much of the time cavalry did not fight from horseback, Celts included, because the stirrup was not invented so the ability to have a "platform" is much reduced, but this reasoning allows me to justify within my mind the idea of a Sweboz heavy cavalry, despite records stating infantry being more common. Unfortunately the RTW engine does not allow dismounting for combat of noble cavalry, but if the Brihentin exist, so too would the elites of the Sweboz, but they will definitely be a reform unit. I think they need to cost a lot (elephantish) to reflect their rarity in large-scale army-use. Another possibility is to half their troop number, but this might not be possible.

I am also thinking of adding a medium cavalry unit, so I am wondering what you guys have in mind for the heavy cavalry/noble cavarly that is not the unit I just mentioned? The idea of a regional Tencteri unit has been discussed and this could be a medium cavalry (unarmored) type similar to the Remi. Is there another idea you guys have in mind?

The Merjoz will definitely be changed since 2-handed Huscarl axes were not in use, so the question is whether we keep a shock axe unit or use that space for another? I would really like to keep 1 axe unit, give it 1-handed axe with shield and make it naked ~;p but I know I will always have trouble defending the use of axes in "ironless" Germania even though they had to chop wood somehow and the fact that Bronze Age cultures had had them in use for a long time. I have found some information about axes found in the Netherlands and of course in the Carpathians, but is there anything that you guys know that could be added? Feel free to tell me how much you don't like the idea.

I have no idea if this will get me beheaded, although these are just ideas being thrown around anyways, but I just felt excited enough to let you guys have a sneak-peak and am interested to know what you guys think ~:)

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You get my vote for the simple fact that you mentioned naked men.

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Originally Posted by the_handsome_viking

I am.

And I started a thread on it a while back asking if anyone else had read it. Though I don't agree with everything in it, it did make a pretty strong case for the existance of wolf skin wearing warriors amongst the Germans.

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I liked Spiedel's book and I thought it was well written. I had a few problems with his book. The first one may get me jumped on but I'm just trying to be honest here. I tend to be wary when I read a history book by a German about Germans, just as I would a Spaniard writing about historical Spain, a Frenchman about France, etc. etc. From my experience in these type of readings some tend to become enamored with their subject and over glorify them. In Spiedel's book I saw a little of this but nothing I think that would skew his historical perspective. The second problem I had was in this book he didn't talk enough about the Germanic tribes enough. I know the sources are small and thats why he relied so much on the column. As far as purposes in EB there also wasn't much mention of performance in battles of varying units. My last criticism is his criteria for beserkers. It seemed to me that Speidel was saying all you had to do was fight naked and your a beserker. I always think of the Norse type for being what I call a "true" beserker. I thought he did put some real interesting information in there and I really enjoyed the book. I like that he uses allot of references and he seemed logical to me. His book "Riding with Caesar" I thought was even better.

I also agree with you that he did make a strong case for the wolf warriors, but in EB with no references in battle all you can do is make supposition on their effectiveness. I think it would be fair to assume that the wolf warriors would be a stronger unit then the average tribal unit, but by how much is hard to say. And by the way thanks again for mentioning this book in your last post, I doubt I ever would have heard of it if you didn't post about it.

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Originally Posted by Frostwulf

I liked Spiedel's book and I thought it was well written. I had a few problems with his book. The first one may get me jumped on but I'm just trying to be honest here. I tend to be wary when I read a history book by a German about Germans, just as I would a Spaniard writing about historical Spain, a Frenchman about France, etc. etc.

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I completely understand the logic behind this judgement, but interestingly enough he didn't really glam the Germans up very much. I read the book because I wanted to know more about Indo European ghost faced warriors, I sort of always find the psychological impact of aesthetics to be quite fascinating and primal, and still highly effective.

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Originally Posted by Frostwulf

From my experience in these type of readings some tend to become enamored with their subject and over glorify them. In Spiedel's book I saw a little of this but nothing I think that would skew his historical perspective. The second problem I had was in this book he didn't talk enough about the Germanic tribes enough.

