> >>Could they perhaps be using the same long spear, scimitar, and big
> >>shield, as described for the generic Lunar soldiers in the RQ2 books?
> >Well, to be fair, if they use spears and scimitars, then they are not
> >like classic legionaries. The classic late republican / early imperial
> >legionaries threw the pila, which was a heavy javelin, not a spear.
> >They then closed to melee distance.
> Precisely. The similarities are those shared with any drilled close
> order infantry from ancient Assyria to the Renassaince.
And the ones most familiar to your Hollywood-educated readers who also had an empire that went around conquering some vaguely Celtic/Norse type people would be the Romans. As you say, in the ways in which they differ from their opponents, they're all the same, it's just implementation details.
If we start talking about Persians, post-300, we'll have people assuming Chaos Rhinos :( (Which is a fun idea as a shock weapon, but not exactly the norm)
> I'm surprised Jane doesn't remember the way a
I remember: I can even demonstrate the drill, given the opportunity, and wibble on about the design of the scabbard for a gladius and why it was hung where it was. But since it's a minor implentation detail, I'm trying not to sword-geek at you. (An almost identical sword was also used by the artillery in the American Civil War, which was not a very good idea).
> By comparison most spearmen use the spear as the primary weapon
> with the scimitar, axe or whatever as a last resort when the
> formation is broken. How lunarised the unit is will determine
> whether a unit has substituted a scimitar for their traditional
> hand weapon.
If we're going to weapon-geek, I'd agree with this. I have Tarshite units using throwing axes (I'm borrowing from the Franks for them). They're not very Lunarised at all.
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