The scope of this guide is intended to cover large (11700) and ultra (16000) fund field battles. While I will touch upon siege battles and battles on other funds, providing in depth information on those is someone else's problem.

Now to introductions. I have an inordinate amount of hours in this game, many of which are spent in multiplayer. I started out playing cav heavy factions and armies and gradually shifted over to infantry as patches changed the balance of the game. These days I consider myself an infantry based player and a master of pikes. While I win the vast majority of my 1v1 battles, I'm far from unbeatable. I consider my main weaknesses to be missile units that I am unable to negate and players who I can only describe as masters of horse, though I continue to improve at dealing with both of those problems.

So keep in mind that everything I am about to say in this guide might not be accurate for players with vastly different playstyles than my own. I will try to accommodate different methods of getting things done to the best of my ability, but if you are reading something here and you go 'that isn't right!' you are probably one of the ones I am talking about. And that is not even a bad thing. I know alot, but I don't pretend to know everything. Just in doing the research to write this guide I learned (or at least internally codified) more new things then I thought possible, and I know there is yet more for me to learn.

So good luck, have fun, and do unto others before they do unto you.

So, Factions.

Actually, there is so much to cover here that this warrants its own separate guide.

Lots of battle videos in there too.

Total War multiplayer is run by host enforced house rules. This system works surprisingly well.

124 Rules in Sieges:
This is a popular ruleset among siege players. 124 means one artillery, two pikes, and four missiles. It goes a long way to solving the wild west of pike and missile spam that dominated siege battles previously. That being said this ruleset is not perfect. One art is usually reasonable for a siege battle. Unless the defenders get a tier 4 city with scorpion towers, then limiting the art to just one is idiotic as the defenders get towers that literally shoot art and they need to be destroyed. Two pikes is a good rule for a siege, as it makes non pike factions more viable while still allowing pike factions sufficient leeway to do their thing. Four missiles is a bit more problematic though. It can cause a balance issue where the defender can block an attacker from even getting past the walls, as the attacker lacks the firepower to force them to move and let them in.

124 Rules in Field Battles:
This is completely idiotic. Allowing art in field battles is annoying to all involved and can cause problems that I will go into later. Two pikes gimps the pike factions too much. In the open field it is possible to avoid, shoot and surround the pikes. No need to set a limit of two on them. Four missiles is a disservice to factions that rely on their missile units to get things done. What is something like Parthia or the Nomads supposed to do with only four missile units?

Max # Same:
This is a common rule in field battles that has existed in Total Wars for many years. It simply means no more than a certain number of duplicate units. It has several variants. Max 6 of one thing is reasonable and any faction can make an effective army when following it. Max 5 same is usually reasonable, only the factions with the most limited of rosters will be given pause and even then they can usually sort out an effective build. Max 4 same is problematic to all but the most diverse factions in the game. For many factions It's too difficult to make proper armies with a limit of 4 of the same thing without resorting to upgrades or bad units. The goal of a max # rule is to curb spam.

Max # Swords:
Also can be max # pikes or missile cav or whatever. Some hosts even limit the total number of infantry or cavalry. How reasonable this rule is depends on how draconian the limits are. The general goal is usually to even the playing field between the sword factions and the factions that lack them. This has mixed results.

No Artillery:
Stupid rule for siege battles. The best rule for field battles. Artillery on the field is annoying and wastes time for all involved. Scorpions are too effective for a 520 fund unit. They will often get an alarming amount of kills from a range that cannot be responded to by conventional units. Fixed Giant Ballista can't turn, so any opponent with patience and two brain cells to rub together wlll run back out of range and spend several minutes walking around the field of fire to attack the Ballista user from the side. This ALWAYS pisses off the Ballista user who will then proceed to start throwing abuse in chat. Nobody needs that ♥♥♥♥. Meanwhile mobile large artillery are overpriced for the amount of kills they will get and their presence will usually force the other player to rush them if they have no artillery of their own. Either that or it will force the other player to wait at the very edge of range and let the Artillery user waste all their ammo on the expendable units presented to them before closing.

No Missile Cav, or Chariots, or Elephants, or Whatever:
Outright banning entire categories of units, other than artillery, is usually indicative of a host who has no idea how to use or counter said units.

