Should I keep my Triarii and Principes?

[g3n]

Now that the Marius Reforms have occurred, and since I cannot produce Triarii and Principes anymore, should I hold onto the remaining armies I have of those units? I have many armies of Triarii in Greece and in Southern Gaul, and I have many armies of Principes at Carthage and 2 nearby cities next to it. So should I keep them or disband them?

[Mongoose]

Keep them for now. when the units are depleted, disband them and replace them with better troops.

[sapi]

Keep them - they're just as good as the early p-m units.

[Joe_Nvidio828]

yea keep them, send them into battle as you would any other army. and when the units become combat ineffective, very low numbers per unit, just disband them.

alot of times they will last a long time if there expierience is good.

[Mr Frost]

The Triarii are the best anti-cavalry unit the Roman factions can produce . Given that the Auxillia in Vanilla RTW is somewhat [*WARNING , CLICHE APPROACHING , WARNING*] ahistorically weak {not to mention , ahistorically uniform} , it is quite reasonable to keep all your Triarii and susspend your disbelief by thinking of them as a stronger Auxillia type .

[Mahrabals apprentice]

I seperate out the PM units into full experienced units (who, if they are below strength, I fill out with less experienced troops just to give myself full units) and the less experienced 'dreggs'.

The elite go on garrison duty on city I feel are vital to my factions strength (but only a few units do this) and city on my more exciting frontiers to hold the line if my attacking armies suffer a disaster.

The dreggs get treated as a mercenary army, they march to war
Any units that gain the experience to be regarded as elite get brought back and used as stated above, the rest just fight battles after battle till they are annailated.

[Ciaran]

Now that the Marius Reforms have occurred, and since I cannot produce Triarii and Principes anymore, should I hold onto the remaining armies I have of those units? I have many armies of Triarii in Greece and in Southern Gaul, and I have many armies of Principes at Carthage and 2 nearby cities next to it. So should I keep them or disband them?

I would say, keep the Triarii and use up the Principes, you paid for them, but they are no high-priority to preserve, the legions you get after the reform are much better, stat-wise. However, the Auxilia is not a good substitute as an anti-Cavalry troop, so you want to make sure to keep as many Triarii intact as possible. Keep asmany in reserve as you can, if you can build them, use the whole building capacity to train them in one city, they´ll be trained even when the reform took place, as long as they are cued before the reform.

[Craterus]

Definitely keep them, and don't disband. They are useful units. Merge them when they become depleted, and then disband when you can no longer merge.

I think it's stupid how you can't build Pre-M units after the reforms. Can you retrain them after the reforms?

[Taurus]

Keep them. They will be very useful and are just as or nearly as effective as the early Legions. No point just throwing them away also Triarii are a very good anti-cav unit for Rome.

Can you retrain them after the reforms?

Don't think so, but not 100% sure.

[bubbanator]

Don't think so, but not 100% sure.

No, but I wish you could. I doubt it is editable either seeing as how it is tied to the Marius event (which isn't really editable)

[Ragnor_Lodbrok]

The only way is to make them available to build after Marius.

[xemitg]

Only keep the Triarii and replace the Principes as quickly as you can. The new legionary troops make principes look like shat.

[Celt Centurion]

[QUOTE=Craterus]Definitely keep them, and don't disband. They are useful units. Merge them when they become depleted, and then disband when you can no longer merge.

How does one merge the "pre-Marius units? Yes, I can combine 3 understrength units which have numbers to make one, but they still use 3 unit cards. Do you have another way around this?

Strength and Honor

Celt Centurion

[pezhetairoi]

That doesn't make sense.... if you have three understrength units that are enough to merge to make one then they should merge to make one. Hmm. Try different conbinations of merging, sometimes it works that way. If not, get a new computer :)

Keep your old troops. I once asked this question too, and I eventually learnt that you can either a) use the troops and continue an offensive, or b) halt them all at the frontier and use them as limes garrison troops while you build up new armies of post-marians, upon which you trot out the principes and use them as flank guards (or the centre) in battles, depending on your tactical plans, and take out the triarii as anti-cav troops.

