View Full Version : Pikemen and the Unit Guide
So far I hadn't played with Late HRE yet, so I recently decided to give that a try. Close to the Swiss, so finally I get the chance to capture it and use those great Pikemen.
An early attack turned out to be a really bad idea, despite me outnumbering the Swiss more than 2-to-1. So in the end I waited until I had 7 units of Chivalric Foot Knights and a 6-star general.
The battle was an immense slaughter. I outflanked whereever possible with these slow units, I always supported my standard halberdiers (I had one or two units of those) with sufficient Foot Knights, so they wouldn't run away (which worked very well), and I finally managed to defeat the 3 units of Armoured Pikemen (and some regular pikemen and halberdiers, but they are of not much consequence). My huge army was decimated, however. About 2 units' worth of Foot Knights survived. Those Swiss Armoured Pikemen kick ass (and are those pikes really not armour piercing?). They must be the best infantry in the game, right?
The Total War Unit Guide, however, says that those Foot Knights were the only rival to heavy janissaries for the title of best infantry in the game, and they're tough enough to charge anything head on, which is nice, because they are too slow to flank.
According to the same guide, pikemen are nice, but spearmen are better at everything, and their shorter front is a crippling disadvantage.
Clearly, I disagree. Pikemen are amazing. Regular pikemen may not be as good as chivalric or gothic sergeants, but Swiss Pikemen definitely are. Armoured Pikemen will kill anything in sight. I only managed to defeat them because I ganged up on each unit of pikemen with 3 units Foot Knights, after having thinned them a bit with my serpentine gun and crossbows.
Now I'm using Swiss Pikemen (unarmoured), and they simply kill anything in sight. They can charge a full unit of Chivalric Knights head on and destroy it, while only losing 2 men themselves. And those knights were part of a group of 3, at least one of which was also caught up in the charge.
If Armoured Pikemen are better than this, surely they must be the best infantry in te game?
I've played with Heavy Janissaries, and while they rock, I don't charge Chivalric Knights head on with them. If anything, those Armoured Pikemen are a good contender for the title of best infantry. Like the Foot Knights and Janissaries they have their own specialty, and they excell at it at least as much as the other two do.
mcv.
motorhead
06-26-2004, 13:09
SAPs are definitely one of the best elite units in the game. In your battle, what was the command of the Swiss general? Also, most SAP units (when part of the Swiss faction) are almost always ruler/heir units - which means they usually have +valor/morale virtues.
- All pikes get +2 attack, +6 defense versus mounted troops, plus tack on their 4 supporting ranks and they're murder against cav.
- But, their biggest weakness (excluding SAPs) is their poor armor rating. Plain pikes have the same armor as peasants (1) and the plain swiss version has 2. Any type of missile fire will decimate them.
Quote[/b] ]They [Swiss Pikemen] can charge a full unit of Chivalric Knights head on and destroy it,
- yah, but just about any good spear (chiv sgts, saracens, Italian Inf, Order foot) can lay the smackdown on knights.
Quote[/b] ]I've played with Heavy Janissaries, and while they rock, I don't charge Chivalric Knights head on with them.
- And good thing you don't, at least not as a rule. JHI are polearm units and get +3 attack, +1 defense versus cav, but no rank bonuses. The strength of JHI is not as a pure anti-cav unit, but their speed, flexibility (good vs cav and infantry) and armor piercing. They can be adapted to many roles, depending upon the battle.
the smaller front does hurt mcv, it means pikes can be flanked much easier by sword units, who are their counter.so CMAA are the correct counter to them (after u've held em up with CS or GS first) second, flank attacks iirc negate rank bonus, so SAP's are not unstoppable by any means
But outflanking those armoured Swiss with my foot knights didn't cut them to ribbons all that fast. Should I have used men-at-arms there?
In any case, problems with short fronts are easily countered by supporting each unit with other units. Don't charge with a single pikemen unit, charge with all at once. When you can't keep your lines closed, at least keep other units nearby to intercept units that try to outflank you.
I admit I don't have a lot of experience with pikemen yet, but so far I've had absolutely no problems with them. As long as they're fighting on my side.
mcv.
Quote[/b] ]But outflanking those armoured Swiss with my foot knights didn't cut them to ribbons all that fast. Should I have used men-at-arms there?
NEVER attack pikeman with cavalary you might just disband them
motorhead
06-26-2004, 14:57
Quote[/b] (amir @ June 26 2004,09:40)]
Quote[/b] ]But outflanking those armoured Swiss with my foot knights didn't cut them to ribbons all that fast. Should I have used men-at-arms there?