No Pushthrough:
Pushthrough, also called Pullthrough, is the act of spamming commands to get units to slide through the enemy units. While this rule is almost never explicitly stated this is one of the fastest ways to piss off your fellow players, who view it as unethical. It is also possible for units to do this on their own when the unit they were given an attack order on becomes blocked by another unit. In those cases your opponent is probably trying to get you to pull through on purpose so they can mess up your charges and kill you easier. It is usually considered ok to pull through your own units, but pulling through the enemy units is considered very bad. My own problem with this practice has more to do with the potential for it backfiring, rather than everyone else deciding that it is wrong. When you pull through an enemy unit that unit gets many free hits on your men, doing an excessive amount of damage to you. Now, if you have two units attacking one unit in a choke point and you need that one unit gone fast, this is a great way to make that happen as the unit that pulls through can end up attacking from inside and behind the enemy while your second unit keeps engaging from the front. But if the enemy has two units and is paying attention, the unit that pulls through will probably get wiped out right along with the unit it is trying to pull through, and then you still have an enemy unit to deal with. And odds are in that situation, the unit that pulls through will get wiped faster than what they were trying to kill. So where you had a 2v2 you now have a 1v2. Either way don't push through enemy units unless you need to and you decide that winning is more important than other people's idea of fair play. Pushing through your own units, such as cycle charging with infantry, is usually considered ok. Some people can be quite anal about this and WILL throw abuse your way in chat for the remaining duration of the match. The exception to the unspoken rule is Elephants and Chariots, since push through with those is kind of the entire point and is responsible for most of their efficacy.

No camping, boxing, etc:
While this is also rarely explicitly stated doing this is also a fast way to piss people off. Only engage in such behavior if your opponent makes you after trying to engage them normally, and even then they will probably get mad at you.

No Rome/Kush/Empire Divided Factions/etc.
Some hosts just don't want to deal with the bs and will just outright ban the worst offending factions. This mindset is perfectly understandable, as the only real alternative is to fight fire with fire and that isn't for everyone.

My Personal Rules:
My own field battle games simply run off a no artillery rule. Anything else goes, though I don't explicitly state that unless asked. For just myself I also usually impose a max 5 same limit in my builds.

Many battles are lost on an army level before the armies even deploy on the field. This is because one player has an overwhelmingly better army than the other. This goes further than faction pick. A poorly optimized army from a strong faction will drag a player down just as surely as a good army from a weak faction.

As a general rule, at 11700 or 16000 funds you want to be using all 20 unit slots. Trying to win by spamming just the elite units is unlikely to work, as even elite units struggle to win when surrounded and and under missile fire. When putting together your 20 unit army on large and ultra funds, always try to have the funds left over balance out to 0 or 10 left without using upgrades. Any more funds remaining than that and your build is not fully optimized.

Unit upgrades, also called chevrons, are NOT cost effective in the vast majority of cases. This is a common mistake among inexperienced players. Only a few units in the game are better than the elite units of the same faction for a lower cost with upgrades. Odds are, those are not the units you are throwing upgrades on. Use your actual expensive units instead. Only use upgrades when provided with ridiculous amounts of funds, where a full stack of all elite units leaves money left over.

150 range missile units are superior to everything else. If you are fighting an elephant or javelin cav heavy faction, a few foot javelins or Thureos Spears to hard counter them may also be warranted.

Many inexperienced players gimp themselves by bringing a bunch of 125 range archers. While cheap, they lack armor and will eat a volley or two from 150 range units before they even get to fire. This means that 125 range archers often rout before they get more than a handful of kills. Most factions with 125 range archers also have cheap slingers. There is no reason and no excuse for having a missile line composed primarily of such an ineffective unit.

Build your armies in custom battle, save them, and load them up in multiplayer battles when you need them. This lets you spend as much time as you need building the best armies possible. Nobody has to wait for you while you do it, and you aren't under the pressure of having to hurry up and ready. There is no logical excuse not to do this for the game's own fund presets that you play on. You can make as many armies as you want or need to deal with as many situations as you might encounter. At time of writing I have 35 saved armies spread out between large and ultra funds, with a handful of special armies on hand as well for loading up dlc campaign factions as needed. Five of those 35 armies are just different flavors of Egypt. Premade armies save time, save hassle, and as you use the same build multiple times it improves your battlefield performance as you get better at using it.

