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Advice for List 82 Triumvirate Roman
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Sparkles
Frondeur


Inscrit le: 28 Mai 2018
Messages: 7
MessagePosté le: Mar Mai 29, 2018 11:23 pm    Sujet du message: Advice for List 82 Triumvirate Roman Répondre en citant
Hi

After reading Caesar's Conquest of Gaul I have decided to get a Roman army.

As legionaries are expensive I am unsure of how many I should aim for in my army? They are obviously the big draw for this list for me but I do not know how best to balance them with supporting units. Likewise I am conflicted on the choice to upgrade their quality. From earlier games I have played, having elite troops is good, especially if they are expensive like legionaries.

I think in most cases I will be outnumbered with this army. How do you best manage that with an infantry army? I partially understand how to run away with horse archers to delay the enemy but am much less sure when it comes to slow heavy infantry.

I have had a look on the madaxeman website but the lists there are not to my taste. They both have allies and not many legionaries. I am also not sure about the gladiators and elephant. I made my first list for 200 points using a list found using google translate as inspiration.

Brilliant:
4 Legionaries Elite
3 Thracians 2HW
2 Light Javelin

Ordinary Included:
4 Legionaries Elite
1 Light Bow
1 Light Bow Elite

Brilliant:
4 Gallic Medium Cavalry
2 Numidian Light Horse

Fortified Camp

I will have access to more units than used in my list but as I get bored doing too many of one troop type at a time I am currently switching between legionaries and others. Eventually I will have all the legionaries and things like ballistae.

Any advice?
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Warwolf
Frondeur


Inscrit le: 21 Nov 2016
Messages: 9
Localisation: Cambridge
MessagePosté le: Dim Juin 24, 2018 5:15 pm    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
Hi Sparkles,

My current Triumverate has some similarities. The difference are that I have only 2 medium cavalry (why have more?).
My list looks like this:

Brilliant
4 elite legionnaries impact armour
1 medium cavalry ordinary
1 light horse javelin
1 medium thracian foot 2HW
1 light infantry javelin

Brilliant
4 elite legionnaries impact armour
1 medium cavalry ordinary
1 light horse javelin
2 light infantry sling

Ordinary
1 elephant mediocre
2 medium swordsment impetuous
2 light infantry javelin

fortified camp

Its a ROMAN army so full fat legionnaries are a must. The elephant and impetuous swordsmen are hard hitting and in my view better than massed medium cavalry. Brilliant generals can handle a mix of horse and foot quite easily.
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Sparkles
Frondeur


Inscrit le: 28 Mai 2018
Messages: 7
MessagePosté le: Mar Juin 26, 2018 12:41 am    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
I went for 4 cavalry because that seemed the the minimum needed for a decent cavalry command.

How do you feel about the impetuous units? I found them kinda a pain to control when there is a small amount of them.


I've played a game with my Romans, played a game against another players Romans and borrow a earlier Republican Roman army.

Some thoughts after those games.

I'm now more convinced that elite is important for legionaries. Against Carthaginian armoured elite heavy spear with ordinary troops the elite bonus was the deciding factor in most of the fights.

Medium cavalry are very vulnerable to bowmen. The heavy cavalry might be a better pick than the elite Germans if going for fancy cavalry.

Light artillery seemed rather weak. The short range left them way too vulnerable to something walking up and killing it.

Being outnumber is really scary. I've been trying get the legionaries into battle as soon as possible and hope they can cause a route before dying to flanks and overlaps.
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Hazelbark
Magister Militum


Inscrit le: 12 Nov 2014
Messages: 1525
MessagePosté le: Mar Juin 26, 2018 3:26 pm    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
The best thing for a Roman legion is another on its flank.

Everything besides the legion is vulnerable.

I would mix in about 1/2 the legion as ordinary just for more legions

The problem with 4 MC or fewer is they can't fight anything other than light cavalry. You can rush 4 forward. Watch your opponent over react with more force, then fall back. But you cannot commit them until well after the legion is engaged. So you are investing a lot in a delaying force. Would 3 HC do better? Sort of yes and no. Same problem its just they can beat 3 MC enemy. I like the 4 MC in principle but that is not investing in victory.