NEVER attack pikeman with cavalary you might just disband them
- agreed, but he does say foot knights, not cavalry
nevertheless, foot knights can only beat SAP's on the flank, all things equal, and the swiss do have some great gens
Quote[/b] ]agreed, but he does say foot knights, not cavalry
http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-oops.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-oops.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-oops.gif sorry i just dont get them of the horses a lot so i use that the word knight and the word cavalary is a synonyms
Mightypeon
06-26-2004, 16:33
My problems with Swiss pikes:
1: Really expensive
2: The only enemy that is giving me real fits is the Golden Horde (stupid we kill charging light cav horse archers) and against them Pikes simply suck.
Ok, they murder the GH heavy Cav, but they arent my main problem when facing the GH. Apart from that, you do not have to be a Swiss pike in order to murder them.
frogbeastegg
06-26-2004, 16:35
Quickly because I don’t have much time:
I did not say pikes were useless or anything of the sort; I said they have their uses just like every other unit, but there are other units who can fill each of those functions better. That makes pikes a ‘jack of all trades, master of none’ kind of unit. I know SAP are deadly, I gave them a good write up and have called them some of the best infantry around (don’t recall where I said that, somewhere…). I know pikes can be useful if you guard their flank well, I did a long write up on how to use pikes complete with pictures…er, somewhere (honestly I can’t remember what part is in which guide now).
The generic pike unit is a bit crap, the unarmed Swiss aren’t too bad, Swiss armoured are scary; I can’t say the entire category is really good when only one of the units is actually really good, it has to be as an overall. To be honest even a peasant with SAP stats would be deadly, it has nothing much to do with the unit type, although the rank bonus does boost them up their base stats are outstanding.
As motorhead said spears will chew up cavalry just as well, and as ah_dut says the frontage can be a problem; as you said if you protect your pikes then the frontage is less of a problem.
Janissary HI are versatile, and that is what puts them at the top; SAP are less flexible and slower when moving, speed really does matter.
If you rae taking on SAPO with chiv koot knights then you need to mob, several (preferably more, it's something like 53FK to 186 SAP per unit) FK to each SAP block, otherwise your FK are outnumbered badly. You need to break the pike formation, put it under pressure from the front and flanks, having damaged it with missile fire before the melee. It is possible, I have done it quite a few times before I got sick of MTW and stopped playing.
I don't think Pikemen were meant to fight, but to become a movable stronghold on the field. Moving some Pavise Arbalest and Pikemen up to the enemy and using staggering fire makes constant death and demoralizes the enemy. I usually support the pikes with a few Arquebrus to destroy nasty attack infantry. While this is going on my cavalry is charging into the weakest point of the enemy line.
Inuyasha12
06-27-2004, 00:21
Exactly, like the phalanx of ancient greece, you can't take them on in a frontal attack so it forces you to flank. and that's were you get'em
Neubs has it right.
Pikemen are a brick wall on legs. They don't fight, they stand there and repel anything that charges them, thus making them great line infantry. In a huge long line of units set on hold position, there are only two flanks, easily protected by cavalry and swordsmen. Their sole purpose is to engage the enemy and not die. This is all they need to do, and fortunately, they're good at doing that.
The units behind the pike wall should be swordsmen, some heavy cavalry, and lots of light cavalry. Pavise arbalesters to the front of the pike wall will protect it from missiles to an extent.
This entails a little patience, keeping your lines tight and straight is essential, otherwise you'll end up exposing a flank or creating a gap in the wall for your enemy to exploit.
Hard work? Yes.
Rewarding results when done correctly? Yes http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/ceasaryes.gif
Inuyasha12
06-27-2004, 01:59
unless you have some archers peppering them, thats why you need cavarly to screen their flanks(like the phalanx in HTW)
Archers are a problem, which is why keeping light cavalry behind the lines to deal with them is a good idea. And in catholic vs catholic combat, archers all but disappear unless you're facing the English or occasionally Italians.
I'm not familiar with any of the mods at the moment, bu I assume the phalanx is historically accurate (Huge shields, dense formation, pike-like rules). Then yes, it would be similar, except with better defence against missiles.
Inuyasha12
06-27-2004, 10:11
Yeah but in Hellenic total war you rarely deal with archers.
