At the same time, the Wuchuan Zhenjun was not idle, and they began formation training under the leadership of Su Lie.

The formation is a kind of battle formation configuration in the ancient cold weapon era, which has important practical combat significance. Under the conditions of short-handed combat in ancient wars, it was produced in order to require unified command and coordinated actions on the battlefield. In ancient times, Shenzhou paid great attention to the arrangement of formations, and there were books from generation to generation.

The so-called "formation" refers to the battle formation laid out by the army in accordance with the specific conditions of the terrain and the strength of the enemy and the enemy when it is engaged in battle. In other words, a formation is the arrangement and combination of various battle formations. The earliest formations are believed to have originated in the hunting activities of primitive societies.

The "Art of War" of the Warring States Period is a collection of the great achievements of the ancestors, and summarizes the ancient formations before the Spring and Autumn Period into ten formations. These "ten arrays" are the square array, the circle array, the sparse array, the several arrays, the cone array, the goose-shaped array, the hook array, the Xuanxiang array, the water array, the fire array, etc. The water array and the fire array talk about the tactics of water warfare and fire warfare, not a simple battle formation, so Sun Bin actually has only eight basic battle formations.

Formations are naturally diverse, such as square formations, circular formations, sparse formations, Shu formations, conical formations, goose walking formations, and so on.

The phalanx is the most basic formation of the army in the era of cold weapons. The large phalanx is composed of small phalanxes, which is called "the formation in the array", Sun Bin believes that the phalanx should be "thin and thick", that is, the strength in the center of the phalanx is small, and the troops around it are more. There are few troops in the middle, and you can bluff. There are many troops around, which can better defend against the enemy's attack, and the phalanx is a relatively balanced formation of attack and defense. The command and other golden drum flags are generally deployed at the rear of the phalanx. The wings are weak and suitable for attacking. (In the Battle of Jingcheng, Han Xin used a square formation, equipped with water on three sides, to prevent the soldiers from escaping and the enemy's outflanking, and used 30,000 old and weak to defeat the enemy's 200,000 troops)

The circle formation is for ring defense. The Golden Drum Banner is deployed in the center, with no obvious weaknesses, and it can be regarded as a panacea-type formation.

The sparse formation is the evacuation of the battle formation, and the square formation and the circle formation can be dredging into the sparse formation. The sparse formation increased the distance between the ranks, through many tree flags, weapons, straw men, and more torches at night, showing strong strength with a small number of troops.

Several formations are dense battle formations, concentrating on defense and attack.

The cone formation refers to the forward such as the cone of the battle formation, the cone formation must be sharp and fast, the two wings are strong and powerful, and the elite striker can attack the enemy in a narrow front, break through and cut the enemy's formation, and the two wings expand the results, which is a formation that emphasizes the offensive breakthrough, and the cone formation is also called the peony formation.

The goose-shaped formation is a battle formation that is spread horizontally, and the left and right wings are arranged forward or backward in echelons, and the forward is a "V" shape, just like the arms of an ape stretched forward, which is a formation used to outflank and detour, but the defense of the rear is relatively weak. If the two wings are more mobile cavalry, then when stationary, they can get the protection and support of the infantry in the center, and can give full play to the power of the attacking cavalry to increase the suddenness. Alexander's battle in India was an approximation of such a formation.

Hook formation, the front of the hook formation is a phalanx, and the two wings are bent back into a hook shape to protect the safety of the flanks and prevent the enemy from attacking the rear command of the golden drum in a roundabout way......

On top of these basic formations, there are some changed formations.

For example, the Xuanxiang Array.

This is a kind of false formation used to confuse the enemy, the queue is very spaced, most flags, drums are constantly beating, simulating the sound of troop vehicles marching, and the sound of foot soldiers is noisy, as if the army is huge, and uses various methods to deceive the enemy. Let's do it

In addition to these, there are also some more psychedelic formations appearing.

For example, the eight-array diagram.

During the Three Kingdoms period, after Zhuge Liang entered Shu to pacify the Southern Barbarians, the main combat object of the Shu army was mainly Cao Wei's infantry cavalry combined troops, and the combat area was mainly mountainous, and Shu lacked horses, so Zhuge Liang rehearsed the "Eight Formations". The Eight Formations were actually formations that had existed long before the Three Kingdoms era. Sun Tzu has eight formations, and Sun Bin also has the "Eight Formations" chapter in "Sun Bin Art of War", and the eight formations are commonly used in combat training in the Eastern Han Dynasty. Zhuge Liang proceeded from the reality of Shu infantry as the main force, innovated the real formation on the basis of the original ancient eight formations, drew the formation map, and finally formed the "eight formation map" to train the Shu army.

