Shuffling Hoplite problem....

[Mikeus Caesar]

...i know many people have adressed this in the past, about how the hoplites shuffle to the right when fighting, but recently on my game this was taken too far: I had let syracuse rebel so i could exterminate the population, i set my spartans on some militia hoplites, i come back a minute later and.....there's about 100 meters between them. They had a large gap in between them, and they were poking thin air.

[Krusader]

That is an annyoing bug/feature.

I decided to test a unit of Silver Shield Pikemen VS Sacred Band Infantry, and they ended up with a big gap...

Some unknown rule of phalanx warfare?

[Ldvs]

Yes this was reported at the very beginning. I encountered it though not to that extent.

[Didz]

I suspect that this is the result of some amazing historical research which proves that in battle the hoplites constant pressure to dress right and close the gaps in their ranks caused the entire unit to drift right during battle.

I first noticed it during a bridge battle where my Nubian spearmen began to shuffle right and expose the bridge threshold. The trick is not to try and correct the movement otherwise you disrupt unit cohesion.

I just move a reserve phalanx into the gap and let the Nubians shuffle themselves out of action.

[Zorn]

It would make at least a little sense if the phalanx would bend and wrap itself around the enemy unit if it reaches its left end. That way they could attack the enemies left flank. It exposes their own flank too, however, so it won`t help that much.
But since the frontline remains completely straight, the whole manouver is just retarded. I have lost cities because my hoplites, that were perfectly aligned to hold a crucial road push themself against a wall to their right, thus creating a gaping hole to their left in wich countless enemies flood which then quickliy surround and destroy my foolish phalanx.

I would be very very glad if this "feature" would be removed.

[Zorn]

It would make at least a little sense if the phalanx would bend and wrap itself around the enemy unit if it reaches its left end. That way they could attack the enemies left flank. It exposes their own flank too, however, so it won`t help that much.
But since the frontline remains completely straight, the whole manouver is just retarded. I have lost cities because my hoplites, that were perfectly aligned to hold a crucial road push themself against a wall to their right, thus creating a gaping hole to their left in wich countless enemies flood which then quickliy surround and destroy my foolish phalanx.

I would be very very glad if this "feature" would be removed.

[hoof]

It's actually quite simple.

Phalanx units start out in "guard" mode, and "guard" mode forces the unit to maintain facing. This is designed so that you can maintain a spear wall among multiple units without fear of a unit rotating during combat and exposing it's flank (turning sideways to the intended multi-unit spearwall).

The solution is to turn "guard" mode off. The units will still shuffle right, but they will automatically rotate their unit to keep the enemy in the middle of the wall of spears. They do this without doing the "raise pikes, turn, lower" technique too. As an extra bonus, they will actually close range with the enemy rather than simply keeping them at spearpoint, which dramatically increases their killing power.

One of the problems with spearmen in MTW was that unless a unit attacked them square-on, they would rotate as a unit to face the enemy, exposing their flanks. "Guard" mode fixes this problem, at the expense of the problem mentioned by the poster. I suspect that "Guard" mode was put on by default so that those unfamiliar with the guard mode capabilities wouldn't get frustrated when setting up phalanx spearwalls with phalanxes that rotate and expose their line when the player wanted the spearwall to keep a particular direction.