View Full Version : Pikeman vs Sword & Shield head to head post 1.02?
RickooClan
04-22-2007, 11:06
I have not really tried to use pikeman in campaign and today i just test them out with custom battle on some S&S units.
I was so surprise even head to head, with a stationary defensive solid setup, the pikeman are chopped into pieces by those S&S unit.
I even tried 2 units of pikemen vs 1 unit of dismounted feudal knight (so they cant "wrap" up my flank), the DFK still outrun them all even at the front of pikeline?? (150 pikemen gone, only 20 DFK is killed....)
I am not sure if this is right any infantry can beat an organised solid pikeline head to head so easily?? :inquisitive:
Not surprising, The pikemen have a penalty to attack VS infantry, they have less attack to begin with, and usually less armour.
A general rule is only use pikemen as infantry if they are upper tier and have maxed out armour upgrades.
RickooClan
04-22-2007, 17:36
Not surprising, The pikemen have a penalty to attack VS infantry, they have less attack to begin with, and usually less armour.
A general rule is only use pikemen as infantry if they are upper tier and have maxed out armour upgrades.
Oh, i never know such penalty applied for pikeman, if thats the case in m2tw only? [RTW pikeman works different]
And such penalty make little sense to me in real life situation, other then game play balancing concern.
The most weird thing in m2tw is, in the initial contact, even the swordman didnt touch the pikeman in the animation, their charge still kill all the front rank of the pikeman.... :inquisitive:
pike master
04-22-2007, 18:45
pikemen are bugged intentionally but there are ways to get around CAs little tricks.
RickooClan
04-22-2007, 19:06
pikemen are bugged intentionally but there are ways to get around CAs little tricks.
"bugged" intentionally? It can either be bugged or intended i think?
Sorry if i have missed this bug which might have been discuss before 1.02. (all the major bugs i know is shield and 2h bug)
Gaius Terentius Varro
04-22-2007, 19:06
They changed it to stop scottish pike spam in MP
They changed it to stop scottish pike spam in MP
~:mad ~:mad
They went on the record with this? Cause if they did, and this is in fact the case, I am thoroughly ~:pissed:
Now, if all this is true, please tell me there is a better way to go around this than removing the pikemen's secondary weapons altogether.
pike master
04-23-2007, 03:19
all this is speculation because CA ,may the cat and rabbit population overrun their facility, will not divulge to its paying customers whether they intended for the pikes to work like they are or whether they are bugged.:wall:
Furious Mental
04-23-2007, 05:16
Well if you can be bothered setting up MTW2 for modding, do so and remove secondary weapons from pikemen. I did this and find them to be much better, albeit not overwhelming. Alternatively you could remove their spear bonus, although since they still seem to love whacking stuff with swords I don't know how much difference it would make.
nameless
04-23-2007, 06:16
Never did like using pikemen, given the fact that they lack a shield they are extremely vulnerable to missile attacks.
I thought that´s precisely what´s supposed to happen :dizzy2:
Pikes beat cavalry, cavalry beats swords, swords beat pikes - it makes perfectly sense to me.
pike master
04-23-2007, 14:07
I thought that´s precisely what´s supposed to happen :dizzy2:
Pikes beat cavalry, cavalry beats swords, swords beat pikes - it makes perfectly sense to me.
historically this is not true.
RickooClan
04-23-2007, 14:21
Not just historically, but it is not true by common sense/physic too.
I can understand a skillful S&S can parry the pike, charging in and make himself on the upper hand in close combat.
But in m2tw while the S&S charge in, make contact on the pikehead with their body/sword/shield, they dont even get hurt/killed but this impact somehow kill the man who is holding the pike in a distance!!?? :wall:
I will have no problem if the swordman or any other infantry beat the pikeman in a sensible way. Either they are parrying in or warping up the pike unit on their flank.
As i think one of the essence of TW is a realistic representation on the battle field. Such unrealistic outcome should not be made merely for game play balance.
Lupiscanis
04-23-2007, 14:42
Not just historically, but it is not true by common sense/physic too.
I can understand a skillful S&S can parry the pike, charging in and make himself on the upper hand in close combat.
But in m2tw while the S&S charge in, make contact on the pikehead with their body/sword/shield, they dont even get hurt/killed but this impact somehow kill the man who is holding the pike in a distance!!?? :wall:
I will have no problem if the swordman or any other infantry beat the pikeman in a sensible way. Either they are parrying in or warping up the pike unit on their flank.
As i think one of the essence of TW is a realistic representation on the battle field. Such unrealistic outcome should not be made merely for game play balance.
Whilst I wouldn't necessarily believe that 'charge' deaths should be biased towards the S&S troops (after all, who wants to charge on to a big pointy stick), think about it...
You have one guy with a really big pole with a point on it and a guy with a sword and shield. Imagine the pole is 6 foot long. How are you supposed to beat a guy with a sword with a 6 foot pole when he's 1 foot from you?
Of course the S&S will win in melee.
Agent Smith
04-23-2007, 14:48
Whilst I wouldn't necessarily believe that 'charge' deaths should be biased towards the S&S troops (after all, who wants to charge on to a big pointy stick), think about it...
You have one guy with a really big pole with a point on it and a guy with a sword and shield. Imagine the pole is 6 foot long. How are you supposed to beat a guy with a sword with a 6 foot pole when he's 1 foot from you?
Of course the S&S will win in melee.
Still, I think you are overestimating S&S's ability to GET into a melee in the first place. The way the pike formation works, there is three ranks deep of pikes exposed, so it isn't just a pike six feet ahead, it is also a pike a few feet back from that, and another one a few feet back from that.
Bob the Insane
04-23-2007, 14:59
Still, I think you are overestimating S&S's ability to GET into a melee in the first place. The way the pike formation works, there is three ranks deep of pikes exposed, so it isn't just a pike six feet ahead, it is also a pike a few feet back from that, and another one a few feet back from that.
and a whole load to the left and right...
In RTW the pikes where more like a physical obstical in the front of the formation of troops and prevented te enemy form reaching them... Only when the enemy wrapped around and squeezed a few men between the pikes did melee combat occur... This made even militia pike troops useful as they could effectly block and pin other non-pike units for a reasonable amount of time even if they did not cause many casualties.
In M2TW this blocking ability seems to have been lost and the troops act more like a group of individuals using pikes rather than a formation. Troops are very quick to stop using the pike and start using their swords.
There was a mod going around that removed the ability to use swords from the pikeman whihc greatly enhanced their effectiveness...
RickooClan
04-23-2007, 15:38
You have one guy with a really big pole with a point on it and a guy with a sword and shield. Imagine the pole is 6 foot long. How are you supposed to beat a guy with a sword with a 6 foot pole when he's 1 foot from you?
Of course the S&S will win in melee.
As i have said i can understand S&S can win if they skillfully parry the pike or wrap up the pike unit at the flank. But the way it is presenting in m2tw now is neither of those, the S&S just kill the pikeman head to head, especially in the initial charge which the S&S even didnt contact the pikeman at all! (but their pike)
@Bob the Insane
And i agree with you in RTW the function of pikeman make more sense and even militia pike troop can hold their ground if using correctly.
Honestly without modding i see very little point to use pike unit in m2tw compare with other standard spearman unit. They do a far better job against infantry, higher resistance against arrow with shield, higher mobility, less vulerable on flanks with schiltrom and also good against cavalry! :inquisitive:
And dont forget pike unit are on a higher tech tree compare with standard spearman...... :wall:
Agent Smith
04-23-2007, 16:15
As i have said i can understand S&S can win if they skillfully parry the pike or wrap up the pike unit at the flank. But the way it is presenting in m2tw now is neither of those, the S&S just kill the pikeman head to head, especially in the initial charge which the S&S even didnt contact the pikeman at all! (but their pike)
@Bob the Insane
And i agree with you in RTW the function of pikeman make more sense and even militia pike troop can hold their ground if using correctly.
Honestly without modding i see very little point to use pike unit in m2tw compare with other standard spearman unit. They do a far better job against infantry, higher resistance against arrow with shield, higher mobility, less vulerable on flanks with schiltrom and also good against cavalry! :inquisitive:
And dont forget pike unit are on a higher tech tree compare with standard spearman...... :wall:
I don't understand why they couldn't make pike units operate like the phalanx did in RTW. The lack of mobility during spear wall should be countered by the superior frontal defensive capability. You are right, the two negatives make them difficult to use.
The chief advantage of pikemen is their ability to statically protect other units from cavalry. Unlike spearmen their pikes are long enough to guard a 2-rank unit in front of it from a cavalry charge.
This ability is extremely useful when combined with such units as Musketeers and Scots Guards. You would have all-around offensive and defensive ability with this setup, especially if you hotkey each pikemen/missile pair.
If pikemen were also good against S&S infantry, however, it would be too strong. It would basically render heavy cavalry in their traditional roles useless, which from a gameplay balance POV is highly undesirable.
pike master
04-23-2007, 18:28
the thing that puzzles me was when i played rome and first saw the phalanxes i said to myself, "they modeled them after medieval descriptions of swiss pike blocks"
the only trully really accurate descriptions of pike blocks come from the middle ages. they are not presented in very good detail at all from ancient pictures.
pike blocks in the middle ages should have 4 ranks lowered instead of two in a melee. 5 ranks lowered when braced instead of three.
battle accounts i have read make no dismissal to the effectiveness of a well ordered pike wall. they were very difficult to break into. often involving heroic deeds of self sacrifice to open a gap.
the romans tactics involved the pilum but also they scouted the enemies line and looked for a place where a boulder or a dip in the terrain weakened the formation. and they would focus their attack there to break into the phalanx.
here is a mtw/vi unit description of pikemen
2.5 Pikemen.
Pikemen are the successors to spearmen, they serve the same function and receive the same rank bonus as the spears ( +1 defence, +1 charge per supporting rank and +1 attack for each second supporting rank) but they can claim up to four supporting ranks. Therefore you should deploy them in ranks of six, one to fight, four to support and the sixth providing men to fill the gaps left by the dead. The supporting ranks mean that pikemen need to hold their formation in order to fight effectively, therefore keep them on hold formation at all times. You should also be careful when moving them, let them stop frequently to recover their formation. You can charge pikes somewhat more effectively than spears, just walk them up in front of the enemy, pause for a second to allow them to redress the ranks and then order the charge from close range. This arrangement allows the unit to take losses without losing the rank bonus too quickly. The need for a deeper deployment means that pikemen can cover less ground per unit as they have the same number of men as the spear units (133), this makes them less efficient for holding a front line. They are also more vulnerable to being flanked as the shorter frontage makes it very easy for enemy units to wrap around the pikes and attack from three sides simultaneously. Pikemen have one major problem – everything they can do another unit can do much better. Spears still provide a better front line troop for protecting missile units and providing a base for mobile units to work from. Polearms are much, much better at killing cavalry and they also have a bonus against armoured units, swords, spears and polearm units are also better for leading the charge into battle and engaging the enemy’s front line while others flank. These units are also less vulnerable to being wrapped in a combat situation.
There is one bonus to their small frontage – they are ideal for holding small spaces like the mouth of a bridge or a castle gate (not breach though, they are usually much larger than the gates) for a long time. They are often able to beat off many determined attacks when given a little missile support.
Pikes are best at: Charging the enemy, holding a position, holding a small space, guarding missile units.
M13
Image M13: This picture shows a unit of pikemen against a unit of spearmen. Both are in their optimal formations (pikes = 6 ranks, spears = 4). This shows just how easy it is for pike formations to get wrapped in combat, it also illustrates why spears are better for building a front line.
https://i155.photobucket.com/albums/s286/hunterhornet/pikesupport.jpg
M14
Image M14: Here is an illustration of the pikes supporting rank bonus in action. Look at the row at the bottom of the screenshot. The first man is doing the actual fighting. The four behind him are in their fighting animations even though they are not near the enemy; this is because they are supporting the first man. The final man at the back is doing nothing, this is because he is the reinforcement rank – he will move in to replace a dead man. Because you can see the supporting ranks working in most of the formation you know that this unit is fighting at its best.
NOTE: the descriptions explaining that they are to fight in 4 to 5 ranks deep.
Bob the Insane
04-23-2007, 19:18
Of course with MTW this was all an illusion as only the first rank was fighting, but with bonus from the active ranks behind (shown by those rank's animations)...
In RTW and even more so in M2TW it is the individual men fighting, even from the rows further back...
I think Miracle may be right and CA have specifically opted to make pikes vunerable to S&S units...
Jobst_vonGrünungen
04-24-2007, 05:38
Whilst I wouldn't necessarily believe that 'charge' deaths should be biased towards the S&S troops (after all, who wants to charge on to a big pointy stick), think about it...
You have one guy with a really big pole with a point on it and a guy with a sword and shield. Imagine the pole is 6 foot long. How are you supposed to beat a guy with a sword with a 6 foot pole when he's 1 foot from you?
Of course the S&S will win in melee.
Because the four guys behind you also have poles and are poking at intermittent distances...
Some swordsmen would break up pike formations with sword and buckler, historically, but for the most part, once you had a pike wall the pike wall was dominant until it was slowly fazed out by guns.
I too have been very disapointed by the behaviour of pikemen, I like the way they worked in RTW better. It's supposed to be a situation where if you can't flank, and you can't headbutt them, then you shoot em, and that's why they should have low armour, no shields, etc. But giving them low armour and making them unable to resist a frontal attack? Ridiculous. Just up the price, or make em harder to get if you don't want to spam them.
The thing is making them vulnerable to S&S units is not sensible from a balance perspective. The RPS isn't Pikes beat Cav, Cav beat swords, swords beat Pikes, because it fails totally to take account of 2-handers.
The actual RPS looks something like this, (ignoring pikes):
Cav beat S&S, (with moderate to heavy losses), 2-Handers, (with low losses), and Archers, (with low losses).
Spears beat Cav, (with moderate to low losses).
S&S beat spears and archers, (with low losses).
2-Handers, beat S&S and Spears, (with low losses).
Archers beat 2-handers, (in conjunction with other units as they can rarely kill a whole unit by themselves).
Pikes are supposed to fit in by being nearly untouchable from the front, but extremely weak from the flanks and very vulnerable to missiles.
Here's the above with pikes added in:
Cav beat S&S, (with moderate to heavy losses), 2-Handers, (with low losses), and Archers, (with low losses), Pikes, (from the flank).
Spears beat Cav, (with moderate to low losses), Pikes, (from the flank).
S&S beat spears and archers, (with low losses).
2-Handers, beat S&S and Spears, (with low losses), Pikes, (from the flank)/B] .
Archers beat 2-handers, (in conjunction with other units as they can rarely kill a whole unit by themselves)[B], Pikes.
Pikes beat everything except archers when attacked head on.
the professional late-medieval swiss pikemen were regarded as pretty much unbeatable as long as they held rank, and should be so in the game too.
sword and buckler men would bypass the pike points by rolling under the pikes and entering meelee, but they cant possibly have have suceeded with that tactic on a regular basis, just imagine how hard that move would be to pull of.
therefore, the good pike units should in most cases beat swordsmen front to front. lesser pike militia, with lower cohesion, might be an other matter because they loose formation quicker and allow swordmen to infiltrate the ranks.
game balance is all well and good, but historically, for a while pike reigned the battlefield almost supreme, and should do so in the game too, losing their dominant position first when field arty and gunners are introduced.
_Tristan_
04-24-2007, 09:24
I was so surprise even head to head, with a stationary defensive solid setup, the pikeman are chopped into pieces by those S&S unit.
You shouldn't have been surprise...
Historically, and from what I remember from my tabletop wargaming days, S&S units were the perfect antithesis of pikes... Think of how more free of movement a sworsman is compared to a man wielding a 10-foot long pike which could be easily diverted to get to the man behind...
Empirate
04-24-2007, 09:32
I'd like to see the more professional soldiers performing better because of discipline issues, not stats alone. This is especially important for pike units that rely on unit cohesion a lot. If you bring only pike militia, seeing them switch to swords in melee or being broken up by swordsmen feels realistic. But if you bring higher-tech pikes (Tercio, Aventuros, Scotch what-was-their-names), these should really be impregnable from the front, just because they hold formation better and don't let go of their pikes in a hurry. This system of "performs better because of discipline" could also be tied to unit experience, to make the system more interesting. This is really something I'd like to see! Until then, Carl's ProblemFixer removes a pike unit's swords, which is sufficient to make it worthwhile.
RickooClan
04-24-2007, 09:54
@ Carl
I think i am going to fix the pike issue on my 1.02 game, could you let me know what have you done to fix the pike problem in your fixer mod? If the only thing i have to do is removing the secondary weapon [sword] ? thanks a lot!
I guess without a fixer, even with the full release of 1.2, pike unit which cant even hold their own at front is totally useless imo.
Well, I have somewhat different experiences with the leaked patch.
Cav beat S&S, (with moderate to heavy losses), 2-Handers, (with low losses), and Archers, (with low losses).
Cav murders swords witht the charge but will not murder high charge 2H units any longer. You are much better of with a high charge 2H unit vs cav than with swords.
Spears beat Cav, (with moderate to low losses).
With heavy losses if there is a charge, and why would the cav player miss the charge?
S&S beat spears and archers, (with low losses).
With the leaked pacth S&S beats most inf with ease.
2-Handers, beat S&S and Spears, (with low losses).
Well, depends on the 2H unit. Some will lose to standard S&S like DCK.
Pikes are supposed to fit in by being nearly untouchable from the front, but extremely weak from the flanks and very vulnerable to missiles.
Supposed to, but they are not, that is why people complain.
Pikes beat everything except archers when attacked head on.
Well, this is does not hold any longer with the leaked patch. DCK beats up any pikes head on with ease. This is, why people, including OP complains. However, IMO pikes were not nerfed (in any way), it is the effect of the shield fix, S&S inf are much stronger overall.
Cav murders swords with the charge but will not murder high charge 2H units any longer. You are much better of with a high charge 2H unit vs Cav than with swords.
It depends on the Cav type. Feudal knights vs. DCK will see the S&S inflict heavy losses. the charge 8 stuff just rolls over them.
With heavy losses if there is a charge, and why would the Cav player miss the charge?
Remember i play my Problem Fixer, which like Lusted's LTC incorporates a few additional changes, something Lusted at least appears to be pushing CA towards. in both LTC and the ProblemFixer mods the Cav vs. spears balance is exactly what the adviser suggests it should be. Generally if you charge Cav into spears head on you'll get the first 2 ranks of spears, but it will cost you your front rank of Cav and sometimes parts of your second rank, (assuming a 3 deep spears vs. 2 deep Cav).
Well, depends on the 2H unit. Some will lose to standard S&S like DCK.
DCK aren't stock, their elite high end. Byzantine infantry/swordsmen militia are more the mid range, (their isn't a low range till you fix the light_spear bug). and even vs. DCK most 2-hander units will still do very high damage for their price, on price they beat S&S senseless.
Supposed to, but they are not, that is why people complain.
AND
Well, this is does not hold any longer with the leaked patch. DCK beats up any pikes head on with ease. This is, why people, including OP complains. However, IMO pikes were not nerfed (in any way), it is the effect of the shield fix, S&S inf are much stronger overall.
I know that, the entire second piece is how it SHOULD be, not how it actually is.
but will not murder high charge 2H units any longer. You are much better of with a high charge 2H unit vs Cav than with swords.
Thats the effects of the mass drop talking I expect, bad idea on CA's part as it's barely effected Cav charges against the units they beat up before, but it's made 2-handers way overpowered. they are SUPPOSED to be countered by Cav. That the point of their low defense, everything that has low defense and isn't pikes is supposed to be murdered by Cav.
Certainly with just an animation fix in place and foz's shield fix the 2-handers get murdered and it's a balance both myself and lusted, (based on the fact that he hasn't changed anything with 2-hander to make them more Cav resistant), have found to work well in general.
Generally whatever lusted tends to find works is a good indicator of what direction he'll be trying to push CA in and he seems to be having some success at this so in time I expect them to match up.
Furious Mental
04-24-2007, 10:54
Take away their swords.