[dulsin]

There is a bug in 1.2 where after the reforms when you capture an enemy city if that city qualifies to produce the pre-marious unit it can be retrained.

My last game after Bruti destroyed the Juli we had the reforms. Then I sent my large pre-marious force into Spain. As each city was enslaved I got one or two turns of being able to retrain the units.

[Celt Centurion]

There is a bug in 1.2 where after the reforms when you capture an enemy city if that city qualifies to produce the pre-marious unit it can be retrained.

My last game after Bruti destroyed the Juli we had the reforms. Then I sent my large pre-marious force into Spain. As each city was enslaved I got one or two turns of being able to retrain the units.

I started a new campaign as Julii a few days ago. I am now up to almost 40 territories, and I am still fighting Britons and Spanish with Hastati, Principes, and Triarii, as well as Equites. I have been building newer units, and retraining them with Foundry quality weapons and armour, and then sending them forward to the fringes to fight the murdering barbarians. They really tear them up with the foundry quality equipment, and I merge them as they wear down. I don't know about you folks, but I am not impressed with legion auxillia troops, and it is often a while before the populations are up to being able to build a legion barracks.

Two odd things this time though. One of them is that nearly two generations after the Marius Reforms, The Senate is STILL rewarding me with Triarii for finishing the missions, but I don't think that will go much longer. The last few missions have all offered threats rather than rewards, and the People are encouraging me to take over Rome.

The other odd thing is that the Senate asked me to blockade a Brutii port. I wondered, "Are we in Civil War now?" I looked, and they were still "Ally." Although I had a small fleet right beside that port, I held off, and the next turn got a message telling me not to do it, but there was a Greek fleet blockading the port by then. I was tempted to attack the Greek fleet, but being the nice guy I am, didn't.

I expect the Civil War to start at any turn now, and have made my settlements bordering SPQR and Brutii extremely strong.

My many thanks to the person who taught me about "drag and drop" to merge the depleted units. It is allowing me to keep units going like the Energizer Bunny. Pre-Marius and Mercenary units just keep on going and going and going, allowing me to defend the settlements I take while I get the buildings I need to train the better troops.

I was in a large city two nights ago, and asked about BI. The fellow there said about two weeks from now, about 28 September.

Strength and Honor

Celt Centurion

[econ21]

In TW SP, the real cost of a unit is its upkeep - not its purchase price. That strengthens the argument for getting rid of obsolete units. However, pre-Marian units will do fine against most factions that don't have post-Marian units so maybe shunt them to another front. The economic situation is not usually so tight that you can't afford to retain your pre-Marian army.

But if you are going to fight a powerful Roman faction that also has post-Marian units, you don't want hastati and principes in your frontline stacks. I had a rude shock when I first tried that and was amazed at how outclassed my hitherto unbeatable Romans were when facing even early Roman cohorts.

Triari are ok as superior anti-cav units, but I am not sure spears are that worth it in vanilla RTW. They are rather slow to intercept AI cavalry - you'd be better off using your own heavy cavalry - and if you have to take a cavalry charge, I imagine cohorts would fare about as well as triari (especially if stationary with fire at will on).

[zukenft]

There's a reason why Roman Legionary is considered the best heavy infantry of its time: it's because they are versatile. they can fare well against other infantry, phalanx, even cavalry...
So my choice is no. A valour 1 or 2 Early Legion will defend against cavalry as well as a Triarii. (you could keep the Triarii until you have some experienced Legionaries, though)

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Personnally I'm trying to avoid the Marian reforms, since they suck in this game.

[econ21]

Personnally I'm trying to avoid the Marian reforms, since they suck in this game.

Why don't you like the Marian reforms?

[Nelson]

I thought the Marian Reforms were rather well done. Most games would have given us one set of Romans and left it at that.

Including the reforms is one decision that was clearly not geared toward the casual gamer to the detriment of accuracy. History was well served in this regard.

[econ21]

I thought the Marian Reforms were rather well done.

I agree - I think the Romans in vanilla are rather historical (they are one faction whose units do not change much in RTR and probably even EB).