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In the thread I made on the book my major criticism was that I felt that economics and enviroment had a greater impact upon the Germanic Warriors weaponry and tactics moreso than a tradional warrior style, that said I undoubtably think that these appreciations for ancient warrior styles were persistent, effective and can still be seen to this day to some degree, and in that I found the book quite interesting.

I've never been fond of the notion of filthy mentally retarded barbarians weilding primitive weapons due to the simple fact that it just didn't seem that rational and I always felt a fairly close affinity to them in general.

When I encountered the arguments about club warriors I rolled my eyes a little but upon actually reading the guys arguments, I became somewhat convinced that this wasn't so much a primitive stereotype but actually a weapon selective for its low cost, and practicality, in short, it was a bloody effective weapon, it took down heavily armored cataphracts for example, so these club weilding Germans weren't all that daft.

My view of a Germanic warrior of the period is still essentially a man wearing a colored tunic, perhpas a cape, armed with a bossed round shield and holding several frame, I'm quite convinced that there would have been elite warriors within these extremely vicious fighting cultures that would have, like many other Indo Europeans saw the shock effect and psychological, dehumanising advantages of basically wearing a wolf hood, we know that this persisted through history, we know that myths like the werewolf and historical factual peoples like the berserkers actually do seem to make it evidently clear that this practice wasn't all that especially rare and most likely did have some sort of factor with the Germanic peoples collisions with Rome.

In the mod we have club warriors, we have ghost warriors such as the wolves of woden, (I forget the Germanic spelling) and both of these warrior styles seem to be discussed in the book, I just don't see why the wolf hooded berserkers are that far fetched.

I'm not just supporting this for fun or a love of the aesthetics of it, I just think that it wasn't such a far fetched Idea. If anyone can discredit the book thats fair enough, objectivly speaking, truth is paramount and I have no shame in accepting that I might have goten suckered into a dodgy historians rhetoric, but really, I don't see anything that far fetched about the concept of wolf hoods being worn by certain warriors.

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Originally Posted by Frostwulf

I know the sources are small and thats why he relied so much on the column. As far as purposes in EB there also wasn't much mention of performance in battles of varying units. My last criticism is his criteria for beserkers. It seemed to me that Speidel was saying all you had to do was fight naked and your a beserker.

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Perhaps he simplified it a bit but I definitely recall him discussing the psychology of someone that goes into the berserker state and the value of the aesthetics, one thing I felt was a bit suspicious about his book was that it was actually really really easy and enjoyable to read, you can fly through chapters without realizing it.

I personally thought his arguments for the evolution of the Germanic crown were very intersting and I was actually quite convinced by them.

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Originally Posted by Frostwulf

I always think of the Norse type for being what I call a "true" beserker. I thought he did put some real interesting information in there and I really enjoyed the book. I like that he uses allot of references and he seemed logical to me. His book "Riding with Caesar" I thought was even better.

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I've not read riding with caesar but I'll probably get round to it eventually, a lot of his references actually I felt were really good, like the horse stabbers sections, I actually rolled my eyes a few times at the start of chapters thinking "er, ok" but upon looking at the plates and reading the sources it started to seem quite convincing, what was actually also interesting was that the ironic stereotype of a sort of insane barbarian, actually sort of came up again, but transformed itself into something that actually seemed a bit more logical than most people would give the stereotypes credit for.

The horse stabbing technique was nothing short of extremely physcially demanding trickery and if pulled off is perhaps one of the most effective anti cavalry tricks in history, it is essentially tricking a rider into thinking he has an easy target, sliding under the horse and killing it, taking the horse down then taking down the rider, that is nothing short of brave and clever.

I'd personally rather train athousand bears to desire to copulate with war horses and sort of just set them loose and laugh from a distance, but that's me, but either way, I do respect the horse stabbing technique also.