Many units in the game are not cost effective. While it takes time to learn what these units are, stop using them as you find them. Mercenary Italian Swords are a good example of this. They have worse stats then Hatsati but cost 50 funds more. Just a quick comparison of the stats will tell you this. For any faction that you want to bring into multiplayer, do a quick comparison of the units you want to use to similar units from other factions. What you find will likely require a rethinking of your builds. It only takes a few minutes and will give you a better idea of what your units are capable of compared to what you will be fighting. Unit tests in battles are important too, so that you can see firsthand how units perform against other units. Unfortunately the AI makes for a poor test partner, but sometimes you can find other players who want to expand their own knowledge on how units stack up to each other.

Many units in the game are also highly cost effective. You want to memorize these as well, and find ways to fit them into your armies when they are available. Play to your faction's strengths and avoid their weaknesses.

Balanced armies are more versatile and are able to adapt to more situations. Specialized armies (polite term for spam) have a harder time coping if their opponent has brought something that they lack the tools to deal with.

Common sense build choices, such as "don't bring a bunch of expensive Praetorian Cav against something like Sparta," should be practiced at all times. If you know that the faction you are fighting is full of hard counters to some of your units, don't bring very many of those units. In this case a few Equites to rout the Spartan missile line and keep the Citizen Cav or Tarantine Cav away from your own is all the cav you should bring. There is a huge difference between a cheap unit not working out and an expensive elite unit accomplishing nothing of value.

Swords are superior to spears in most cases. Swords with precursor javelins are also usually better against cav than spears without. Like it or not, it is true. Many players get mad if you just bring a bunch of swords though. In which case, the best course of action for winning on a build level is to bring a "balanced" army where the non sword units are low cost, while the sword units are the best you can field. You still get the power of swords, but you also get most of the versatility of a truly balanced build. This is also why some factions are vastly more powerful than others. The ones who have the rosters to make builds like this are objectively better than the ones who can not.

That being said try to provide a fair fight for your opponents. One of the best things about multiplayer in this game is that many people pick factions just because they like them, often for historical reasons. You see just as many people running factions that aren't great just because they want to play those factions as you do people who only use the most powerful thing they can find. When fighting the meta people, bring out your own meta. When fighting the historically inclined people, fight them with your own lower tier stuff. Everyone gets to have fun, the hardcore meta people rage quit and hopefully leave the rest of us alone, and the non meta people are encouraged to keep doing their thing.

Micromanagement decides battles. Knowing about game mechanics and unit stats and whatnot can only get you so far. Fact is, if you are fighting someone who can give orders significantly faster than you can, then you are at a crippling disadvantage. There is only so much you can do about that, and this is the reason some people resort to boxes or line camping or spam or just stick to siege battles where micro matters less. If your micro is bad I cannot help you. I can give you suggestions, like do a few Legendary campaigns with horse factions, or play through all the historical battles on Legendary. Other than that if your micro is not enough and it does not improve with practice then you are fighting at a disadvantage and it isn't even your fault. Multiplayer field battles are ruled by scrappers running on instinct, not the thinking analytical types that make carefully planned decisions. The scrappers don't give any time for that. The only way to counter that is to do something so out there that the scrappers don't know what to do about it, because they have never seen the like before. And that only works the first few times.

Taking advantage of a difference in micromanagement is one of the best ways to win battles. If the enemy doesn't seem to know how to move, hit them hard and fast and envelop both flanks. Or bait them and let them chase your units into ambushes before they get around to ordering their units back. If their army is spread out, distract them on one side and at the same time pounce on their units elsewhere while they aren't looking. Notice a hole in the enemy line? Send a cav unit right through their center to pick on their missile line. The possibilities are only limited by your own micro ability and imagination.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8Mn0wFgljY

One thing I've noticed is that other players like to tilt their lines at odd angles to my army. I'm assuming it is supposed to give some sort of advantage when they charge into an enemy distracted by trying to give alignment orders of their own. Or maybe they are trying to flank enough to defeat the opposing line in detail. Since this has yet to work on me, and since the kind of players it would work on are probably going to lose regardless, I'm going to say that this tactic is silly and a waste of time.

I try to keep my armies as compact as I can. This allows me to better keep track of all my units and the enemy, and thus improves my micromanagement. I'm even ok with being flanked or surrounded because of this. Flanking just sends units out of support distance of your main body. When I'm being flanked, I can redirect whatever I want to stop the offending units, including defeating them in detail if i so desire. Catching a flanking enemy flat footed with a counter attack, in between being given their move orders and attack orders, is also a great way to pick off enemy units or distract my opponent for an unopposed charge somewhere else.