And in terms of gameplay, the many upgrades (hastati=>principes=>triari=>early cohort=>cohort=> urban cohort) provide a nice hook to keep you motivated.

You certainly can't complain about the Marian reforms being underpowered - yes, auxiliary spears are weaker than triarii but that is more than compensated by the superiority of cohorts over principes.

In fact, from a historical point of view, I can't help feeling this is overstated. IIRC, it seemed to be driven largely by the armour stat and it's not clear to me from eye-balling the units that cohorts are so much better armoured than principes. The game treats it as if it were a chain=>plate kind of transition as in MTW. But all the heavy infantry seems to have a big shield, a helmet and decent torso protection but little else (ie exposed limbs).

[melvinio]

Two words: cannon fodder

Okay, maybe arrow fodder.

Or even kebabs?

No man can concentrate on battle with a doner in his hand.

[Garvanko]

Marian reforms are simply upgrades. Aand they are absolutley necessary.

[Geoffrey S]

I tend to set them in large armies once I've trained a decent amount of post-Marian legions, and send them to wipe out a couple of large (non Roman) enemy armies; they can take a beating, and when the army is no longer combat effective they get disbanded. Harsh, but useful.

[Ciaran]

Marian reforms are simply upgrades. Aand they are absolutley necessary.

Though I would personally prefer if the Romans had an even harder time before the reform. But then again, if they´re played by AI, they´d get swept away even easier than they are right now.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

I thought the Marian Reforms were rather well done. Most games would have given us one set of Romans and left it at that.

Including the reforms is one decision that was clearly not geared toward the casual gamer to the detriment of accuracy. History was well served in this regard.

The Marian reforms are totally unrealistic in RTW.

Marius did the following:

1. Eliminated the Triarii, Hastartii and velites, abolishing the class system and opening the Legions to all citizens.

2. Made the Legionary carry all his own personnal gear, hence "Marius' Mules"

3. (Maybe) had the Scutum (shield) clipped top and bottom to make it lighter so that it could be carried all day on the march.

4. Made the state supply equipment to those who could not afford it.

5. Reorganised the the Legion and cut the organic cavalry to 120, effectivly eliminating them as a battlefield force.

Thats it. The game goes up to 9AD, at that time the Legions were still all wearing chainmail, they had "clipped" scutums, not rectangular ones and were still mostly using Itallic helmets and Mainz style Gladii.

The Imperial Gallic Helmets, laminated currais, and Pompeii style Gladius along with the rectangluar shield did not appear for another ten to fifteen years at least.

The only new unit after the Marian reforms should be the Early Cohort and it should appear 100BC earliest.

What CA have done is give you the 100AD Roman arsenal a hundred years early.

Rant over.

[econ21]

OK, I understand your objection now. I guess you've tried RTR? It avoids the historical offences most likely to induce rants. But on the other hand, you never see the Marian reforms as Romans (you win before that). I'm not sure how EB is going to handle this. They are doubling the turns (by having 4 seasons), so if it's going to be hard to be "realistic" and still give us the Imperial stuff they've showcased.

Personally, I don't want to play the whole campaign with just pre-Marian units - I want my shiny toys - and I don't want to have to play 400 turns to get them.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

No, I haven't tried RTR. Sorry about the rant but the Roman Army is my "thing."

Sorry abou the rant but while I'm ranting I should point out that ALL the pre-Marian units should have black and purple feather crests on their helms, horsehair came later.

[econ21]

No, I haven't tried RTR.

Then I advice you to RUN, don't walk, to their website and download the mod[1]. It is amazing. They roll the gameplay back to MTW standards (ie slower, more deliberate battles) and do a great job of improving the historical accuracy of the units.

If the Roman army is your thing, you may particularly like the Roman campaign in RTR. They start out small: one faction, only three starting cities, no Senate and Pyrrhus' army banging on your backdoor. It will be too easy if you get too many Roman or ranged units, so I'd recommend you have half your stacks composed of allies or auxiliaries. I had to restart my campaign as it got too easy until I came across this house rule and then it was a blast.

[1] http://www.rometotalrealism.org