How might this Legion idea work?

[jim600]

Not really heard anything about this. The Teuterburgerwald trailer didn`t seem to offer any clues-there were 3 legions invoved and the info panel didn`t mention "legio" at all (all a bit blury )

Any thoughts???

[Alpkerem]

I think other than you and me also, nobody have any idea except devs how they'd "work" actually.

[Cresilia]

Wasn't the video we saw just a trimmed down and speeded up demonstration that doesn't truly represent the Battle of Teutoburg Forest?

[daelin4]

Can you at least explain what you mean by "legion idea"?

And frankly looking at the Teutoburg videos to see how the game works is still basically like depending on the movie 300 for your history facts. They WERE meant more to advertise the game in a detailed manner, but still in an advertising (re enticing exciting hyped up) fashion. At best it does not elaborate on what you're talking about.

[zagy20]

I have a bit of a picture in my head of what it may be. I think either you will have a general that raises an army or you somehow raise an army and then appoint a suitable general. I have heard things like you will be able to choose the load outs of your legions. This could be done in a variety of way such as having a block of maybe 3000 men (more or less depending on your unit size settings) and then you break them off into units, then pick what sort of unit you want it to be such as standard legionaries, archers, cavalry etc. Depending on the supplies you have available, what quantity and what technology you have researched you could then customize the units like your general in Shogun 2 avatar conquest and pick what armor you want them to have, what weapons, how much training. This could go into massive amounts of detail such as when you create a legion you may give 1st Cohort double the amount of men and equip them with Lorica Segmentata, Gladii, Pilum and train them to use Testudo, wedge and shield wall formations, to cut costs however you might not give your archers any armor or training in melee combat. This could really add personality to your army. Perhaps you could create a highly trained unit of Praetorians with the best most expensive armor or even rearm your veterans to become Praetorians or if you were really desperate like if Carthage was right on your doorstep you could pull together a legion with outdated armor and very little training to try and get them into the field as quickly as possible.

I also think unit training and unit experience should be different somehow. Maybe the higher trained the unit is the better it is at getting into special formations or getting experience quicker to give them an edge over less well trained units but not so much that they could beat a veteran. I think veterans should be highly prized so they are more valuable than even three rookie legions. One thing I didn't like about Shogun 2 was late game you could train a unit that was stronger than any veteran.

Back to the unit load outs though, maybe when you research new technology you could pull your legions back to Rome or another major city and rearm them with better equipment. This is only the unit side of things.

Legions also get traits so I assume if a legion is fighting in Egypt they may get traits that give them bonuses in hot climate or bonuses when fighting the Egyptians as they know their tactics however if they get transferred to Germania they may suffer as the climate is far different and they will be fighting a completely different type of enemy. This could also be linked back to the load outs, so if you were outfitting a legion to go fight the Parthians you may give them equipment that will help them in the desert and maybe have more light cavalry to counter the horse archers.

Perhaps cohort's centurions could be characters in that you can customize them separately and they have their own names however they would have a high likelihood of death. I also think famous people would be cool. Something like a centurion that has distinguished himself and is well known might meet the commander of an enemy warband in the middle of a battle and nearby troops stop fighting and watch the two duel like in troy and the winner of the duel grants a very slight leadership bonus to his troops or if your general is a good fighter he may challenge the opposing general to a fight before the battle (don't think this is very historical) and if they other general refuses too many times his army may think he is a coward and this could carry over into the political side of the game and may hinder their chances of high political positions.

I would also like to see the Rome and Medieval 2 features of unit recovery and enemy captured return. Units should only recover for the side that is the victor as we can assume they kill any enemy wounded. Captured enemy units could be released, executed or sold into slavery each with its own positive and negative points. Releasing may improve your diplomatic standing among both the enemy and other factions depending on their temperament, this may have drawbacks such as your enemy getting some of their troops back. Executing enemy will make the enemy hate you more and may make others fear you (both good and bad sides to that) and could grant your legion traits that make them feared and lower enemy morale or improve public order. Slavery will supply your or another faction with slave labor however to many slaves may spark an uprising. I was also thinking of another option of offering the captured enemy a chance to join your faction although their is a possibility of them betraying you if their loyalties are not properly obtained. Captured slaves may gladly join you and will be loyal although enemy elite unit or highly loyal units will refuse and rather be executed.

Since their has also been talk that the legions will be more loyal to the general than to the state maybe if a general is sick of the corruption he may attempt a coup or if one has had to many political failures they may also rebel. A wide spread rebellion may prove fatal if not dealt with quickly and may escalate into a large scale civil war. Maybe a feature such similar to revolutions from empire and your family could side with either the SPQR and loyalist legions or the traitor legions and that could be a way to obtain an Empire. If a general is plotting to rebel there could be an option to execute him and replace him with someone more loyal however the legion may not like the new person. Perhaps even a general may decide to fight alongside an enemy faction if he has traits that suggest he is "good" however you force him to do things such as exterminate cities, execute prisoners etc.

I think I went i bit overboard with my ideas and please keep in mind that apart from the obvious things this is just my imagination of what I think could work.