Javelin's and their effectiveness

[QwertyMIDX]

Likely more than 3/4 miss. Even with 7.5 per legionarie most if not all would hit the shield for the average legionarie, which is why if you can hit them from behind or the non-shield flank you'll do much better.

[fallen851]

Likely more than 3/4 miss. Even with 7.5 per legionarie most if not all would hit the shield for the average legionarie, which is why if you can hit them from behind or the non-shield flank you'll do much better.

Likely more than 3/4 miss? Hmm, if I was a trained archer, I'd hope at least 1 in 4 of my arrows would hit a mass of 80 men (or more) packed together...

Otherwise I should be put in the unit of peasant...

Ok so if 5/6th of the arrows miss, there is still 5 arrows going into each legionnarie... 400 arrows on target if they have 30 ammo...

How many of those will land short and slice through a knee and break up the formation? How many will skid off the shield into another guys face? How many will go directly through the shield and into a fist? How many would hit someone with such power as to knock them over, and breaking up their defense and other mens defence...

With 2400 arrows fired and 400 on target (which wouldn't exactly be a unit of "dead-eyes") I'd imagine that 1/3 to half of the unit of legionnaries would go down...

Slingers would do even better, their stones would richochet (spelling?) off shields and armor into unprotected flesh, shatter into tiny bits on shields that would sent splinters of rock up that would blind people...

Ranged units should make a big mess.

I'll be editing to make 80 archers kill 2 legionnaries per 80 arrows, slingers kill 1 per 80 stones, and javelin troops kill 7 per 80 javelins. Ammo will be reduced (who brings 40 arrows to a battle, you know how many that is!)

[QwertyMIDX]

It sounds nice and logical, but sources say that ranged weapons weren't that effective against well armored units, especially ones with large shields. If you want to ignore that, fine and well, but I'd perfer not too. Missile weapons, especially in the west, seemed to be more a weapon of harasment rather than one of killing.

Also, 400 on target, the vast majority of which hit the shield and do no damage. Further, most of those that hit something other than the shield would either be stopped by the armor, or cause only minor wounds.

[fallen851]

I think logic can easily explain why units were used in a harrassment role, they didn't have very much ammo.

When archers did have ammo, they were incredibly effective, at the battle of Carrhae, Persian archers firing from horseback with a basically infinite supply of arrows from a nearby baggage train put down 20,000 Romans, mostly with arrows... To be fair many were killed in the frantic retreat, but obviously arrows were effective enough to get them to route Roman Legionnaries, despite them being in a testudo. The fact is they were being killed at a fast rate.

I would think archers wouldn't be so effective because they didn't bring so many arrows to the battle, not because their arrows were ineffective. I don't think that even the most prepared archer brought anymore than 20 arrows... probably around 10-12 for most. And if 3/4 miss, that is only 4 arrows on target. So 2 archers put 8 arrows down on target, and I'd like to think one would kill.

I don't think single units took 2400 arrows either back then... but you can do it in RTW...

Anyway, this is obviously unforunately a matter of opinion, whether you choose to believe logic, or ancient texts (just be careful with some of them like the Bible!), is up to you.

Either way, if EB is ported to 1.5, how are you planning to deal with the archer bug? I should hope you'll develop it so archers shoot at heavily armored unit...

[QwertyMIDX]

They kept them out of testudo with heavy cavalry charges, it only worked because of the effectives of combined arms.

Western archers almost all carried 15 arrows into battle.

[fallen851]

They kept them out of testudo with heavy cavalry charges, it only worked because of the effectives of combined arms.

Western archers almost all carried 15 arrows into battle.

Ok if we continue this back and forth between the two threads we'll be up all night.

I'm just curious how you plan to deal with the archer bug in 1.5 if EB is going to be ported?

[QwertyMIDX]

Not sure yet, I'm doing my best to work around it, but in the end I feel like it's a less crippling bug than the load/save bug.

[Kralizec]

I think logic can easily explain why units were used in a harrassment role, they didn't have very much ammo.

When archers did have ammo, they were incredibly effective, at the battle of Carrhae, Persian archers firing from horseback with a basically infinite supply of arrows from a nearby baggage train put down 20,000 Romans, mostly with arrows... To be fair many were killed in the frantic retreat, but obviously arrows were effective enough to get them to route Roman Legionnaries, despite them being in a testudo. The fact is they were being killed at a fast rate.

I would think archers wouldn't be so effective because they didn't bring so many arrows to the battle, not because their arrows were ineffective. I don't think that even the most prepared archer brought anymore than 20 arrows... probably around 10-12 for most. And if 3/4 miss, that is only 4 arrows on target. So 2 archers put 8 arrows down on target, and I'd like to think one would kill.

A bit late, but I feel compelled to respond to this. I don't mean to crack you down, but this is a blatant inaccurate portrayal of facts.

