The very useful(cough cough)schiltrom replacement

**Somebody Else** · 11-22-2005, 18:19

Inverse cantabrian circle's always a good one... horse archers riding 'round and 'round the enemy.

(I think they call this the 'circle of death' in Mechwarrior)

I also like making a 'big fat wedge' with a whole heck of a lot of cavalry and busting straight through the centre of an enemy line to their general. With mine in the lead, of course.

**Kraxis** · 11-22-2005, 19:37

By virtue of enemy attacks I was actually slowly forced into a similar formation, but that was unintentional.

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=54780

**Viking** · 11-22-2005, 19:40

Originally Posted by Ragnor_Lodbrok

The Roman losses were aprox. 1000 and mine were also 1000.
Have you created other weird replacement for formations?

It was some nasty casualties you got there, looks like regular phalanx formation works out much better somehow.

Haven`t created any weird formations, but I use to line up my phalanxes such that they slightly overlap, leaving no gap for the enemy to break through, and presenting a solid wall of spears.

**Kekvit Irae** · 11-22-2005, 20:06

Originally Posted by Somebody Else

(I think they call this the 'circle of death' in Mechwarrior)

Ahhh... good old circle strafing...

And on the same note, I wish there was a button for the unit to automatically perform the circle of death using HA in RTW instead of the cantabrian circle.

**dismal** · 11-22-2005, 20:32

I think a lot of us use that formation (or used since the phalanx is not much of a factor in BI. There was a thread about it a while back.

Ideally you really need 4 or so archer units to put in the middle. This keeps the romans from peppering you with ranged units.

It also works better if you find a small round hill that does not give them the option to attack from above you.

Inverse cantabrian circle's always a good one... horse archers riding 'round and 'round the enemy.

What I like to do is send 2 units of HA's to the right (or left) flank of the formation. One stays goes to the back at a about a 45 degrees angle to the right side, the other stays in front at about a 45 degree angle. Usually, the defending unit leaves formation and starts chasing after one of the units of HA. At that point you slip the other on in behind it. It's actually rather sad when the unit of infantry realizes it can't catch either unit of HA and can't avoid being shot in the back. They stop running and wait to die.

**Dutch_guy** · 11-22-2005, 21:39

it's a good formation, but you do need high morale units, or else a unit routs and the formation get's disrupted, causing the other units to suffer morale loss- and rout.

Still, I don't use this formation to often, seems like giving the AI even less chance than it has already.

**LordKhaine** · 11-22-2005, 23:01

Works better if you do it against the side or corner of a map, and have archers and perhaps an onager unit. And a couple of cavalry units to mop up the routing enemy..

Not that I use such rather cheap tactics often.. *whistles*

**pezhetairoi** · 11-25-2005, 06:57

I use them all the time with the Germans. Massed cavalry in the middle, phalanx ring on the three sides (front facing the enemy and the flanks of that face) and archers dispersed throughout the space. If I have enough spears I cover the fourth side, else I just throw whatever other infantry I have there.

Not a single unit has ever broken before, and never has any unit suffered more than 40 out of 240 dead, even when practically the entire enemy army is piling itself on it, even when I never had archers. Usually the massed cavalry charge through the phalanx when the first units start wavering is enough to set the entire army running. Roman ranged units usually never manage to do me any damage because they usually have time for one salvo, then the heavy infantry are upon me and the scripting automatically stops the ranged attacks for fear of FF.

But this formation is spectacularly useless against phalanx attack. I was doing Germans vs Greek with this formation, and I went off for a cup of tea while the enemy hoplites and militia hoplites shattered themselves on me. I came back to find that the front-facing spear warband had only 80 men left (holy shit) and falling fast, and the others were all in various stages of being mauled. My cavalry had to save the day by charging straight into the weakest militia unit to break it and force a gap to outflank the others. This was without archers, see.