Bob the Insane
04-24-2007, 11:16
There really should be some distinction between pikes in good order and not in good order... In good order and even more so if braced pike should by nearly impossible to get at from the front for infantry or cavalry... However if not in good order they should become very vunerable...
I never understood why switching their special ability on or off seemed to have little effect on the way they functioned...
Making pikemen nearly invincible against frontal melee attackers makes both S&S infantry and heavy cavalry far less useful. Granted, pikemen are currently of limited use themselves, but they are the only unit type capable of withstanding a cavalry charge and killing cavalry quickly with minimal losses as well as directly protecting another unit from that charge.
However, I'd agree that they whip out their swords too soon against attacking infantry, and inflict too few casualties . Making them use their pikes longer and inflicting greater casualties on infantry is perfectly fine, but they should still lose a 1 vs. 1 match against a comparable S&S unit.
pike master
04-24-2007, 11:47
the only reason sword and buckler men succeeded against pikes is because they were integrated in the tercio pikemens ranks. when the pike walls engaged the sword and buckler men would crawl underneath the melee and start hamstringing the opponents pikemen.
this would be very difficult to implement in the game. also a disciplined pike formation would tend to remain holding their pikes despite if an isolated individual makes it throught the pike wall because they know that if they continue to inflict damage to the rest of his unit he will look back and realize he is isolated while his unit is fleeing.
furthermore under the weighted advance of a swiss pike block he would also stand a good chance of loosing his balance and being trampled underfoot.
offensive pike tactics also usually integrated a core of halberdiers inside the pike block to continue the attack in case the spear wall broke down.
a very formidable combination, but also very difficult to emulate in the game because of different marching speeds.
Has anyone previously tested whether pikemen work better in deep formation, i.e. 6+ ranks, or in shallow formation, i.e. <6 ranks? Are they more likely to bring out their swords one way or the other?
pike master
04-24-2007, 12:25
a formation wide enough to contain the opposite units flanks works the best. usually 2 ranks deep versus horse and 3 to 4 ranks deep versus infantry
Agent Smith
04-24-2007, 13:14
Making pikemen nearly invincible against frontal melee attackers makes both S&S infantry and heavy cavalry far less useful. Granted, pikemen are currently of limited use themselves, but they are the only unit type capable of withstanding a cavalry charge and killing cavalry quickly with minimal losses as well as directly protecting another unit from that charge.
That's just not true. In RTW, phalanxes were tough from the front against anything, however, they were far from invulnerable.
Bob the Insane
04-24-2007, 14:11
That's just not true. In RTW, phalanxes were tough from the front against anything, however, they were far from invulnerable.
Quite true, and a head-on battle between a decent phalanx and a good S&S (or spear) unit often ended up with very few initial casuaulties as the S&S could defend themseves against the pikes but could not get close enough attack the men. Only if the S&S men could get around the flanks or somehow break the formation and get in could they do a lot of damage. Until then there was just a lot of pushing.... :2thumbsup:
Phalanx units in Rome were completely overpowered in the hands of a human. I don't want pikes to go back to that level. Somewhere in between Rome and what we currently have in Med II would be better.
Agent Smith
04-24-2007, 14:35
Quite true, and a head-on battle between a decent phalanx and a good S&S (or spear) unit often ended up with very few initial casuaulties as the S&S could defend themseves against the pikes but could not get close enough attack the men. Only if the S&S men could get around the flanks or somehow break the formation and get in could they do a lot of damage. Until then there was just a lot of pushing.... :2thumbsup:
Exactly. Phalanxes were utterly destroyed by the whole hammer and anvil tactic. Hold them in place while simultaneously hitting their flank, preferably with cavalry. They will die very, very quickly. Not to mention how the Medieval Pikemen can be pelted to death by missile units.
There really is no reason to have to dumb down pikemen and make them virtually unusable.
Switching to alternative weapon almost immediately after the impact IMHO is the main (and possibly the only) pike problem in the vanilla game. It was present also in vanilla RTW.
In general, there is nothing wrong with pike's battle stats, but switching to swords part (even when fighting cavalry head on) makes them vulnerable. Taking away pikes' secondary weapons helps them to maintain the spearwall formation and retain their main advantage. The effect is so powerful, that with swords taken away, pikes can hold their ground against anything non-pike thrown at them frontally in the game.
There is a slight problem with taking pikes secondary weapons away though. Without their swords, pike formation seem to be able to annihilate cavalry charging them from behind and from flanks...
pike master
04-24-2007, 16:31
Phalanx units in Rome were completely overpowered in the hands of a human. I don't want pikes to go back to that level. Somewhere in between Rome and what we currently have in Med II would be better.
one could also say that about the roman legionarres as well. not only could they weaken a phalanx by throwing pilums but there was also the trick where you could use testudo to get inside the spearwall and then attack.
most that dont want strong pike units are the ones who want to cav spam. not all but most.
Agent Smith
04-24-2007, 17:00
Phalanx units in Rome were completely overpowered in the hands of a human. I don't want pikes to go back to that level. Somewhere in between Rome and what we currently have in Med II would be better.
Do you mean phalanx units were easily killed by human players, or that human players could destroy everything with phalanxes?
Jobst_vonGrünungen
04-24-2007, 17:17
Quite true, and a head-on battle between a decent phalanx and a good S&S (or spear) unit often ended up with very few initial casuaulties as the S&S could defend themseves against the pikes but could not get close enough attack the men. Only if the S&S men could get around the flanks or somehow break the formation and get in could they do a lot of damage. Until then there was just a lot of pushing.... :2thumbsup:
Well, generally my experience was that a Phalanx would butcher any infantry or cavalry stupid enough to charge it in the front eventually, but that another phalanx would pin them effectively (they even did the shifting-to-the-left thing which historically occurred as the men edged towards the shield next to them..!) and if your frontal attackers could survive long enough for anyone or anything to hit em in the rear the phalanx was a goner.
The second it's hit in the rear with cavalry it switches to sword and loses. That's how it should be. Even a wall of multiple phalanxes will generally break with just a few units of cavalry charging towards the rear of their wall, especially if you kill the enemy general first. Also, shooting them worked quite well. M2TW pikes have less armour and should be even more vulnerable to missile-fire.
It's one thing to look at pikemen in real life or in RTW, but it's another thing entirely in the context of the M2TW battle system.
They should be judged primarily by their usefulness in the present combat environment, not by realism or past precedent.
It's also quite misleading to say that pikemen can be easily defeated by pinning them with one unit and flanking them with another. That's two vs. one. Practically all types of units are vulnerable to such tactics. Every unit should be judged by comparing it to another, single unit, not multiple units.
There's also one important aspect of M2TW over RTW that totally changes the rules: gunpowder troops. They are capable of breaking S&S infantry before they even get close, especially if placed on a hill. If pikemen too were strong against S&S units, then S&S infantry wouldn't have much of a use in the late game environment. While historically S&S infantry virtually died out with the advent of pike & shot formations, in M2TW gameplay (read: fun) always comes first. And it's simply more fun to play battles with 5 or more types of units rather than just a few.
Jobst_vonGrünungen
04-24-2007, 19:12
It's one thing to look at pikemen in real life or in RTW, but it's another thing entirely in the context of the M2TW battle system.
They should be judged primarily by their usefulness in the present combat environment, not by realism or past precedent.
It's also quite misleading to say that pikemen can be easily defeated by pinning them with one unit and flanking them with another. That's two vs. one. Practically all types of units are vulnerable to such tactics. Every unit should be judged by comparing it to another, single unit, not multiple units.
There's also one important aspect of M2TW over RTW that totally changes the rules: gunpowder troops. They are capable of breaking S&S infantry before they even get close, especially if placed on a hill. If pikemen too were strong against S&S units, then S&S infantry wouldn't have much of a use in the late game environment. While historically S&S infantry virtually died out with the advent of pike & shot formations, in M2TW gameplay (read: fun) always comes first. And it's simply more fun to play battles with 5 or more types of units rather than just a few.
I suppose none of us had really considered the M2TW system, to be fair. But the fact is that pikes, at least the earliest pikes available to most factions, seem nearly useless, which does not give one much incentive to use more units. I tried playing as the scottish in a custom battle and I was appalled at how the pikeman operated (or rather didnt operate). They were no where near the operating level of the phalanxes with which I am so familiar and enamoured from RTW.
I supposed it's that very fact that biases me against the m2tw ones, I'm used to the RTW ones and disappointed that these guys don't hold up to comparison, but I suppose that's not entirely historically inaccurate. I haven't been quite as disappointed by the late period pikes, particularly with gunners and a few cannons, in custom battles, but Ive only fought with them against Aztecs, so I don't know how they'd handle against another European army.
pike master
04-24-2007, 19:23
[If pikemen too were strong against S&S units, then S&S infantry wouldn't have much of a use in the late game environment.]
this isnt true. to attack castles or flank an army you need infantry who do not require to maintain a formation.
also in rome many of the lower class phalanxes and hoplites were trash against a roman legionarre unit or any good infantry unit for that matter.
one on one the phalanx unit gets wrapped by sword infantry and only the better phalanxes could protect those vulnerable corners who had better sword fighting ability such as spartans.
militia hoplite and pike units were very easy to rout frontally if they were the lower class variety because they could not protect their wrapped flanks as well as units like spartans, and armored hoplites.
of course against horses they were very effective as they should be. but it seems i did some testing of lesser phalanx units versus heavier horse in rome and the horse routed them.
rome had a good balance. pikes and hoplites needed to support one another to win.
Jobst_vonGrünungen
04-24-2007, 19:38
[If pikemen too were strong against S&S units, then S&S infantry wouldn't have much of a use in the late game environment.]
this isnt true. to attack castles or flank an army you need infantry who do not require to maintain a formation.
also in rome many of the lower class phalanxes and hoplites were trash against a roman legionarre unit or any good infantry unit for that matter.
one on one the phalanx unit gets wrapped by sword infantry and only the better phalanxes could protect those vulnerable corners who had better sword fighting ability such as spartans.
militia hoplite and pike units were very easy to rout frontally if they were the lower class variety because they could not protect their wrapped flanks as well as units like spartans, and armored hoplites.
of course against horses they were very effective as they should be. but it seems i did some testing of lesser phalanx units versus heavier horse in rome and the horse routed them.
rome had a good balance. pikes and hoplites needed to support one another to win.
Two points to add; Historically s&s were rather useless in late period, thats why it evolved into the PIKE and Musket era; Second, that's very true and something I didn't think of that both S&S and 2H really(or would really) come into their own in sieges, where pikes are nearly worthless. Historically they would just use cannons to neutralize the castle in late period, which you could do, but if you came up against a stone wall with no cannons you'd need S&S or 2H to take the walls and get through the gate.
Do you mean phalanx units were easily killed by human players, or that human players could destroy everything with phalanxes?
Both really. The main issue was more that the AI didn't use them to their best ability. This is now true for pikes and halberds in Med II.
pike master
04-24-2007, 22:06
i think if they would just fix the visual bug of them not leveling their pikes until contact would go a long way to at least allow you to see them use the pikes a little longer.
but if they just fix them to hold on to their swords more reliable wise, ill settle for doing without the additional ranks.
Agent Smith
04-24-2007, 23:05
It's one thing to look at pikemen in real life or in RTW, but it's another thing entirely in the context of the M2TW battle system.
They should be judged primarily by their usefulness in the present combat environment, not by realism or past precedent.
It's also quite misleading to say that pikemen can be easily defeated by pinning them with one unit and flanking them with another. That's two vs. one. Practically all types of units are vulnerable to such tactics. Every unit should be judged by comparing it to another, single unit, not multiple units.
There's also one important aspect of M2TW over RTW that totally changes the rules: gunpowder troops. They are capable of breaking S&S infantry before they even get close, especially if placed on a hill. If pikemen too were strong against S&S units, then S&S infantry wouldn't have much of a use in the late game environment. While historically S&S infantry virtually died out with the advent of pike & shot formations, in M2TW gameplay (read: fun) always comes first. And it's simply more fun to play battles with 5 or more types of units rather than just a few.
The reference to the hammer and anvil was directed at the notion that CA didn't want "pikeman" spam. I was merely pointing out that large pike armies are vulnerable just like anything else.
I also disagree with you entirely. There are no factions that have real, professional pike units, except the Scottish. How would making pike units actually perform their intended duty make the game less "fun"?
@mad cat:
I was specifically talking about S&S infantry, not 2-Handers. For sieges/battles most 2-Handers (D[N/P/E]K's, VG, Tabs, etc.) have superior close combat abilities, so you'd rather use them instead of swordsmen anyway. If pikemen were beefed up the only role S&S would be best at is chopping up cornered archers and javelineers - hardly worthy of such well trained warriors.
I'm not going to comment on RTW because it's simply a different game than M2TW.
@Agent
A relatively homogeneous battlefield is a boring one. The more types of units you have to play with, the more fun it gets. But if some types of units become relatively overpowered, then the player is obliged to build them over the more specialized units. This de-diversifies army composition. The result is that battles require less of the type of tactical thinking and micro that many gamers enjoy. So while pikemen ought to be nearly invincible at the front, CA has compromised this to allow more varied gameplay.
Regarding the Scots:
It's true, they're not as powerful in 1.2 as they once were. Many have suggested that pikemen should drop their pikes later rather than sooner to fix this, and I agree.
But they still shouldn't beat a comparable S&S unit.
hellenes
04-25-2007, 02:39
@mad cat:
I was specifically talking about S&S infantry, not 2-Handers. For sieges/battles most 2-Handers (D[N/P/E]K's, VG, Tabs, etc.) have superior close combat abilities, so you'd rather use them instead of swordsmen anyway. If pikemen were beefed up the only role S&S would be best at is chopping up cornered archers and javelineers - hardly worthy of such well trained warriors.
I'm not going to comment on RTW because it's simply a different game than M2TW.
@Jobst
Yes I acknowledged the fact that swordsmen became nearly useless at the start of the Renaissance Period. Please read more carefully. But I also stressed that gameplay comes first and that swordsmen should still have a solid role in the late game - that of chopping up pikemen.
@Agent
A relatively homogeneous battlefield is a boring one. The more types of units you have to play with, the more fun it gets. But if some types of units become relatively overpowered, then the player is obliged to build them over the more specialized units. This de-diversifies army composition. The result is that battles require less of the type of tactical thinking and micro that many gamers enjoy. So while pikemen ought to be nearly invincible at the front, CA has compromised this to allow more varied gameplay.
Regarding the Scots:
It's true, they're not as powerful in 1.2 as they once were. Many have suggested that pikemen should drop their pikes later rather than sooner to fix this, and I agree.
But they still shouldn't beat a comparable S&S unit.
You see the difference between the Warcraft, AoE to the Total War games is that the fun and the immersion is coming from the realism of the setting and the battlefield...
I can name at least 5 games that are hyped and played just because they can claim a significant level of realism (SWAT, PES, America's Army) espessially PES (Pro Evlution Soccer) is preffered by most real football fans just because its closer to real football...it lacks the licences...presentation..commentary...of FIFA but since its FAR closer to the real sport than FIFA in gameplay its much more fun to play since its the sport that is fun not some guys perception of the sport...
Can you imagine a possibility to be able to travel back and time and lead an army on the battlefield?
Just try the EB mod and you will see the value of realism and historical immersion in the era...
I posted this in TWcenter, but perhaps I should post it here to.
One huge balance issue right now is pike units. Currently, when enemy infantry charges the first row of pike men die immediately, even though the enemy infantry hasn't gotten past the row of pikes. Then the rest of the pike men switch to swords and get slaughtered. Pikes currently suck against everything but cavalry. Historically Pikes are what brought an end to medieval warfare, and it would be great if the late era simulated this.
Also, since only the first two ranks of pike men engage in combat with their pikes, the enemy will always run between the pikes and force them to draw their swords. The third, and likely fourth ranks need to attack with their pikes as well, that way spear wall formation can be useful.
There's also the problem of pike men turning their backs to the enemy during combat. This seems to occur after toggling the spear wall formation several times (which is needed to make them use their pikes again...).
If all of those issues were fixed, and a couple more ranks of pike men engaged in combat as opposed to two, pikes would become much more powerful and able to compete.
Before the game was released CA said that you had the option to ban certain units in multilayer. If this is still the case then there should be no problem with pikes being realistic. As it is now the only point in getting them is to prevent frontal cavalry charges. Other than that they are just a weaker swordsmen unit.
Jobst if you're reading this please ignore the comment hellenes quoted.
@hellenes:
Unfortunately the historical roleplayer demographic is a small one. They're what those mods are for. But a mainstream game like M2TW has to make CA profit, and nothing drives sales like a quality, finely-balanced game.
Jobst if you're reading this please ignore the comment hellenes quoted.
@hellenes:
Unfortunately the historical roleplayer demographic is a small one. They're what those mods are for. But a mainstream game like M2TW has to make CA profit, and nothing drives sales like a quality, finely-balanced game.
I don't think the majority of people buy the total war for it's multi player.
You may recall Rome total war, which sold quite nicely and also had realistic pikes. I don't see functioning pikes driving sales down to much.
I don't think the majority of people buy the total war for it's multi player.
You may recall Rome total war, which sold quite nicely and also had realistic pikes. I don't see functioning pikes driving sales down to much.
But having better, more solid gameplay in SP and MP helps to attract a wider audience and increase sales, doesn't it?
Agreed, functioning pikes will improve gameplay and drive up sales. But dominating pikes will not. Every impression has to be made that Total War games are intrinsically great games even without the historical backdrop. It's good for the gamer and it's good for CA.
pike master
04-25-2007, 03:26
how difficult would it be for CA to change those animations? i suppose you couldnt just replace them with rome total war animations for phalanx because of the more individual moves and animations.
i think adding 3 or 4 lowered ranks in melee would probably do the trick.
But having better, more solid gameplay in SP and MP helps to attract a wider audience and increase sales, doesn't it?
Agreed, functioning pikes will improve gameplay and drive up sales. But dominating pikes will not. Every impression has to be made that Total War games are intrinsically great games even without the historical backdrop. It's good for the gamer and it's good for CA.
Agreed. I recall someone suggesting that pikes be made more expensive for multi player. That would perhaps balance it out. That way if someone were to mass pikes there would be fewer, and they would be extremely vulnerable to arrows and fire-arms.
Agreed. I recall someone suggesting that pikes be made more expensive for multi player. That would perhaps balance it out. That way if someone were to mass pikes there would be fewer, and they would be extremely vulnerable to arrows and fire-arms.
Their massive slowness is undoubtedly also a huge killer in multiplayer already. A reasonable number of missile units should absolutely demolish a pike-heavy army before it gets anywhere near threatening them. I honestly don't think any further changes should be needed for multiplayer: you can easily force the pikes to go on the offensive, and once they must do so, they are doomed from missile fire and/or elementary cavalry flanking.
I agree pike can use some upgrading.
HA, archers, gun infantry, jav units, naffitun, and flanking would still going to hurt pike units alot, with there slow movement speed.
Switching to alternative weapon almost immediately after the impact IMHO is the main (and possibly the only) pike problem in the vanilla game. It was present also in vanilla RTW.
In general, there is nothing wrong with pike's battle stats, but switching to swords part (even when fighting cavalry head on) makes them vulnerable. Taking away pikes' secondary weapons helps them to maintain the spearwall formation and retain their main advantage. The effect is so powerful, that with swords taken away, pikes can hold their ground against anything non-pike thrown at them frontally in the game.
There is a slight problem with taking pikes secondary weapons away though. Without their swords, pike formation seem to be able to annihilate cavalry charging them from behind and from flanks...
its not the only problem.
its one thing for the pikemen to shift to sidearms as soon as their ranks are infiltrated.
whats worse is that they always raise their pikes and keep them raised when attacking, thus really losing nearly all offensive value. and medieval pikemen of the higher quality types should be able to attack, both by slow pushing and poking and by charge.
Bob the Insane
04-25-2007, 11:10
Agreed, functioning pikes will improve gameplay and drive up sales. But dominating pikes will not.
There is the rub...
One man's functioning pike is another's dominating pike...
As for disabling their secondary weapon and there pikemen fighting with raised pikes, are they not still using the pikes from a game mechanic perspective as it is their only weapon? I mean do they still kill enemies at close quarters?