The so-called formation diagram is to draw the formation into a figure, draw it on the brocade, paper, on the ground or pile it up with sand and gravel to form an intuitive physical object, which is the formation diagram. Zhuge Liang's text recording the formation has not been handed down, and the eight formation diagram has been lost in the Tang Dynasty. But it is said that Zhuge Liang once made eight formations of stones, it is said that the remains of the eight eight sixty-four piles of stones by the fish belly river, is the eight formations left by Zhuge Liang, combined with a few words about Zhuge Liang's eight formations, for reasonable simulation, modern soldiers believe that the eight formations are a kind of group phalanx, each eight formations have eight small formations distributed in the eight directions around the central formation, the center of the eight formations is the general, the golden drum banner, and the soldiers and horses directly under it, this is the middle formation. Each small array has code names such as heaven, earth, wind, clouds, dragons, tigers, birds, snakes, etc. This is the saying in "Li Tang Asks Right" that "the number of formations is nine", so the Song Dynasty also called the eight formations the nine army formations.

The formation of each direction is six small formations, the middle formation is sixteen small formations, and the entire large phalanx has a total of sixty-four small formations, which is just in line with the number of eight eight sixty-four piles of stone relics in the fish belly river. After the large phalanx, there may be twenty-four small formations composed of rangers, for a total of eighty-eight small formations. These small phalanxes can be cavalry, infantry, convoys, composed of dozens to hundreds, the front row is the crossbowman, the middle is the long weaponman, and the back row is the short soldierman (sometimes the order is also different) In order to delay the enemy's attack and give full play to the power of the Shu army's crossbowmen, the eight formations also set up obstacles such as rushing cars, antlers, and thistles when defending. Zhuge Eight Formations belong to defensive formations, the advantage is that there is no weakness in deployment, any direction is attacked, the overall large array does not need to make fundamental changes, one is attacked, the two adjacent formations can automatically become two wings, protecting and supporting the attacked array. But the shortcomings are also obvious, first of all, such a complex Zhuge Eight Formation requires a lot of time to train, and the mobility is poor, in order to maintain the integrity of the formation, it is not allowed to run when it is forward, and it is not allowed to run when it is backward. This is "the front is the back, the future is the front, there is no speed in the front, and there is no retreat and no reluctance" in "Li Tang Asks the Right". Therefore, the eight formations are a very conservative formation of defensive nature. Without a big defeat, it is also difficult to achieve a big victory. Zhuge Liang went out of Qishan six times, and Jiang Wei also attacked Wei many times, without major defeats and no major victories, and it cannot be said that it has nothing to do with the Shu army's use of eight formations to fight.

But this may only be the basis or prototype of the Zhuge Eight Formations, because relying on such a rigid formation, it seems impossible to contend with Cao Wei for decades without a major defeat with the weak strength of the Shu State, and it is not commensurate with the position of the Zhuge Eight Formations that has been praised for thousands of years, and the combat area belongs to the mountainous environment, and the arrangement of the Eight Formations seems to be more suitable for infantry to fight in the plain area.

Therefore, Ling Hao still believes that the Zhuge Eight Formations should have many changes on the basis of the original Eight Formations, and when there are restrictions on the position, such as ditches and trees, they should be adjusted according to the actual situation.

Moreover, when marching, there should be various changes in formation when attacking, but due to the limitations of the information that Ling Hao had collected by himself, he could only think about this bold idea by himself for now.

What's more, the so-called Zhuge Eight Formations is not only a combat formation, but through the training of the "Eight Formations", the Shu army's operational guiding ideology, establishment, and training are infiltrated into the Shu army......

And Li Jing in the Tang Dynasty was based on the Zhuge Eight Arrays and arranged the Six Flower Arrays...... The so-called six-flower formation is like the formation of "six flowers".

The Chinese army is in the center, and the front army, the left army, the left Yu Hou army, the rear army, the right army, and the right Yu Hou army are distributed around the Chinese army.

According to the record of "Li Weigong Asks the Right Question", the Liuhua Formation has a circular formation, a square formation, a curved formation, a vertical formation, a sharp formation and other formations, each of which has five variations, a total of 25 variations, and the commander can adopt different formations according to different enemy conditions, terrain, offensive and defensive needs......

But Ling Hao felt that he didn't need these ever-changing and unfathomable formations for the time being, so it was better to come to something that was the most practical and easier to practice.

Therefore, he chose the Crane Wing Array and the Fish Scale Array, as well as the five types of Mandarin Duck Array, Crab Array, and Glaive Array, and arranged for Su Lie to practice after studying.