[QUOTE=Frostwulf]I also agree with you that he did make a strong case for the wolf warriors, but in EB with no references in battle all you can do is make supposition on their effectiveness. I think it would be fair to assume that the wolf warriors would be a stronger unit then the average tribal unit, but by how much is hard to say.

It's definitely something a historical accuracy mod should heavily debate before releasing, I totally agree there and I'm not quite sure how people on the forum react to things like comparitive historical and cultural study, linguistic study, and experimental archeology, which could all have to be used if you were to sort of scratch out a sort of general idea as to how these warriors fought, what their purpous was and what kind of effect they had on people.

In Late Roman times and Early Medieval times these wolf skin wearing warriors seemed to definitely come over as quite a scary lot, which was probably the whole point in general, but unfortunatly I can't seem to find many contemporary EB period references to how they would fight, I can sort of just assume they would have fought like the army of the dead warriors depicted in EB, basically a shocking warrior type.

If I was to outline a sort of idea as to how I'd assume them to fight however based on what I've read, I would say they should have the capacity to hide in tall grass sort of similar to the Iberians, definitely have an intimidation factor which would make them somewhat tactically ideal for anyone wanting to ambush and scare the pants off (did Romans wear pants?) their enemies.

As for what weapons they would use? I'm really not sure, I can't really see them as a ranged weapon sort, if they sort of emulated the wolf I can see them just charging in very quickly, lightly armored and using perhaps a slashing weapon. Medieval depictions of these warriors show them weilding spears and swords, so really, who knows.

Perhaps its safe to assume that they would just fight like a band of wolves...loyal, swift, vicious and cunning.

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Originally Posted by Frostwulf

And by the way thanks again for mentioning this book in your last post, I doubt I ever would have heard of it if you didn't post about it.

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It's no problem, I sort of assumed it was a fairly rare book when I saw that there were no reviews for it on Amazon.

It was also eye catching because it was somewhat expensive, but really, a look at the free contents made me really want to read it when I saw the words "frightening warriors" and the subsection "ghosts".

The problem is that there isn't much in the way of evidence to support the existence of such a warrior cult within the EB timeframe. Even if the likelihood exists that such men existed as wore animal skins in imitation of wolves and bears it may prove presumptuous to classify them as a warrior caste. We simply do not know enough.

Especially with the potentially inflammatory nature of this type of depiction it's my opinion the EB team should exercise caution and insist on solid information before proceeding with this sort of unit. With such information being currently lacking I'm personally opposed to the fabrication of a unit based *purely* on conjecture.

Besides, i'm sure there are other more evidentially supportable unit suggestions?

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Originally Posted by Lowenklee

The problem is that there isn't much in the way of evidence to support the existence of such a warrior cult within the EB timeframe. Even if the likelihood exists that such men existed as wore animal skins in imitation of wolves and bears it may prove presumptuous to classify them as a warrior caste. We simply do not know enough.

Especially with the potentially inflammatory nature of this type of depiction it's my opinion the EB team should exercise caution and insist on solid information before proceeding with this sort of unit. With such information being currently lacking I'm personally opposed to the fabrication of a unit based on conjecture.

Besides, i'm sure there are other more evidentially supportable unit suggestions?

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Hawk men.

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Originally Posted by the_handsome_viking

Hawk men.

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LOL, guess that beats pheasant men.
I do agree with your responses to my post.I also agree with your view of the German warriors. The Germans did have elites as they were generally a chieftains or nobleman's bodyguard but there would have been others as well.

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Originally Posted by Lowenklee

My point however was that the use of ponies or small horses does not equal inferiority. The small steppe ponies employed by, among others, the Mongols make as good an example as any to illustrate that. Regardless of the merits of larger horses German cavalry are documented as being quite able to successfully engage and route larger numbers of opposing Celtic cavalry, this isn't currently represented, so to refocus on the original issue with the Ridoharjoz...