Furious Mental
04-25-2007, 11:31
Yes they seem to. It looks a bit silly up close because three or four of them will stick their pikes right through an enemy soldier and jab them until they get a kill. But yes pikes do work up close. The main issue with taking away their secondary weapons is that the pikes don't work properly on a steep slope and they have nothing else to use.
@Miricale:
You can't compare pikes 1 on 1, you have to start by doing it on an army by army basis.
I'd also like to point out that your argument that pikes need 2 units to beat them makes them IMBA is wrong. simply put a unit like DFK or DEK simply isn't going to be beaten by, (for example), 2 units of town militia, (with the light_spear bug fixed), even with one in the front and another in the flank. Almost ANY pike unit in the game WILL be beaten by such a combination though. Pikes are incredibly weak in melee once they pull out swords.
As mentioned you also have to look at the overall armies. Pike based armies typically won't be able to include much/any ranged units if they wish to place sufficient infantry melee units on the flanks to keep said flanks safe. You also probably won't see as much in the way of heavy Cav either. I went into this a while back.
But to summaries a good pike army needs:
6 units of S&S/2-Handers, (preferable 4 S&S and 2 2-Handers)
4 Spears
4 Cav, (preferably light Cav)
The rest is a mix of pikes and whatever else you want/can fit in.
A Pike "FORMATION" is VERY vulnerable to flanking actions in a way that no other formation is because even one semi-decent unit in the flank of a line of pikes can and will chew it's way along the entire line of pikemen with very low losses for the amount of damage it inflicts. No other unit is as vulnerable to flanking actions like pikes are because they still fight with their full melee abilities to the flank and rear, so if the combined forces engaged front and rear are NOT of overall greater power than the unit in question, then said flanked unit can drive it's flankers off. Pikes are not like this, even the best are only barely better in melee to the flanks than Spear Militia.
Thus trying to say needing to flank pikes is IMBA totally fails to take account of the fact that other units suffer FAR less from flanking actions than pikes and that formations containing pikes give up large advantages in mobility and composition so as to allow the pikes to function correctly.
Agent Smith
04-25-2007, 16:53
Pike Business
EXACTLY. This is what I was trying to get at. This notion that pikes would be overpowered if they worked as intended just isn't true. Pike-heavy armies get slaughtered by missile units and need adequate support. If anything, @Miracle, making a true pike army REQUIRES you to have diversity to make it effective.
In regards to the Scottish, if they were going to make pikes like this on purpose, they could've at least gave the Scots a better archery unit. As it stands the pikes are barely supportable at range. The Scots lack of ranged units would really balance any extra "power" the pikes would get from being actually effective. Although I don't think pikes would get overpowered by making them actually work.
In MP it shouldn't even be an issue. Any player stupid enough to make an army mainly of pikes without support is going to get killed by another player.
@Carl:
I was thinking more on the lines of being flanked by charging cavalry, for which neither DFK, DEK nor any other non-schiltrom infantry unit can hold out against, no matter what their formation.
Also, while swordsmen do have better flanking resistance against infantry, one should take steps to avoid enemy flanking actions regardless, in order to minimize casualties.
So all my unit comparisons were done using frontal combat power only, since between two equally competent commanders, neither should be able to outflank the other.
@Agent:
Different folks have different ideas of how pikes should work "as intended." Some want them to be invincible to frontal melee attackers, including S&S infantry. This is wrong. Others, like me, want them to simply use their pikes longer and perhaps fight in deeper ranks. This is perfectly fine, as long as they can't beat a comparable S&S unit.
As for the Scots, perhaps better morale and stamina for all their pike units, higher melee attack and defense skill for their archers, and the obvious pike fix should satisfy most disgruntled Scots players.
It's one thing to look at pikemen in real life or in RTW, but it's another thing entirely in the context of the M2TW battle system.
They should be judged primarily by their usefulness in the present combat environment, not by realism or past precedent.
While historically S&S infantry virtually died out with the advent of pike & shot formations, in M2TW gameplay (read: fun) always comes first. And it's simply more fun to play battles with 5 or more types of units rather than just a few.
Well, this of course depends on one’s perspective and expectations. Nothing disappoints me more than seeing a unit perform in a manner that is inconsistent with history. Pike and polearm units could be ferocious units (on defense AND offense) and I expect them to be so in the game. If certain troop types became obsolete they should suffer accordingly when their time has past. I realize that the goal is more to be fun and less to be didactic but the game can be both. Buffing or nerfing units in order to encourage diverse armies is unnecessary. Some troop types are inherently superior to others while some are generally weak. Such is war. Finely honed strengths and weaknesses for each unit regardless of historic fidelity is a hallmark of traditional RTS games with their artificial rock, paper, scissors thing going on. I enjoy RTS games but I don’t want Total War to be like them. Factions did the best they could with the armies they could raise. I enjoy dealing with the various impediments and advantages of each faction.
I think we can all agree that the game already lets us tailor armies for various tasks in a way that was absolutely not available to medieval or renaissance commanders. They had to use the tools at hand.
Flavius Merobaudes
04-25-2007, 17:40
I must say pikes work fine for me, even against sword+shield units. I have them stand still in shield wall (special formation active) but with guard mode off.
This way they will point their pikes up into the air. Now let the enemy come closer. If they charge, the first few lines of pikes will lower their weapon and form what is pretty much a phalanx. That way you can avoid having your first line killed by impact. Au contraire! I tested it with aventuros against Spanish sword&shields and the poor Spanish lost half their numbers instantly making them run. Of course it's harder with pike militia against knights and sometimes you can loose but those foolish enough to charge will pay the price.
I have not tried it against cavalry yet, maybe it's diffrent for that.
For so long I've refrained from using pikes but now knowing how to make good use of them they have some slots in my armies. :yes:
Gaius Terentius Varro
04-25-2007, 17:43
The problem is that the scotts get pikes from the start so it would make them an absolute unstoppable superpower at the start of the game if they were to make S&S obsolete as it happened historically
pike master
04-25-2007, 20:57
if teh scots pikes are mainly defensive units and they have very weak missile troops firepower wise and their cav is average its apparent that one only needs sit back and bombard the scots pike forcing him to attack which supposedly makes his pikes lose cohesion and become defeated.
every faction has weaknesses and strengths. to me cav currently are way overstrength but i have yet to play1.2.
the only unit that usually stops cav reliably are pikes. this is ok but why limit pike numbers to 5 and allow 8 to 9 cav. dont you think that is leaning toward people using cav exploits more?
i really fail to understand why some people think pikes are such steamrollers.:laugh4:
Different folks have different ideas of how pikes should work "as intended." Some want them to be invincible to frontal melee attackers, including S&S infantry. This is wrong. Others, like me, want them to simply use their pikes longer and perhaps fight in deeper ranks. This is perfectly fine, as long as they can't beat a comparable S&S unit.
You just said "There are people that think differently from me: they're wrong. Then there are people that think like me, and they're right." Since when do you get to make up what's right and wrong, and give no supporting evidence at all to back it up? In case you missed the memo, just because you think something doesn't make it inherently right. In fact most of the people discussing this issue are agreeing that pikes should do exactly what you just said is "wrong" so I'm just going to write off your comments as part of your seeming inability to look at the situation objectively. If you intend to say that you don't think the game should work in a given way, then say that: but don't go about trying to paint it like your viewpoint is right and the other is wrong, especially without making a case for that. If anything, history bears out that your viewpoint is simply fallacy, and I've heard no word yet in any direction as to what the developers actually intended the pike units to do, so to claim any knowledge of how pikes should work "as intended" is not only presumptuous, it is simple fabrication.
Agent Smith
04-26-2007, 01:26
To be fair, I was the first one to say the phrase "as intended." I meant that in a historical sense, not in a "how CA wanted it done" sense. My fault if that was confusing. I just wanted to point out that pikes should be hard to run full speed into.
Other than that, I agree with Foz. I'm still not seeing how it would ruin game balance, force armies without diversity, and make pike heavy armies uber-powerful. Many here have said over and over about how easy pike heavy armies can be thumped, tough in a frontal assault or not.
give no supporting evidence at all to back it up?
The reasoning was given throughout this thread. In case you missed it, it was mostly because of gameplay balance reasons - which, in the interests of both CA and most gamers, ultimately triumphs over historical correctness. I suggest you carefully look over this entire thread from beginning to end before making such criticism.
In fact most of the people discussing this issue are agreeing that pikes should do exactly what you just said is "wrong"
Just because the majority of the posters here disagrees with me, doesn't mean I'm wrong.
I've heard no word yet in any direction as to what the developers actually intended the pike units to do
And neither have I. But it's still possible to determine what would be most favourable to CA.
pike master
04-26-2007, 04:01
[Originally Posted by Foz
I've heard no word yet in any direction as to what the developers actually intended the pike units to do]
this is the most frustrating issue of all since the game has been released no one can get those geeks to tell us yes or no.
probably 40 threads on pikes in the .com forum and not once has any member of CA or SEGA ever made a legitimate comment on it.
why is that? a very good question i think.
We can probably make a very good guess from the custom battle unit roster descriptions of all Scottish pike units:
Scots Pike Militia:
Lowland Scots levied into a militia to defend their settlement. Armed with pikes for good defense against cavalry, but lacking in armour.
Highland Pikemen:
Well trained, but sometimes reckless clansmen armed with pikes, able to form a wall of pikes against cavalry.
Heavy Pike Militia:
Levied troops equipped with pikes and protected by heavy armour. Good defense against cavalry.
Noble Pikemen:
Well armoured Pikemen made up of Scottish nobles preferring to fight in the infantry.
Emphasis mine.
From this it's pretty clear CA intended pikemen to be primarily anti-cavalry units. If pikemen in M2TW were intended to be an invincible wall of sharp points that could defeat even knightly swordsmen, CA probably would have dropped us a hint.
I'd admit, however, that the AI doesn't know how to properly use pikemen in their capacity as anti-cavalry units. One reason is the utter passiveness of guard mode, but of course the bigger issue is that pikemen simply drop their pikes too quickly, and don't fight in deeper ranks. I'm sure everybody will be happy if this were fixed.
But again, going further than that and making S&S infantry nearly useless against them would hamper gameplay.
The reasoning was given throughout this thread. In case you missed it, it was mostly because of gameplay balance reasons - which, in the interests of both CA and most gamers, ultimately triumphs over historical correctness. I suggest you carefully look over this entire thread from beginning to end before making such criticism.
Gameplay balance does not ultimately triumph over historical correctness, at least not entirely. If you make a WW2 game and have foot soldiers more powerful than tanks, or have shermans at three times the power level of panzers, no one will play it. It could play like a million bucks, but the inaccuracies are so crazy at that point that no one would be able to stand it: it's entirely unbelievable. So it is with M2TW. It doesn't matter what is best for gameplay if it makes the game ludicrous historically, because part of the game's appeal comes from its roots in history. There is some amount of liberty that can be taken with history in order to improve the gameplay mechanics, but if things deviate too far from historical accuracy, the game loses all the things that make it more appealing than fantasy games of the genre. Actually it becomes worse than other games at that point: a fantasy game is easy to accept, because it has no preconceptions. A history-based game has to be believable in some sense for most players to enjoy it as much as they would any fantasy game, or else the experience is ruined by the constant nagging of things that feel wrong. It is that believability I call into question: many of us know better than to have sword and shield units able to successfully attack pikes frontally, and it is a disturbing enough sight when it happens that for those who know better, it hurts the game far more than some imbalance due to historical accuracy would. I'm not even admitting it would cause any, but that's been argued already: I'm just saying any that might be caused would be more than compensated for through the much better immersion the change would create.
Historical games require not only a well-designed combat system, but also enough realism to maintain the illusion, and neither can be sacrificed to the exclusive benefit of the other without also destroying the game.
From this it's pretty clear CA intended pikemen to be primarily anti-cavalry units. If pikemen in M2TW were intended to be an invincible wall of sharp points that could defeat even knightly swordsmen, CA probably would have dropped us a hint.
...
But again, going further than that and making S&S infantry nearly useless against them would hamper gameplay.
Perhaps it should be more of a stalemate than anything. S&S units are very well armored, so some sharpened sticks should have real problems causing them harm. On the other hand, heavily armored men just shouldn't be able to easily breach a wall of such pikes. Barring wraparound (which will kill the pikes due to poor side defense) I would be happy enough if a pike and S&S unit engaged would simply lock horns, losing a few men as they test each other and try to find weaknesses, and mostly get stuck waiting for some other unit(s) to flank and break the stalemate. In that sense S&S would still be useful as one of the few units able to hold a while against the repeated stabbings from the pikes, and so would at least provide an anvil to smash pikes on. As others have pointed out, pikes get slaughtered when engaged on multiple fronts, so all that's really necessary is for S&S to be an effective anvil against otherwise-effective pikes: a simple flanking move from any other unit then destroys them. That seems like a reasonable balance to me at least. They'd be:
On ~even terms against each other
Both good against other infantry
Pikes far better against cav
S&S far more arrow-resistant
Pikes totally vulnerable to flanking, where S&S can hold for quite some time usually when flanked.
What does anyone think?
@Carl:
I was thinking more on the lines of being flanked by charging cavalry, for which neither DFK, DEK nor any other non-schiltrom infantry unit can hold out against, no matter what their formation.
Also, while swordsmen do have better flanking resistance against infantry, one should take steps to avoid enemy flanking actions regardless, in order to minimize casualties.
So all my unit comparisons were done using frontal combat power only, since between two equally competent commanders, neither should be able to outflank the other.
@Agent:
Different folks have different ideas of how pikes should work "as intended." Some want them to be invincible to frontal melee attackers, including S&S infantry. This is wrong. Others, like me, want them to simply use their pikes longer and perhaps fight in deeper ranks. This is perfectly fine, as long as they can't beat a comparable S&S unit.
As for the Scots, perhaps better morale and stamina for all their pike units, higher melee attack and defense skill for their archers, and the obvious pike fix should satisfy most disgruntled Scots players.
why on earth should they not beat similar-quality swordsmen head to head every now and then? theres a reason pikes dominated early ancient and late medieval battlefields, and that was that you usually cant run headlong into them and expect a good outcome, neither is it any fun when they run headlong into you, all four sharp points of the file in front of you going for your gut.
of course, they should loose badly when they get infiltrated by the "close-combat" types, but semiprofessional pike should be able to stay in formation and keep the swords away.
The problem is that the scotts get pikes from the start so it would make them an absolute unstoppable superpower at the start of the game if they were to make S&S obsolete as it happened historically
the scots pike shouldnt be unbalancing in the campaign because there should be one very effective pike-killer waiting south of their border; longbows are absolute death to unarmoured, tightly-packed slow-moving pike formations.
also, pike dont render swordsmen completely obsolete, elite swordsmen should perform well agaisnt pike militia, and then theres all those situations where pike get bogged down, flanked, looses formation etc.
without having tested it, I also suspect that in a one on one open field battle sword can beat fully functioning ( RTW style) pikes simply by running up to their sides, and then charging in as the pike raise their weapons to wheel around.
Gameplay balance does not ultimately triumph over historical correctness, at least not entirely. If you make a WW2 game and have foot soldiers more powerful than tanks, or have shermans at three times the power level of panzers, no one will play it. It could play like a million bucks, but the inaccuracies are so crazy at that point that no one would be able to stand it: it's entirely unbelievable. So it is with M2TW. It doesn't matter what is best for gameplay if it makes the game ludicrous historically, because part of the game's appeal comes from its roots in history. There is some amount of liberty that can be taken with history in order to improve the gameplay mechanics, but if things deviate too far from historical accuracy, the game loses all the things that make it more appealing than fantasy games of the genre. Actually it becomes worse than other games at that point: a fantasy game is easy to accept, because it has no preconceptions. A history-based game has to be believable in some sense for most players to enjoy it as much as they would any fantasy game, or else the experience is ruined by the constant nagging of things that feel wrong. It is that believability I call into question: many of us know better than to have sword and shield units able to successfully attack pikes frontally, and it is a disturbing enough sight when it happens that for those who know better, it hurts the game far more than some imbalance due to historical accuracy would. I'm not even admitting it would cause any, but that's been argued already: I'm just saying any that might be caused would be more than compensated for through the much better immersion the change would create.
Historical games require not only a well-designed combat system, but also enough realism to maintain the illusion, and neither can be sacrificed to the exclusive benefit of the other without also destroying the game.
Perhaps it should be more of a stalemate than anything. S&S units are very well armored, so some sharpened sticks should have real problems causing them harm. On the other hand, heavily armored men just shouldn't be able to easily breach a wall of such pikes. Barring wraparound (which will kill the pikes due to poor side defense) I would be happy enough if a pike and S&S unit engaged would simply lock horns, losing a few men as they test each other and try to find weaknesses, and mostly get stuck waiting for some other unit(s) to flank and break the stalemate. In that sense S&S would still be useful as one of the few units able to hold a while against the repeated stabbings from the pikes, and so would at least provide an anvil to smash pikes on. As others have pointed out, pikes get slaughtered when engaged on multiple fronts, so all that's really necessary is for S&S to be an effective anvil against otherwise-effective pikes: a simple flanking move from any other unit then destroys them. That seems like a reasonable balance to me at least. They'd be:
On ~even terms against each other
Both good against other infantry
Pikes far better against cav
S&S far more arrow-resistant
Pikes totally vulnerable to flanking, where S&S can hold for quite some time usually when flanked.
What does anyone think?
I think youre pretty much spot on, but the push of pike should eventually push away or injure other infantry so long as the pike unit is cohesive.
sorry for quting the whole post by the way, how do I quote parts of a post?
@Foz:
The thing with all TW games is that in the vast majority of cases realism doesn't impair gameplay. So I'm not saying everything should be changed to optimize gameplay.
But this pikemen issue is a special exception. This isn't like riflemen beating Panzers or whatnot. There's at least some historical basis by which sword-wielding soldiers could break pike formations head on:
Sword-And-Buckler Men: Although mad cat tech mentioned that they actually rolled beneath the pikes to reach the pikemen, obviously this is a little difficult to emulate in a game. So CA made the rightful decision to make them and thereby all S&S infantry able to kill pikemen head-on.
Zweihanders: According to The Association for Renaissance Martial Arts (http://www.thearma.org/essays/2HGS.html) (a highly respected organization):
These weapons were used primarily for fighting among pike-squares where they would hack paths through knocking aside poles, possibly even lobbing the ends off opposing halberds and pikes then slashing and stabbing among the ranks.
...
The Italian humanist historian Paulus Jovius writing in the early 1500s also described the two-hand great sword as being used by Swiss soldiers to chop the shafts of pikes at the battle of Fornovo in 1495.
So there you have it. It may be hard to imagine for some, but pikes, while very formidable to face in a frontal melee, were not actually frontally invincible to certain sword-wielding troops.
So why are some historical immersionists here opposing my viewpoint? The answer may be that they can't imagine, nor can they ever find evidence for, dismounted sword & shield wielding knights beating pikemen head on.
But my belief is that ultimately the need for balanced gameplay ought to overcome what little historical impediment this presents. Not only are the benefits concrete and significant, but it will not seriously ruin the historical aspect of the game.
In that sense S&S would still be useful as one of the few units able to hold a while against the repeated stabbings from the pikes, and so would at least provide an anvil to smash pikes on.
That's it? Merely an anvil? These knights trained for all their lives just so they can let some pikemen try to poke them?
And what if the opponent had another unit to oppose your flanking action? How are you going to kill the pikemen without missile units?
Let me tell you what I believe is a guiding principle in M2TW balancing: Every normal (non-elephant) unit should have a melee-based counter-unit in frontal combat. This is because in confined situations (woods, settlements), using missile units may not always be an option. So if pikemen had frontal melee invincibility, you couldn't effectively use any missile units, and you had very little maneuvering room, how would you beat the pikemen?
Of course, you'd ask, "What about Dismounted Christian Guard? How could you beat them in those conditions?" Well the answer may be a little underwhelming but you'd have to charge them with upgraded Royal Mamluks or Quapakulu and hope for the best.
But DCG is one heck of a special exception. As it stands it's fairly balanced, with pikemen needing a little more treatment to make them fulfill their role better.
