cavalry against phalanx

[krasni]

I recently got ETW, but all it did was make me want to play RTW and XGM =D so I dug out the CDs and downloaded the latest (when I last played I think it was on a 1hp system?)

Anywho. So far it seems that head on cavalry charges against my phalanx formations are far too effective, which doesn't make sense. They can hold off infantry all day long, but if the enemy general comes in on a suicide charge, the formation gets completly broken up. Cavalry is the one thing I shouldn't be worried about when I have phalangites, or at least so I thought. Is there a tactic to prevent this?

When I'm fielding an actual army, this isn't a problem. The problem is I'm trying to defend a siege in my current campaign with a relatively small garrison of phalangites, and if any one gets compromised, I'm screwed.

My first post but I'm a longtime fan =) great work on this mod.

[Scutarii]

Well, the reason cavalry (even the light ones) can crash your formation, is because the phalanx's formation spacing is wider than other units in XGM, wider than vanilla's. This is to make them not invincible from the front to infantry as well, eventually they will slip through the pikes (although it takes a long time and a good charge). If you want to make phalanx's stronger and stop (or at least make less effective) cavalry charges into your formation, decrease the formation spacing in the export_descr_unit file. It should be 1.2 right now, just decrease it to the default for most other units...

[Anakarsis]

HEavy cavalry charges from the sides or from behind should, in my opinion, must be ABSOLUTELY LETHAL against a phalanx already engaged in melee with another unit. Turning the 6kg, 6m spears was difficult and cavalry moves fast and has a good momentum. Obviously we are talking about really heavy cavalry that could endure being hit by a spear or two, say Steppe/Iranian heavy cavalry, Roman and Barbarian top-notch cavalry and the like.

Alexander himself battled the (hoplite) phalanx of the Sacred Band of THebes with his personal Companions, 250 men against the 300 Elite Hoplites, my manoeuvering and avoiding the spears front. A single spearmen against a cavalryman has NO advantage, its the wall of spearpoints wich gives these infantry an edge.

[krasni]

I agree, Anakarsis. Once they're flanked they should be done for (and they often are in the game)

However, the situation I'm talking about is in a city, on a narrow street with buildings on either side. The only way past is through my wall of spears, yet to see cavalry do it rather easily just seems preposterous. I'm fine with infantry eventually slipping through, as the phalanx in vanilla was too invincible.

[Vercingetorix_Defeated]

The tricky part is making cavalry charges to the flank or back effective while keeping charges to the front of the phalanx suicidal.

If you make the phalanx too strong, charges from behind will be ineffective, and the phalanx will be overpowered in general. (phalanxes can generally turn around to attack enemies once charged from behind far too quickly and easily in RTW. Historically, when charged by a decent unit of cavalry OR infantry from behind or in the flank, phalangites were done for. But when holding from the front alone, they were very difficult to beat.

Currently, I think cavalry are overpowered in general because every unit has 2 HP. When they had 1 HP, cavalry would lose so many men hitting the phalanx that they'd usually rout and die quickly, assuming it isn't a horrible unit like levy pikemen or militia hoplites.

[Scutarii]

I find putting the phalangites on an angle seems to help (ie: have two units form a "<" shape with the open end facing the street that the enemy will funnel through). Otherwise, you can choose between returning them to invincibility by lowering formation spacing or just living with it an bringing more phalangites to make a reserve behind. The reserve unit can come in to reinforce if the cavalry mess up the first unit formation...

[Vercingetorix_Defeated]

There are other factors you can tweak to change it, unit spacing is the most important but not the only one. I'm sure there's a happy medium between invincible phalanxes and phalanxes that collapse like a house of cards when charged from the front.

[Scutarii]

We're somewhere near that medium right now. It used to be 1.33, but with 2 HP they were far too easy to breach, so now they're 1.2, which works perfectly against infantry, and for the most part alright against cav as well. If they get a proper charge, and you don't have reserves, you're fairly screwed, but its not hard to deal with...

