Quote Originally Posted by Brave Brave Sir Robin View Post
I'll agree on this. The general increase to good stamina for all heavy infantry is really what hurt the Romans most. Prior to that, it was really only elites, Roman legionary units, and a select other few heavy infantries that had good stamina. I suppose in that sense the stamina edits help them more since I've reverted to those stats. That being said, most Roman infantry only has +1 defense skill over hoplite units which means they were equal prior to the shieldwall bonus. True the scutum is cumbersome, but to only have a +1 value over a buckler is silly, is it not? Its very nearly a full body shield, exposing the shins and head only. Plus, armor values on legions really aren't that high. Compare with Theurophoroi for example. The +2 for a pair of greaves more than makes up for the fact that chain mail is rated higher than linothorax. Romans do get good auxiliaries but to compare Roman native heavy infantry currently with Gallic, Iberian, Carthaginian, or Hellenic and you will find the Roman units wanting. I found it odd that Roman cavalry was actually more effective cost-wise than Roman infantry, something that I wanted to change by pricing the cav up slightly (along with a small morale plus) and making the infantry a little better.
What unit are you looking at to say it's only 1 more than a buckler? Remember now that light units got a +1 shield, so if you're looking at Bagaudas, their buckler shield value is actually only 2 even though their shield stat is 3. It was an earlier attempt at making light infantry less useless.

As for the greaves on a Thureophoroi giving them the same armour value as Marians, that's true, but the reasoning being that the legs are more exposed than the chest area due to the shield, as I'm sure you know. This is of course a bit wonky as armour value protects from the back as well, which the greaves do not. Is it possible to put the greaves value on the shield instead, so it works from the front (+1 side) and vs missiles, but not from behind? I don't know, just something that struck me right now. The downside of that would be a less straight-forward stat system, of course, and possibly better defence vs missiles than they should have (from front and/or shield side at least) due to shield-value doubling... Just an un-thought-through idea, 's'all.

That non-Roman heavy infantry is better quality-wise is not wrong either... it's as it should be. They *should* be inferior to Gallic heavy infantry like Neitos, Arjos etc. What they've got is numbers and cost, which means that they can bring twice as many Cohortes Reformata/Imperatora as you can any of those even though they - the cohorts - still have more men individually as well. They were kind of the USSR of antiquity that way...