As currently implemented within the mod, a player may be led to believe that the ancient Germans fielded poor quality cavalry compared to the Celtic light cavalry. If this is not the EB team's position then perhaps something is amiss with unit balance? Even with the inclusion of a Sweboz reform the ability to recruit heavier cavalry does not really address the Ridoharjoz question.

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I still disagree with you on the pony vs. larger horse debate I do completely agree with you on the documentation of the superior German cavalry.

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Originally Posted by blitzkrieg80

The regular Ridoharjoz should not be automatically superior, because the examples of Celtic defeat against German cavalry was not a representation of the Celts during their heyday and the Germans at that time suredly had experienced units on that front rather than conscripts more accurately portrayed by the normal Ridoharjoz.

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Blitz this isn't a hit on you, but it's hard for me to buy this exaggeration. I see others putting forth the same claim that all the Celtic "elites" were wiped out in this civil war. Yet not one has put down any information to confirm this nor any information contrary to these quotes below:

Adrian Goldsworthy"The Roman Army at War 100bc-ad200"-"Before Caesar's arrival in the country, the Gallic states used to fight offensive or defensive wars almost every year (BG6.15). The scale of these conflicts is hard to judge, but it is probable that the aim was the reduction of the enemy to a subject tribe through a moral defeat rather then his destruction. For the nobles, warfare offered the opportunity of wealth, prestige, and reputation to further political aspirations at home.As in Germany, a retinue could only be maintained by actual fighting. The reason given for the migration of the Helvetii, that the geography of their homeland did not allow them full scope for raiding(BG1.1),and the subsequent raids on Rome's allies (BG1.2) reinforces the importance of warfare in Gallic society. Again, both factors are similar to those discussed as encouraging endemic warfare in Germanic culture. This is the customary method of opening hostilities in Gaul. A law common to all the tribe alike requires all adult males to arm and attend the muster, and the last to arrive is cruelly tortured and put to death in the presence of the assembled host." pg56


Simon James "The World of the Celts"-" The complex web of clientage and alliance which Caesar reveals in Gaul was largely based on the outcome of frequent wars. The theater of combat was where many personal and tribal relations were tested, broken and forged. We may suppose conflicts ranged from great wars associated with migrations of whole peoples to mere brigandage, inter-family feuds, and cattle raids by individual warriors seeking quick wealth and prestige. Probably most Celtic warfare was on a small scale, involving no more then a few score men on each side. The population was growing and states were developing in late Iron age Gaul, and this may have led to an increase in the scale of warfare. But it is clear that the vast armies commanded by Vercingetorix and others were assemble only as a response to the great threat from Rome (p.127). In fact, Rome changed the very rules of Celtic warfare, bringing large armies into an area where, internally at least, they may have been much rarer before. Certainly, the Gaul described and conquered by Caesar showed no signs of exhaustion by internal wars-it was a rich and prosperous land-so means were evidently found for limiting the damage war could cause. Caesar says that the Druids were involved in disputes and in the decision to wage war, providing some evidence for the existence of limiting social mechanisms. War did not threaten the fabric of society as a whole, even if the fortunes of the individual clans and tribes did wax and wane. It would be probably also be wrong to think that love of war was confined to the nobility, at the expense of the suffering of a pacifist peasantry: admiration for the warrior ethic appears to have been general, and was not restricted to men either (see box). Violence was endemic, but sufficiently intermittent for most people to get on with their lives successfully most of the time: warlike display was at least as important as actual fighting." pg. 74

The italics in this last quote are what I added from when I posted this on another thread. The bold I added for obvious reasons.

Its one thing for the Celts to be overpowered but now the Germans are being diminished due to this exaggeration. Both of these books are easily accessed through just about any local library.

Does anyone else have a problem with this exaggeration? If there is any information to contradict this please put down the author and book(article etc.). If I'm wrong on this-great, if not-great. The only thing that should matter is getting as close to historical as possible.