[krasni]

Reserves work. I just didn't have enough units garrisoning my cities, which was easily fixed over the next few turns. I think Scutarii is right in that the current unit attributes achieve the best compromise.

Stretched thin right now, I only have 16 territories, 7 of which are under siege. I love the agressive AI in RTW/XGM! I had forgotten how fun it was, after playing M2TW for so long.

[DimeBagHo]

One thing I might try playing with is the radius for mounts. A higher radius should make it harder for cavalry to slip between the pikes (though it will also make them fight a little further apart in melee).

I will probably increase cavalry mass and charge values as well, to compensate for the effect of the 2hp system.

[Vercingetorix_Defeated]

We're somewhere near that medium right now. It used to be 1.33, but with 2 HP they were far too easy to breach, so now they're 1.2, which works perfectly against infantry, and for the most part alright against cav as well. If they get a proper charge, and you don't have reserves, you're fairly screwed, but its not hard to deal with...

Why not have the cheaper and more poorly trained phalangites have a wider and easier to breach formation than the elite ones?

Makes sense that militia rabble can't hold a close formation as well as highly trained troops. They'd be a lot more likely to just break and run when being charged by cavalry, even from the front.

[Darth Alec]

Because poor militia troops already are bad. They would be useless if they couldn't stand against anything.

[Vercingetorix_Defeated]

Because poor militia troops already are bad. They would be useless if they couldn't stand against anything.

You're implying that they can stand against anything now hahah.

Leave the militia troops with their wide spacing, and give the more elite phalangites closer spacing. That way your militia phalangites don't get any worse, and the real phalangites no longer suck at dealing with frontal charges.

(one unit of greek hoplites can walk into and through a greek phalangite unit from the FRONT, kill them all while taking only 60 casualties. It's a joke. Not even using shield wall.)

[Anakarsis]

Try putting a horrible penalty on scrub (the first terrain atrribute) for cavalry.

[Scutarii]

Well, that's because of the recently lowered radius on hoplites. Its a balance between them being the perfect anti-phalanx troops, or making them suck like they did before. I do think the elite phalangites could be better, might actually do that myself, thanks.

[Vercingetorix_Defeated]

Yeah, it's a very tricky area to balance, I agree with you there. Elite hoplites on shield wall are the best thing to use against the front of a phalanx, I think. (though I'd prefer to just avoid hitting the front altogether, leave some skirmishers there to throw javelins at the slow moving phalanxes, and then get your flexible forces to flank them and crush them from behind)

The thing is, it was kind of annoying because Greek Hoplites aren't really elite. Athenian hoplites or Spartans or Sacred Band, sure, those are elites, they'd have a chance at getting through a phalanx.

But phalangites cost the exact same to recruit as Greek hoplites, so when the greek hoplites can literally walk through their phalanx and wipe them out, those two units aren't balanced at all.

[krasni]

Hoplites cost the same but take two turns to recruit, so that balances out a bit doesn't it?

[Darth Alec]

Militia phalangites are able to hold of any infantry that does a poor charge.

Hoplites are a ton better though, but they have to fight, so take more casualties in general.

[Roman Warlord]

Vercingetorix your obvisly playing with BI, for me with basic RTW so Hoplites can't use shield wall they seem balanced compared to a phalanx.

Prehaps the stats need to be altered in the BI version.

[Vercingetorix_Defeated]

Vercingetorix your obvisly playing with BI, for me with basic RTW so Hoplites can't use shield wall they seem balanced compared to a phalanx.

Prehaps the stats need to be altered in the BI version.

The AI controlled hoplites did not use shield wall.

Actually, now that I think of it, I've never seen the AI use shield wall at all yet.

Without shield wall, they still walked right through a phalangite phalanx and wiped them out with minimal casualties.

But after I changed the phalangite formation to be tighter, hoplites were no longer able to casually walk through their ranks and kill them with few losses. It was almost as if they would LOSE from running directly into the front of a decent phalanx...what a novel concept, eh.