Unit mechanics and tips in Total War: Arena Total War Arena Guide & Walkthrough
Last update: 28 February 2018
Here you'll find tips & advices for your units.
Basic Info
The game contains a large number of units. It should be mentioned that each unit has its advantages and disadvantages - there are no invincible units. Your job is to study the differences between them and know which units to attack, and which ones to avoid. Each player has three units on the map, with new types of units unlocked after in-game progress and acquired experience.
Each unit has two main indicators - health and morale.
- Health (red bar above the unit) is lost as a result of dealt damage and cannot be replenished. When a unit loses its health, it dies. If the defeated unit was bought for Silver, you'll need to buy it again after the fight has ended (this takes place automatically - the game deducts the needed Silver from your pool).
- Morale can be replenished outside of combat or when your unit wins a battle. If the morale has been depleted, the unit begins to retreat from the battlefield. If a group has more than ten units the group will retreat to a safe location as a whole and will slowly replenish its morale, enabling you to regain control of the unit - any group less than ten soldiers will be routed and counted as dead.
Moreover, each unit is characterized by a set of parameters: aggression, defense, survivability, and mobility. In this case, the defense is the defining parameter of this unit, as you can use the disadvantage and send a unit of bowmen equipped with more powerful arrows to defeat it, or decide to focus their fire on another, better armored unit.
General Tips for Various Units
This chapter offers a set of tips that can save your units during combat.
- A charge can trample your units or end up hitting objects or rocks which will end in (sometimes mass) suicide. Always try to manipulate your ranks to prepare a trap or flank the enemy cavalry.
- Always place yourself in front of the charging opponents. You'll receive much less damage and the enemy won't mix up with your units.
- To change the current formation, hold the right mouse button and press Alt to be able to change the width of the formation. Do not let the enemy surround you, especially when your units form a phalanx.
- Know your enemy - if you've encountered new units and aren't sure if they pose a threat, place the cursor on the enemy unit to receive an information on the threat.
- Know your surroundings - you can study the modifiers of each terrain type by pressing the left mouse button. For example, most units will receive penalties to movement and attack speed when in a forest, while barbarian warriors or war dogs receive a large bonus to combat in such surroundings.
- Help your teammates - if your ally made a mistake, help him instead of ignoring him. This also applies to formations - if your ally has left his artillery unprotected, send your units to protect it.
- If your base is currently under attack, make sure to defend it. A lot of matches are lost because the players don't defend their own base. All you have to do is to clash with the forces found inside the circled area to stop the capture bar from progressing.
- Learn to use your keyboard. This will facilitate sending orders and enable you to perform actions that cannot be performed through mouse orders only (deciding upon the width of the formation, stopping the current actions, etc.).
- Use Space to target the enemy hidden between the trees (e.g. when you are using artillery) or to separate the fighting units to learn from which side to engage the enemy units.
- You can zoom your camera during forest encounters and study the battle area for enemy movements (flanking or enemy stakes being placed).
- If one of your allies had disconnected (a plug icon) the rest can take over his units. If no one does so, the units will continue to stay idle.