Question about the Roman army

[Edzamon]

Ok, i realized from theese games that there were camylian reforms, then polybian, then marian and then imperial.... and thats where the RTW ends... and then, 200-300 hundreds years later, the army is completely different (barbarian invasions, BI modifications)

I would like to know what happened in between? When did they switch like that? Was it something some units in between in theese a.d. 100 - 300 smth that we never saw in these mods?

Thanks in advance

[julianus heraclius]

You may find this helpful: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=175023

[Julianus Flavius]

I think, what Edzamon meant was 'is there any 'in between' legionaries?' And I have a similar question. What caused the dramatic change???

[Basileios]

Well, one factor is certainly a completely different tactical situation. The old legions were supposed to conquer an Empire while the new ones were supposed to defend it!

This meant that the armies had to become far more flexible. On one hand they had to be able to deal with small bands of plunders as well as entire tribes on the other they had to be able to fight pitched battles against sophisticated Empires like the Parthians and Sassanids.

As you can imagine heavy armed infantrymen were rather illprepared to chase raiders, so the cavalry had to be expanded. The large legions were split up in smaller more flexible units and new troop types were adopted from the Empires enemies.

Btw in 235 the Roman army had a recorded strenght of 389,704 troops, while in 324 it had an estimated strenght of 581,000 troops in total (Navy 45,562 and 64,000)

[Valentinian Victor]

The army of the 320's onwards evolved into one that could meet a variety tactical challenges. Whilst it still had to deal with the usual 'barbarian' suspects over the Rhine, it now had to deal with other groups over the Danube and from beyond the Eastern Frontier. These new groups included lots of mounted warriors and this led to the Romans recruiting an increasing number of light and heavy cavalry, as well as specialist cavalry such as the 'clibanarii'.

Armies were no longer mainly based in frontier fortresses, instead their component units were barracked in towns and cities not far from the frontier, with old style legionary and auxilia 'cohorts' manning the frontier forts. This is known as 'defence in depth' and proved a double edge-sword as the soldiers based in the towns and cities were often responsible for atrosities against the civilian populations.

The style of warfare also began to change, whilst the use of the pilum and gladius did not fall out of use until after 400AD, newer weapons such as the heavy spear known as the Spiculum, the light javelin called the Veruta, a longer sword called the Spatha, and throwing darts called 'martiobarbuli' began to replace the older infantry weapons. Other equipment changes also came in, armour was either a mail hauberk or a muscle cuirasse, helmets became simplier in style, and the shield was now oval or round in shape and made out of solid, flat, planks. The legiones and auxilia units now had a proportion of archers attached who provided overhead missile fire. There is absolutely no evidence that the infantry of the 4th Century AD was inferior to that of earlier times, in fact a number of historians believe that the army of this age was actually in many respects superior. However, it appears that Roman cavalry at this time still had a tendancy to brittleness and often routed from the battlefield, leaving the infantry to an uncertain fate.

There were many other changes but these are probably the ones that were most obvious.