Elephants?

[alicia]

What is the best way to use Elephants in Battle?
(Not the archery ones)

[master of the puppets]

my personal best way to use elephants all out charge (elephants only) into the enemies center, then as chaos reigns a huge mass of cavalry hits the flank filling in the gaps. i once got a score of i killed 448 julii on corsica without losing a single man. no seriosly not one man even fell on the battle field. it was a sally (sally forth) battle. two units of weak elephants charge out the front gate into the enemy forces plow through there velites hit there center turned them around hit the velites again, turn hit the flank then a force of 3 generals and 2 adidtional cav hit there right killing all the remaining velites who could hurt the elephants. after that its a hunt and slaughter thing easy as pie.

hint never let the elephants stand still always charge, retreat, charge

[aw89]

But if you meet a scipii general called Afrocanis, be wary of the velites!

[master of the puppets]

or you could squish him into toejam
its all good

[katank]

Elephants and chariots are both meant to repeatedly charge through to bust up the enemy formation. Getting either stuck in melee is stupid and will often get them killed. Although animations of eles tossing people in the air is fun, it will get them routed or killed.

Exploit the gaps and disorder with cav or a timely infantry charge. Cavalry works best at the troops that are run over by the elephants are stunned and temporarily unable to respond. While eles by themselves might not kill much, follow up by cav results in massacre and insta rout in most cases.

[Red Harvest]

Haven't experimented much with them in 1.2. They were easy to use before that. Just charge them into the center of the enemy and aim for his general. Bring your cavalry in right behind them, and hit both wings at the same time. (Not the way to do it if you face phalangites, you need to work around the sides of them a bit because elephants have trouble charging a pike wall.) The combination led to a steamroller that rapidly swept the enemy from the field in a chain rout. All those folks saying elephants are not overpowered, have just never faced them when used properly. If the center looks too strong pick a flank with not good counter units, then cut across laterally once you destroy it. Keep the elephants moving and give them some support. That is really all that is required.

I learned this trick from facing the AI when it had the elephants.

[Somebody Else]

Always amuses me when I can pin a line of enemy troops with, say, a phalanx or three, then charge the elephants in from the side. Scatters and crushes most of the pinned enemy troops in just one charge. Then, of course, cavalry can come in and chase down any survivors.

[Sam Adams]

elephants are tanks. Its that simple. Charge them into anything except for the fronts of phalanxes. fire pisses off elephants alot so kill off enemy archers and catapults first. Then kill the general. Then so on and so forth.

[Sam Adams]

and if a unit goes amok you gotta put them down instantly. They will run into and kill all your other elephants if you dont(assuming you have your tanks massed, like guderain says) and cause a mass elephant extinction that will leave you with no army.

btw once one unit has reached its amok threshold its likely they others are close so its time to cut your losses and withdraw... unless youve done something dumb like charge that unit into a line of pikes.

[master of the puppets]

ah how glorios it is to be surrounded by such military adepts. usually i have to deal with my fellow teenagers who can't say pilum correctly and can't find italy on a map.

[Claudius Maniacus Sextus]

i as parthian used elephant + cataphract charge,so you can only imagine the masacre do i realy need to tell more?no i dont,no i dont......

[The Stranger]

and if a unit goes amok you gotta put them down instantly. They will run into and kill all your other elephants if you dont(assuming you have your tanks massed, like guderain says) and cause a mass elephant extinction that will leave you with no army.

btw once one unit has reached its amok threshold its likely they others are close so its time to cut your losses and withdraw... unless youve done something dumb like charge that unit into a line of pikes.

bo dont do it or it has been fixed cause before amok running eles didnt hurt anyone but the enemy

[Red Harvest]

I've run some more tests in custom with armies and I'm finding the elephants many times more likely to run amok than before. (In 1.1 it just wasn't happening to me, or for me.) I had a unit of war elephants run amok when they had rear support and were not facing any fire archers. It was a good size army they faced (2 -light auxilia, 2-auxilia, 2-legionary cohorts, and general), but in 1.1 they would have run back and forth through it easily while my other units caused a chain rout.

I wouldn't put the elephants down unless I absolutely had to. You can still win with them running amok, and they are expensive. If you put 'em down you run the risk of losing them altogether. If they are in the enemy position when they start to run amok they will cause more havoc there than for you. Now if they get into your own army...it's time for the Peanut Lover to go bye-bye.

Faster fatigue may be contributing to the tendency to run amok. Fatigue reduces morale. Before it was time to pull them whenever they reached "winded"...because at "tired" they became very skittish. Right now I may have to try to keep their foray's shorter, doing a single charge through then moving them away swiftly so as not to spend any time in the "winded" state inside an enemy formation.

[The Stranger]

i've saw it happen many times with mine or enemy eles

[m4rt14n]

They are now very frail and fragile... If such can be said of elephants.

My favourite (cheap) tactic was to mass 2 -3 elephants and just rush straight into enemy line followed by horsies then light infantries.

Try that now, and the elephants would lose 3-5 men before routing and running amok.

[pyrocryo]

I usually use elephant as a deal-clincher
usually i put my first line with a small hole in the center where i put my elephants.
send the troops and when they clash, some of the enemy will pour into the gap, trying to flank.
that's when i send my elephant in plus a heavy cav or heavy infantry unit
the effect is that usually two enemy units are calculated to get hammered hard, my infantry can push them back, while my exploitation forces hold the gap and rolled them
oh an the elephant, slow march then charge one part of the enemy line literally breaking them apart
that's when the carnage began