Roleplaying armies?

[Nkagnito]

I'm trying to play as the Romans and I'm trying to roleplay as well. I would like to know how do you make up a single Legion Pre and Post Marian Plz. While on the subject of armies what would the make up of other nations armies be?

[Revan The Great]

Camillan Legion: Probably three Hastati, Principe, and Triarii each, with two leves, two accensi, and your choice of Equites, Campanian Cavalry, or any other regional cavalry. Throw in a Pedites Extraordinarii somewhere in there.

Polybian Legion: Three, possibly four each of Hastati, Principe, and Triarii, two velite, your choice of cavalry again. Add regional archers, slingers, etc. at your discretion.

Marian Legion: One First Cohort, nine regular cohorts, and whatever local flavor of supporting light infantry, missile units, and cavalry you can come up with.

And on another note you should probably get rid of that Signature of yours. It strikes me as...mean spirited...

[Africanus]

I'm trying to play as the Romans and I'm trying to roleplay as well. I would like to know how do you make up a single Legion Pre and Post Marian Plz. While on the subject of armies what would the make up of other nations armies be?

http://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showth...edux-for-EB%29

[torongill]

Notice: the opinion below is written in mind with huge settings and 160 men being the size of 1 hastati maniple.
Quintus's guide is basically correct, except for the cavalry. I don't really know about the Camillian armies, but 1 Polybian Roman legion had 1200 light infantry 1200 hastati, 1200 principes, 600 triarii and 300 equites romani. The alae consisted of equal numbers of infantry equivalent, with 1/5 of them being pedites extraordinarii. The allied cavalry was 3 times the roman number, with 1/3 of them being equites extraordinarii. What it boils down to is this: With 2 units of hastati, 2 principes, 1 triarii(or 2 half strength), 1 velites and 1 accensi representing the roman foot, you need roman horse at 1/4 of the hastati strength, i.e. 80 men. The allied foot troops should be basically equal in number to the roman contingent, with 2 units of light infantry(any mix), 2 units of medium infantry(like Bruttians, to represent the hastati equivalent), 2 units of heavy infantry, including the pedites extraordinarii(so for example 1 unit of samnitici milites and 1 pedites) and 1 triarii equivalent(for example allied classical hoplites). The real difference comes with the allied cavalry. Its number should be 3 times the roman, that means 240 men, with 1/3 of them being equites extraordinarii. This either means that the allied regular cavalry has to be 160 men, or 2 units of 80 men. This also means, that if the regular cavalry is 160 men, ALL the regular cavalry of all the states should be at 160. By regular cavalry I describe units like the gallic light cavalry, Hippeis, etc. Elite cavalry, like the Hetairoi and the sacred band cavalry should also be in the range of 80-100.
If you on the other hand make all cavalry 80 and recruit 2 units allied cavalry, that means that in a full stack you'd have 4 units of cavalry, comprising 10% of the total number of men, which is incosistent with the historical evidence. Not to mention that in this way You're indirectly weakening the enemy, since AI rarely recruits more than 4 units of cavalry and any more than 4 cavalry leaves their infantry outnumbered.

I also do not agree about the components of his post marian legion, but maybe he tries to represent the fact that post-marian legions were usually outnumbered. Still, if you seek to represent a full stack like a single legion, then you need 1 first cohort, 7 reformata cohorts, 1 FM, 1 unit of engines, 1 unit of antesignani, 2 allied cavalry(whatever local cavalry you deem proper), 4 units of light infantry and 2-3 allied heavy infantry. In this way you have more or less the historical proportion of 1:1 between legionnaries and auxiliary units.

After the imperial reforms you should increasingly use auxilia units instead of locals.

[TW-fanboy]

Something you also should consider is that the legion size varied, not only temporal, but also from legion to legion. An early imperial legion could have 4000 to 12000 men, only the ratio was (roughly) the same, half of legionaries, the other half auxilia.