No you get off much worse, you fight peltasts, spanish javelinmen on crack
They can really tear up your perfectly formed phalanx.
Especially the mounted ones who can simply trot away, ughhh
Spears will chew up cavalry if the cavalry charges, but AI cavalry rarely charges my spear walls. Swiss pikemen are pretty awesome on the charge, however.
On default settings Foot Knights are 40 per unit and SAPs are 96 per unit, so I used 2 or 3 units of foot knights per SAP unit, attacking the flank as much as possible, and the foot knights won in the end, but only after taking tremendous losses. I expected chivalric foot knights to be the perfect counter to SAPs, so I was a bit surprised that so many of my knights died.
I just reread the pikemen bit in the unit guide, and it says that pikes have a bonus against armour (I hadn't noticed that before), so that probably explains why my knights died that quickly, but I still wonder what would be the best counter to SAPs. Low armour/high morale axemen like Ghazi Infantry, Abyssinian Guard, and possibly Vikings? Not availlable to most factions, but it would save a lot of money.
mcv.
Gallowglasses would be effective too. Low armour, armour-piercing attacks, good morale, relatively cheap.
Not sure if Highland Clansmen have a bonus against armour... but they have a good charge, a double-team by Gallowglasses and Highland Clansmen would be rather effective for any English player, or anyone who's lucky enough to pick them up on the mercenary market.
Ghazi would be effective too. Not sure about Gothic foot knights, they're heavily armoured and would get torn to bits by the armour piercing pikemen. Janissary heavy infantry, with their lower armour value and nasty armour piercing pole arms, would do well, but then again, what don't JHI do well against? http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-confused.gif
Swabian swordsmen would also be good.
cutepuppy
06-27-2004, 19:48
Quote[/b] (Sarnaen @ June 27 2004,20:39)]Not sure about Gothic foot knights, they're heavily armoured and would get torn to bits by the armour piercing pikemen.
Pikemen don't have armour piercing, only units with an (pole)axe or a two-handed sword (gallowglass, swabian swordsmen, gothic foot knights) have AP.
Quote[/b] (Sarnaen @ June 27 2004,21:39)]. Janissary heavy infantry, with their lower armour value and nasty armour piercing pole arms, would do well, but then again, what don't JHI do well against? http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-confused.gif
a nice longbow barrage http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-jester.gif
Pikes are easily flanked by lunatics with MAA's so watch your flanks, my typical english army should do allright against a swiss one. 8 longbows, 3 bills, 1 CFK, 3 cmaa and a mounted sergeant. it's cheaper than a swiss army allowing me higher valour, so pikes are by no means invincible, http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/ceasaryes.gif
8 Longbow units? http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/eek.gif
I would hate to try and take a hill that has that army sat on top of it. Lack of spearmen might make it vulnerable to light cavalry, though...
Now you've got me thinking, damn you. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/tongue.gif Thats a pretty solid list, and effective against a standard Turk army.
Pikemen are defenitely not invincible, they are very vulnerable to arrows because of their close formation, and that way you can easily kill them, just take some arrowmen and start shooting, the enemy will do one of three thing:
1)stay at place - you just keep shoting 'till they will rout
2)stop the close foramtion and pass to opener formation waiting 'till you will lose your arrows - you quick rush with cav as they are vulnerable
3) rush toward your arrowmen - before you shoot make sure you have cav on the side ( /// |||| \\\ - as the | represent the arrowmen and the \ and / represnt cav) and once they got close flank'em, the morale loss will pay for the fact they are pikemen, also pikemen usualy lose formation when attacking making them more vulnerable
so pikemen defenitely not invincible
Citaat[/b] (ah_dut @ Juni 27 2004,13:52)]
Citaat[/b] (Sarnaen @ June 27 2004,21:39)]. Janissary heavy infantry, with their lower armour value and nasty armour piercing pole arms, would do well, but then again, what don't JHI do well against? http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-confused.gif
a nice longbow barrage http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-jester.gif
Pikes are easily flanked by lunatics with MAA's so watch your flanks, my typical english army should do allright against a swiss one. 8 longbows, 3 bills, 1 CFK, 3 cmaa and a mounted sergeant. it's cheaper than a swiss army allowing me higher valour, so pikes are by no means invincible, http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/ceasaryes.gif
I think your talking about MP. In MP massed arqeus are also effective agains SAP.
