Spears are very unbalanced

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Wiki is wrong. After Marius the legions were often kept under arms because of the almost constant state of war, the term of service was actually fixed under Tiberius according to Tacitus.

Funny, the experts believe differently?

There were loads of Roman defeats, two Legions were routed during Corbulo's campaign. The Roman soldiers were only as good as their commanders. I don't know why you think I'm talking about an "unwillingness" to fight. Corbulo's men had spent too long in camp without fighting, Tacitus tells us there were 20 year veterans who had never constructed a night-camp. Even if he is exagerating the situation was certainly dire.

No one has ever said that the Roman army has been great since the beggining and it is widely known that sometimes things went pear-shaped in a very bad way, especially if the commander didn't do his job. The same can be said of any army in history, without a good leader no army, no matter how powerful, is useless.

At no point did I say the Romans were inferior, but under Marius they remained a militia and although four months was the standard training period often they recieved far less. These men were either disenfanchised farmers or beggars and vagabonds, of the latter Marius could not take many because they were unfit for service.

The fact that they had nothing else to lose made them better fighters and soldiers. They had grown up living harsh lives and were used to things being rough, joining up with Marius gave them an income, food and a purpose. Their equipment was standardised and so was their training and their is quite a few important historians who believe this wasn't the first time such men had been used. People like those you have described saw the army as a career and a chance to make something of themselves and to gain a lot of money from plunder. The fact that he did not take some with him was nothing new to the Roman army and had happened many times long before Marius.

The idea that the Greeks were "just" farmers is absurd, like the Romans the local militiamen trained regualrly, and were then drilled en masse to bring them up to fighting stanard after call-up.

The Romans did it yearly, the Greeks only did it when it was needed, mercenaries were used a great deal more.

See above, the Greeks had standing units of infantry and cavalry, the Silver Shields, Shieldbearers, Companions, Theban Sacred Band.... the list goes on. By contrast until Augustus Rome had NO standing army, only men unfortunate enough not to have been discharged.

Small numbers of men compared to the rest of the citizens who formed the rest of the army. Much like in Celtic society where a small number of men would be full-time fighters and the rest were conscripts.

When Successor armies were kept in the field for extended periods they reached a comparative level of excellance. When the Romans beat the Makedonians the latter were mostly fresh levies while many of the Roman Triarii had joined as Hastati to fight Hannabal.

Same can be said for the Romans, the longer they were in the field the better they got, infact the same can be said for any army. Please stop throwing out excuses when it suits you, first you say that the Roman armies were less effective than others because they had no real standing army til Augustus BUT then you say the only reason they won is because they had experienced men in the ranks, you are only supporting my earlier statement that in general, a newly raised Roman army would have somewhat more experience than say Greece or Macedon because a good portion of Roman men would of already seen service in previous call-ups.

Not really, Alexander's army was more flexable, tougher, and at least as well armed and armoured. They also used the superior combined arms tactics that it took the Romans a very long time to adopt.

More flexible than armies of that time. superior combined arms? How would an army several hundred years older have superior arms? The Romans carried 2 pila a man, a good sword and a large sheild. The Pila would remove the protection of the Phalanx's shields and leave them vunerable to the swords. The tactics employed by the Romans seems to of come on quite fast by ancient standards and after Alexander, things in the army barely changed in the Hellenistic world.

Take a look at the cavalry engagement at Pharsallus, once Pompey's supperior cavalry were eliminated Ceasar relied on his veteran infantry and he even used those infantry to kill the opposing cavalry themselves, rather than his own horsemen.

Roman armies were mincing machines, flexable in their own way but also quite limited.

He knew his horsemen would never stand up to Pompey's cavalry so he used his greatest asset to deal with them, his veterans, there is nothing wrong with that and if you wish to use that example then it means that Alexander and his cavarly weren't very good because he used light infantry to run along side his cavarly in close support, not unlike Caesar did at Pharsallus.

The Roman armies were indeed flexible, unlike the phalanx which is why they had the advantage in their engagements.



I really do not wish to carry on a debate about Alexander, this is about the balance of the Romans in the EDU and simply wish it to be resolved.