@anders:
but semiprofessional pike should be able to stay in formation and keep the swords away.
...But they did not. Some swordsmen either cunning avoided the clumsy pikes or simply chopped them off. CA has decided to apply this to all S&S units in order to simplify things as well as give S&S a solid role.
I agree with them.
RickooClan
04-26-2007, 08:30
One huge balance issue right now is pike units. Currently, when enemy infantry charges the first row of pike men die immediately, even though the enemy infantry hasn't gotten past the row of pikes. Then the rest of the pike men switch to swords and get slaughtered. Pikes currently suck against everything but cavalry. Historically Pikes are what brought an end to medieval warfare, and it would be great if the late era simulated this.
I think this is the key problem for pikeman in m2tw now, especially with 1.02 shield bug fixed. (that sounds like Chinese Kung Fu while somebody hit the pike the power go through it and the pikeman holding it got killed instantly AAARRRH OMG!!!! :wall: )
Lower rank or militia pike units just lost 20+ men after receiving the first charge and then being slaughtered in 10 sec is totally joke.
RickooClan
04-26-2007, 08:36
btw, should we put "fixing/balancing pike unit" into 1.2 buglist or 1.3 wishlist?
if teh scots pikes are mainly defensive units and they have very weak missile troops firepower wise and their cav is average its apparent that one only needs sit back and bombard the scots pike forcing him to attack which supposedly makes his pikes lose cohesion and become defeated.
every faction has weaknesses and strengths. to me cav currently are way overstrength but i have yet to play1.2.
the only unit that usually stops cav reliably are pikes. this is ok but why limit pike numbers to 5 and allow 8 to 9 cav. dont you think that is leaning toward people using cav exploits more?
i really fail to understand why some people think pikes are such steamrollers.:laugh4:
I'd like to see you try that against a real opponent online, maybe we can gt together sometime and I'll show you how to use pikemen of any variety and just why they're so overpowered in 1.1.
Even when attacking Pikemen can beat every other infantry unit. I read a thread over at the .com that said that to use pikes you had to do alot of micromanagement and on their own they're more or less crap, A view which alot of people over there seem to share. I must say that that is completely inaccurate as I can and have charged pikemen into DCK and won on quite a few occassions, with absolutely no micromanagement as I was too busy with cavalry on the flanks.
The fact of the matter is that if you think pikemen suck compared to how they were historically, or your personal opinion of how they should be then your using them wrong.
Luckily in 1.2 with the shield bug being fixed they're alot more realistic, the only problem being that swiss pikes and the other more elite ones are now a tad bit underpowered for my liking when facing infantry. The Scottish Highland Pikes/Pike Militia Are a little weakened against cavalry, however they perform better than I would expect 40 mounted french knights to perform against 60 peasants with 14 foot sticks in real life as to stop a cav charge it requires a far greater number comparative to the number of knights.
There is still the graphical problems of S&S killing pikemen at range, but apart from that pikemen look almost perfect to how I would lik them, and what they should be historically.
Furious Mental
04-26-2007, 09:07
Pike squares should be superior to pretty much everything in melee. Within a certain degree of flexibility the game should progress through historically accurate stages and it should culminate with the greater part of Western European armies being pikemen. Factions that fail to adapt should die. Simple as that in my opinion. Frankly the fact that sword wielding infantry in Renaissance armies sometimes tipped the balance in a bad war in favour of one pike square isn't a very convincing historical basis for pikemen invariably being useless against infantry. The gameplay problems with the way pikes work (or rather, don't) right now are notorious, so in my opinion the status quo cannot be justified either on the basis of historical accuracy or gameplay expediency.
"These knights trained for all their lives just so they can let some pikemen try to poke them?"
If lifelong training counted for so much medieval men-at-arms would not have been replaced by the pike and shot army. But it didn't and they were.
I'd like to see you try that against a real opponent online, maybe we can gt together sometime and I'll show you how to use pikemen of any variety and just why they're so overpowered in 1.1.
Even when attacking Pikemen can beat every other infantry unit. I read a thread over at the .com that said that to use pikes you had to do alot of micromanagement and on their own they're more or less crap, A view which alot of people over there seem to share. I must say that that is completely inaccurate as I can and have charged pikemen into DCK and won on quite a few occassions, with absolutely no micromanagement as I was too busy with cavalry on the flanks.
The fact of the matter is that if you think pikemen suck compared to how they were historically, or your personal opinion of how they should be then your using them wrong.
Luckily in 1.2 with the shield bug being fixed they're alot more realistic, the only problem being that swiss pikes and the other more elite ones are now a tad bit underpowered for my liking when facing infantry. The Scottish Highland Pikes/Pike Militia Are a little weakened against cavalry, however they perform better than I would expect 40 mounted french knights to perform against 60 peasants with 14 foot sticks in real life as to stop a cav charge it requires a far greater number comparative to the number of knights.
There is still the graphical problems of S&S killing pikemen at range, but apart from that pikemen look almost perfect to how I would lik them, and what they should be historically.
Where are you getting your facts exactly?
Currently, one on one pikes will take massive casualties against any swordsmen of halberd's. They simply aren't efficient in the campaign. They may be some-what decent in multi player but the heavy casualties pikes take each battle makes them simply not worth it in the campaign.
Massed "peasants armed with 14 foot sticks" when trained correctly by William Wallace and Robert the Bruce for example, absolutely devastated English knights. Wallace's army was untouchable until the English were able to mass enough long bowmen to defeat them.
That is how pikes should be defeated historically. The best compromise is to make pikes more expensive in multilayer and perhaps a bit more vulnerable to missiles. It works perfectly balance-wise as well. Pikes are already slow and vulnerable to missiles, why should they suck against swords and shield units to?
Unfortunately for you this isn't Renniasance Total war, this is Medeival total war, Where Men at Arms dominated the battlefield until high quality Gunpowder units rendered thier armour obsolete. If it wasn't for GOOD Gunpowder weapons the pikemen would of only been effective against cavalry. The reason they became effective against infantry as well is due to the decline of heavy armour.
Unfortunately for you this isn't Renniasance Total war, this is Medeival total war, Where Men at Arms dominated the battlefield until high quality Gunpowder units rendered thier armour obsolete. If it wasn't for GOOD Gunpowder weapons the pikemen would of only been effective against cavalry. The reason they became effective against infantry as well is due to the decline of heavy armour.
Then why did they add Tercios, French pikemen and musketeers? Why add units from the pike and musket period if they didn't intend for them to work properly?
Pikes could roll over infantry formations. The enemy would be held back by the pikes and the few stragglers that got past the pikes would be killed by swordsmen withinin the pike formation. Ca clearly intended to simulate this, what with pikes switching to swords and all. Unfortunately the pike formation in medieval 2 isn't capable of keeping most enemy infantry at bay, thus several enemy infantry will always get past the pikes as soon as combat begins and that forces pike men to draw their swords and get annihilated.
Where are you getting your facts exactly?
History as well as ALOT of experience at playing TW games. Where are you getting yours?
Currently, one on one pikes will take massive casualties against any swordsmen of halberd's. They simply aren't efficient in the campaign. They may be some-what decent in multi player but the heavy casualties pikes take each battle makes them simply not worth it in the campaign.
Not worth what exactly? 150 base cost as well as a small upkeep fee, considering they can beat dismounted Conquistedors (with around 30 men remaining, not including healed men) which have a base cost of 690 as well as atleast double upkeep cost and are the best S&S unit in the game, I'd consider that *efficient* personally.
Massed "peasants armed with 14 foot sticks" when trained correctly by William Wallace and Robert the Bruce for example, absolutely devastated English knights. Wallace's army was untouchable until the English were able to mass enough long bowmen to defeat them.
They were hardly untouchable, the reason for the defeats was solely due to terrain and bad commanding by the english, granted the pikemen are effective against cavalry, but thats it. Even then there's been quite a few occassions when cavalry as beaten pikemen. Here's what happened at Bannockburn: http://www.braveheart.co.uk/macbrave/history/bruce/banseq.htm
That is how pikes should be defeated historically. The best compromise is to make pikes more expensive in multilayer and perhaps a bit more vulnerable to missiles. It works perfectly balance-wise as well. Pikes are already slow and vulnerable to missiles, why should they suck against swords and shield units to?
Historically pikes were defeated by S&S in combination with missiles, however S&S were capable of doing it on their own. Which is why pikes were mainly only used when the enemy force consisted of a large contingent of cavalry.
Making pikes more expensive in multiplayer is not an option as the campaign prices are tied to the multiplayer prices and without the shield bug they're worth their cost anyway.
They're as vulnerable to missiles as a unit can be without giving them a negative bonus such as spears have against infantry, In multiplayer that wouldn't make any difference whatsoever anyhow as people don't just stand around getting shot like the AI. The slowness of pikes isn't actually slow when you know how to play so getting into melee with pikes against a human player is easy to do and you won't take much if any casualties from missile fire. The only reason SP people notice their vulnerability to missiles is because the AI is so inept so when single players decide to use a basic tactic like mass missiles that the most incompentent player could counter it's considered that thats the way pikes should be countered.
What seems clear for this is that Scotland is the problem due to its limited unit roster.
If Pikes are too good then they can beat anyone.
If they're not, the Scots are doomed.
Otherwise the only thing I'm not claar about is: What Pikes are we talking about here?
Is anyone saying pikes in vanilla or 1.0 are overpowered? They are blatantly not for what I can see (and I've played a campiagn with scots).
With Carl's pike fix - yes I suppose they are. But when you have poor archers and poor cav it only seems fair to have decent Infantry options. Make Pikes poor against other Inf and the scots are the weakest faction militarily in game. No other faction has poor choices in all 3!!!
RickooClan
04-26-2007, 10:22
Otherwise the only thing I'm not claar about is: What Pikes are we talking about here?
Is anyone saying pikes in vanilla or 1.0 are overpowered? They are blatantly not for what I can see (and I've played a campiagn with scots).
Didnt the topic suggested? (Pikeman vs Sword & Shield head to head post 1.02?) :laugh4:
Is anyone saying pikes in vanilla or 1.0 are overpowered? They are blatantly not for what I can see (and I've played a campiagn with scots).
I'm saying they are because for their cost you can just spam them and they'll beat the top infantry easily. Maybe not many of you have noticed it because against masses of peasants and other cheap infantry, both of them having the shield bug which is the cause of this deminishes the effects somewhat, however against a good army no infantry except other pikemen can match them unit ofr unit. Scotlan are meant to have a poor army anyway:laugh4:
Didnt the topic suggested? (Pikeman vs Sword & Shield head to head post 1.02?) :laugh4:
Yes it did but we've sort of side tracked from that because some people beleive that in 1.0 and 1.1 they're were underpowered :gah:
Well back ontopic, I'm very pleased with the fixes to pikemen in 1.2, it would help if they made it so they didn't switch to sword so quickly for use against cavalry, as well as the minor graphical problem of swordsmen killing Pikemen from range, but these 2 are rather insignificant to me personally copared to the overall power of pikemen.
Lupiscanis
04-26-2007, 10:55
I've been testing the pikemen vs cavalry charges a bit (leaked 1.2), and it does seem a little odd. If your pikemen are not precisely as wide as the cavalry charge, or a little wider, they will be flanked upon the impact of the charge, and immedietly turn to their swords and die usually.
I'm at work now, but I'll see what else turns up.
Unfortunately for you this isn't Renniasance Total war, this is Medeival total war, Where Men at Arms dominated the battlefield until high quality Gunpowder units rendered thier armour obsolete. If it wasn't for GOOD Gunpowder weapons the pikemen would of only been effective against cavalry. The reason they became effective against infantry as well is due to the decline of heavy armour.
no way man, pike and polearm was the weapon that first shook the supremacy of men at arms/knights, and not by rendering armour obsolete.
gunpowder, in turn, made pike formations less viable over time.
btw. the pro-pike, if it can be called such, guys in here arent saying pike should always slaughter swords, nobody disagrees that sword and buckler could take on pike and win, denying that would be like denying roman legionaires eventually beat phalanxes, we are just saying that walking up to a row of sharp sticks, as much as four or five pointing at each swordsman, and then trying to get into sword range, is starting melee at a disadvantage.
also, remember that the sword and buckler man of the 1500s was something of a martial artist who, at least in the spanish tercio system, had a specialized task of disrupting pike formations. thats something else than a dismounted heavy knight( who of course also could have very good individual skills) and I refuse to believe that sword and buckler men routinely won over pikes, if so were, they would constitute much more than the 20% of a tercio they did when the adversaries so often were pike-heavy armies.
btw. it must be remarkes that the bane of swiss pike wasent only gunpowder, but repeat charges from heavy cavalry after artillery "softening"
ok boys, Im afraid we have to stop this discussion, a girl from work just walked in here, read the last posts in the thread, and asked us all to get a life..:beam:
ok boys, Im afraid we have to stop this discussion, a girl from work just walked in here, read the last posts in the thread, and asked us all to get a life..:beam:
To quote a friend of mine
"It's not that I don't have a life. It's just that the life of my character is so much better."
:embarassed:
RickooClan
04-26-2007, 15:10
I've been testing the pikemen vs cavalry charges a bit (leaked 1.2), and it does seem a little odd. If your pikemen are not precisely as wide as the cavalry charge, or a little wider, they will be flanked upon the impact of the charge, and immedietly turn to their swords and die usually.
I'm at work now, but I'll see what else turns up.
I actually think it is perfectly fine which the engine will auto "wrap" and flank an pike unit if they are not wide enough, and it should be the way to beat them.
@Kronos
Yea, you r right the thread is a bit diverse now. But i think a discussion base on 1.02 will be much useful as it is likely what we are going to see and use for m2tw unless CA spot this issue and fix it. (Most of us will agree the upcoming patch likely be the last on m2tw)
RickooClan
04-26-2007, 15:13
ok boys, Im afraid we have to stop this discussion, a girl from work just walked in here, read the last posts in the thread, and asked us all to get a life..:beam:
Lol, i think the only way to stop the discussion is a begging of full release 1.02 from CA. I am sure at least 50% of the member on the forum will be disappeared, for a week at least. :laugh4:
pike master
04-26-2007, 20:53
well great sword and halberd units should break through a spear wall to give the game some balance but sword and shield infantry shouldnt be able to do it.
sword and shield infantry became obsolete long before halberds and bills did. mostly soldiers began wearing full or partial plate which made shield obsolete and gave him an extra hand to help produce enough force to splinter and damage a pole or damage another opponents armor.
pikes historically should not be beaten head on by shield units. and if they are it will be due to a wrap or a serious breach in the spear wall which currently it is breaking down before it is even breached. i would also tend to believe that even if a soldier or two breaks through and starts inflicting injuries to the pikemen that the pikemen would remain disciplined enough to know that they need to keep to their pikes or they are all doomed anyways.
and also the rear ranks could pull their swords out to stop the infiltrators. or the forward movement of the phalanx would just walk him over.
halberds would be a good option to use but they are more expesnive and their animations and walking speeds arent too good.
but i would have to assume that CA does want them to work the way they are. even though it is historically incorrect.
this is what a spear does to sword and shield infantryhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpfv_VMaynQ&mode=related&search=
But my belief is that ultimately the need for balanced gameplay ought to overcome what little historical impediment this presents. Not only are the benefits concrete and significant, but it will not seriously ruin the historical aspect of the game.
Even if we assume it is not wrecking the historical aspect of the game, the notion that the current pike implementation is actually balanced somehow is still hotly contested in this thread: clearly no one has demonstrated that their current treatment lends balance to the game, nor that the various proposed changes would in any way imbalance the game. If you intend to allege that pikes should be the way they are in the game currently, you'll have to lay out more convincing evidence than has been presented in this thread thus far, to both of those ends. The consensus is that pikes are not operating correctly/optimally, which should mean their operation is brought in line with what people expect barring substantial reasons not to do so; reasons which I ask you (or anyone for that matter) to provide, explain, and adequately demonstrate.
...But they did not. Some swordsmen either cunning avoided the clumsy pikes or simply chopped them off. CA has decided to apply this to all S&S units in order to simplify things as well as give S&S a solid role.
I agree with them.
You are not agreeing with anything, you are expressing your opinion. Again I will reiterate: you are fabricating CA's viewpoint on this matter. They have not commented AT ALL on it. It is not safe to assume that everything in the game is the way CA wants it, as evidenced by the many things that are changing in updates, even things like spying mechanics which were not broken per se. Logic like yours would have led us to believe that the shield bug was intended by CA simply because it was in the game, which is obviously a load of bull. So please stop citing CA to back you up - all you are doing is making yourself look foolish by trying to conjure up credible support that you simply do not have.
pike master
04-27-2007, 01:08
YUP! same as foz
well great sword and halberd units should break through a spear wall to give the game some balance but sword and shield infantry shouldnt be able to do it.
If that were so, then what would S&S units be best at? Anything they could do, some other unit could do better:
Flanking action: Medium/Heavy Cavalry, Javelins, or Naffatun
Chasing light archers: Light/Medium Cavalry
Killing hybrid archers: Medium/Heavy Cavalry
Beating spearmen: Polearms/Axes
Absorbing missiles: Spearmen
General purpose front line "anvil": Spearmen
General purpose reserve unit: Javelin/Medium/Heavy Cavalry or Short Polearms/Axes
General purpose siege assault and defense: Polearms/Axes
So if most of the posters here had their way, S&S units would be useful in SP for only a short amount of time (about 20 turns or so) and nearly useless in MP. Given how expensive and ubiquitous S&S units are in-game and how historically important they were, this is not right.
clearly no one has demonstrated...that the various proposed changes would in any way imbalance the game.
I get the feeling you haven't carefully read over this thread enough. I have clearly demonstrated how over-improved pikemen would render S&S units nearly useless, and that the extra vulnerability of pikemen against flanking infantry is, in the hands of most players, insufficient to balance their otherwise overpowered frontal melee capabilities.
If you intend to allege that pikes should be the way they are in the game currently
I'm not. Stop trying to shove this strawman down my throat.
I have very explicitly stated that pikemen can and should be improved to fulfill their role as an anti-cavalry unit with greater proficiency, which would also inevitably result in better performance against infantry as well.
What I'm proposing is that they should not be improved to the extent that they can beat S&S units, which in my view would unbalance the game.
Logic like yours would have led us to believe that the shield bug was intended by CA simply because it was in the game
This is in no way like the shield bug. If you actually looked at the way S&S units are presented in-game you'd (probably) agree with me.
Look at the description of Sword & Buckler Men in-game:
Renowned for their swordsmanship, these infantrymen are protected by light armour, or later plate armour and an open helmet. Armed with a double edged and razor sharp Toledo made sword and a buckler, these swordsmen are capable of breaking pike formations and wreaking havoc amongst less well armed and trained units, making them amongst the foremost infantrymen of their day.(Emphasis mine)
Now compare their stats to DFK's.
They have almost identical stats to DFK's, except they have less armor.
Now, do you think DFK's should perform the same role as these guys? After all, they have very similar stats, use swords and shields, and are an elite infantry unit.
If CA intended DFK's not to perform the same role as as SBM, don't you think their stats should be significantly different?
And if you think CA has made a mistake and somehow intended DFK's to perform another role, do you think they would have more easily caught that then the shield bug? After all, while you can look at stats and descriptions at-a-glance, spotting the shield bug requires a lot of battle testing and careful observation.
This is not a fabrication. This is not a conjuration. Much of my evidence comes from in-game descriptions written by CA, which by and large give the biggest hints as to what they intend a unit type to do.
Do you need more evidence, Foz, or do you still believe I'm some snake oil salesman? If not then stop with the ad hominem attacks and focus on the actual arguments instead.
Not worth what exactly? 150 base cost as well as a small upkeep fee, considering they can beat dismounted Conquistedors (with around 30 men remaining, not including healed men) which have a base cost of 690 as well as atleast double upkeep cost and are the best S&S unit in the game, I'd consider that *efficient* personally.
I've proposed many times that pikes be made much more expensive.
