Using Javlinmen

[Phil of Loreauville]

Hey how do you guys use your javelinmen? When playing as the Romans, I see the Akritai's stats and think, "Wow! Good armor, good missile attack, decent melee attack.............. I could use these guys!"
But the same thing always happens --- they get clobbered every time. I place them out in front (usually), put them in skirmish mode, and they almost always get over run and routed.
So I ask, "What is the best way to utilize Javelinmen?

[bɑne]

Try to flank with them and attack in the rear / sides of enemy units that are enganged with your own.

[Phil of Loreauville]

Try to flank with them and attack in the rear / sides of enemy units that are enganged with your own.

But what about hitting your own troops? I can't say for sure, but I think always get a lot of casualties from hitting my own guys with friendly fire.

[Gnostiko]

Akritai and Akontistai are brilliant in siege defence. I usually have 2+ spear units immediately behind the castle/city gate, and the aforementioned units positioned a little ways behind them. I wait until the enemy commander has just passed the boiling oil point, and these guys almost always get the job done in taking him out; the enemy army then usually breaks. The trick is to finding the sweet spot to positioning them - too close to your melee units and they either won't fire, or they risk being engaged by stray enemy soldiers, drawing the whole javelin unit into combat. Too far and you risk more friendly casualties. Ippoakritai are even better: once they've used up and their javelins, I use them to run down high-priority fleeing units...makes sure they don't return if the enemy army doesn't break up at battle's conclusion.

Try experimenting, hope that helps.

[PerXX]

I like to place them in the front line itself, with Skirmish off. Usually Javelin infantry are decent in a melee fight, atleast comparable to militia type units. Since the AI often likes to go for the Javelins, I place them slightly further back than the regular infantry line, like this:

IIIII----IIIIIIIIII-----IIIIIII
IIIIIJJJJJIIIIIIIIIIJJJJJIIIIIIII
IIIIIJJJJJIIIIIIIIIIJJJJJIIIIIIII
---JJJJJJ-------JJJJJ------


This gives them a free line-of-sight to throw their javelins at incoming enemies, and any enemy infantry engaging them will also be flanked by your infantry units.

[smitty]

I always place them immediately behind my spear wall/planted stakes. You want to make sure these guys use all of their javelins before risking them in melee, so I'd never put them in the front line. They're even better on an elevation because they'll have more time to throw at the enemy due to the slowed time it takes for them to hike up a hill. Once your spearwall/front line are engaged usually your javelins will stop firing at the enemy directly in front. HOWEVER they can still be deadly effective, you simply need to task them to attack any unit to their diagonal. The entire unit will have great clearance over the front line and be able to hit a huge amount of the engaged enemy front line. So, if you have 4 Akritae behind your spearwall the two on the left side need to throw at the right part of your line, and the right two Akritae need to fire on the left part of your line. You'll see they'll get their javelins out in no time with this strategy.

Also, if you have spear units holding your flanks javelin units are pretty good at tossing at any cavalry that get tangled up in your flank. The larger cavalry unit size usually means your javelins are tossed higher, making sure they hit only the enormous horses and not your smaller men below.

[RollingWave]

generall, in field battle, my typical tactic is to have them on the outer most flank, so if

I= infantry C = cavalry = J = javelin cavalry then...

jj cc iiiiiii cc jj something like this

in battle, the best way to utilize them is to turn off skrimish, as they're range is too short that if they skrimish you'll almost never be in range anyway, have them run on the outer most flank, try to have your cavalries intercept there cavalry if you can, and then run the javlines around their line... keep them running forward while being in range of enemy is by far the best way to utilize them, by running foward they're at max speed, making them very hard to catch and if they're not running strait at archers they're also pretty hard to shoot as well.

This sort of tactic have multiple ways of utilziing, you can have the javelin go ahead of your infantry line, cause some chaos while your own infantryline advance foward and crash in (or your heavy cavalry crash in) or you can have the infantry go in first then have the javelin act as flank support.

Another trick against the AI is to send in your jav cav against their heavy cav, which will usually provoke them to chase after you, during this you constantly pepper them with javelin while your running backward, and you can also intercept them with your own Heavy cavalry once you lead them away from their main lines.

[Silver Legionary]

Defense mode is good for jav infantry.