Pay attention to your camera angle and placement. You want to be viewing the entire relevant battlefield as much as possible.

Team Battles add a whole new layer of strategic thinking to a battle. It is extremely important that you form an accurate assessment of both your allies and the enemies as quickly as possible. Team battles can be won or lost just by misjudging how well a given player knows how to move their units around the map, let alone everything else that needs to be taken into account.

Failing to form accurate assessments of allies and enemies often results in rage from team members who feel they have been slighted by underperforming allies. I'm just going to go ahead and say it. If you lose because you think your ally failed you it is probably still your fault. Before you get mad hear me out.

Let's start with the elephant. Some teammates would be of more use if they were an AI. There is not a whole lot you can do if stuck with such a person other than use their army as a meatshield while hoping for the best. GG and move on. Or at least wait until AFTER your useless piece of ♥♥♥♥ for an ally has left the lobby to start throwing salt around.

But the team members who are bad, but communicate and want to improve? Come on, we can work with that. Stop getting mad at them and start helping them. Even just basic build level advice like "Please bring 150 range slingers instead of those 125 range archers, you have the funds available" or "Please use your elite units instead of upgrading (chevrons) your cheap units" can be enough to give a positive outcome to a match. And then there are the newer players who don't really know what they are doing but actually listen to battlefield directions.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzVta6ELcFg

I know the video is a bit long but I couldn't have gotten a better illustration of my point if I staged it. To start out with, realizing in the lobby screen that my ally would adopt a stationary formation just from their army composition, I adopted a supporting formation SAFELY BEHIND THEM during deployment. If the enemy attacked us, they would also have to give proper attention to my ally regardless of whatever else happened. They can't just gang up either of us when we are together like that, and if they tried to flank the pikes I would make them pay for it.

Then the battle started and it turns out the enemy also had no idea what they were doing. And they had no intention of moving, meaning we had to attack them. Rest was just a matter of communication and coordination. I usually consider "positive thinking" to be a bunch of nonsense, but seriously if you constantly find yourself salty about your allies try changing your approach a bit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmB5kCSmblM&feature=youtu.be

As far as basic level advice goes, stay in support distance of your allies. Veteran team battlers will try to split you up, and if they succeed one of you is going to get jumped by both and defeated in detail.

Also try to avoid switching places after the battle starts. Even if you would much rather fight the enemy standing in front of your ally instead of the enemy standing in front of you, switching places with your ally will just tire out both your units. Being able to handle any of the factions you are fighting is something you should have taken care of on the deployment screen.

Try to avoid combining your formations unless you intend to be stationary. Such a formation is extremely difficult to move coherently, and without precise coordination one player's units can easily be left out to dry before their ally notices and moves their units in to help.

Expect units from other enemies to spill over into your fight. That's just how it goes. Keep a reserve as best you can and call for help if you need it, and remember for every extra enemy tied up in your fight your ally should be having an easier time.

With a competent ally you don't even need to communicate with each other. Both of you can just do your own thing and the battle will probably go your way.

If the battle is not going your way, those big red arrows and green lines you can draw surpass all language barriers. Use them.

Most importantly, if you end up going down, but your ally wins the battle afterward, its still a win. If you know you are going to lose your engagement but there is still hope for an overall victory, change your objective from defeating your enemy to hurting your enemy enough for your ally to mop them up. Sacrifice your last reserves to get rid of their remaining missile units or elephants. Pull a strategic withdrawal to keep their units split up chasing you as long as possible, or even abandon your fight and move whatever you can save to help your ally wrap up their fight quickly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSjUn6scM2M&feature=youtu.be

Most field battles are fought on nice, open flat maps. The community likes such maps and they make for well balanced battlefields.

Not all maps are nice, open, or flat. It can be hard to tell from the little image it gives you but if the map looks anything other than open and flat there are some steps you need to take.

The first is, if the map looks to be full of trees, don't bring a Horse Faction. Your horse archers perform poorly against enemies in the woods and your chances of victory go down accordingly. Foot range are also impacted so don't rely on a foot skirmish heavy build either.

Second thing to worry about is hills. If one side obviously gets a big hill, bring this up with the host. Whether it be from malice or accident, hills that give an unfair advantage tend to make for bad games.