They were hardly untouchable, the reason for the defeats was solely due to terrain and bad commanding by the english, granted the pikemen are effective against cavalry, but thats it. Even then there's been quite a few occassions when cavalry as beaten pikemen. Here's what happened at Bannockburn: http://www.braveheart.co.uk/macbrave/history/bruce/banseq.htm
I was out of line there.
However late pike formations were not vulnerable to swords & buckler men unless they were unorganized and fighting other pike men.
Historically pikes were defeated by S&S in combination with missiles, however S&S were capable of doing it on their own. Which is why pikes were mainly only used when the enemy force consisted of a large contingent of cavalry.
Historically, the downfall of S&S units was due to pikes being too organized. S&S units were only useful when the push of the pike occurred.
Here's a wiki article on Rodeleros (sword and buckler men): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rodeleros
Now, the Tercio didn't fight with pikes alone, they had muskets and swordsmen in the formation as well as others. The game only simulates the pikes and swords. Rtw also did this. When an enemy swordsmen gets past the pikes, two or three of the pike-men switch to swords and kill the loner.
Making pikes more expensive in multiplayer is not an option as the campaign prices are tied to the multiplayer prices and without the shield bug they're worth their cost anyway.
I'm fine with making them more expensive in the campaign.
They're as vulnerable to missiles as a unit can be without giving them a negative bonus such as spears have against infantry, In multiplayer that wouldn't make any difference whatsoever anyhow as people don't just stand around getting shot like the AI. The slowness of pikes isn't actually slow when you know how to play so getting into melee with pikes against a human player is easy to do and you won't take much if any casualties from missile fire. The only reason SP people notice their vulnerability to missiles is because the AI is so inept so when single players decide to use a basic tactic like mass missiles that the most incompentent player could counter it's considered that thats the way pikes should be countered.
That's more a problem with units moving too fast than anything else. Similarly they also kill too fast. Things need to be slowed down.
What I'm proposing is that they should not be improved to the extent that they can beat S&S units, which in my view would unbalance the game.
What's your response to making them more expensive and slower? Or limiting the amount of pikes that can be used in multi player?
pike master
04-27-2007, 05:00
shield infantry is dominant in two eras of the game guys what more do you want. even in mp early and high era you have your sword and shield after 1.2 will be the dominant infantry on the battlefield.
but when late era comes around those units are obsolete. units such as halberdiers and pikes and two handed axemen dominate the scene. this is simple common sense.
its a fact that once the medieval era reached the late period shields were not used as often. but you often times find pictures showing bowmen and masses of pole arm phalanxes fighting it out.
i fail to understand your logic. you are trying to say that up until the rennaisance that sword and shield infantry and spearmen still dominated the battlefield.
i suppose we need to rewrite the history books.
if you dont want pikes and halberds play in the early and high periods. sheesh!
im getting convinced that the knight fights guys are the ones responsible for this and it is on whole not historically accurate. its a major warping of historical accuracy.
OK here is a mention on page 56 of the instruction manual under special abilities-spear wall formation=this ability allows a spear wielding unit to form up a deadly wall of spikes that makes them extremely[EXTREMELY] difficult to attack from the front. while in this formation, the unit cannot run and moves slowly.
If that were so, then what would S&S units be best at? Anything they could do, some other unit could do better:
Flanking action: Medium/Heavy Cavalry, Javelins, or Naffatun
Chasing light archers: Light/Medium Cavalry
Killing hybrid archers: Medium/Heavy Cavalry
Beating spearmen: Polearms/Axes
Absorbing missiles: Spearmen
General purpose front line "anvil": Spearmen
General purpose reserve unit: Javelin/Medium/Heavy Cavalry or Short Polearms/Axes
General purpose siege assault and defense: Polearms/Axes
First off, you begin under the false assumption that a unit must be best at something. It is not necessary at all. A unit that is very good at most things is quite acceptable, and sure to find a use in any army. I don't think it's disputable that S&S units fit that description. In fact, they are more well-rounded than most units in the game, and thus are quite easy to use well on the battlefield. As a result, they undoubtedly appeal and will continue to appeal to many players due to their simplicity and ease of use, not to mention utility.
Second, I bolded the various claims you make that are simply not true. For absorbing missiles, clearly the higher defense values of the S&S units make them much better than spearmen in this regard: they simply are hit less often by the missiles as a result. The difference in defense between say an armored sergeant and a DFK is ~7 points, which if I recall discussion of the stat system correctly can be up to a 70% difference in how often they are hit by an attack. S&S units are almost certainly the best in this category because they have unrivaled defense values.
For anvil units again the valued stat is raw defense, so it is easy to see that S&S units are far better for this than spearmen: they hold longer, and will survive better too, not to mention being WAY better at actually killing enemy infantry they encounter, especially because spears take a penalty in combat vs infantry. There's simply no contest here, S&S are best in this respect too.
The last one, polearms may be good for defense because they kill quickly, but they are inferior for assaulting due to their low armor and especially their lack of shields. A great many of the losses during an assault are caused by the towers, which continue firing even into the melee on the walls. As a result high defense will save a ton of the assaulting men from destruction. I haven't done a side by side comparison (for obvious reasons), but I don't think it's possible that a unit that is vulnerable to missile fire can be the best choice for assaulting walls. I'm sure they can be good for rushing through breaches or opened gates, though. Perhaps that's what you had in mind in the first place.
I get the feeling you haven't carefully read over this thread enough. I have clearly demonstrated how over-improved pikemen would render S&S units nearly useless, and that the extra vulnerability of pikemen against flanking infantry is, in the hands of most players, insufficient to balance their otherwise overpowered frontal melee capabilities.
Oh I've read the thread in its entirety, and carefully enough to understand the various viewpoints. You may think you've clearly demonstrated those things, but all you've done is make arguments that are less than airtight and far from compelling. There's not a single thing there that could be considered evidence, or actually indicative of what would happen if they were "over-improved," which is exactly why I asked for you to make better arguments that are more supported by information instead of speculation.
As to balance, the extra vulnerability of pikemen against flanking infantry would of course be insufficient to balance their "otherwise overpowered frontal melee capabilities." You neglected to mention their horrific slowness, inability to turn quickly, and awful missile defense. That's a LOT more vulnerability. Any player who fails to recruit any missile units to cut them down or outmaneuver them at all with cavalry or infantry simply should lose to pikes. It would be like if a tank was coming at you and you refused to do anything except stand in front of it trying to attack it with your fists. You'd deserve to die, because that's the last thing you should be doing to attack a tank. The improved pikes would be beat by archers and literally any unit can kill them from any side except the front, plus they're as slow as molasses, which is plenty of drawbacks and limits in exchange for the ability to stand in one place and be very difficult to move or kill. It's an incredibly 1-dimensional unit, and at least has to be good at that 1 thing it actually is supposed to be able to do...
I'm not. Stop trying to shove this strawman down my throat.
I have very explicitly stated that pikemen can and should be improved to fulfill their role as an anti-cavalry unit with greater proficiency, which would also inevitably result in better performance against infantry as well.
What I'm proposing is that they should not be improved to the extent that they can beat S&S units, which in my view would unbalance the game.
I don't know if they should beat them or not: I do think it should take a long time for anything to happen though. They both prevent what the other tries to do! Pikes have bad attacks against great S&S armor, while S&S must close to attack which pikes are designed to prevent. I'd honestly think it should just be horribly frustrating more than anything w/ very little getting accomplished.
Look at the description of Sword & Buckler Men in-game:
(Emphasis mine)
Now compare their stats to DFK's.
They have almost identical stats to DFK's, except they have less armor.
Now, do you think DFK's should perform the same role as these guys? After all, they have very similar stats, use swords and shields, and are an elite infantry unit.
If CA intended DFK's not to perform the same role as as SBM, don't you think their stats should be significantly different?
As I recall, the primary argument for SBM beating pikes is their ability to roll on the ground and basically outmaneuver the pikes with speed and agility. The DFK's higher armor is not only more protection, it is probably substantially less speed and agility. In order to protect the man better, the armor would typically have to be substantially heavier (b/c of being both thicker and having more area of the man covered) and also often more restrictive. It's unlikely that the more heavily armor-clad DFK's could perform such agile stunts to avoid pikes, and so no I do not think one should consider DFKs to perform the same role in this regard. I will agree that in the game they are similar in role, but you simply can't make the jump of saying DFKs should be good against pikes in the game because in history SBMs might have been. Nevermind that bucklers would not provide the same protection as large shields that DFK use either: the unit stats do not do the real life difference justice, SBM would be weaker defensively than the game represents.
And if you think CA has made a mistake and somehow intended DFK's to perform another role, do you think they would have more easily caught that then the shield bug? After all, while you can look at stats and descriptions at-a-glance, spotting the shield bug requires a lot of battle testing and careful observation.
You just won't give up on the bad logic regarding CA! Something being "caught" and being "fixed" are a world apart. It's entirely possible and likely that CA is aware of the pike issues and has simply prioritized other more broken and important things ahead of it. That something is not changed does not illustrate that it is unnoticed or represents intended game behavior.
Do you need more evidence, Foz, or do you still believe I'm some snake oil salesman? If not then stop with the ad hominem attacks and focus on the actual arguments instead.
Snake oil salesman? Your term, not mine, lol. For the record, I have not once made a personal attack against you in this thread. I have, however, thrashed your ideas and methods. There is a world of difference, which I suggest you read about before using labels like "ad hominem."
Easy, guys. I think everyone would be doing themselves a favor is we all stopped and took a breath. Miracle, if you feel someone has personally insulted you, then you should use the "report post" icon -- that's what it's there for, after all. If the staff finds that it's in violation of the Org's rules, we'll deal with it accordingly.
That said, I honestly don't think it's the intention of Foz or anyone else to personally insult you. There's been one or two instances where both of you have neared that line; but you've managed to avoid actually doing so thus far, for which you're all to be commended.
So just consider this as a (mild) general warning to all: In any argument here on the forums, make sure you're attacking only the position, and not the person posting it. You guys have been having a thorough, spirited - yet civil - discussion & debate up to this point, and I would very much prefer to see it remain that way. :yes:
Bob the Insane
04-27-2007, 10:50
For absorbing missiles, clearly the higher defense values of the S&S units make them much better than spearmen in this regard: they simply are hit less often by the missiles as a result. The difference in defense between say an armored sergeant and a DFK is ~7 points, which if I recall discussion of the stat system correctly can be up to a 70% difference in how often they are hit by an attack. S&S units are almost certainly the best in this category because they have unrivaled defense values.
Just a small nit-pick but I believe that the defense stat is not used in defense against missiles, just armour and shield (from the front and right, as of 1.02)... Is that not correct?
Mind you foot knights tend to be the best armoured anyway so using them to absorb hits from non-AP missiles still works.
RickooClan
04-27-2007, 12:04
I believe defense skill only count in melee combat.
Just to throw my own two penath back in.
@ Miracle, your suggesting using medium heavy Cav for a HELL of a lot of things that IMHO they aren't really useful for when you get the spears up to a balanced power level, a unit in schiltrom on the end of the line and another unit or two behind it more or less leave Cav as opportunists, who's primary roles is to tackle any undefended or unsupported units. Generally this only happens after the battle lines have engaged when things become confused. they can be used in effect to turn a losing fight into a win or to achieve a victory faster.
In addition the schiltrom units on the end of a pike formation make it nearly impossibbile to use Cav in that role, (to mention nothing of the light Cav, any Cav coming too close will find itself tied up by the light Cav and mugged shortly after by the spears, any attempt to run away would result in them being run down by the light Cav and the spears will get them if they don't run).
Their are 3 basic ways of dealing with a schiltrom on the end of a line.
1. send in 2-handers
2. send in other spear.
3. send in a S&S unit
1. has the disadvantage that if the 2-hander walks their going to get shot to pieces, and if they run a spear unit cannot easily get between it and enemy Cav. Either way it's very risky to try, (although it has a huge payoff if it works).
2. Suffers from a slow kill rate, ties up a very valuable counter Cav unit of your own and will decimate your own spear unit.
3. Has few disadvantages beyond cost, it can walk inside protection distance of a spear unit, survive enemy missiles, and will kill the spears off fast with few losses
Lastly, as Foz noted, S&S units ARE all rounders, they aren't perfect at any one thing but they can do a lot of things at OK level.
Regarding not being able to flank because everyone has the same units.
Thats not really true, everybody is going to have different numbers of archers and Cav, as a result that means the number of "line" units, (most archers not being able to double as good melee units), is going to vary considerably between the two forces. Thus the length of the line will vary a lot making flanking easy.
In addition dealing with a pike line involves throwing cheap trash at the pikes and defensive blockers at one flank whilst every major offensive unit you have hits the other flank in an effort to collapse it before the pikes finish your trash and turn on your flank attacking forces. However the very overwhelming nature of most attacks on the flanks of a Pike formation often means that the flank guards of the formation simply won't ever make their value back, the pikes have to make their own value back AND that of the units that are protecting your flanks.
In a pike vs. non pike battle the pikes will often be equivalent of about 1/3 the total size of the enemy force and 1/10th the cost, but over the course of the battle will have to kill something like 3/4 the numbers of the enemy force and 9/10th the cost if your to actually win the fight.
The entire purpose behind a pike formation is to protect the pikes flanks long enough for them to grind pretty much the entire enemy force into dust.
Whilst the aim of anyone fighting a pike formation is to keep the enemy pikes occupied whilst you eliminates the rest of the enemy army with low losses, thus allowing you to hit the pikes from every direction at once and destroy them.
The entire purpose behind a pike formation is to protect the pikes flanks long enough for them to grind pretty much the entire enemy force into dust.
Whilst the aim of anyone fighting a pike formation is to keep the enemy pikes occupied whilst you eliminates the rest of the enemy army with low losses, thus allowing you to hit the pikes from every direction at once and destroy them.
In theory perhaps but in practise that will never work. Here's an example of a scottish set up from High era: 6-8 Pike Militia ( I favour 7 personally although it's changeable depending on who your facing) As many cavalry as you can, usually 9 (dependant on rules) and then some archers to counter the opponents archers so say 4.
The pikemen set up in a single line, cavalry on the flanks and archers up front.
You both advance into archer range at which point you run at them (Pikemen can do this as fast as other infantry when out of spearwall) because your archers suck as you spent all your money on good cavalry and upgrades for that cavalry. They won't be quick enough if you time it right to change their targets from your archers to pikes by the time you get to their lines. So they can either leave their archers to stand there and die, or withdraw them behind their main infantry line which they've just opened up to you. You can either engage them and win with pikemen (which is reality in 1.1 and even worse if the people who want pikes improved get their own way). Or just stand in front of them without engaging so they can't move their infantry to help their cavalry which by this point is getting ****ed on the flanks as yours is far superior due to more money. If they do try to move to help out their cavalry you can catch them in the rear so it's win/win.
While all this is going on their archers can't do anything without shooting thier own troops in the back so they're out of the equation for now. If they decided to move their cavalry behind their main infantry line so it doesn't get crushed by your superior cavalry then you send yours all the way round the back and engage them from that side, pin thier infantry with yours and hey started routing/fighting to the death as they're surrounded.
Thats the reality of it and there's only 1 thing the other guy can do about it due to the shield bug. That other thing would be to get the worst infantry they can like peasants so they can afford to upgrade and get better cavalry than you. A peasant unit with 1 chevron, 1 attack and 1 defense is a formidable unit with the shield bug, so now they can hold your pikes and even win in 1.1 as pikes are only effective themselves because of the shield bug, a mass of cheap infantry > pikemen who are better suited to killing smaller quantities of elite infantry.
That is the ONLY thing that can e done against pikemen currently and if the people who want pikemen improved further get their way it will completely ruin MP more than it currently is in 1.1.
As for increasing the price of pikemen thats even more historically inaccurate than supposedly having weak pikemen is and would require a substantial increase to even more than S&S units like dismounted conquistadors that cost 690 currently. So would u like peasants with long pointy sticks like the scottish pikemen have to be more expensive than CHIVALRIC KNIGHTS?
I don't however have a problem with keeping pikemen at their current level in late era such as Swiss Pikemen as long as there's a substantial increase in cost.
This is about MP btw as Carl seemed to be talking about player Vs player:2thumbsup:
Has anyone checked out this thread over at twcenter?
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=88483
In it the thread starter claims to have found a way to improve the unit's utilisation of the pike over the sword.
Gaius Terentius Varro
04-27-2007, 17:48
In theory perhaps but in practise that will never work. Here's an example of a scottish set up from High era: 6-8 Pike Militia ( I favour 7 personally although it's changeable depending on who your facing) As many cavalry as you can, usually 9 (dependant on rules) and then some archers to counter the opponents archers so say 4.
The pikemen set up in a single line, cavalry on the flanks and archers up front.
You both advance into archer range at which point you run at them (Pikemen can do this as fast as other infantry when out of spearwall) because your archers suck as you spent all your money on good cavalry and upgrades for that cavalry. They won't be quick enough if you time it right to change their targets from your archers to pikes by the time you get to their lines. So they can either leave their archers to stand there and die, or withdraw them behind their main infantry line which they've just opened up to you. You can either engage them and win with pikemen (which is reality in 1.1 and even worse if the people who want pikes improved get their own way). Or just stand in front of them without engaging so they can't move their infantry to help their cavalry which by this point is getting ****ed on the flanks as yours is far superior due to more money. If they do try to move to help out their cavalry you can catch them in the rear so it's win/win.
While all this is going on their archers can't do anything without shooting thier own troops in the back so they're out of the equation for now. If they decided to move their cavalry behind their main infantry line so it doesn't get crushed by your superior cavalry then you send yours all the way round the back and engage them from that side, pin thier infantry with yours and hey started routing/fighting to the death as they're surrounded.
Thats the reality of it and there's only 1 thing the other guy can do about it due to the shield bug. That other thing would be to get the worst infantry they can like peasants so they can afford to upgrade and get better cavalry than you. A peasant unit with 1 chevron, 1 attack and 1 defense is a formidable unit with the shield bug, so now they can hold your pikes and even win in 1.1 as pikes are only effective themselves because of the shield bug, a mass of cheap infantry > pikemen who are better suited to killing smaller quantities of elite infantry.
That is the ONLY thing that can e done against pikemen currently and if the people who want pikemen improved further get their way it will completely ruin MP more than it currently is in 1.1.
As for increasing the price of pikemen thats even more historically inaccurate than supposedly having weak pikemen is and would require a substantial increase to even more than S&S units like dismounted conquistadors that cost 690 currently. So would u like peasants with long pointy sticks like the scottish pikemen have to be more expensive than CHIVALRIC KNIGHTS?
I don't however have a problem with keeping pikemen at their current level in late era such as Swiss Pikemen as long as there's a substantial increase in cost.
This is about MP btw as Carl seemed to be talking about player Vs player:2thumbsup:
This is my experience of MP too and I am thrilled that CA listened to MP community and stopped the ungodly infidel scottish pike spam
Agent Smith
04-27-2007, 17:58
So, Kronos, aren't you really complaining more about the shield bug then the pikes? Also, everyone else has archers with better range, and the English have cheap ones at that. What's stopping you from backing off your entire line to continue firing while your opponent sets up his spearwall?
You're also totally mincemeat to a HA army. They'll outnumber and cut up your cav, then wipe out your defenceless pikes.
So should the Turks be banned too?
pike master
04-27-2007, 18:46
if you cant defeat a pike spam army with a balanced army you need to practice more. you have to be prepared for anything within the ruleset. pike army can be beaten especially if they arent using "certian" methods to get around the bugs of the pike animations.
a person with a balanced army will keep their distance and rain arrows on them and pick off isolated and seperated units by overloading them with two or three cav units attacking from several directions.
they will also keep their melee infantry away from the pikes until they can find a weakness or isolated unit.
you cant expect every opponent you face to have the same unit clone build that you have. if you dont like it because a pike unit beats you than you need to learn how to defeat them. this has not been a problem for me, but i think out of the box and i win some games but not all my games because of it.
and i fail too understand how it is said by someone that CA has decided to put a stop to pike spam armies. as far as i know they have never made a comment one way or another yet.
:smg:
So, Kronos, aren't you really complaining more about the shield bug then the pikes? Also, everyone else has archers with better range, and the English have cheap ones at that. What's stopping you from backing off your entire line to continue firing while your opponent sets up his spearwall?