I personally don't feel that the Celts are overpowered, they typically seem to have a bit of trouble with the Germans, at least when I play the game, and I typically enjoy fighting ther Germans the most because though different to the Celts they are similar in the sense that they are somewhat heroic for a lack of a better term.

The difficulty with the nature of the Celtic situation was that basically they were a loose patchwork quilt of tribes bound by a similar culture and language which is probably why some people will argue that Celts didn't actually exist at all.

I personally think they did and feel that denying their existance based on a multi ethnic or highly stately nature would be like saying the Romans didn't exist because the republic was made up of a multitude of Italic peoples not just the Latins, and some non-Italic people too, though I'd say these peoples differences were probably more distinct than the differences between the Celtic tribes, but even then the revision process is constantly in progress.

De Bello Gallico is I suppose a good source of information, though I'm not really all that sure if I can trust it, the battles always seem to follow a similar patterm, bascially the Romans encounter a group of Celts, the Celts charge and theres this big fight, and it looks like the Romans are in trouble, then suddenly Julius Caesar does something clever and the Celts rout.

Perhaps thats an oversimplification but I recall a lot of battles in the book that went along those lines, that said, perhaps that is the way it unfolded anyway, Caesar complimented the Celts, I recall the best one being somethin along the lines of "the most innovative people in the world", so obviously there was something he liked about them, and I don't see why a propagandist would want to paint all too nice a picture of his enemies, though perhaps he was setting down the foundations for the idea that these people could become good Romans also, who knows, either way what he does mention is that the most vicious Celtic people were the Belgae, because they were the closest to the Germanic people and fought the Germans on a regular basis and probably came from Germanic stock originally.

Now whether or not this is true, who knows, but his reasoning for many other Celts being softer was more that they had become too civilized, which isn't too far fetched and idea due to the seemingly liberalistic nature of the Celts with their tendnancy towards living in free states.

The Celts were undoubtably the masters of their territory and the replication by others of Celtic weapons does present them as at least a technologically adpet people when it comes to warfare, but as to how good they actually were at fighting? who knows, what we do know is their culture covered a very large amount of territory and really, if you were to view the Celts as a single unit were probably the dominent force in Europe prior to being conquered, so in short, there must have at least at one point been a highly formidible warrior culture in place to have allowed them to hold so much territory and keep it for as long as they did, and the fact that they were still raiding the Italian Peninsula goes to show that there must have been a very expansionist cultural element there.

The question now really is, what made them saps when it came to the Romans? civil war? possibly, being pressed by both Germans and Romans? that could be it, or perhaps it was the simple political fragmented nature of the civilization in general that made them weaker.

In terms of gaming I think the solution would be to have various celtic settlements not being able to initially produce as adept warriors as more eastern and northern cultures to sort of keep in line with the notion that these people had become more business and state orientated than like the more vicious Northern and Eastern Celts.

But in many ways these factors are already in place in the modification anyway.

The Celts seem quite powerful at times in the Mod but really the Germans seem to be explosivly expansionist, which seems quite realistic, they are also bloody good fighters.

Perhaps this is a problem that only EB2 will be able to fully solve.

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Originally Posted by the_handsome_viking

I personally think they did and feel that denying their existance based on a multi ethnic or highly stately nature would be like saying the Romans didn't exist because the republic was made up of a multitude of Italic peoples not just the Latins, and some non-Italic people too, though I'd say these peoples differences were probably more distinct than the differences between the Celtic tribes, but even then the revision process is constantly in progress.

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Thanks for replying, I agree with you exactly for the reasons you state. Yes they constantly fought but they shared the same language and culture.

I answered allot of what you said on this thread https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=83475
The reason it's being posted there is most of your statements are answered in this thread. I also want to keep this mostly with the Germans. I'm trying not to blend the two threads. Go to the last page.

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Originally Posted by the_handsome_viking

The Celts seem quite powerful at times in the Mod but really the Germans seem to be explosivly expansionist, which seems quite realistic, they are also bloody good fighters.