I remember one siege battle against a Swiss defender. The three attackers were all heavy gunpowder and although there was some rain(Swiss have no real cav, so no fast counter-attacks). We won taking almost no casualties. Just put some foot knight or maa behind the arques and the sap are harmless.
frogbeastegg
06-27-2004, 21:13
Quote[/b] (mcv @ June 27 2004,19:31)]I just reread the pikemen bit in the unit guide, and it says that pikes have a bonus against armour
Can I politely suggest you read it again? It says nothing of the sort, it says polearms have armour piercing which makes them better versus heavily armoured cavalry than pikes.
I'm not impressed with Arquebusiers, Handgunners are more effective as they're better in close combat. They let you fire off a couple of volleys and then close into CC as a light flanking unit. I'm pretty convinced that a couple of units of handgunners and some MAA or foot knights can deal with pikemen.
This, however, is two or three units being used to take out one. The Pikemen player will probably have several more units in close coordination with the unit of pikemen, defending it from such attacks.
1 unit of CFK, used properly and with equal valor and equal upgrades can defeat one unit of SAP the majority of the time and the CFK cost 200 florins less.
If you really did use 3 foot knights per SAP with flanking and rear attacks and still took heavy losses then I'd have to say there's some other factor that you don't know about (maybe the SAP had heavy armour/morale upgrades, or one of them had a valor+ trait, etc).
In my opinion SAP are only in the running for best infantry when they have their full rank bonus (and they won't always get this). Once they start losing it, their effectivness drops exponentiallly. It has a snowballing effect so that when you fight SAP, 95% of your casualties occur in the first half of the battle. Once you kill 1 or 2 ranks worth of bonuses you're barely going to lose any men at all (assuming you're using something like CFK to fight them with). Since you can circumvent the rank bonus, even when the SAP is supported on its flanks (though it's a bit trickier then), I don't have a very high opinion of SAP. But that's me.
In single player, they're okay for buildng spearwalls. But spearwalls are inefficient and only work because 'Aritifical Intelligence' is a misnomer. I never quite understood the attraction to building spearwalls in single player. I suppose the biggest attraction is that they're low maintenance in that they deal with swords better than swords deal with cavalry. So you can just set them up as your frontline and leave them alone until they rout. But again, not very efficient.
When using a faction that has access to them, I use them as a solid core for the rest of my army to work around. They provide a reliable core, even if they don't have the devastating effect of other units.
IMO, they're tacticlly underrated, but the description of them as a stand alone unit is quite accurate. Pikemen die easily on their own, whereas many units are tough enough to survive when working solo on the battlefield.
Quote[/b] (frogbeastegg @ June 27 2004,15:13)]
Quote[/b] (mcv @ June 27 2004,19:31)]I just reread the pikemen bit in the unit guide, and it says that pikes have a bonus against armour
Can I politely suggest you read it again? It says nothing of the sort, it says polearms have armour piercing which makes them better versus heavily armoured cavalry than pikes.
You're right. I read it correctly the first time and wrong the second time. No armour piercing bonus, but very effective against heavily armoured foot knights nonetheless.
mcv.
Is it just a myth that Pikes perform well against armour, then?
I find they do okay against armoured units, and they're not at the disadvantage that they should be at.
Just goes further to show that they're reliable choices for an army http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif
gaijinalways
06-28-2004, 07:38
They are expensive, but if you can get them, I usually snap them up and upgrade their armor (if needed). Their size as a unit and their ability to take punishment rate them highly for me, as stated earlier, my only problem with them as I usually never get them (very late in the game, if at all)
I usually dedicate a province to building towards creating high armour, high valour, high morale pikemen from the early stages of the game. Pikes aren't available until later, but that doesn't mean you can't prepare for their coming.
If you've built everything you need early on, then you're able to build them as soon as they hit the scene. This gives you a headstart, and allows you to begin updating your armies, giving you an advantage against your enemies for a while. This margin between you updating your armies, and your foes updating, is the time when you make your massive land grabs, and take good provinces previously unattainable due to a strong garrison. It's in this way I take down the usually godlike Italians when I play as the English. As soon a spikes hit the scene, pump out a hi-tech army and ship it south for the sun, take Venice or Tuscany, and use the damage doen to their economy to wear them down and force them to disband a lot of their standing army.
Buying the disbanded units as mercenaries is the next step http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/tongue.gif
See the impact on a campaign pikemen can have? http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif
Oleander Ardens
06-28-2004, 10:47
I personally use SAP and other Pikes almost always with missle heavy stacks. This way your missles will protect your Pikes from enemy missles, and take away a big threat number one.