Well yes it is more about the shield bug in the 1.1 patch which is the reason pikes are so strong, but i'm also voicing my opinion of other peoples misconception that pikemen should be improved even further than what the shield bug accomplishes.
As for backing up that may work against relatively new players and people who would use the same type of *noob rush* tactic with heavely upgraded urbs if any of you remember the 1.5 patch ( me and some of my clanmates actually started using a certain parthian tactic that was based solely on missile/cav to counter this which was very good at what it did and would almost guarantee us heroics:laugh4:, which then got copied and used by everyone else so we had to find a counter to that which turned out to revamp egypt which lead to it being remembered for the powerhouse it was back in 1.2 and before. But this is neither here nor there). But m2's different enough to allow for this to be easily countered. Most experienced players would use a similar tactic to what was used when you had a poor army to counter people using this type of thing in rtw but had phalanxes as your infantry (I can only actually recall from personal experience, seeing this used by two different people but i'm sure many more did, those 2 being myself and |Sith|Mel). This would go something along the lines of this:
You rush in like one would, but when they backpeddle you send in some if not all of your cav through your infantry lines if they're positioned behind infantry or in from the flanks and attack whatever units in front. It's usually archers, but with the Medieval cavalry charge if their infantry's infront then they're gone. So they have 2 options, either continue backpeddling and getting large chunks taken out of their infantry/archers if not all of it. This one being what only inexperienced players would do, so then it's easy when they're dead to consolidate your forces and shoot their cavalry until theyre all dead by archer fire or morel likely have had to attack your whole army alone and have been raped.
Or they're forced to send in cavalry to protect archers/infantry where it turns into one big pile in, but you'll win as you have pikemen as well as your cavalry to kill their cavalry. You can then either fight it out and most likely win, or withdraw your cavalry and flank/fight their cavalry on the flanks if they withdraw there's as well then flank. But no matter what you'll of taken out a large portion of their archers and/or Infantry and successfully got them to engage in melee with you, taking minimal casualties from Archer fire.
I shouldn't be telling you this really as these tactics are some of the top end stuff that separate the experts from the average in MP. However I'm sure this thread will get buried in this forum soon enough and not many serious MPers will get a chance to read it:verycool:
As for HA cavalry's limited to under 10 in almost every game (usually 8 or 9) and sometimes there's a max 4 HA rule aswell. But HA don't have the same quality they did in rtw and beating them is extremely easy comparatively. With a max on cav any HA you get just makes the other person have a greater melee cav advantage. Although saying that in 1.1 with the shield bug HA are effective Melee fighters compared to what they should be, but still not as good as standard melee cav.
if you cant defeat a pike spam army with a balanced army you need to practice more. you have to be prepared for anything within the ruleset. pike army can be beaten especially if they arent using "certian" methods to get around the bugs of the pike animations.
It depends on your definition of "Pike spam", all my armies are more or less balanced, but if you mean spam as in 20 units of pikemen then I could defeat that with any army I've ever used in mtw2 without even trying. As far as i'm aware no one is even talking about pike spam except you though, I'm talking about how overpowered they are when used by someone who isn't a complete moron and overzealously gets far in excess of what a sane person would consider. However if you consider spam to mean 9 or under units then tell me your ingame name and I'll look out for you to give you a private demonstration of how easy almost any balanced army you could throw at me wouldn't stand a chance.
I'm unfamiliar with these *certain* methods, but maybe i just use them without thinking about it. Could you please elaborate on this. BTW Pikes work perfectly fine no matter how you use them, within reason.
a person with a balanced army will keep their distance and rain arrows on them and pick off isolated and seperated units by overloading them with two or three cav units attacking from several directions.
they will also keep their melee infantry away from the pikes until they can find a weakness or isolated unit.
Read my above post, that shows but one of a few ways to get around this easily. who in the hell has isolated units anyway? lol
Unless your trying to lose seperating units is a bad idea with a few exceptions.
you cant expect every opponent you face to have the same unit clone build that you have. if you dont like it because a pike unit beats you than you need to learn how to defeat them. this has not been a problem for me, but i think out of the box and i win some games but not all my games because of it.
No, just the competent ones who will have very similar armies. I don't get beat by pike units anymore and I know how to beat them with ease after a handful of attempts. If it hasn't been a problem for you then you've either been playing the wrong people or your using something similar to what I said or another coupel of tactics that can get the job done. I win most of the games against people I try to play with and all the games unless maybe if i'm trying something new against the type of people it sounds like you play with.
and i fail too understand how it is said by someone that CA has decided to put a stop to pike spam armies. as far as i know they have never made a comment one way or another yet.
:smg:
Actually I've heard rom people that know CA staff rather well of this and even in passing got that impression from a CA staff member
As for increasing the price of pikemen thats even more historically inaccurate than supposedly having weak pikemen is and would require a substantial increase to even more than S&S units like dismounted conquistadors that cost 690 currently. So would u like peasants with long pointy sticks like the scottish pikemen have to be more expensive than CHIVALRIC KNIGHTS?
Unlike RTS games where the developers are best off making games with a lousy single player and a quality multilayer, total war games focus on both (with the exception of Rome :skull: ).
Since both markets are equally valued, it's best to come to a compromise. I've suggested pike men being as good as they were historically, but much more expensive and perhaps slower (with or without spear wall on) to please those who fear other units being made useless.
Now pikes are fine if you think they should only be mobile stakes, but that's far from historical.
I haven't heard you or Miracle object to making pikes less likely to switch to swords (which would require making more ranks use their spears, that way the enemy could be kept at a distance, thus keeping pikes from switching to swords), and you in fact support ending the death-by-charge pike bug.
If these bugs were fixed, even without increasing a pikes attack pike men would dominate the battle-field infantry-wise. For balance, i suggest decreasing the amount of attack pikes have (perhaps cutting it in half?) and increasing their cost.
I will agree that as it is now pikes kill far too quickly. Normal infantry should be able to hold them off for a long amount of time, locked in a sort of stalemate. In fact, due to the lack of mobility the spear wall presents, S&S units should be able to enter and exit combat with pikes without losing more than a handful. However, though nearly immobile, pikes shouldn't take much more casualties than S&S's. Pikes should be a sort of mobile barrier.
Neither should be able to just frontally charge in and slaughter the other. It should take time.
pike master
04-27-2007, 22:14
the thing is though is that spears and pikes have a lot of killing power in them to inflict damaging wounds just as quickly as swords if not more so. especially with additional ranks. and the fact that the pike unit usually attacks at a slow trot, as is described was used by the the swiss pikemen in their many battles.
this ability was finally featured in the game over the past games which tended to portray spears as having a weak attack which is obviously not true.
the only massive deadlocks in the game involving pikes should be against other pikes, pole arm units or units who use some sort of shield wall. which thanks to a couple of highly opinionated consultants was left out of the game. in example spear or axe, and sword or shield infantry which can form a shield wall and form a deadlock [temporarily against the superior pike].
pikes and spears were superior to one handed swords. this is common sense.the only use for one handed swords was for a secondary weapon, an heirloom or someone obsolete enough to actually believe he can duel it out with a pike force.
swords and shield are for the early and high eras only. spears and shield may have still played a small role in the late era until gunpowder pretty much left cheap wood and leather shields obsolete and no army could afford to equip the huge numbers of lower infantry with steel shields to make up for it.
Well yes it is more about the shield bug in the 1.1 patch which is the reason pikes are so strong, but i'm also voicing my opinion of other peoples misconception that pikemen should be improved even further than what the shield bug accomplishes.
That's not what I've gotten out of this thread at all. Primarily, the discussion is post 1.2 according to the thread title. Therefore no one is talking about the shield bug at all: it is gone in 1.2. So no one thinks pikes should be more powerful than they are w/ the shield bug. We think they should be more powerful than they are without the shield bug. They fail to create the barrier effect that a pike formation should create, and without the ability to hit high armor units very often (note most shield units get a +12 armor boost from having their 6-point shields help instead of hurt), they are reduced to utter garbage in 1.2. I'd personally be fine if they had some difficulty hitting heavily armored units, but were at least able to hold them out of the pike formation for the most part. I guess it's possible that it could work to make them able to kill heavily armored units instead, but I really am most in favor of them dragging the speed of combat down substantially by keeping other units from being effective, instead of pikes being upped to the kill rates of other units. The effect I'm looking for might honestly be achieved w/ their current stats if CA simply made them stick to their pikes and not let the enemy unit breach their formation/kill them as easily.
For absorbing missiles, clearly the higher defense values of the S&S units make them much better than spearmen in this regard: they simply are hit less often by the missiles as a result. The difference in defense between say an armored sergeant and a DFK is ~7 points, which if I recall discussion of the stat system correctly can be up to a 70% difference in how often they are hit by an attack. S&S units are almost certainly the best in this category because they have unrivaled defense values.
Just a small nit-pick but I believe that the defense stat is not used in defense against missiles, just armour and shield (from the front and right, as of 1.02)... Is that not correct?
Mind you foot knights tend to be the best armoured anyway so using them to absorb hits from non-AP missiles still works.
I believe defense skill only count in melee combat.
Sorry for not being clearer. To me, "defense" is always the sum total of all defense values: armor + skill + shield. I generally say skill if I mean defense skill. I don't know how else to refer to the general defense of the unit than to call it simply "defense," which is why I do so.
In this case, the S&S units actually have better armor than spears do, in addition to the better skill that you two have noted. For armor/skill/shield Armored Sergeants are 5/3/6 to the DFK's 7/8/6, so certainly the melee defense difference is far more than the missile defenses differ b/c the biggest DFK improvement is in the skill category, but DFK are still superior in both regards.
pike master
04-28-2007, 00:00
i thought the shield worked against missiles just not in melee in v1.1.
if you shoot straight into some shield bearing units with weapons it is not easy to bring them down. so i always try to get around at an angle to get around the shields.
Agent Smith
04-28-2007, 03:28
Alright, this may sound like a stupid question, but do pikemen actually get a penalty agaisnt infantry? I know that standard spearmen and, to a lesser extent, town militias get an inherent penalty because of the "spear" attribute they have. Is there such penalty for the pikes "spear" attribute?
Alright, this may sound like a stupid question, but do pikemen actually get a penalty agaisnt infantry? I know that standard spearmen and, to a lesser extent, town militias get an inherent penalty because of the "spear" attribute they have. Is there such penalty for the pikes "spear" attribute?
Well, pikes have the long_pike attribute that makes them "phalanx capable" according to the description. They also do have the "spear" attribute, which does mean they have a bonus versus cav and penalty versus infantry like other spear units have. It's really no wonder they're ineffective, all things considered.
i thought the shield worked against missiles just not in melee in v1.1.
if you shoot straight into some shield bearing units with weapons it is not easy to bring them down. so i always try to get around at an angle to get around the shields.
That's almost correct. The shield worked against missiles, but not only failed to work in melee, it actually showed a trend of working backwards. Obviously no one at CA will likely confirm exactly what it was doing, but it's for certain higher shields hurt the unit more in melee, and my assumption (and best guess) has always been that it worked exactly backwards, subtracting defense value instead of adding it in melee.
Wow 22 long posts since I last visited...
To keep things short and relevant I'm only going to discuss the most important issues.
shield infantry is dominant in two eras of the game
In the Early era, yes, but not the High era for many factions. Once you can get DEK's or their clones you'd rather use them over swordsmen in many situations - except beating pikemen. It's true that factions without good DEK-like units would still make S&S a staple unit, but the utility of the unit class itself becomes much more limited in High and Late. If pikemen were over-improved then S&S would be nearly useless in High/Late as you'd much rather have another unit in one of your 20 slots (assuming DEK-like units are available).
but when late era comes around those units are obsolete.Then why did CA bother to put Sword & Buckler Men in the game, if they will inevitably become obsolete?
sure to find a use in any army.
The thing is that, if pikemen were over-improved, they won't be useful enough, even in a general all-around role, to justify their cost in High/Late. You'd still much rather have some other unit.
For absorbing missiles, clearly the higher defense values of the S&S units make them much better than spearmen in this regard
As you already know now only armor and shielding matters in missile defense. Plus, it's an absolute waste for an expensive unit like a DFK to absorb missiles when a gold-armoured spear militia can do the job just as well. (7 armour vs. 7 or 8 armour). The point of absorbing missiles is to minimize the economic damage enemy archers inflict on your army. Cheap but well armoured junk units like spear milita do this better than DFK's.
For anvil units again the valued stat is raw defense,
Raw defense AND anti-charge mechanisms. Even with 22 defense S&S can take 50%+ casualties from a single cavalry charge. Armoured Sergeants won't. The best anvil is the one that can reliably withstand all types of melee attacks for a reasonable amount of time. Plus, AS have a larger unit size, which helps to compensate for their lower defense skill.
A great many of the losses during an assault are caused by the towers
By the time most polearms are available you'd have the siege artillery necessary to destroy towers, rendering this issue moot.
assaulting walls
Again, why assault defenders on walls when you can just blow apart the walls with artillery.
I'm sure they can be good for rushing through breaches or opened gates, though. Perhaps that's what you had in mind in the first place.
Yes. Exactly.
You neglected to mention their horrific slowness, inability to turn quickly, and awful missile defense.
1a. They can run if you turn off spearwall, and can quickly get back in standing spearwall with a quick "F+Backspace."
1b. Spearwall polearms are even slower. Why aren't they getting a whole thread devoted to them?
2. If you micromanage toggling running/spearwall, they can turn fairly quickly, although this is not easy. Point otherwise taken
3. All other shieldless units have the same problem
I do think it should take a long time for anything to happen though
Perfectly agreeable as long as the S&S unit will eventually get the bulk of their men in and start the butcher's work.
As I recall, the primary argument for SBM beating pikes is their ability to roll on the ground and basically outmaneuver the pikes with speed and agility.
...But of course CA can't model this into the game; they have to use stats to represent this ability. And if DFK's are given practically the same stats and equipment, CA most likely intended these guys to perform the same role. Also, M2TW doesn't accurately portray the weight of increased armor in the game; Armoured Swordsmen can run as fast as unarmored Sudanese Tribesmen and have the same animation to boot.
It's entirely possible and likely that CA is aware of the pike issues and has simply prioritized other more broken and important things ahead of it.
Changing the stats of DFK's, DCK's and their like (to differentiate it from SBM) should be quite easy - easy enough that CA could have squeezed it in 1.2 or even 1.1. The fact that they didn't, and that it isn't acknowledged as a bug anywhere at all by anyone most likely means that CA and the rest of the community is fine with it.
Cav as opportunists, who's primary roles is to tackle any undefended or unsupported units.
That would be my definition of "flanking action." Schiltroms cannot be "outflanked" and I wouldn't call charging them flanking them.
But in addition, cavalry can frontally charge any infantry units without the "spear" attribute, and after the charge they can withdraw and recharge.
to mention nothing of the light Cav, any Cav coming too close will find itself tied up by the light Cav and mugged shortly after by the spears
Two vs. One. What if another cavalry unit charged the flank of your now schiltrom-less spearmen? The plan falls apart.
Their are 3 basic ways of dealing with a schiltrom on the end of a line.
How about avoiding them until all the enemy cavalry have been occupied or dealt with, then running polearms/axes up to them and chopping them up.
every major offensive unit you have hits the other flank in an effort to collapse it
What if the enemy commander allocates his flanking forces accordingly, and reinforces this flank in order to prevent collapse? Neither commander will be able to outflank the other, and what results is frontal combat everywhere for the duration of the battle. If pikemen were over-improved to have superior frontal combat abilities against any melee unit, they'd dominate most battles, leading to an imbalance.
You might say that the AI won't be able to intelligently respond to such strategies, and you're right. But MP matters too, and battle AI can always be improved.
Neither should be able to just frontally charge in and slaughter the other. It should take time.
Yes, it should take time, but in the end, S&S should win - that's all I'm asking.
pike master
04-28-2007, 14:47
quoted from miracle
[1b. Spearwall polearms are even slower. Why aren't they getting a whole thread devoted to them?]
i started a thread on polearm units in both this forum and discussing its affect in mp games as it pertains to marching speeds being too slow. it seems most people dont seem to care too much about the issue but as for myself it would solve some of the discontent pertaining to pikes ineffectiveness.
if polearms were faster marching like the pikes then i would choose pole arm units over pikes despite their being more expensive. pole arms act in melee more like i would expect from pikes. namely that the deeper the formation the more effective they are. it seems a narrow deep collumn of spearwalled pole arms can actually drive a wedge into a pikemen line as well as handle wrapping of its by opposing infantry.
plus a major argument in my opinion is that if pikes were expected to only stop a cav charge and nothing else than it is odd that the entire formation has pikes. what use would the pikes do the rear ranks if they never got to use them.
more than likely in a battle as many ranks as possible that could be projected forward past the men in the front rank were. also pikemen were able to lower the pikes to prevent some one from rolling under. the tercios successful use of sword and buckler involved occupying the opposing pike block with a bad war against their own pikemen and then slip under the spearwall.
sword and buckler infantry if one notes have a smaller steel shield instead of a wooden/leather shield. this is what made the buckler still usable after the firearm came onto the field. albeit it didnt really contribute much. it was lighter and could still be used as it forebears and was still effective versus mechanically driven missiles.
you simply did not drive your infantry into these guys. even in the rennaisance era, the battle of recroi both sides used extensive use of pikes over any other infantry unit. they were simply better.
Has anyone checked out this thread over at twcenter?
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=88483
In it the thread starter claims to have found a way to improve the unit's utilisation of the pike over the sword.
I tried it, and maybe I'm using the pikes differently, but I found that the changes mentioned in that thread had no effect on weapon switching. True, they kill more with their pikes, but this is to be expected when you set the delay to 0 and have a much better compensation factor for pikes than for swords.
I also for the first time tried removing the secondary weapon for pikes, and found it to be a horrible way to bypass the problems with the pikemen. Flanking resistance aside, by switching both guard mode and phalanx formation off you can get such a ridiculously powerful charge with the pikemen that it's definitely better to leave the swords in.
hellenes
04-28-2007, 16:06
I still cant understand the whole: "Roll under the pike" thingy...It sounds kinda overblown...How on earth can you "roll" on the ground at the battlefield and not risk to be trampled to death? :dizzy2:
Well, you know there's a clear 8 feet of space between the pointy bit and the first pikeman's foot!
Someone here previously posted a link to a youtube clip from some spanish film (captain alatriste I think) which had that very thing in a battle scene (the whole tercio thing).
2 armies, pikemen going pokey pokey poke (with no one getting very hurt I recall), people with swords rolling under then doing all the maiming and killing.
Can't remmeber who it was though..
[Edit]
Found it - here's the post (note the warning if you don't want to know the end!)
FROM A VER EST
Just a curiosity, here you have a cut from the film "Capitan alatriste" of the battle of Rocroi. You can see a Tercio unit (with pikes, arquebusiers and sword man) fighting.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=je-c81wwrpA
If you don't want to see the film end do not watch the link
I am not sure if the scene is historically accurate, comments are welcome.
__________________
Agent Smith
04-28-2007, 16:58
Well, you know there's a clear 8 feet of space between the pointy bit and the first pikeman's foot!
Someone here previously posted a link to a youtube clip from some spanish film (captain alatriste I think) which had that very thing in a battle scene (the whole tercio thing).
2 armies, pikemen going pokey pokey poke (with no one getting very hurt I recall), people with swords rolling under then doing all the maiming and killing.
Can't remmeber who it was though..
[Edit]
Found it - here's the post (note the warning if you don't want to know the end!)
FROM A VER EST
Just a curiosity, here you have a cut from the film "Capitan alatriste" of the battle of Rocroi. You can see a Tercio unit (with pikes, arquebusiers and sword man) fighting.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=je-c81wwrpA
If you don't want to see the film end do not watch the link
I am not sure if the scene is historically accurate, comments are welcome.
__________________
I think that the scene should dispel the myth that you could just run up and hack the spear point off with a sword at your liesure. Those shafts were thick!
Double entendre (sp) aside, the tercio unit was INCREDIBLY slow, if I remember my history correctly. I think I heard that they probably only moved about three feet forward every minute or so, so that scene where the two units kind of lurched toward each other seemed realistic.
