Phalanx rank depth and horse acrobatics

[Puzz3D]

The primary/secondary weapon fix has made the phalanx weaker to cav because their secondary weapon is weaker, and the cav forces the pikemen to switch to the secondary weapon by jumping onto the front row of pikes and into the phalanx.

[Sid_Quibley]

There is an in depth disscussion on spears here.

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showt...t=39916&page=1

And also details of a file that remove the horse jump anim.

A new version of cav fix(compatible with 1.2 patch) is linked by Simetrical on page four.

[MacBeth]

IMHO three ranks deep is pretty thin against horsies

[The_Emperor]

You need at least Four ranks deep when facing cavalry.

As a general rule I also sugguest you place another Phalanx behind your frontal one... That way should any horses manage to push through the first they will have to contend with another one behind.

Sometimes the first Phalanx suffers badly in the initial charge, but on those occasions they act as a speedbump to slow the enemy down for the second Phalanx who pretty much always hold.

Its a standard tactic for me whenever I do city fights.

[Puzz3D]

So you need two phalanx units to stop one cavalry unit from the front.

[Louis de la Ferte Ste Colombe]

I'd say you need a 5/6 rank deep phalanx unit to stop a cavalry unit from the front. 3 is definitly not enough.

Louis,

[The_Emperor]

So you need two phalanx units to stop one cavalry unit from the front.

Not really as I say the second one is there only in case the first one fails... Very often the first Phalanx can hold up an entire army in a tight city street!

The cavalry units that are most likely to get through are the Generals with their bonus hitpoints, should they impact with a hefty charge they will suffer, but they can disrupt the Phalanx formation enough for other units to exploit and collapse it...

The other thing about a Hoplite Phalanx is the more ranks you have the more vulnerable you are to the natural 'wrap-around' flanking of enemy units.

As i say the second unit is a precaution, because there is always the chance the enemy might overpower the frontal Phalanx.

[Puzz3D]

Phalanx looses to cavalry frontally even when 8 deep. Take a 54 man Cataphract and charge a 121 man Silver Shield Pikeman. The Catapharct will wipeout the phalanx, and only loose 20 men. I've done this test in custom battle on medium difficulty and in multiplayer with the same result.

[The Stranger]

no they won't, 108 cataphracts vs 160 libian spearmen
result cATAPphracts rout and killed 78 men and lost 89