Great amounts of heavy sword and polearms can be a problem, but your missles should create great havoc among them. Especially focus the fire on flanking units - they will get thinned out so that your small cavalry screen on the flanks should handle them.
The mass of the enemy will now have the charge your pikes headon. When they are 5-6 ranks deep it will mean incredibly heavy casualities for the enemy. Meanwhile I replace depleted missleunits with Cav which turn the tide by flanking and charging them form the rear...
But your pikes will have their finest hour when defending bridges and castels. SAPs can hold a castlegate almost forever...
The GoldenHorde knows for sure http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-2thumbsup.gif
OA
KyodaiSteeleye
06-28-2004, 13:45
The biggest downside to SAP is their cost, which in no way is equivalent to their advantages over other good infantry types. Even with their armour they are very vulnerable to missile fire, and in single play, the AI will target all of their missiles onto your SAP units. As stated before they are also unmanouverable and slow.
Still, they are fun to play with and will defend anything just about, but in MP i don't think they have a place.
To attack pikes - same as for spears, a shock infantry unit (high att) in wedge at full charge should break into their formation and disrupt their rank bonus imediately.
{TL}Lord_Krutz
06-28-2004, 14:58
ok...i'm not quite sure what guide u all keep referring(sp?) to, but in the little booklet u get w/ the MTW game (and for all i know u could all be talking about VI) it says the following....
Spearmen-Spearmen are the defensive backbone of an army, as they can fend off most cavalry attacks from the front-no horse will ever willingly charge into a wall of spear points. With the front two ranks able to fight, spearmen can also be a useful offensive force too. Pikemen are even better, as even longer spears allow the front four ranks to fight at the same time.
KukriKhan
06-28-2004, 15:20
They are referring to the Guides in our Guides Forum located:
http://www.totalwar.org/cgi-bin....SF;f=34 (http://www.totalwar.org/cgi-bin/forum/ikonboard.cgi?act=SF;f=34)
Welcome to the .Org, {TL}Lord_Krutz
welcome {TL}Lord_Krutz, you're slighty wrong in that with the patch, swords smack straight through spears so a no no there. and pikes have a terminal frontage problem, so i don't use either too much by the end of the game http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif
{TL}Lord_Krutz
06-28-2004, 18:32
oh, ty u both. i'll have to check out the guides, sounds good and informational. and ah_dut, ty for that info. i realize i was probably way off but i thought i'd just try and share that info incase it cleared anything up. as for myself, i rarely(if ever) use pikemen or spearmen. i use CFK because they can murder cav (if u use the stats i use) and they can also be used to kill infantry, making them very versatile IMO. and when an opponent uses pikemen, i tear them up w/ my swords (i'm no n00b, just not clear on all aspects). so, glad to learn w/ every post http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/medievalcheers.gif
it might take you a year but read froggy's guide, she must have spent a year writing it it's good http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif
Blodrast
06-28-2004, 19:37
Quote[/b] (motorhead @ June 26 2004,08:09)]- All pikes get +2 attack, +6 defense versus mounted troops, plus tack on their 4 supporting ranks and they're murder against cav.
just for the sake of accuracy, Motorhead, why +6 defence ?
i thought it was +4 (1 for each supporting rank).
do they get extra defence vs cav ? or are you referring to the +2 def they get from hold formation (in which case, their attack goes 2 down) ?
thanks
Quote[/b] (Blodrast @ June 28 2004,11:37)]just for the sake of accuracy, Motorhead, why +6 defence ?
i thought it was +4 (1 for each supporting rank).
do they get extra defence vs cav ? or are you referring to the +2 def they get from hold formation (in which case, their attack goes 2 down) ?
He's referring to the anti-cav bonus that the pikes get. All pike units share this bonus 2 att - 6 def against cav. Spear units get 1 att - 4 def bonus against cav. All polearms get 3 att - 1 def bonus against cav.
This is in addition to the rank bonus (for spear and pike units), so you can see that cav stands pretty much no chance.
Quote[/b] (KukriKhan @ June 28 2004,09:20)]They are referring to the Guides in our Guides Forum located:
http://www.totalwar.org/cgi-bin....SF;f=34 (http://www.totalwar.org/cgi-bin/forum/ikonboard.cgi?act=SF;f=34)
I get the Guide from http://www.totalwar.org/strategy/twug/index.html. It's a bit easier to look up the exact unit you need to know about.
mcv.
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