Carrhae took days, not hours. As you said the horse archers (wich weren't drawn from Persians, correct me if I'm wrong) were so effective because they had an unlimited supply train of arrows. If you play EB or especially vanilla RTW with limited ammo off, it's easy to score a victory with negligable losses. That is, unless the Roman player is smart and brings in a good number of slingers and auxiliary archers, wich is exactly what the Romans did afterwards and enabled them to put up more of a fight against the Parthians in later battles.
A lorica hamata coupled with a scutum offers excellent protection against arrows, and when in a testudo formation legionaires would be nigh invulnerable to archers. The Parthian general realised this and charged with his cataphracts or just feigned charges, so to force the Romans to break up their testudo because it's a specialised formation that's no good in close combat, let alone warding off cavalry charges. The continuing cycle of charges of heavy cavalry, followed by massive barrages of arrows, proved exhausting to the Roman infantry and destroyed their morale.
I'm not entirely sure what happened after that, I think Crassus accepted a Parthian invitation to negotiate, but it was a trap...the Romans later tried to escape but were rolled over by the Parthian cavalry.

Crassus was a fool trying to fight an enemy that prefers horse archers with an army consisting almost entirely out of heavy infantry. The Armenian king actually tried to warn him I believe, but he ignored his advice. Horse archers are not an invincible force, but you have to bring along the right tools to fight them.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

A bit late, but I feel compelled to respond to this. I don't mean to crack you down, but this is a blatant inaccurate portrayal of facts.

Carrhae took days, not hours....Crassus was a fool trying to fight an enemy that prefers horse archers with an army consisting almost entirely out of heavy infantry. The Armenian king actually tried to warn him I believe, but he ignored his advice. Horse archers are not an invincible force, but you have to bring along the right tools to fight them.

Absolutely.

Heavy infantry without significant missile support and insufficient water in a desert environment.

Allowing most of the cavalry off on a "raid" when facing an all-cavalry opponent (cut off and chopped up as we know).

Insufficient scouting/use of irregulars.

Crassus set himself up for a beating.

Arrows annoyed and flustered the Romans for days -- wounding many and killing a few -- but it was heat, exhaustion, and heavy cavalry that broke them.

[O'ETAIPOS]

A lorica hamata coupled with a scutum offers excellent protection against arrows, and when in a testudo formation legionaires would be nigh invulnerable to archers. The Parthian general realised this and charged with his cataphracts or just feigned charges, so to force the Romans to break up their testudo because it's a specialised formation that's no good in close combat, let alone warding off cavalry charges. The continuing cycle of charges of heavy cavalry, followed by massive barrages of arrows, proved exhausting to the Roman infantry and destroyed their morale.

Not! Scuttum could be crushed with 1-2 special arrows if you use compound recurve bow. Chain mail do not protect against specialised arrow. HA's had lots of types of specialized arrows for different tasks. After few hours probably half of romans didn't have shield at all.

Cataphracts were there mainly to destroy gallic cav had Crassus had with.

[QwertyMIDX]

Kralizec has presented the orthodox, widely accepted narrative of the battle. In fact I have never encountered a piece of scholarship making an argument for a seriously different narrative. So for the moment O'ETAIPOS, your interpretation is doesn't hold water. If you could find some sort of support for it I'd be interested though.

[fallen851]

A bit late, but I feel compelled to respond to this. I don't mean to crack you down, but this is a blatant inaccurate portrayal of facts.

Carrhae took days, not hours. As you said the horse archers (wich weren't drawn from Persians, correct me if I'm wrong) were so effective because they had an unlimited supply train of arrows. If you play EB or especially vanilla RTW with limited ammo off, it's easy to score a victory with negligable losses. That is, unless the Roman player is smart and brings in a good number of slingers and auxiliary archers, wich is exactly what the Romans did afterwards and enabled them to put up more of a fight against the Parthians in later battles.
A lorica hamata coupled with a scutum offers excellent protection against arrows, and when in a testudo formation legionaires would be nigh invulnerable to archers. The Parthian general realised this and charged with his cataphracts or just feigned charges, so to force the Romans to break up their testudo because it's a specialised formation that's no good in close combat, let alone warding off cavalry charges. The continuing cycle of charges of heavy cavalry, followed by massive barrages of arrows, proved exhausting to the Roman infantry and destroyed their morale.
I'm not entirely sure what happened after that, I think Crassus accepted a Parthian invitation to negotiate, but it was a trap...the Romans later tried to escape but were rolled over by the Parthian cavalry.

Crassus was a fool trying to fight an enemy that prefers horse archers with an army consisting almost entirely out of heavy infantry. The Armenian king actually tried to warn him I believe, but he ignored his advice. Horse archers are not an invincible force, but you have to bring along the right tools to fight them.

I have no idea why I said Persian archers...

As to Carrhae taking days, that depends on how you look it. It didn't take more than a day for the Romans to give up and begin a retreat, but they were harrassed during their retreat.