Some maps are just gnarly. These can be hit or miss on whether they make good battle maps for multiplayer. Only way to find out is to load them up and see... I apologize to anyone caught up in my own failed map picks. I vetted them all in custom battle and it looked reasonably balanced, I swear!

Using pikes in historical fashion does not work well in multiplayer. A line of pikes in the open backed up by melee and spear units guarding the flanks and a strong missile line, will perform poorly against anyone competent. When faced with a line of pikes any player with sense will avoid them and refuse to engage. This leaves the pikes marching haphazardly across the field trying to catch something, while the enemy shoots them with everything they have and takes advantage of the pikes becoming isolated by attacking them from multiple directions or sending units right through the enemy center to catch their missile line. Meanwhile the rest of the pike user's army is being defeated in detail. At this point most players decide pikes are bad in the field and only ever use them in sieges.

If you have great micromanagement there is another way to do it though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4cuQN1BDjqU

Pike Tactics involve sending in a melee unit to pin down an enemy unit, then sending in an undeployed pike unit right after it and deploying it right in the enemies face. The enemy will be pushed back and take severe damage from attacks of opportunity from the melee unit, and said melee unit will also keep the pikes from harm by taking most of the return damage. This can piss people off, but it can also highly impress them. Either way I consider it my "thing" and I'm going to use it extensively.

Pike tactics used incorrectly are easy to counter. The pike unit usually ends up alone, undeployed, and in melee. The best counter to this is to push through the pike unit a bit so your unit is already inside it when it tries to deploy, but this will infuriate your opponent if you over do it so be careful.

Advanced Pike Tactics is the art of getting pikes to turn while still keeping their pointy sticks lowered the entire time. This is very difficult to pull off but if you can manage it reliably, you can turn a losing battle in your favor as your unsuspecting opponent that thinks they are flanking the pikes instead charges into the points. This can also make people mad because they think it is bs. They are probably right but as this is well within the mechanics of the game I'm going to use it anyway.

If you find your army dying around your pikes, it is ok to form a box. As long as you have three or more pikes you can do this. What else are you reasonably supposed to do if your opponent seemingly ignores your pikes and takes out the rest of your army? If they didn't leave themselves enough ammo to break a box when they knew the entire time that you had enough pikes to make one, their defeat is on them. Doesn't matter how salty they are, that is the truth.

Cycle charges with cavalry is one of the most well known tactics in Total War and should need no explanation. However, you can do it with infantry as well. This can backfire in your face if you mess up the timing or get accidental pull through on enemy units, so be careful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dllMe2ejuSM

This is especially helpful to Barbarians with their high charge bonuses. Something like Rome with anemic charge bonuses but great staying power in extended fights will benefit the least.

Multiple lines of cycle charging melee units is also resistant to a popular tactic in barb vs barb fights where one player switches their first and second lines at the last second. The intention is to block the charges with the second line, denying the enemy charge completely while getting a free charge of their own, or even getting the enemy to chase the first line in a fatal unintentional push through while the second line rips them apart. When two or more lines of cycle chargers encounter this switching tactic, if one line gets caught flat footed the other line can quickly replace them while the first resets with hopefully minimal losses.

This "switch" tactic is devastatingly effective on the unprepared or those with poor micro ability, so watch out.

If you are prepared for it though... The initial clash of the lines in this video is one of the best examples of the switch tactic and the counter I have ever seen. Also pay attention to all the enemy unit push through going on, both as a result of the switch tactic and intentionally.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lYWg3mgY88

Like everything else that works, infantry cycle charges sometimes pisses people off.

Many players fail at this. They send in their special units first, alone, and the entire enemy army has the luxury of defeating them in detail.

What you want to do is send in your special units dead last, after everything the enemy has to counter it is either tied down or routed. Or at least the counter is some distance away where it can't do anything.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1k6OMLOq88
Chariots, with proper timing, can turn the tide of battle by driving right down the entire enemy line and getting hundreds of kills. Wait until said enemy line is fully engaged before doing this, chariots do not inflict friendly damage so don't worry about going through your own units. However, chariots require almost 100% of a players micro ability to pull this off, let go of them when they are in combat and they will get bogged down and die. Send them in, let them do their thing for a few seconds, pull them out to safety, and then continue giving orders to the rest of your units. Remember, a single precursor volley can rout a Scythed Chariot. Be very careful when and where you send them in.

