mine go with the order: "LANCE THE BARBARIANS!!"

anyways, I agree with all previous answers about them: guard mode is the only way you can keep the cohesion of the unit in question. prblem is that they sometimes try too hard to stick to formation (I had a phalanx face a carthaginians in an oblique manner-so that only 3 or 4 were actually contacting the enemy-I had to take guard mode off to make them actually face the enemy).