Phalanx mechanics.

[Slug For A Butt]

A phalanx of levies or mercs will take out a decent unit of axeman...obviously. Does anyone know the mechanics , modifiers given to a phalanx when fighting front on? There must be a modifier being in phalanx, as you beat many units simply by being in phalanx, even though their stats are inferior.

[pezhetairoi]

It's the fact that you have multiple rows of weapons, I think... not only that, because they are arranged in rows they can pick upon the same target is the targets gets past the first one. Also, the Spear attribute seems to somehow make it harder to get close to the enemy to attack him. My tests may be flawed one way or another, but I have found that German spear warbands that have been modded to remove their phalanx and to make their attack equal to other warbands have a marginally higher survival rate even when fighting in melee, much less in phalanx. It would appear to me that the only difference between them and Gaulish warbands were their spear attribute.

Technically I cannot comment, but it does seem that the ability to multiple-hit an enemy by presenting a multiple-layer defence of spears helps. That, and the fact that as one spearman dies another comes up to take his place, so by cohesive attrition the phalanx can wear down the enemy while never compromising its layered defence.

[bubbanator]

I believe it is just the fact that the phalanx can hit the enemy unit while they are too far away to use his sword/axe/whatever. I have done no test other than what I have seen in my own battles.

[Kuma]

There must be a modifier being in phalanx, as you beat many units simply by being in phalanx, even though their stats are inferior.

Reach + rank = phalanx phun.

You can watch how it works quite easily. Set up a battle where you're fighting any equal medium/heavy infantry. Then go into standard formation, and let the infantry get *close* but not into contact, then go into phalanx. By the time your spears are down, the infantry is inside the pikes and you're toast.

So it's a bit of both.

[antisocialmunky]

That's the whole point of the phalanx, keep the enemy away from you and kill them if you can.

I don't think that most phalanx armies, fighting each other atleast, usually took more than 5% casualties before one side gave up and ran.

There's the Roman battle vs the Macedonians where the Romans massacred the fleeing Greeks after the phalanx broke and fleed after being flanked.

[Marcellus]

The phalanx wasn't a very good offensive formation - the pike (sarissa) each member of the phalanx used was up to 21 feet long and so very unwieldy and hard to use offensively. However the 'wall' of pikes was very good for defense, as it is very hard to get past. IMO the best use of a phalanx is to fix an enemy in place, not letting them through, and then to attack it with cavalry from the rear or side (sort of like what Alexander the Great did).

This is reflected in the game - phalanxes are very hard to defeat from the front, but can easily be defeated from the side or rear.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

The Phalanx was an offensive tool as well, but most of its power came from the formation, not simply having a longer "pointed stick," though that helped. In muscle powered combat, it is difficult to get your attack past the shields of an enemy formation, but one proven way to attack them was to literally push the other side backwards. By having so many spears so close, a phalanx is better suited to pushing an enemy back and pushing their formation apart. The phalanx is slow, however, and is likely not to be the arm of decision if faster strike elements are present.

Spear wall v spear wall resulted in few casualties during the combat itself, but if a formation broke from the weight of the push, then that formation was at such a disadvantage that they would often run, thus exposing the flanks of other formations and begetting chain reactions. Most casualties in any "civilized" muscle-era battle were perpetrated upon the fleeing or done by protected missile troops against an opponent with no ability to return fire.

Rome never did manage to regularly defeat a phalanx opponent in the open field, but the flexibility of the manipular formation and the use of missile weapons by almost all of the infantry that could render the primary defensive tool (shield) of the hoplite moot allowed them split seams and cause casualties more effectively than any spear opponent.

[pezhetairoi]

The two showcase battles of Phalanx vs Maniple show clearly the inadequacies of the phalanx, and also the inadequacies of the maniple. In Kynoskephalae, the phalanx were attacking from higher up a slope than the Romans, and on the left wing they were in order, pushing the Romans back while the right, which was having some trouble trying to get into formation (the Romans had attacked before they had time to get in order) was barely maintaining position. Eventually the battle was won by the Romans only because some quick-thinking tribune on the right took 20 maniples, marched over to the left, around the phalanx and hit them in rear, turning the Macedonian right flank. No other reason the maniples could have won otherwise.

At Pydna, the Romans and their allies were getting trashed by the massive 50000 man phalanx that Perseus V (I think that was his name) had cobbled together. They were being killed well and good by the phalanx despite the fact that the phalanx right wing had routed under an attack of some Roman-allied elephants. It was only when the phalanx went onto uneven ground that the Romans managed to move into the gaps between the phalanx to get into the phalanx itself and 'return fire', as it were. Hence my pet grouse: RTW doesn't reflect this susceptibility of phalanxes to uneven ground.