Elephants have a major drawback of going berserk and wrecking your own troops. A single hit from a precursor volley is enough to cause this. Be very careful when using elephants when the enemy has anything at all to shoot them with. I suggest using elephants on the flanks to mitigate the risks, as less enemy units will be in a position to counter them. That being said, if you you can mitigate the enemy ranged units and either tie down their melee units or get them to burn their precursors, elephants are all but unstoppable and will wipe out several units on their own.

Unlike chariots that work best pulling through your own units to get at the enemy units they have pinned down, elephants do best when they get a clean charge at the enemy. This can be either enemies in the open or enemies pinned down with the elephant rear charging. Trying to send the massive entities through your own units will bog down your charge and hinder your effectiveness, along with increasing the risk that the enemy can make your eles go berserk in the middle of your own men.

I don't do whole lot of these because they are full of nonsense and bs and rules I disagree with, but when I do, they are usually large armies 1v1s hosted by someone else. As I said in the introduction, a full siege guide is someone else's problem. So I'm just going to drop some videos of what I consider to be interesting siege battles, and you can figure it out from there.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sFBPENTrbY&feature=youtu.be

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaonATU-D_8&feature=youtu.be

These next sections go into detail on dealing with problems that may arise from other players pulling nonsense and ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ in the field.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQKbC86d6rI

Melee spammers are players who spam sword units. Lots of sword units. Like, Legatus and 19 legionaries level of ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. Melee spammers will usually deploy their many melee units in a single long line, with one end out of easy support distance of the other end. They will also often insult and belittle their opponents, hoping to goad them into rash action instead of methodically picking them apart the way such a matchup requires. Ignore them, it is nothing more than the mewling of the desperate, for only the most insecure of players resort to such tactics.

So, obviously these players in particular need a proper thrashing. Let's give them one. Good part starts around 6:30.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1pTvmi-oAU&feature=youtu.be

Assuming that you yourself have brought a balanced army against all these sword units, you might be thinking you are screwed. This can not be further from the truth. You actually have the advantage. The key to victory is in your missile units. Some of these bastards don't even bother to bring cavalry or missile units of their own, and their long formations necessitate that they have to envelop your army to get into combat. This means that not only are they lacking in counters to your skirmishers, but they also have to present the flanks and even backs of their units to your missile line. Play your missiles right and you can take out a significant portion of your opponents funds vs the amount you invested. Of course, they might wise up and start chasing you. This is also often to your advantage, as it removes one of their units from the battle for an extended period of time and if your micro is good they won't even catch you. An Evocati cohort chasing my cheapo slinger unit around suits me just as well as if the Evocati took my entire ammo pool to the rear.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNKzMqtdfpc&feature=youtu.be

Assuming your opponent is using a big long line your best counter is to pick a side and pounce on it. Defeat everything on that side in detail while your missile units shoot up reinforcements coming in from the other side and your second or third line units hold them off.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUYEb9kRw9I&feature=youtu.be

If they are using a more compact formation go ahead and drive right down the center. If they flank you shoot up both flanks and hold them off with your reserves while your pike tactics or cycle charges rip through the center. If they blob your center instead of flanking even better, it is more efficient to rip them all apart at once. Just remember to give your missile units something to do, such as flanking the enemy yourself.

Some players have so much trouble with this that they outright ban or heavily limit missile cav in their games. Many others view missile cav as annoying and hard to deal with. Odds are most readers of this guide will fall in this latter group. What if I told you that you should instead view missile cav as laughably ineffective? Don't believe me? Watch this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9t5ig62LCo

See what I did there? I call those anti-cav locked formations 'Detachments' and their main purpose is to completely shut down enemy missile cav while also denying the enemy melee cav map control.

Detachments consist of a locked group including a spear unit, preferably Thureos Spears, in the front, and a missile unit, preferably a slinger of some sort, standing right behind it. Optionally, a third unit may be added to the group with another melee infantry placed behind the slingers. Armies made with the specific purpose of fighting horse factions should be able to field at least three Detachments, enough to completely cover their flanks and rear. Otherwise any balanced build should be able to throw a Detachment or two together on the fly if the need arises.