However, this rolling under the pike thing in that kind of battle is seemingly impossible for one main reason: where are the swordsmen standing when the pikes meet? If the swordsmen are mixed in with the pikes, the spearwall will not be as dense. The only other possibility is that they are crawling on their hands and knees in front of the pikemen while they all move forawrd simultaneously.
In medieval terms it seems even more unrealistic. A S&S unit does not have the benefit of pikemen right over top of them to keep the other pikes busy. Also, I'd like to see some of you put on heavy mail armor with a breast plate and roll around on the ground to see how fast you can get up!
Furious Mental
04-28-2007, 17:09
As far as I know the tercio was slow chiefly because it had to move slow enough for musketeers to reload, run forward, and fire as it moved. A plain old pike square would have been faster than that.
However, this rolling under the pike thing in that kind of battle is seemingly impossible for one main reason: where are the swordsmen standing when the pikes meet? If the swordsmen are mixed in with the pikes, the spearwall will not be as dense. The only other possibility is that they are crawling on their hands and knees in front of the pikemen while they all move forawrd simultaneously.
In a book of mine, depicting historical weapons etc, there is also a page showing pike tactics etc and mentions that two handed swordsmen and halberdiers used to work their way through the pikes in order to wreak havoc in the opposing pike formation. Humans are quite adaptable, I don't know where those guys were standing, but they could for example form the third row and once the engagement starts, they try to reach the other pikemen while the fourth row of pikes closes in to the second row after they are gone.
It's a bit hard to imagine anyone would try to get through there, but it's about as hard as imagining to stand in the front row of a napoleonic battleline and not run away IMO.:sweatdrop:
In medieval terms it seems even more unrealistic. A S&S unit does not have the benefit of pikemen right over top of them to keep the other pikes busy. Also, I'd like to see some of you put on heavy mail armor with a breast plate and roll around on the ground to see how fast you can get up!
Well, we're not all trained warriors with mucho muscle etc.
Agent Smith
04-28-2007, 17:27
I suppose my main problem is that I don't think any unit should be able to charge full speed into a pike formation. I understand pikes can only poke so far, and that if you can get in close you can reak havoc. But, perhaps part of the problem in the game is that infantry can charge full speed into a pike unit and get their charge bonus against a unit that has poor defense. Maybe if the mechanics were altered so that infantry wouldn't get a charge bonus against pikes it may make a little more sense to me. As it stands now, the game mechanics are just poorly done for pike units.
I think that the scene should dispel the myth that you could just run up and hack the spear point off with a sword at your liesure. Those shafts were thick!
A S&S unit does not have the benefit of pikemen right over top of them to keep the other pikes busy. Also, I'd like to see some of you put on heavy mail armor with a breast plate and roll around on the ground to see how fast you can get up!
Slightly off topic but I shoudl point out that that the view that plate armour made you slow and clumsy is a myth that has been disproven time and time again.
I've seen 3 or 4 programmes in last few years (I'm in Uk so BBC and history channel shows I think) that did weapon/armour recreations. Among them were plate armour and they had guys rolling, doing press ups leaping aona nd off horse and doing 100 yeard dashes in the armour. It was actually very flexible (it was usually built for the person too, for extra manouverability) and you coudl easily have done a forward roll or crawled on hands and knees.
P.s. Yes, sorry, that does mean Excalibur isn't historically accurate. Except the bit when Uther Pendragon has sex in 15th century full plate of course....
Agent Smith
04-28-2007, 17:34
Slightly off topic but I shoudl point out that that the view that plate armour made you slow and clumsy is a myth that has been disproven time and time again.
I've seen 3 or 4 programmes in last few years (I'm in Uk so BBC and history channel shows I think) that did weapon/armour recreations. Among them were plate armour and they had guys rolling, doing press ups leaping aona nd off horse and doing 100 yeard dashes in the armour. It was actually very flexible (it was usually built for the person too, for extra manouverability) and you coudl easily have done a forward roll or crawled on hands and knees.
P.s. Yes, sorry, that does mean Excalibur isn't historically accurate. Except the bit when Uther Pendragon has sex in 15th century full plate of course....
I don't doubt that armor was more flexible, etc. However, they did in fact weigh quite a bit, and fighting for extended periods is more of the issue than being able to don plate mail, run a 100 meter dash, then take a break. There are plenty of historical example of troops getting fatigued just MARCHING to the enemy depending on the circumstances.
pike master
04-28-2007, 23:19
i think you should experiment with it yourself before you make that claim. i for one if i have a 100 lb rucksack on my back its gonna be awfully difficult to do just about anything except march and maybe shuffle run short distances.
even at 60lbs getting on your back and getting up is very difficult but crawling may not be so hard to do. but in the movie the guys crawling around are not sword and bucklers they appear to be the arquebusiers seen at the first of the battle scene. as well as i notice some of the pikemen after impaling someone or out of some response dropped their pikes and decided to get in on the crawling battle where they seemed to be cutting the opponents achilles tendons or hamstrings.
but i would have to assume that CA does want them to work the way they are. even though it is historically incorrect.
Sadly I would have to agree. I've made several posts about the pike bugs in the 1.2 (unofficial) bugs thread (at TWC) and they have all been ignored by the staff there.
So I decided to send a PM to Caliban about the death-from-ten-feet away bug and the issue of pikes switching to swords. I've tried to make it as balanced as possible.
Hello.
I'm sorry to bother you but there are a couple issues regarding pikes that I feel should be fixed. I've made several posts about this in the 1.2 unofficial bugs thread but for some reason they are ignored. So I figured it was best to simply send a PM to you about this.
Currently there is a bug where when infantry charge pikes, several pike men are killed even though the infantry are ten feet away due to pikes blocking them.
Another issue is pikes switching to swords too quickly. This is because only two ranks of pike men lower their pikes, making it easy for enemy infantry to run in-between the spear wall and force the formation to switch to swords. The only way I could see this being fixed is if one or two additional ranks also lowered their pikes, making it harder for infantry to get past the spear wall.
Is this something CA is willing to look into, or are pikes intended to work as they do now?
Thank you for your time.
Hopefully some kind of answer will eventually be sent.
pike master
04-29-2007, 02:10
well, olmsted, who is a moderator on the .com made up the latest patch fix list for the devs. his biggest complaint as well as mine was the visual bug of not showing the pikes lowered before contact when in fact they are.
later after a more in-depth discussion with olmsted[ who i know has really little pull with the devs but was making the list] olmsted reluctantly agreed with me that they switched to swords to early and in the list both bugs are now mentioned right beside each other.
but to it a CA official to make any comment on the issue is impossible. i fear we will know our answer soon enough.
it just burns me up that all the other issues were addressed and comments made such as their intent on the new cav charge mechanics, admission to shield and two handed bug, but no mention on spearwall units period.
As you already know now only armor and shielding matters in missile defense. Plus, it's an absolute waste for an expensive unit like a DFK to absorb missiles when a gold-armoured spear militia can do the job just as well. (7 armour vs. 7 or 8 armour). The point of absorbing missiles is to minimize the economic damage enemy archers inflict on your army. Cheap but well armoured junk units like spear milita do this better than DFK's.
I think we're talking about different things. I mean "ability to absorb missile fire in the normal course of their duties" not "usefulness as a junk unit to stand around and get shot." It's pretty wasteful to recruit a unit simply to eat up enemy missile fire. It makes a lot more sense to just get the better unit that avoids missiles at least as well, and simply march it at the enemy line until melee is joined. They won't take too many missiles, and will fare very well in the melee that follows, generally. Every 2 spear units you recruit to die to enemy missiles deprives you of 1 S&S unit that could instead be simply winning the battle for you. So to my thinking DFKs are better in this regard, because they do something besides just die: they actually go attack and win, where you can be reasonably assured your spears will die quickly if they try to similarly fight it out in melee to end the missile battle.
I will also point out that you are comparing a unit with no upgrades required to one with 3 upgrades required. It costs you 4200 florins to get your junk spears up to the level you're talking about, and you'll certainly need more than one city with that upgrade to get enough spears. So at least 8400 florins invested just so the unit can be wasted all the time... that doesn't seem like smart spending to me at all. A few factions may have other reasons to upgrade their city blacksmiths that far, but others probably don't, so the desirability of doing this with spears is certainly questionable at best.
Raw defense AND anti-charge mechanisms. Even with 22 defense S&S can take 50%+ casualties from a single cavalry charge. Armoured Sergeants won't. The best anvil is the one that can reliably withstand all types of melee attacks for a reasonable amount of time. Plus, AS have a larger unit size, which helps to compensate for their lower defense skill.
Uh, no. Mainline troops that are typically anvils do not have to be anti-charge at all: only the flanks of the line need that ability, since that's typically where cavalry show up. Frontal cavalry charges by contempary cavalry (FKs) cause ~1/3 initial kills to DFK... and then the FKs can be assured of destruction by the surrounding mainline units. Not to mention it's difficult to get your cavalry to go through your own line and get organized enough to hit the enemy with a formed charge, especially before he can react. The simple fact is that most times your anvil units are not vulnerable to cavalry attack, and therefore do not need that ability at all. They do however end up in protracted melee all the time (since that is the point of being an anvil), where the 7 or more extra melee defense S&S units have will make a HUGE difference in their effectiveness over spears. Spears can die to 2-handers so quickly that they'd be nearly worthless as an anvil against them, and in the vast majority of situations are far inferior at holding off an enemy force, i.e. being an anvil.
By the time most polearms are available you'd have the siege artillery necessary to destroy towers, rendering this issue moot.
Yup, if you choose to go that way. It's not a good choice always though - see below. Also, does anyone know if towers can shoot you while you're on the ground in the area of a breach? It may be possible the polearms can get shot by the towers if the enemy plugs the hole decently, which would really hurt their value in that role. I don't know if it's possible for towers to do though: they'd have to fire backwards a tiny bit.
Again, why assault defenders on walls when you can just blow apart the walls with artillery.
Speed, of course. If your army has to move any considerable distance, it will take many more turns if it has artillery along. I sometimes go either way on the artillery issue, but some forum goers are definitely in the "never use artillery b/c it is so slow" camp, so the issue has bearing on at least some portion of players since not everyone uses artillery, and it is sometimes not practical to do so (like if you're going on crusade, or have expanded away from your primary production centers).
1a. They can run if you turn off spearwall, and can quickly get back in standing spearwall with a quick "F+Backspace."
Quickly enough to be set for cavalry if the cav take off at a run? I'm pretty sure you'd fail at least some of the time. It seems like a method that is just inviting cavalry to take a shot at the pike unit. Even if you can get them set in time every time, a smart opponent will feint the charge just to make the pikes stop, when they will be shot to pieces by archers. There's no way to make their speed into a non-issue if your opponent has any sense or tactical prowess.
3. All other shieldless units have the same problem
Duh. That doesn't mean you can write it off. The primary issue here is pikes vs. S&S units, so the huge difference in missile defense counts as a big drawback (and thus a big mitigating factor to their potentially increased performance) any way you slice it.
Changing the stats of DFK's, DCK's and their like (to differentiate it from SBM) should be quite easy - easy enough that CA could have squeezed it in 1.2 or even 1.1. The fact that they didn't, and that it isn't acknowledged as a bug anywhere at all by anyone most likely means that CA and the rest of the community is fine with it.
What do the stats of DFKs and DCKs have to do with the pike issues that we are talking about here? I'm talking about things like the pikemen switching to swords right away, failing to keep enemy units out of their ranks, and walking through enemy units with pikes raised, never attacking even though an attack was ordered. All this about SBM is tertiary at best, and frankly losing sight of the bulk of the real issue: that pikes suck horribly, and simply should not.
Hey guys, i wonder if any of you would be interested in testing out these files me and Palamedes have been working on for LTC 2.3:
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?p=1711543#post1711543
You can use them with the -io.file_first command, and you need to have 1.2 installed. Just interested to see what you think of the balance.
Gaius Terentius Varro
04-29-2007, 18:57
Anyone thought that they are swithing to swords directly BECAUSE the S&S infantry has rolled under the pikes and is eating them ( i'd like a graphic effect there tho) already?
hellenes
04-29-2007, 23:53
Anyone thought that they are swithing to swords directly BECAUSE the S&S infantry has rolled under the pikes and is eating them ( i'd like a graphic effect there tho) already?
S&S infantry was doing this TOGETHER with pikes of their own and apparently with not that great success...otherwise this trick wouldnt have been completely abandoned by the Renessaince...
Pike units arent as uber as some people assume they are slow volnuerable to missiles and weak at flanks...
If one has a little strategical thought one would NEVER charge the pike units recklessly head on...but would try to pin them using some shielded spearmen whith high defence and rip their flanks apart by S&S or cavalry...
Well Caliban sent me a reply and it looks like it's already been discussed. Palamedes is working on the problem.
I suggest downloading the file Lusted posted, it definitely improve pikes. There are still a few problems, but pikes work much better.
I'm really not worried about pikes anymore, it looks like it's being taken care of.
Agent Smith
04-30-2007, 01:17
If one has a little strategical thought one would NEVER charge the pike units recklessly head on...but would try to pin them using some shielded spearmen whith high defence and rip their flanks apart by S&S or cavalry...
Then why CAN units charge recklessly head on into pikes in M2:TW and come out drastically on top?
hellenes
04-30-2007, 01:53
Then why CAN units charge recklessly head on into pikes in M2:TW and come out drastically on top?
Maybe because of the classic "RTS" RSP system that assumes that there is no flanking manouverability or physics involved...
The RPS system was fine for the simplified green bar-resourcecollecting-basebuilding Dune2 clo(w)nes however when approaching the whole matter from a more logical and realistic matter the pikes should exist in the space (as in RTW) and thus work as a barrier...
pike master
04-30-2007, 03:25
what i think is funny is that when i played rome on multiplayer that when i played against a guy who used a phalanx box. there was always a way depending on his skill to defeat it. this was in rome with the uber hoplites and pikes.
in mtw2 they change to swords to quickly, lose formation easily, have no shield to stop missiles and are pretty much trash and still people find a way to complain about pike heavy armies. you have to be very,VERY creative to find ways to make pikes work in mp.
and if you have a system worked out than i figure you earned it. maybe people who like their favorite melee units can spend as much time as some of us pike fans have they would have us complaining about their units.
any system put together by units you think a lot of can be made to work successfully but you have to work and practice with it and learn how those units work at their best.
Hey guys, i wonder if any of you would be interested in testing out these files me and Palamedes have been working on for LTC 2.3:
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?p=1711543#post1711543
You can use them with the -io.file_first command, and you need to have 1.2 installed. Just interested to see what you think of the balance.
Well my first thought is... what good are knights now? You gave crap spear units so much defense that the knights can barely touch them even with a perfect charge - they lost 15 or less when I was charging spear militia w/ mailed knights. And that's with no armor upgrades at all on the spears. On the other hand, their attack boost ensures that the knights die in droves. Given that spears are the vast majority of what you'll encounter in the game for quite a while, what usefulness can knights now possibly have?
I also notice that spears, when upgraded fully, will actually have comparable stats to most heavily armored units like DFK (13+7 = 20, where many heavies have 19 in your file). This just seems wrong, and I can't see how it will possibly be balanced.
So my overall impression so far is that things went in the right direction, but went past balanced and landed at unbalanced in the opposite direction. I suspect this is more due to the huge shift in spearmen stats than anything else...
Note: I haven't played it to death yet so I'm sure there are more opinions & possibly refinements of these coming yet, but this is my impression after a play session.
if pikes were expected to only stop a cav charge
Not just a cavalry charge, but any melee cavalry attack in any style at the front, including walking wedges. For that, two ranks are not enough.
the tercios successful use of sword and buckler involved occupying the opposing pike block with a bad war against their own pikemen and then slip under the spearwall.
CA's description of SBM says they are "capable of breaking pike formations." Either they didn't know what you know or they simply didn't care. But compared to other things it's a trivial matter.
I think we're talking about different things
Yes, completely. This is the type of scenario I'm talking about: The enemy army has a good portion of foot archers. The one sacrificial armoured spear militia is moved towards them to gain their attention and absorb their missiles. Meanwhile your main attack forces run up behind and alongside this unit completely unharmed. Because your attack forces may be expensive but shieldless, it's much better to have the SM take the missiles instead of your attack forces. After your main forces engage in melee, the SM can still function in the rear as a reserve unit against cavalry.
Obviously this only works in SP; in MP some other strategy should be used.
It costs you 4200 florins to get your junk spears up to the level you're talking aboutThose 4200 florins aren't just for making SM arrow eaters. As we've discussed before smith buildings are incredibly useful for many units for a very long time. Even if you do intend to use DFK's to absorb missiles you'd end up getting those smith buildings anyway. Also note that castle smiths can upgrade city units and vice versa.
only the flanks of the line need that ability, since that's typically where cavalry show up.
You can't always assume that...even the AI tends to exploit any vulnerabilities.
Frontal cavalry charges by contempary cavalry (FKs) cause ~1/3 initial kills to DFK
A far better comparison would be CK vs. DFK or DCK. In that case the S&S will easily lose. Given how short a time FK's dominate the cavalry scene (which is debatable; MK's are just as good anyway), this is a far more relevant comparison.
especially before he can react.
And what do you think he'll react with? Ah that's right - spearmen.
Spears can die to 2-handers so quickly that they'd be nearly worthless as an anvil against them
S&S die even quicker to a good cavalry charge. Given the choice between a cavalry charge and polearms, I'd chose the polearms.
If your army has to move any considerable distance,
Typically this happens in large largely landlocked factions like Poland, Hungary, and Russia. In this case you'd want to use your superior cavalry to reach settlements and starve them out, instead of sieging at all.
For factions like Venice, ships can be used to transport siege artillery quickly to coastal settlements. For the majority of other factions, the campaign slowdown due to siege equipment isn't as significant as it seems.
a smart opponent will feint the charge just to make the pikes stop, when they will be shot to pieces by archers.
It takes a considerable amount of time to halt an uncommited charge, withdraw, reform, and attempt another formed charge feint. During that time the pikemen can quickly close the distance between it and the archers.
Furthermore the enemy puts their own cavalry at the risk of friendly fire, just to feint pikemen. That doesn't sound too smart.
The primary issue here is pikes vs. S&S units
No, the main issue is how pikemen perform in the combat environment. To discuss this pikemen and S&S need to be compared to every other unit type.
What do the stats of DFKs and DCKs have to do with the pike issues
I apologize if it seemed indirect, but they do have a connection. The stats of these units give a hint as to their function. Since these stats are very close to that of SBM, there is a strong possibility that these units ought to perform the same function of SBM. CA has described SBM as capable of breaking pike formations. So these units should probably break pike formations as well. If pikemen were over-improved, this would not happen, and CA would contradict itself.
I also want to correct a claim I made last time; Armoured Swordsmen are actually two levels slower than Sudanese Tribesmen.
But DFK's are still as fast as SBM, and for this discussion that's all that matters.
pike master
04-30-2007, 06:33
but CA is already contradicting itself.
again read the instruction manual and you will find several sections describing how tough the spearwall is supposed to be and that pikes can do schiltrom.
it seems like they had different people put all this stuff together and one had no idea what the other was going to do.
the wedge formation is accurately described in the instruction book but not described properly in the game. basically saying that the wedge is useful to move through enemy lines but not as an ability to engage with.this is a rather hideous issue in itself is that the units which can benefit from wedge the most i.e. border horse, alan mercenaries dont have it while heavy cavalry which usually launches its attacks head on and do not do as much nimble maneuvring do have it.
from the instruction book, to the unit descriptions, the stats, actual battlefield performance are pretty messed up on certian issues.
I suppose my main problem is that I don't think any unit should be able to charge full speed into a pike formation. I understand pikes can only poke so far, and that if you can get in close you can reak havoc. But, perhaps part of the problem in the game is that infantry can charge full speed into a pike unit and get their charge bonus against a unit that has poor defense. Maybe if the mechanics were altered so that infantry wouldn't get a charge bonus against pikes it may make a little more sense to me. As it stands now, the game mechanics are just poorly done for pike units.
charging into pike should cause losses for the charging unit, not the pike formation. much better chance of getting yourself impaled by running into a braced pike point than actually getting trough.