I would suggest you note after each game which Roman units are lost? I find a lot of romans lose their LI, Auxiliaries and their mounted but very few legion. This suggests a doctrine error. Employ more legions.

Elephant doesn't do anything a legion doesn't do, except against cataphracts. A Sarmatian HC impetuous charge against the front of the legion is very dangerous to the Sarmatians.

The hardest call is command points and LC. Are investing to gain initiative? OK the idea of the legions triple moving on turn one is important. But after that first turn how helpful are all those points? Distributed LC have the same issue as the above Cav.
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Hazelbark
Magister Militum


Inscrit le: 12 Nov 2014
Messages: 1525
MessagePosté le: Mar Juin 26, 2018 3:28 pm    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
Else where Evil Doctor posted the following while difference is instructive. While this was specifically in rebuttal to how do romans beat shooty cav, I think/hope you will find it helpful.


Citation:

Here is the Republican Roman list I proposed a couple days ago.

CiC Brilliant (+1, 21 Units, Fortified Camp)
1 Elite Armored H Sw Impact
2 Armored H Sw Impact
1 Elite Armored H Spear
2 Elite LI Javelins
1 Elite LI Bow
1 Mediocre Elephant
2 M Spear (or impetuous M Sw if you prefer)

Alternatively replace Elephant+M Spear (24 points) with 2x M Cav + 2 LC (26 points and a couple of points from elsewhere).

Ordinary Sub (Could be included)
1 Elite Armored H Sw Impact
2 Armored H Sw Impact
1 Elite Armored H Spear
1 LI Javelins

Ordinary Sub (Could be included)
1 Elite Armored H Sw Impact
2 Armored H Sw Impact
1 Elite Armored H Spear
1 LI Javelins

12 armored heavy infantry, the elephant+m spear, and a few LI.

Let’s imagine it is facing something like this, we’ll call them Huns.

12 Elite MC Bow, 8 Elite LC Bow

What do you do?

Assume you lost the initiative and are in a mostly open table. First, what is each side’s “theory of victory†in this match-up? If you don’t have conception or plan about how you win you probably won’t…

Huns: If you answer is something like, “run up shoot at the Romans until they break†this might work against some people but it is likely to result in a draw at best. If the answer is “ride around the Romans flank, shoot them a bit, and hope the Romans don’t react so I can flank charge…†again might work against some but still isn’t very robust.

The IMO right answer is a combination of these. Maximize shooting to the extent you can to try and accumulate a lot of damage against the Romans, effectively lowering their break point from 21 to 10-13 or so. Maneuver against one flank that appears most vulnerable and be prepared to sacrifice 3-4 MC into the front of the legions to hold them in place while 2-4 MC work to get on the flanks. The rest of your army keeps shooting and keeps the bulk of the Romans from participating in the decisive fight. You can also see why I prefer to avoid an army this light. The “heavier†your shooty cav army is the more effective it is going to be at that decisive charge – which is the game winning maneuver. I like Ghaznavids as Elite Elephants, Elite M Sw Impact, and Impetuous M Sw are nasty hammer to hit something with while HC Bow maneuver on the flank.

Romans: You need to force the Huns to actually fight you, while avoiding being flanked decisively. The base calculation here is that if you advance 2 UD every turn, starting from 5 UD in at deployment AND keep the Huns in front of you in turn 5 you are 15 UD and in turn 6 you are 17UD across the table and at about that point the Huns have to fight or flee off the table. Now the Huns know this as well so they are going to try and avoid this and try and slide around your side so they aren’t going straight back, they will try and arrange to fall back somewhat diagonally to buy themselves more time/room, try to get you to spend time not advancing and pushing them, etc. The nastiest thing they will do is shoot then fall back and march to the other side of the table YOU MUST NOT LET THIS HAPPEN. Your job as a Roman is to nullify as much of this BS as possible and push them back or into a corner where they have to fight.

So how do you do this?

