Chapter 7: Infantry.

[^Marcus Cornelius^]

7. Infantry

7.1. General Overview

Infantry represents the main front of the army in the central part of the battle: the melee.
Winning the melee phase means winning the game. Unless your stategy consists of consciously evading melee and tire and weaken enemy with shots and runs. Something like that was usually done by Mongols and some Eastern factions.
So, if you are chosing infantry troops to win a melee phase, be sure of what tasks they can perform and what are their weak and strong points.
Typically, melee infantry can beat spearmen but lose against cavalry. Spearmen win against cavalry.




The primary factors to keep in mind in choosing infantry units are:
- Armour
- Shield
- Defensive Skill
- Attack Factor with arrows (if any)
- Attack in Melee Skill
- Armour piercing weapon
- Anti-Cavalry bonus
- Morale
- Pike Wall mode (typically pikes).

Before Melee
With more armour and shield your units will die slower under missile shots. But try always to keep your costly melee units away from these shots.
If your melee units have throwable weapons they will also have an attack factor with these weapons. These are deadly weapons. If you have some weapons to be thrown try always to throw them before engaging in hand to hand. Enemy will suffer heavy losses and his capability to resist the melee fight will be substantially reduced.
Spearmen can be used to defend foot missile from enemy cavalry charges.

During Melee
With more Defensive Skill + Shield + Armour your units will die at slower rate during hand to hand.
The slower they die the longer they can last in the fight and kill more of the enemy. If your units have armour piercing capability, armour and shield of the enemy will count less.
With more attack in melee factor, your units will kill enemy units faster in hand to hand.
With a good morale, your units will face the enemy for longer and stand for heavier losses before they rout. I.e they will hold the line better and longer.

7.2. Light Infantry

Light Infantry has limited use in MP games.
One real tactical use could be to draw enemy shots to avoid better melee units being hit.
They could also be used to fill any remaing unused unit slots of your 20.
They could also be used to create mass and as a backend support, really not usually employed in melee, to better skilled units forming the first line.
These are peasants and some other types of non professional foot troops at low cost such as woodsmen, levies, highlanders, raiders.

7.3. Melee Infantry

Melee troops could be of these types:
- Heavy infantry
- Ranged melee infantry.

Heavy infantry units are usually armed with swords or axes. They have strong combat attack melee factor. They are always good to fight spearmen. They have good armour and may have shield protection. Skilled professional men at arms are the units that dominate the melee. They are shock troops. Be careful in using them in the right way, they are costly and suited to engage enemy infantry.
Do not expose them to shots and cavalry charge.

Ranged melee infantry, like othoman infantry or mongol warriors for example, are missile archers even skilled in hand to hand combat. Their melee combat factors are not outstanding, but they can shoot at incoming enemy, softening their force, and hold well the front. Use them like a hybrid between infantry line and missile troop.

7.4. Spearmen

Spearmen troops could be of these types:
- Spearmen
- Pikemen.

The task for spears is mainly to stop cavalry. They have a bonus in fighting cavalry. Spearmen are beaten easily by melee infantry. They rout quickly if charged in the back by heavy cavalry.
Anyway not all spearmen are equal. Some of them are of good quality and can hold a front line for sometime even against skilled melee units.

Pikemen and Halbardeers also have the capability to fight melee units successfully, if they use the pikewall mode. Pikewall mode slows unit movement. To move quickly you have to switch it off.
Pikemen are a very powerful unit, the backbone infantry unit in late medieval armies.