Detachments with just the Thureos and the slinger are called 'Half Detachments' and ones with all three units are called 'Full Detachments.' The advantage of Half Detachments is that they only use up two units each and you can direct more of your units to other things, including the deployment of more detachments. Half Detachments are vulnerable to melee though. The advantage of Full Detachments is that any cav that tries to melee your slingers is probably going to die in the attempt, and odds are good you get to save your slinger too. The only problem with full detachments is that they take up three of your units.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTdOmUca-wQ

The advantage of detachments over traditional boxing is mobility. Boxing gives your opponent full control of the map. Detachments deny it and force the enemy cav to engage on your terms. The Detachments can move with the main body of the army while providing cover for the flanks and rear, and they can also sally out independently to push the enemy cav around the map. The Detachments' mobility means that they can reposition as needed to counter what your opponent is doing. The main advantage of horse archers is their mobility allows them to gain local superiority over the enemy foot missiles. Take that away from them and the horse archers die en masse.

Even if the detachments are are out gunned by horse archer spam, the battle is still yours to lose. The enemy will at least take moderate losses taking out your well protected ranged, and expend much of their ammo in the process. Out of ammo horse archers are not much of a threat so once they are done blowing through their ammo at the units you want them to shoot at you win. And even against a large melee or shock cav presence charging into a layered defense full of things to shoot or stab them is suicidal. It's like going into a kill box.

Remember, detachments are supposed to be expendable and are expected to come under heavy missile fire or shock cav attack so your good units don't have to. Form them from cheaper units just good enough to do their jobs, not elites.

Detachments also scale up with large armies. Just make the detachments bigger.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0gFsZBwrVQI

As you can see there is no reason for anyone to ever fear horse archers again.

Otherwise, if you decide to box against a horse faction bring pikes. Three pikes in a triangle is unassailable for cav in melee. Use the entirety of the rest of your army to force the horse archers to shoot anything but those three pikes. Sacrifice your other 17 units if you have to, as long as those pikes are up and don't rout you literally can't lose once the enemy runs out of ammo or horse archers. Before I got into detachments I pissed off a few cav users this way.

Noob Boxing, as the name suggests, is usually done by players who have no idea what they are doing. This means that they can reasonably be expected to make many more mistakes after the initial mistake of choosing to box. Take advantage of this.

Boxing cedes any pretense of map control over to the opponent. With control of the map, said opponent is free to surround and envelop the box, shooting at it from any angle they please as they line up flank and rear angles of fire to inflict maximum casualties. The missile units inside the box lack the range to fire back, and if they sally outside they find themselves set upon by cavalry or defeated in detail by local missile superiority.

Most boxes are composed of pike spam. To better counter this possibility, when fighting a pike faction I suggest bringing pikes of your own to pick apart the corners of the box in the event that you run out of ammo before the box is sufficiently weakened enough for an all out melee assault.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KJDWZhsblM
I also strongly recommend fighting pike factions with factions that either have full rosters of precursor javelin units or with army comps that utilize multiple units with Thureos Spear style javelins. It will make your life easier even if the enemy does not box.

Small boxes may also appear at the end of a battle when one player has pikes but their opponent routs the rest of their army, leaving them unsupported. If your opponent has three or more pikes and you choose to ignore them while focusing on the rest of the army, make sure to leave enough ammo on your units to break apart a potential box.

Line/Corner Camping is utilizing the edge of the map to camp, forcing the opponent to attack from only one or two directions. It is highly annoying and time consuming to deal with.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CgSZoDlkstk

When fighting a corner camper, cycle charges with your infantry is the most efficient method to to remove enemy infantry.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQQrWikHaLQ

If the camper has pikes in reserve, make sure to save enough ammo to deal with them or you will lose. If the opponent is stupid and puts pikes as their outer unit, or just spams pikes, counter them as best you can by shooting them to low hp before sending in melee units to overpower the weakened pike unit, this allows you to conserve ammo. Don't forget to take advantage of the stationary enemy by using Heavy Shot if you have it. Remember that bringing pikes against other pike factions is immensely helpful in these situations.

For the enemy missile units, odds are good that the enemy will blob them together due to limited space. This can greatly hinder their ability to fire at you, and makes any fire you put onto them hit several of their units at once. If appropriate, shoot them. If you need your ammo for something else, let them expend their ammo pools on your most expendable units. Avoiding the enemy fire before sending out of ammo missile units into their range (after shooting up an outer line of pikes) is a great way to do this.

Thank you for reading this far, hopefully you found something useful in here.

If you think I missed something important please let me know so I can consider adding it.

Here is another link to the faction supplement for your convenience.