Shield Wall

[Shin-GaiJin]

What are the attributes of the special ability 'form shield wall', where to use and when not to use?

Thankyou for your help

ShinGaiJin

[A.Saturnus]

Shield wall improves the defensive ability of an unit but slowes it down. It is quite usefull if you want to defend a position without moving your troops around. Even light spearmen like levies are capable of stopping a cavalry charge when in shield wall formation. Obviously, it's less usefull if you want to attack. However, even then I've used it with levy spearmen.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

If a unit has it use it, put them on guard and shieldwall. It makes a unit vertually inpenatrable from the front.

[econ21]

It seems a tricky formation to master from my limited experience. You have to allow enough time of the unit to settle down, facing the way you want, and you have to make sure you guard the flanks. I tried to use it to block the front of a bridge and my unit got massacred because I left it took late and did not anchor it enough. It's a little too static for my fighting style, I guess. I use the pause alot and micromanage to get good unit match-ups against the AI. The shieldwall and schiltron don't seem well suited for that kind of flexible fighting style.

[Viking]

My shield walls are usually broken, and the units massacred. I might be using it wrong, but for me it looks like a pretty useless formation.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

I use it a lot in my Roman campaign, the Auxilia fight very well but they're quite a high stats unit for spears. Several units together is the way to use it, provided they take the charge square on the front they should hold.

[Celt Centurion]

My shield walls are usually broken, and the units massacred. I might be using it wrong, but for me it looks like a pretty useless formation.

Have you upgraded your units at an Armorer, or better yet, at a foundry? If you have troops out there in a shield wall, but have not upgraded their armor, and the other fellow has brought all of his units recently upgraded from a foundry, then you probably will get massacred.

Check your armor, (or lack of it) go to the nearest settlement where you are equipped to retrain and obtain it, and that will probably help.

I don't know how many times I lost superior number armies against much smaller ones, until I noticed that they had armor, and most of mine didn't.

I hope this helped you Viking.

Strength and Honor

Celt Centurion