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I agree that the Germans were "bloody good fighters" :beam: I just feel that in comparison to the Celts that is not shown. In general the Romans should be stronger then the Germans and in general the Germans should be stronger then the Celts. Its not that way in EB.

What I'm trying to get at is the Germans consistently beat the Gauls during this period, but with the units the Celts get this wouldn't happen. The Celtic units are much more powerful then the Germanic units because of this exaggeration that the Germans were fighting "weaker" Celts. Not only are the Celtic units more powerful then the Germans they are more powerful then the Roman units. You have several Celtic elite units as powerful or more powerful then the Praetorian guard.
I'll restate that the Germans are being diminished because of this exaggeration.

actually there are Hawk men in EB- Habukoz Swaiut (or however that word of questionable Proto-Germanic origin is spelled [my version is Habukadruhtiz]), of course habuka is not a definitively proven source of the Chauci name, it is very likely and better than nothing ~:)

The Wolves of Wodan should be renamed to "Host" of Wodan (wolves being the wolf-skin concept, completely separate) if it were to stay, but their subjective existence is also not quite justifiable either, besides the general lack of unit space... so don't count on seeing them, especially alongside a berserkr

No worries guys, the great thing about discussion and academia is that one doesn't have to feel personally attacked, because the information should speak for itself. So I agree my argument is pathetically weak for the Celts being overall less than their prime during the Germanic invasions- I don't claim to be an expert ~;p I have not read any argument put forth that they were at their prime then so I still believe that peculiar circumstances were afoot- unfortunately both oral cultures did not bother to mention their own military strength and tradition in relation to generations past concerning that era. I am trying to get Anthony who is an expert to put his 2 bits on that thread, so have patience.

I think the Celts should be stronger than the Romans- they sacked their ass early and kicked it aplenty in comparison to a large-scale lucky conquest by Rome. I think the Germans should be stronger than the Celts and Romans because obviously the Germans formed the real military power in the late Roman era for good reason. It's interesting that the pacification of the Celts is mentioned as being possibly in part from their redirection to business and infrastructure orientation, which sounds exactly like how the Anglo-Saxons handed Celtic Britain it's ass (can't forget the Picts who really caused it to happen). When a civilization doesn't bother protecting itself, like France in WW2, it pathetically gives up without much of a fight. This is no disparage against France- they had more tanks and heavier tanks than the Germans at the time, so they weren't pacifists, but when it came time to fight to the end like they did heroically in WW1, they stopped way short. I don't know why I brought that up, it's totally inappropriate to ancient warfare :wall:

"Germans should be stronger than Celts" is an absurd statement in the context. The former only began making any major inroads against the latter centuries after the starting-date of the mod, as for that matter was the case with the Romans. It should be pretty darn obvious this was due to changing fortunes at the strategic level (such as both the Romans and Germans having gotten sufficiently organized and well armed) and not some "inherent" difference in strenght.
Moreover it contains an element of selling the rightly feared Celtic warrior class rather short.

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Originally Posted by blitzkrieg80

This is no disparage against France- they had more tanks and heavier tanks than the Germans at the time, so they weren't pacifists, but when it came time to fight to the end like they did heroically in WW1, they stopped way short.

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France suffered the highest proportional casualties in WW1 you know. They lost something like one-fifth of an entire generation there. Small wonder they weren't keen on repeating the experience.

And yes, it's very irrelevant to the discussion.

And coming from an equally costly defeat at the Franco-Prussian war, which the idiot Napoleon III instigated.

No offence but Americans are very quick to downplay the French in WW2. Guess it comes from never having to fight a major modern fight on their own soil.

All strategic and tactical blunders aside, having had the mobile crack element of their army cut-off or destroyed and half the country lost, what were they supposed to do? Sedan, Dunkirk and El Alamein are more than enough examples of French bravery in spite of overwhelming odds.

Really...