Clann Levy

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Let your masters come and attack us: we are ready to meet them beard to beard.

— William Wallace

In game

Armmilit icon.png
Clann Levy — Vital statistics
Clann Levy

Militia units, with better movement speed and hitpoints than normal Peasant Levy.

  • Strong versus unarmed units, siege weapons and missile units with low accuracy or rate of fire
  • Weak versus military units, especially heavy cavalry.
Prereq: Build time HP LOS Attack Attack speed Movement
speed


  • Level 2: Mercenaries Military
  • Centralisation Taxation
3.3s
(50t)
95 7 13 2.1s
(32t)
20


Cost Created from Armour Weapon range Specialty
Base Ramp Pop
Food.jpg: 20;
Metal: 10
Food.jpg: 1
1 Town Watch Guild.png 1 Melee
  • Fast and cheap to create.
  • Cannot resist attrition.
  • +1 splash radius
Scotland

Overall strategy

Clann Levy are levied peasants raised by the nobles of the Scottish gentry, and consist a sort of militia armed with Lochaber axes. Although they are incapable of ambushing enemies like the Caterans, they have better hitpoints and are also capable of dealing splash damage thanks to the wide reach of their weapons.

Clann Levy are easily mowed down by missile weapons and heavy cavalry, but as a "forlorn hoop" forming the first line of any offensive action or defence, they can be indispensible — use these units as an aggressive form of meat shield to reinforce an attack, or better still keep them within your settlements, where their ability to hold off enemies in tight areas can be played off against invaders. Clann Levy are available only if Centralisation was achieved at the Nobles' Court. So while they are a welcome addition to any Scottish army owing to the Scottish lack of good light melee infantry in the Imperial Era, it will take some time before they are made available, but having them in place can be useful as a "meat shield" for countering late game pike-and-shot formations, thanks to their splash damage and movement speed. Clann Levy however like most halberd units suffer against heavy cavalry — so the normal countermeasures prerequisite to fighting them should always be borne in mind if you are planning to use Clann Levy spam as an offensive tactic.

Unit summary

  • Built To Kill — Clann Levy march faster and have more hitpoints, and can be individually selected, making them more useful tactics-wise.
  • Splash Attack — Because of their splash attack, Clann Levy are best used either to reinforce or blunt an attack in the field, or to defend settlements and/or areas with closed-off terrain.

History

Although the Scottish national army had taken up pike and shot tactics, polearms and their variants proved to be popular for irregular forces and continued to be in use well until the 19th century. Despite being deceptively simple to make, a polearm was highly lethal, especially in the hands of well-trained users. Polearms combined the long reach of spears and shorter weapons, such as warhammers or swords to form a highly versatile anti-personnel weapon. Scotland as a nation was relatively poor and so was reliant on the use of peasant levies whereso required and so for this reason, the Lochaber Ax, a modification of the old Norse-style sparth axe, was popular as a melee weapon alongside other polearms in Scotland.