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Thread: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

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  1. #1
    Member Member cunctator's Avatar
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    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    Real legionnaires could use their pila like a thrusting spear to fight cavalry. In RTW they can`t do this and have to use the gladius. Giving them a penalty only because of the limits of the game would do no good job to represent their real capabilities.

    Arrian describes roman anti cavalry tactics in his Array against the Alans.
    http://members.tripod.com/~S_van_Dor...s/ektaxis.html

    And i don`t think that legionnaires or heavy infantry in general should be more vulnerable against cavalry. It was almost impossible to break an intact heavy iinfantry formation just with cavalry, without weakening it with other troops before.

  2. #2

    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    I doubt the pilum would have been especially effective, considering its purposeful design to have a weak neck, bending or breaking upon impact.

  3. #3

    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    Well, they did apparently use them that way, so it might have worked.

    Anyway, Roman legionaries weren't that vulnerable to cavalry. There are quite some example of legionaries taking on and trouncing Cataphracts in a head-on encounter. It's when the cavalry get's around the legion's flanks they're in deep trouble. (just like every other type of infantry.) So giving Romans a penalty verus cavalry does not seem all that appropriate to me.

  4. #4
    Spends his time on TWC Member Simetrical's Avatar
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    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    Quote Originally Posted by meatwad
    Speaking of gladii, have the EB people fixed the animation with the slashing gladius? I mean, no legionary would fight like that- they were stabbing machines.
    Quote Originally Posted by Polybius, Histories, book 18, chapter 30
    Now in the case of the Romans also each soldier with his arms occupies a space of three feet in breadth, but as in their mode of fighting each man must move separately, as he has to cover his person with his long shield, turning to meet each expected blow, and as he uses his sword both for cutting and thrusting it is obvious that a looser order is required . . .
    -Simetrical
    Last edited by Simetrical; 04-26-2005 at 22:44.
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    Probably Drunk Member Reverend Joe's Avatar
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    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    "Originally Posted by Polybius, Histories, book 18, chapter 30
    Now in the case of the Romans also each soldier with his arms occupies a space of three feet in breadth, but as in their mode of fighting each man must move separately, as he has to cover his person with his long shield, turning to meet each expected blow, and as he uses his sword both for cutting and thrusting it is obvious that a looser order is required . . ."

    Oh. Well, thanks.

  6. #6
    EB Member... sort of Member Proper Gander's Avatar
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    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    putting all the historical talk aside and going back to the original posters suggestion.

    i'm not quite sure it is such a good idea to give the legionaries the "axe" attribute for their gladii.
    the axe-attribute basically gives the unit an armour piercing ability. so it would most likely be unbalancing toward's heavy elite infantry.

  7. #7

    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    AP is separate from the axe attribute, read the files dude...
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  8. #8

    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    Quote Originally Posted by NeonGod
    I doubt the pilum would have been especially effective, considering its purposeful design to have a weak neck, bending or breaking upon impact.
    This is true, but in use against cavalry you don't actually have to thrust with the spear - so long as you have a sufficient wall of spears presented to the enemy, no horse will charge it. The horse, after all, doesn't know that pilums are weak. Once the momentum is broken, you can close on the cavalry with your swords.

  9. #9

    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    Quote Originally Posted by Spongly
    This is true, but in use against cavalry you don't actually have to thrust with the spear - so long as you have a sufficient wall of spears presented to the enemy, no horse will charge it. The horse, after all, doesn't know that pilums are weak. Once the momentum is broken, you can close on the cavalry with your swords.
    True, but I present that a sword is a less effective weapon than a spear when fighting cavalry, even when the horseman is at a standstill. Better to kill the soldier or horse from a distance.

    I guess the pilum would have been marginally effective...for the first stab. It's better than no spear at all.

  10. #10
    Spends his time on TWC Member Simetrical's Avatar
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    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    It's just as good as a regular spear for a wall of spears. I saw a photo of a spear-wall formation by some reenactors—the first rank crouched, pila forward between shields, butt planted in the ground, the second rank standing with pilum poised to throw. No horse would charge that without lots of training that nobody bothered to give them. Horses were expensive, anyway, not the sort of thing you'd want to throw away like that. Of course, lancers could charge in relative safety if their lances were longer than the pila, as many doubtless were.

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  11. #11
    Member Member Dromikaites's Avatar
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    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    Quote Originally Posted by NeonGod
    I doubt the pilum would have been especially effective, considering its purposeful design to have a weak neck, bending or breaking upon impact.
    It didn't matter it the neck was soft or not. A stick would do to scare the horse. I was surprised to read this first in a book about infantry tactics in 18th century, especially since I knew that pikes were the "cure" for heavy cavalry's charges. Then I've read something similar about the napoleonic wars. I think it was in Clausewitz's manual for the Prussian crown prince (not in his more famous work "About War"). Then I found out that knights were charging mostly...other knights. Knights were charging infantry head-on only after the cohesion of the enemy units was severely disrupted. The main purpose of such a charge was not to break the infantry ranks by means of the shock. Contrary to what we have seen in the movies or in the TW games series, the purpose of such a charge was to destroy whatever morale was left in the battered infantry, making them to break ranks and run away at the sight of the steel wave comming towards them.

    The pikes were also mainly used against infantry, like the phalanx. The role of the pike against cavalry was mainly psychological: the horse has a mind of its own and won't charge against something looking so dangerous. Besides, even barded horses won't chage into a wall of pikes/spears/sticks ;-) because the normal horse is not that smart to understand the role of the armour it is wearing.

    Now, back to the topic of this thread, I think it is not possible to change the parameters in export_descr_unit.text in any meaningful way in order to have 2 types of defence (not 2 types of attack - this was already done by the mount_effect): one against infantry and one against cavalry.

  12. #12
    graduated non-expert Member jerby's Avatar
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    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    well, i think that the pilum would have bene effective against ( non-cataphract) cav.
    indeed the shaft would bend , but only when (much) force is aplied. but the tip of the spear is so thin. that it will not get much resistance when entering the horses body. so the pilum would (i gues/hope) bend After it entered the body.

  13. #13

    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    Quote Originally Posted by Dromikaites
    The pikes were also mainly used against infantry, like the phalanx. The role of the pike against cavalry was mainly psychological: the horse has a mind of its own and won't charge against something looking so dangerous. Besides, even barded horses won't chage into a wall of pikes/spears/sticks ;-) because the normal horse is not that smart to understand the role of the armour it is wearing.
    A properly trained warhorse would probably have a little more composure and would be able to be forced into charging a stick. Indeed, the pilum is effective enough for creating the "spear wall"; I've admitted that much. My point is that anyone with enough gusto to pull off a charge against the pila would find it paid off better than expected.

  14. #14
    graduated non-expert Member jerby's Avatar
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    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    I was guestimating before, but this is just plain old guessing adn assuming

  15. #15

    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    Quote Originally Posted by jerby
    I was guestimating before, but this is just plain old guessing adn assuming
    Assumptions based on facts. Maybe we should have a test?

  16. #16
    graduated non-expert Member jerby's Avatar
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    Default Re: "Axe" attribute for Legionnaires

    well, sorry for not elaborating. but i thoughyt the "anyone gutsy enough to charge a pilum-wall will find it paying off" was a wild guess.
    was there a test? or shoudl I bring teh horse and wil you fix up a pila-wall :D ^^

    btw, thnx for not taking my post offensively. i dont speek english well enough to give emotion to my words. and sometimes i might offend people were i didn't want to

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