Hello:
May I simplify my own experiences into one principle: create "local advantage".
From your post I know you have be doing that, by throwing everything as a bunch. You can win because the AI doesn't do that often. So when you charge everything in, the AI gets outnumbered by you.
What you need is a little refinement of "throwing the bunch". A face-to-face combat is always hard. The TW series stress the value of flanking a lot, which makes it such a revolutionary wonderful game.
The most common practice is: when you see one enemy unit coming angrily at you:
(1) You face it with a defensive "sponge" troop, such as your infantry. If you just leave them there they will probably get wiped out, though. Even better is to send in 2 units of infantry to face one charging foe, at a slightly different angle.
(2) Almost at the same time of the melee starts, you charge in a "shock" troop. That shock troop will first run forward a bit, so by the time the enemy crossed the line of your shock troop, they have their back exposed to you. You know what to do next - charge in and wait for their flag turning white.
Once the routing starts you are not far from victory. Just keep the momentum going, free up your troops and do the same to other charging units.
Some troops have high morale and doesn't rout that easily, for example, general's bodyguard. You might need to have 3, 4... even more units focusing on this single unit, charging from left, right and back, and left, and again right to rout them.
There are also certain types of paper-rock-scissors relationship that will optimize your result.
Enemy use:
Regular spear infantry (triarii, eastern infantry, etc.) -> block it with your short-weapon infantry (they have bonus against spears). Be careful not to charge your cavalry in unless you are certain they will break soon after your charge. Or, they will just turn around and massacre your cavalry.
Phalanx -> the easiest. Don't bother melee. Instead always surround it and shoot it from the sides and back. They are too slow to touch you and will rout before any melee starts.
Missle infantry (pelsates, archers) -> you will need to watch out for those turbo archers (the chosen archers) because they should be treated as melee infantry, too. (So you need to carefully surround them.) For regular lv 1 archers & pelsates, almost anything can massacre them in melee. Just 1 cavalry works well but you might want to pull them out of melee as soon as they get stuck.
Melee Cavalry (incl. general's bodyguards) -> spearman is the best. If you don't have any, then use other infantry plus your own melee cav. is good.
Horse archers -> never chase them because the riders will turn back on the horse and shoot you in the face. Duel it with your own archers and see which side dies more. When they charge in face it with your melee troops.
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I found everytime when I face a large AI army, I suffer from big casaulty if I also extend the melee line as long as the AI's formation. Because by making my lines long, I can't really create a lot of local advantage to rout AI quickly. So I always try to run to one side and cripple the AI army from there. If you have a lot of cavalry (esp. archery) this can be made rather easily. However, if you are slower than the AI army then you will take the passive stance... which is not easy, indeed.
Hope this helps.![]()
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