Hoplitai too weak ?

[Watchman]

From what I gather hoplite phalanxes didn't do all that well against the Celtic approach to offensive infantry combat, you know...
The Romans could probably tell you a bit about that.

[Satyros]

Well , my point isn't exactly that the hoplite phalanx should beat any and all infantry formations just that we don't get to see them push much as already mentioned earlier .

If enveloped , they would be cut down I suppose , since they would have to use shortswords against ferocious longsword wielding Celts .

Satyros

[Watchman]

*shrug* As mentioned, their soldier-mass values are relatively high plus then there's the "push effect" of the light_spear weapon attribute. I'd also remind you that AFAIK back during the Persian Wars the hoplites in practice had to "push" into the Persian infantry arrays by the crude expedient of killing their way through...

The "pushing match" of hoplite clashes came really more from the same reason as in all shieldwall clashes - the relative difficulty of meaningfully hurting foemen protected by overlapping shields. Ergo it became rather important to try to distrupt their mutually supporting formation by physically forcing it apart, something easiest and safest accomplished by putting the weight of several ranks behind the front-rankers shields and pushing...

[Watchman]

ANY infantry - or for that matter cavalry - that get "crushed" too closely together (ie. to the point where they can no longer wield their weapons effectively) become little more than sitting ducks, irrespective of who exactly does the pressing and what against. Heavier equipement just makes them more troublesome and difficult to kill, whereas lightly armed men can be massacred with relative ease - no need to hack and stab through body armour, no ?

[Maion Maroneios]

Does the shieldwall ability enables them to charge as a solid unit , or are the disruptions in unit cohesion some kind of bug in the RTW engine ?

I would suppose that you use the shieldwall offensively and the guard button ( just stating the obvious here ) defensively . Am I right ?

Satyros

Yes, they charge as a solid unit as far as I remember. I don't use it very often, only during sieges to protect narrow passages, or when I want to attack an enemy formation. And even then, I prefer guard mode because your men tire much slower.

ANY infantry - or for that matter cavalry - that get "crushed" too closely together (ie. to the point where they can no longer wield their weapons effectively) become little more than sitting ducks, irrespective of who exactly does the pressing and what against. Heavier equipement just makes them more troublesome and difficult to kill, whereas lightly armed men can be massacred with relative ease - no need to hack and stab through body armour, no ?

Yes, I was just giving emphasis about Hoplites.

Maion

[Watchman]

Yes, they charge as a solid unit as far as I remember.

My memory seems to speak of an annoying tendency for the first row to charge alone and the rest of the unit to snail-pace into the combat over the next half a minute or so using the careful "combat stalk" animation, though...

Although granted, that's a reasonably commonly occurring flaw in the engine AFAIK.

[tls5669]

Well , my point isn't exactly that the hoplite phalanx should beat any and all infantry formations just that we don't get to see them push much as already mentioned earlier .

If enveloped , they would be cut down I suppose , since they would have to use shortswords against ferocious longsword wielding Celts .

Satyros

Thats why I love the Massilian Hoplite.

[Maion Maroneios]

Indeed, but not man-to-man. It was rather against the flexibility of offensive infantry combat that they lost to, I believe. When a hoplite formation with some serious amount of body armour gets surrounded, their armour becomes a deathtrap. Same happaned during the battle of Cannae, were the Romaioi were promptly surrounded and butchered by the thousands. Closely packed heavy infantry formations, especially disciplined ones, had the tendency to be very vulrenable when outflanked and surrounded.

Maion

[Satyros]

Indeed, the "pushing" effect cannot be achieved with EB's "pseudoshieldwall". The real shieldwall now, that gives the desired effect but comes with other disadvatages and bonuses that were not taken in mind by the EB team, thus overpowering units with the shieldwall. At least that is what many members say, I personally make use of both shieldwall and guard mode depending on the situation (I play on BI executable).

Maion

Does the shieldwall ability enables them to charge as a solid unit , or are the disruptions in unit cohesion some kind of bug in the RTW engine ?

I would suppose that you use the shieldwall offensively and the guard button ( just stating the obvious here ) defensively . Am I right ?

Satyros