First, you deploy carefully. DO NOT leave multiple open flanks. You might notice that the Roman list above has exactly as many HI as the Huns have MC Bow. This is not unusual, bow armed cavalry are basically just as expensive as legions so are unlikely to outnumber the legions. So you should be thinking in terms of one elements of HI for every cavalry. If a legion charge a cavalry it is a fight in your favor at +1 (armor) vs. +0 (elite) this is a good fight for the legion. Stay together don’t expose two flanks, you probably can’t avoid exposing one. The Huns might/will try and turn your flank. The one thing you don’t want to do is have the Elephant+M Spear group isolated on their own – especially on the open flank. If you do that you can guarantee that the Hun will send every man on a horse to kill them. They are much much more vulnerable than the legions. This goes equally for small groups of cavalry or light cavalry in a Roman army. If you put them somewhere the shooty cavalry can get at them they will do it and do it hard. They can’t compete with masses of bow armed cavalry – don’t try. This is equally true for a Roman cavalry group. NO the Romans can’t take a few cavalry and “skirmish†with the Huns. That leads to a lot of dead Roman cavalry. They aren’t useless but you have to use them extremely careful.

Put that group in one of two places depending on the terrain. It either goes in the middle of your army OR it goes on the edge of the army next to a waterway. Both of these are dangerous locations for our Hun to mass cavalry and you would in fact like them to do so. Why? In either location you push forward and there is a line of legions that are placed to cut off the retreat routes. Sure they can just flee away but that is what you want and eventually the Hun is going to flee and want to turn to one flank or the other to find more space. This is the secret sauce if you will of pushing someone off the table. They need to make this turn while they still have table space to get out of the way. If they can’t march (and more on marching below) that means the cavalry is going to turn and move 3 UD one turn and maybe more 4 more UD the next turn. You need to be able to catch them before they squirt off to the side of your legion by any means necessary. Your ZOC extends out 1 UD and as you advance you can slide 1 UD to the side for free. Always be looking to get the Hun into a position they can’t turn away to the flank. Normally, a cavalry army needs to start thinking about this maneuver when they are about 5 UD from their base table edge at least.

5UD is usually the magic point as that is the last spot they can be assured of not fleeing off the table and being pretty sure they can turn and start moving sideways. When the Huns decide they are going to try and can opener your flank – be ready for that and start turning. Be ready to get heavy troops all the way to the table edge or nearly the table edge. This is a place the M Cav can help if you are careful. They move a bit faster so you can use them to fill the last little gap BUT they need legions supporting them or they are victims.

Get the rest of your army turning as well – remember you have a legion for ever MC Bow. Yes the LC Bow are annoying and will shoot at you and you want to keep them from getting behind you but fundamentally they aren’t that dangerous. Again M Cav + L Cav can help keep them corralled. Or you have “extra†width with the elephant/cavalry group to help. One key to remember is that you are marching on an interior line, behind your rear, so you have less distance to cover than the cavalry player. This can often let you match any big turning/flanking maneuver.

Once all this has happened do what you can to prevent the MC from being able to march move again. March moves are sneakily dangerous.

Your goal here to create a fight where the Huns are forced to fall back to and edge somewhere so they can’t simply keep retreating. That can be their back edge, your back edge, or a side – somewhere they are going to commit their troops. DON’T let them commit then slide sideways to an open part of the table. That is how you lose. If you have to this is the point to sacrifice some cavalry/light cavalry/medium infantry to hold them in place while the legions catch-up.

When you do this ALWAYS charge them every turn you can. It forces them back – closer to an edge and it stops half their shooting. Even better is if you can force them back and break up their groups. That over time will pip starve them and they will become less efficient and/or leave you elements you can scoop up by preventing flees. Similarly, don’t let your army get broken up into tiny groups. Each Corps can fairly easily support two groups, but once you are at three or more you risk being unable to charge due to lack of pips.

LMI and especially MI shooters are extremely useful here. DO NOT place them alone on your flanks as unsupported they are vulnerable and a good target. Nestled safely in the midst of heavy infantry they provide powerful firepower and are like all weak points in an unpleasant place to attack.

