I was talking about the ones Pahlava gets, which I understand seem to be the generic Persian Hoplites with those short sword lethalities.

It gets awfully boring killing fullstacks with only horse archers and cataphracts, and throwing in an incredibly weak line helps spices up things quite a bit, especially since it is subject to crumbling instantly versus a heavy cavalry charge. Makes it even more fun and challenging because the East is absolutely saturated with Heavy Cav.....and the occasional elephant!