Heroic victories with the romans

[Iskandar]

Hey guys, I've noticed that I get very rarely heroic victories with the romans. True, I can smash down any resistance with the roman military machinery, but I seldom do it with heroic victories. With cavalry based armies almost every battle ends up in the heroic range - doesn't matter if it consists of horse archers or not, with the nomad-like divide and conquer tactic it's a walk in the park. With hellenic factions it's also easy - I just counter the enemy with my mix of troops until they commit to my fairly static heavy infantry and then I utilize my cavalry arm to achieve a rout. With romans (and barbarians), however, it's a lot harder.

What is your regular roman army composition - pre- and post-Marian and how do you achieve heroic victories?

[Jamey]

There's a lot of stuff in the Status Reports Thread, including this:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

My army composition:
I've now standardized the Roman core of all of my armies. Each contains 2 generals (one commander and one assistant, hopefully a younger protégé, but sometimes a complete loser who needs a job). It also contains 2 each of Triarii, Principes, and Hastati.

Beyond that, the armies are all auxilia. I've chosen not to build the Italic units so far. I'll probably upgrade a barracks or two to build those at some point so that I can play with them some. In general terms, the rest of the army tends to be mostly heavy infantry, with 0-4 skirmishers, 4 missile units and 0-2 cavalry.

I'm currently fielding major forces with these Auxilia:

• 6 Etrurian Hoplites, 4 Gallic Slingers, 2 Gallic Noble Cavalry
• 4 Picene Hoplites, 4 Light Samnites, 4 Cretan Archers
• 2 Marsi Heavy Spears, 2 Heavy Samnites, 4 Light Samnites, 4 Balearic Slingers
• 2 Marsi Heavy Spears, 2 Heavy Samnites, 2 Light Samnites, 4 Cretan Archers, 2 Numidian Cavalry
• 6 Libyan Spearmen, 4 Balearic Slingers, 2 Numidian Cavalry (currently being retrained with level 2 equipment in Roma)
• 4 Picene Hoplites, 2 Cretan Archers, 2 Tarentine Cavalry (defending Apollonia)

Against forces with a lot of heavy infantry like the Greeks, I was able to generate heroic victories from most full stack armies.

You probably won't be able to do so from the lighter barbarian forces unless you avoid using the really heavy infantry for your core (and what fun is that?).

[Iskandar]

What was your tactics?
When talking about light barbarian forces - you mean that they are javelin-throwing, or that you can't "catch" them all after achieving a rout?

Also, I forgot to ask - what are the conditions for "BattleSuccess = crushing" and in which files are they?

[Jamey]

What was your tactics?

My tactics were simple. I engaged line to line as well as I could. I then brought my skirmishers and cavalry around my flanks. My missile troops stood behind the main line and targeted enemy missile troops, skirmishers, and cavalry in that order.

When talking about light barbarian forces - you mean that they are javelin-throwing, or that you can't "catch" them all after achieving a rout?

There are two factors with the barbarian troops. A full stack of barbarian troops tend to have a very low density of heavy units. E.g. the Gauls will generally have 1-2 Chosen Swords and/or Spears. The rest are light infantry. It's hard to have a Roman army outstrengthed by an army with that little heavy infantry. It's also hard to catch those who run.

Also, I forgot to ask - what are the conditions for "BattleSuccess = crushing" and in which files are they?

Generating a heroic victory requires that your army have a lower autoresolve strength and a smaller number of troops. It also requires that you kill a large number of the enemies (more than half, I'd guess).

If you're wondering about the triggers for ExRM traits, here they are:

Trigger heroicvictory
    WhenToTest PostBattle

    Condition IsGeneral
          and WonBattle
          and PercentageEnemyKilled > 25
          and BattleOdds < 1
          and not Trait Bug = 1

    Affects Renown  2  Chance  50 
    Affects Warlord  2  Chance  50