Terrain considerations:

- Always try for the waterway, it is generally helpful. If you get a waterway don’t bother with the village it isn’t helpful as it most likely is sitting on your base edge on the waterway which is not a useful spot.
- Don’t get overly obsessed with RGo especially of the fields/brush sort. Unless you have a lot of medium infantry – especially medium infantry that shoots (not a Roman forte) it doesn’t make that much difference. Its biggest value is letting LI stand up to mounted so it is of some value but not hugely. Next biggest use is dummy ambush markers preventing marches.
- If you are somewhere that isn’t steppes/plains then you want DGo. The single most dangerous thing you can place for the Huns is a piece of DGo (or impassable) sitting on their baseline dividing up the deployment zone. This generally will compact their army which is good and even better dramatically cut down their ability to march away from your advance. Watch out as the counter-move to this is often to flank march. That is not terrible for you unless you deploy badly and get caught out by it.
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Sparkles
Frondeur


Inscrit le: 28 Mai 2018
Messages: 7
MessagePosté le: Mar Juin 26, 2018 10:30 pm    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
Thanks for the advice and other post. It makes for interesting reading.

I will start keeping a record of my casualties. Going off memory, 1 game had significant legion casualties, 1 had some LI and cavalry casualties and one had significant casualties among the legion and the mix of everything allied corp.
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Snowhitsky
Prétorien


Inscrit le: 15 Juin 2015
Messages: 224
Localisation: Lancaster, UK
MessagePosté le: Mer Juin 27, 2018 8:36 pm    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
I agree with Hazelbark, there is no point being subtle with this list. Design and use the list so your opponent has no choice but to fight legions to win.

Three legion commands each with one cavalry unit and some LI, bow. Keep the cavalry behind the legions and between commands. When your legions are in charge reach of the enemy cavalry try to get it behing the enemy cavalry with your own to stop evades then charge the legions in. If that isn't possible charge the CV on its own at an angle against the end of the line. If the unit evades, you end up behind the next unit which can't evade and the legions charge in. If they hold, the legions charge in support. If the entire line evades, the cav stops the charge after 2 MU and you advance the legions alongside. The LI, bw move through and every so often you get to shoot the CV in the back.

To be honest, it's not much fun but it works.
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Sparkles
Frondeur


Inscrit le: 28 Mai 2018
Messages: 7
MessagePosté le: Ven Juin 29, 2018 4:39 pm    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
Had another game against Classical Indians. My cavalry went up against an elephant corp and while they did manage to prevent it from flanking me I lost 2 LC to shooting and 2 MC ran off the board without me having much chance of hurting them. Another MC died in combat but I got good odds for that and lost the roll.

My big legion corp fought another elephant corp. The enemy managed to get a overlap on the Thracian side which wasn't too bad as elephant have an annoying habit of cancelling many of my legionary upgrades. The legion won in the end losing some Thracians. The other legion corp went for the camp and had a good time chewing through mediocre MC and mediocre bowman guarding it.

In the end I lost a lot of cavalry and some LI and MI. The legionaries were hardly scratched.

So I certainly see now the benefit of of getting rid of the most of the cavalry, they couldn't do much except evade and give away points. I did like the Thracians.

I'll be adding more legionaries to my painting queue. Just need to get some renaissance Polish done first.
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Hazelbark
Magister Militum


Inscrit le: 12 Nov 2014
Messages: 1525
MessagePosté le: Lun Juil 02, 2018 6:53 pm    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
Snowhitsky a écrit:
Three legion commands each with one cavalry unit and some LI, bow. Keep the cavalry behind the legions and between commands.


I would not have the center corps have a Cav unit. It will be wedged between legion so just a wasted unit. Either don't buy it or put it out to one side.
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Snowhitsky
Prétorien


Inscrit le: 15 Juin 2015
Messages: 224
Localisation: Lancaster, UK
MessagePosté le: Mar Juil 03, 2018 9:04 am    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
Hazelbark a écrit:
Snowhitsky a écrit:
Three legion commands each with one cavalry unit and some LI, bow. Keep the cavalry behind the legions and between commands.


I would not have the center corps have a Cav unit. It will be wedged between legion so just a wasted unit. Either don't buy it or put it out to one side.


Like i said, if you are facing cowardly evady types that Cv will make all the difference in keeping them honest. If you are facing heavies then you keep it in reserve behind the legions. When a hole appears you have a battle unit to plug the gap. For 7 points it's a worthwile investment.
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ethan
Signifer


Inscrit le: 12 Nov 2014
Messages: 347
MessagePosté le: Mar Juil 03, 2018 11:15 am    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
I would concentrate the cavalry in 1-2 corps rather than have a lone cavalry in each corps. The Cv-free corps can go in the middle and have a lower quality general. If needed the cavalry from the neighbor corps can help or the neighbor corps has more cavalry to work with. My gut feel is that the lone Cv are going to wind up left behind at some point as when you lack pips.

I would just by 2 HC/MC and put them in a single corps myself.
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Snowhitsky
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MessagePosté le: Mar Juil 03, 2018 5:11 pm    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
ethan a écrit:
I would concentrate the cavalry in 1-2 corps rather than have a lone cavalry in each corps. The Cv-free corps can go in the middle and have a lower quality general. If needed the cavalry from the neighbor corps can help or the neighbor corps has more cavalry to work with. My gut feel is that the lone Cv are going to wind up left behind at some point as when you lack pips.

I would just by 2 HC/MC and put them in a single corps myself.


You always have two PiPs. One for the legions, one for the cavalry.

Putting weak cavalry groups on the wings is just asking for trouble IMHO. Too few to do anything and easier prey than legions. Splitting single units between commands means you are more careful with them and you make your opponent's life more difficult by always having a 4 UD unit threatening open flanks, LMI and carelessly placed lights.
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ethan
Signifer


Inscrit le: 12 Nov 2014
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MessagePosté le: Mar Juil 03, 2018 9:09 pm    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
Snowhitsky a écrit:
Putting weak cavalry groups on the wings is just asking for trouble IMHO. Too few to do anything and easier prey than legions. Splitting single units between commands means you are more careful with them and you make your opponent's life more difficult by always having a 4 UD unit threatening open flanks, LMI and carelessly placed lights.


Well you can read my rather voluminous reasoning a couple posts up.
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Sparkles
Frondeur


Inscrit le: 28 Mai 2018
Messages: 7
MessagePosté le: Dim Nov 11, 2018 4:41 pm    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
Sorry to restart this conversation but I'm on a 5 game losing streak and really need some help. I think the problem I'm currently having is less to do with my list or dice but a problem with my deployment and movement before combat. Here are of the things that I think are making me lose. The armies I'm fighting mostly come from the Macedonian or Barbarian families with Nikephorian Byzantines as the exception.

    I end up deploying a legion corp up against a refused flank of LH or something similar. It take forever to get them into combat. Similarly when I tried Armenian Cataphract allies they faced Pike or Elephants.

    My opponents keep getting small (2-4 units) cavalry groups onto my flank or rear in a single turn through gaps in the 4UD range and I don't know how to respond to it.

    My opponents are much better than me at getting LI to provide overlap or just have a bigger army so I end up at a disadvantage in combat.

    I don't know how to deal with a couple of CV on the end of a HI line. They'll just evade me leaving legions not fighting the actual enemy line but if I have the legions so they face the infantry line then the CV will start getting ready to flank me.

    I'm not sure how to deal with Pike and Cataphracts. I seem to lose against them head on more often than and although my legions should be easier to move I'm not sure how to take advantage of that. HI can't move very fast.

    When taking casualties from shooting, usually from LI or LH, should I rally or keep going? Legions don't take shooting hits often so rallying seems a good choice but I feel my opponents use that time to get an advantage over me.
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ethan
Signifer


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MessagePosté le: Lun Nov 12, 2018 5:39 pm    Sujet du message: Répondre en citant
Sparkles a écrit:

When taking casualties from shooting, usually from LI or LH, should I rally or keep going? Legions don't take shooting hits often so rallying seems a good choice but I feel my opponents use that time to get an advantage over me.


Rallying is almost always a bad idea - especially against a shooty cavalry army. You need to get forward. Rallying effectively costs you a turn of movement.
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