A far better comparison would be CK vs. DFK or DCK. In that case the S&S will easily lose. Given how short a time FK's dominate the cavalry scene (which is debatable; MK's are just as good anyway), this is a far more relevant comparison.
And CK are nearly TWICE the price of DFK/DCK, DFK vs. feudal is a FAIR comparison because since S&S ARE NOT an anti-Cav unit I would NOT expect them to hold vs. Cav that is nearly double their price.
S&S die even quicker to a good cavalry charge. Given the choice between a cavalry charge and polearms, I'd chose the polearms
WRONG, S&S don't die to a good Cav charge when they walk everywhere because you should have some spears behind the line ready to intercept Cav charges, the AI does exactly that to me in my ProblemFixer and if the AI was just half a second faster in moving it's spears forward I'd never be able to get a frontal charge into a formed battle line.
You can try the same with polearms, but I guarantee any sane opponent will shoot them to bits. if they walk, and Cav charge them off the board if they run, (you can't move the spears to protect because the spears move at the same speed as the Cav).
It takes a considerable amount of time to halt an uncommitted charge, withdraw, reform, and attempt another formed charge feint. During that time the pikemen can quickly close the distance between it and the archers.
Furthermore the enemy puts their own cavalry at the risk of friendly fire, just to feint pikemen. That doesn't sound too smart.
Well first they wouldn't keep shooting constantly, second, they could do EXACTLY the same with ANY infantry unit because Pikemen CANNOT use their pikes when out of spearwall so a simple spears charge into them will make them melee with swords. Lastly their is such a thing as multiple Cav units, you can keep more than one pike unit slowed up with just one Cav unit and cycling lots of Cav units in and out can really mess things up.
Missile fire can be let off in the gaps with relative ease. The other problem is I find that the time it takes for pikes to get into spearwall is about the same time it takes Cav to cover the distance your ordinary bowman can shoot. You won't EVER be able to switch out of spearwall whilst under missile fire because if you do you'll never get back into it in time to receive the charge. You will be forced to endure the missile fire regardless. Remember running units get spread out a Little.
I apologize if it seemed indirect, but they do have a connection. The stats of these units give a hint as to their function. Since these stats are very close to that of SBM, there is a strong possibility that these units ought to perform the same function of SBM. CA has described SBM as capable of breaking pike formations. So these units should probably break pike formations as well. If pikemen were over-improved, this would not happen, and CA would contradict itself.
The History that CA has provided with SBM says they used to be used for breaking pike formation. CA has said NOTHING on the matter. Lastly, it's not just S&S that are the issue, every infantry unit in the game (apart from a few of the weakest spears), can beat pikemen up. The only way you'll get Pikes to hold off non-S&S units is to make them fight in more ranks and in a more tightly packed formation so they keep these other units out frontally. However if you do that the S&S units won't get in either, they won't have enough defense and if you give them enough then even CK won't be able to hurt them with a formed charge. Your either stuck with pikes as invulnerable from the front,. or with pikes that are crap against everything, (since good spears can counter Cav far better).
Well my first thought is... what good are knights now? You gave crap spear units so much defense that the knights can barely touch them even with a perfect charge - they lost 15 or less when I was charging spear militia w/ mailed knights. And that's with no armor upgrades at all on the spears. On the other hand, their attack boost ensures that the knights die in droves. Given that spears are the vast majority of what you'll encounter in the game for quite a while, what usefulness can knights now possibly have?
Ah, spears might be very good against cav when charged from the front, but they are still incredibly vulnerable to flanking and rear charges. The cavalrys mobility allows them to out flank spear units and beat them like that. The changes makes the player think more about how they are using cav.
I also notice that spears, when upgraded fully, will actually have comparable stats to most heavily armored units like DFK (13+7 = 20, where many heavies have 19 in your file). This just seems wrong, and I can't see how it will possibly be balanced.
Spear units have a negative bonus against other melee infantry so any non-spear armed infantry will have an edge over them.
So my overall impression so far is that things went in the right direction, but went past balanced and landed at unbalanced in the opposite direction. I suspect this is more due to the huge shift in spearmen stats than anything else...
Spearmen have had +2 or +1 added to their attack stats, the main change is their increased mass(are you sure your playing with the latest version of the files i posted?)
Note: I haven't played it to death yet so I'm sure there are more opinions & possibly refinements of these coming yet, but this is my impression after a play session.
You do need to play it quite a bit to see the full extent of the rebalance.
Hi All ! I have'nt read through the whole thread, unfortunately but in essence, would some be so kind as to tell me if pikes work in 1.20 ? Thanks.
Bob the Insane
04-30-2007, 22:59
There is no perceptable diffierence in the 1.02 leaked patch...
Ah, spears might be very good against cav when charged from the front, but they are still incredibly vulnerable to flanking and rear charges. The cavalrys mobility allows them to out flank spear units and beat them like that. The changes makes the player think more about how they are using cav.
Yes, I figured that out as I was going. However, it's still a problem. Almost all the fighting in the game happens during sieges... where it becomes nigh impossible to attack units from the flanks most of the time. Even harder to actually charge from there, the city layouts almost never allow it. And when my mailed knights do not hit the charge, they die anyway even when attacking from the rear of the spears. Most battles are sieges, ergo knights become pointless units if they are immediately ground into meat by spears frontally, and that's not even considering their already lacking usefulness because they are incapable of manning siege gear, assaulting walls, or otherwise performing useful functions in a siege.
I also note how ludicrous it looks for an entire company of knights to crash into what is essentially a brick wall of spearmen, which gives not at all under the tremendous energy of a charge. I thought that pikemen were supposed to perform that function, in which case spears should not do it as well, as they are less teched up and obviously not brandishing 3 whole rows of nasty pike points.
So perhaps my issue is more with the mass than with the stats. With the shield fix the stats, combined with the anti-charge ability, proved to go an awful long way toward stopping cavalry charges, which makes me think mass manipulation should not be required at all for spears now that their shields are working and you've otherwise boosted their melee defense substantially as well. I'd like to try that - setting the spears back to normal-ish mass, and just playing with mass in general. Where's the setting at in the files? I don't believe I've seen it yet, at least not that I knew what it was.
Spearmen have had +2 or +1 added to their attack stats, the main change is their increased mass(are you sure your playing with the latest version of the files i posted?)
Well I assume so, since I have previously not used your mod at all. I grabbed the "Latest changes.zip" late-ish last night, and dropped the files into my mod directory, overwriting my typical ones.
You do need to play it quite a bit to see the full extent of the rebalance.
I did notice one other big thing so far. It seems like missile fire is somewhat better than in vanilla. I note though that missile attack values stayed about the same, or maybe were lowered a bit even in some cases, and missile defenses are often increased. Am I imagining it, or are there changes to the projectiles or missile accuracy that are causing improved results?
Also I just ran a test of upgraded spearmen against DFK, and it put down that concern at least. The DFK won handily, losing only 23% while inflicting 78% casualties on the spears. Seems to more than justify the cost difference. So I'm more and more convinced my main beef is w/ the mass of the spearmen being high.
I aim for the balance to be good for field battles, not sieges, as i tend to fight more field battles in my mod. Plus cav are never going to be very useful in narrow streets.
So perhaps my issue is more with the mass than with the stats. With the shield fix the stats, combined with the anti-charge ability, proved to go an awful long way toward stopping cavalry charges, which makes me think mass manipulation should not be required at all for spears now that their shields are working and you've otherwise boosted their melee defense substantially as well. I'd like to try that - setting the spears back to normal-ish mass, and just playing with mass in general. Where's the setting at in the files? I don't believe I've seen it yet, at least not that I knew what it was.
It's the collision mass number:
soldier Armored_Sergeants, 60, 0, 1.5
This is still much less than the 4 mass for pikemen.
There needs to be an early anti-cav unit that can stand up to cav charges, because pikes are late game, and having other heavy cav as a counter just doesn't work well for balance, as all cav armies would dominate.
I did notice one other big thing so far. It seems like missile fire is somewhat better than in vanilla. I note though that missile attack values stayed about the same, or maybe were lowered a bit even in some cases, and missile defenses are often increased. Am I imagining it, or are there changes to the projectiles or missile accuracy that are causing improved results?
Bingo, improved accuracy of arrows/crossbows, reduced accuracy of bullets to tone gunpwoder units down a notch.
Seems to more than justify the cost difference. So I'm more and more convinced my main beef is w/ the mass of the spearmen being high.
Basically im going for a MTW balance with cav v spears, where all spears can halt any cav unit frontally, though low levels ones will lose quiite a few men against high level cav. But spears remain very vulnerable to flanking, and can be almost wiped out in a single charge to the rear. This imitates the MTW balance, encourages flanking charges with cav whilst enemy spearmen are tied down by your infantry, and reduces cav spam as they can be countered better.
Now we just need to get the AI to flank with its cavalry. The AI always seems to charge its cavalry headlong into my ranks...
According to Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pikeman
"The pike was an extremely long weapon, carried by infantry and resembling a spear usually 10 to 14 feet (3 to 4 meters) long. It had a wooden shaft with an iron or steel spearhead affixed. The shaft near the head was often reinforced with metal strips called 'cheeks' or langets. When the troops of opposing armies both carried the pike, it often grew in a sort of "arms race," getting longer in both shaft and head length to give one side's pikemen an edge in the combat; the longest pikes could exceed 22 feet (6 meters) in length. The extreme length of such weapons required a strong wood such as well-seasoned ash for the pole, which was made narrower towards the tip of the weapon to prevent the pike sagging on the ends, although this was always a problem in pike handling.
"The great length of the pike allowed many spearheads to be presented to the enemy and greater reach, but also made it unwieldy in a confused close combat. This meant that pikemen had to be equipped with a shorter weapon such as a sword, mace, or dagger in order to defend themselves should the fighting degenerate into a melee. In general, however, pikemen attempted to avoid such disorganized combat, at which they were at a disadvantage. To compound their difficulties in such melee, the pikeman often did not have a shield or had only a small shield of limited use in close-quarters fighting."
(emphasis added by this poster)
Im gonna play with that variable we discussed at TWc, see if that affects the ai.
IMO it's much better to decrease the mass of mounts than to increase the mass of infantry.
I aim for the balance to be good for field battles, not sieges, as i tend to fight more field battles in my mod. Plus cav are never going to be very useful in narrow streets.
How do you do it? I never seem to fight many at all. The AI seems more than happy to just let me march up to lay siege to its settlements most of the time.
It's the collision mass number:
This is still much less than the 4 mass for pikemen.
Yeah, it turns out it wasn't the problem. You didn't mention that you also nerfed the lance and sword attack values and charge bonuses for cavalry. The mailed knights do nothing because they've suffered what amounts to a 9 point loss to their charge value, between spear defense buffs & losses to knight primary attack and charge bonuses.
There needs to be an early anti-cav unit that can stand up to cav charges, because pikes are late game, and having other heavy cav as a counter just doesn't work well for balance, as all cav armies would dominate.
So... it's fair for a spear unit that costs 290 to chew up knights costing 540 and up? Cuz the way it is w/ the 2.3 files, I'm sure you could lose at least 4 units of knights to a single crappy spear unit, which is way beyond wrong IMO. "Stand up" to cav charges does not equate to "completely erase with hardly a scratch" which is more what I'd describe the current situation as - and that's without any armor upgrades to the spears, which will simply make things that much worse. Even if it expended an entire spear unit to stop a charging cavalry unit and kill it, you'd still be making nearly double your investment every single time it happened, which seems more than fair. There are more than enough spear units around in the early part of the game to counter cavalry if they're even close to okay against them, so I fail to see how the argument that such drastic over-balancing is required can hold any water. It seems especially important to NOT let crappy spears turn into cavalry meat grinders precisely because of their insane proliferation in the early game.
I also question why you suggest it's necessary that spearmen be able to do this. Is there a unit in the game that completely slaughters all the sword and shield units without a scratch? Monetarily, those two unit types are largely equal, but you'd never know it from the harsh treatment you're giving to the cavalry.
Bingo, improved accuracy of arrows/crossbows, reduced accuracy of bullets to tone gunpwoder units down a notch.
That part, at least, works for me! Missiles did seem weak-ish in vanilla. :2thumbsup:
Basically im going for a MTW balance with cav v spears, where all spears can halt any cav unit frontally, though low levels ones will lose quiite a few men against high level cav. But spears remain very vulnerable to flanking, and can be almost wiped out in a single charge to the rear. This imitates the MTW balance, encourages flanking charges with cav whilst enemy spearmen are tied down by your infantry, and reduces cav spam as they can be countered better.
I guess I just don't like that take on things. It feels rather like trying to force a square peg into a round hole. The game has plenty of dynamics without forcing even crap spears to stomp all over every sort of cavalry. They could've used a modest boost to be sure, but the RPS dynamic you're trying to make spears vs. cav conform to is so heavy-handed in comparison to the others the game employs that it's a deal-breaker for me.
I also question why you suggest it's necessary that spearmen be able to do this. Is there a unit in the game that completely slaughters all the sword and shield units without a scratch? Monetarily, those two unit types are largely equal, but you'd never know it from the harsh treatment you're giving to the cavalry.
Okay, only from the front do spears chew up cav, from the flank or rear the spears get chewed up, and cav are still really effective against non-spear infantry.
I guess I just don't like that take on things. It feels rather like trying to force a square peg into a round hole. The game has plenty of dynamics without forcing even crap spears to stomp all over every sort of cavalry. They could've used a modest boost to be sure, but the RPS dynamic you're trying to make spears vs. cav conform to is so heavy-handed in comparison to the others the game employs that it's a deal-breaker for me.
It's only if you charge spears from the front that it works like that, use the cavs great assets - speed and ability to flank, as well as devestating rear charge, to beat early spears. No spear unit can withstand a proper rear charge.
pike master
05-01-2007, 12:54
even spear and shield infantry should not be worthless versus swordsmen in my opinion. the spear was an effective weapon in infantry combat.
also units like the papal guard and various dismounted noble units should be able to match swordsmen fairly well. there should not be a penalty against spears versus swordsmen. however this is a minou issue and i can live with it.
its the pike issue that im more cocerned with.
hellenes
05-01-2007, 18:19
even spear and shield infantry should not be worthless versus swordsmen in my opinion. the spear was an effective weapon in infantry combat.
also units like the papal guard and various dismounted noble units should be able to match swordsmen fairly well. there should not be a penalty against spears versus swordsmen. however this is a minou issue and i can live with it.
its the pike issue that im more cocerned with.
But you see the spear isnt giving any area effect to keep the enemy away from you...Only shieldwall/classical phalanx has a chance against swordsmen...
This is because the sword is more expensive and takes more skill to use than the spear...
also I cant understand how spearmen are supposed to stop a heavy cav charge of armored knights the pike makes sense due to its length and the butt end of it stuck in the ground but plain 2 meters spear logically would have a tough task to stop it...
Agent Smith
05-01-2007, 20:21
But you see the spear isnt giving any area effect to keep the enemy away from you...Only shieldwall/classical phalanx has a chance against swordsmen...
This is because the sword is more expensive and takes more skill to use than the spear...
also I cant understand how spearmen are supposed to stop a heavy cav charge of armored knights the pike makes sense due to its length and the butt end of it stuck in the ground but plain 2 meters spear logically would have a tough task to stop it...
True. Stopping a cavalry charge is much more about bracing when it comes to spears than the actual weapon by itself.
Bob the Insane
05-01-2007, 20:36
also I cant understand how spearmen are supposed to stop a heavy cav charge of armored knights the pike makes sense due to its length and the butt end of it stuck in the ground but plain 2 meters spear logically would have a tough task to stop it...
I think to be fair their is an eras thing at work here...
Certainly your Gothic Knight is not going to be bothered too much by charging a bunch of guys in chainmail welding spears and shields, at least not much more than the same men with swords and shields. However the early Feudal Knight in his chainmail and chainmail barding is certainly going to have a lot more problems charging onto those 2 meter spears with their bases set...
I think the assumption is that Town Militia have light spears and are not particularly effective against cavalry. Spear Militia (for instance) have heavier spears that are effective against cavalry but are less so against other infantry.
You know after some test runs it is not that fact that S&S beat pikes that bother me, it is that they do it so very fast... I mean the pikes are abandoned almost immediately on impact rather than waiting until the S&S have significately inflitrated the ranks of the pikemen. I would not really expect to see the pike men cutting a swath through everyone, but I would have thought they could have held the S&S men at bay a little longer even if they would eventually loose...
I guess one question I have is: Are pikes the late era successors to spears or another unit type altogether?
RickooClan
05-01-2007, 22:00
Not sure if CA have taken notes from this thread or related issue??
It will be great if we could have some official respond on this! :yes:
(The great discussion/debaten here shouldn't be wasted)
pike master
05-02-2007, 00:25
INDEED!:yes:
After conducting some rather extensive testing using the 3 different Scottish pike units vs DFKs I reckon I've found the best compromise! Until, that is, CA sort it themselves.
Removing their secondary weapon is an unfortunate must I'm afraid, and this is really more for the benefit of the AI than anything else. Although having said that, even I find pikes irritatingly unreliable in my own hands. We all know this can make pikes a bit uber, but there's a clever way round this without completely crippling their stats! What I did was reduce their main attack by 1 and also reduce their mass by 0.2. This reduction in mass gives them some much needed vulnerability particularly if attacked from directions other than from the front.
Try it out and see for yourself. It works quite nicely. :)
PutCashIn
05-02-2007, 22:46
Bring back Feudal Sergeants! They stopped cavalry and were available early.
RickooClan
05-03-2007, 01:12
Hi guys, sorry I haven't been around much today... been up at SEGA HQ with Alex. I will look into the Pike issue and see what I can find out.
Mark O'Connell
(aka SenseiTW)
Not sure if this is a good news or not....sounds like the pike issue was not addressed in patch 1.02. :juggle2:
pike master
05-03-2007, 04:54
mark does the intercedin for people on the .com.
he is trying to find out what the devs have done specifically to address the pikes and their intentions.
hopefully once he can get an answer or get them to answer the community it will put the issue to rest.
mark does the intercedin for people on the .com.
he is trying to find out what the devs have done specifically to address the pikes and their intentions.
hopefully once he can get an answer or get them to answer the community it will put the issue to rest.
Well that would certainly be a welcome development. Their intentions (and reluctance/inability to express them) have been the source of much debate and anxiety, I'm sure...
Bob the Insane
05-04-2007, 16:04
It will be interesting to hear...
Do we think this could be more of an issue with the Shield wall formation/special ability than the unit itself... I have been having issues with Halberd Militia in my HRE campaign. Enabling Shield wall does not appear to have an disernable effect (other than prevent the men from running) when facing either infantry or cavalry...
To continue my question from above, are Halberd militia a replacement for Town Militia or do they serve a difference purpose?
Am I intorducing the new troops too soon? Should I wait unit the enemy armies have a large proportion of AP (specifcally gun powder) missiles before introducing the use of pikes and halberds myself...
I staged a custom battle, 10000 point each side... Pike and muskets, plus a few S&S and knights on one side (Spainish) against a spear and knight, both mounted and foot and a few crossbows (French) on the other side.
It was an open field battle (grassy plain) and a victory for the Spainish (played by me). I would have to say the units that played the biggest role in this were the gunpowder ones. The morale hit from the gunpowder volleys breaks up the enemies attacks making it pretty simple to take on individual units rather than a whole army. My knights and gunpowder units did the most work with the pikes forming a line to base the action around.
I will have to try it the other way around to see how that goes...
I don't just think it's the spearwall that's the problem, since removing the secondary sword weapon of the pikemen units make them function very well. The problem with vanilla pikemen is they change to their swords too quickly rendering them fairly useless.
I too have issues with western halberd units. Not only do they move excruciatingly slowly, they also function poorly much like the vanilla pikemen. However, if you replace their primary weapon (long_pike) with their secondary weapon, and remove the phalanx (spearwall) ability they function much better overall, much like the ME Halberd Militia and Janissary HI.
Carl do you plan on releasing a fixer for 1.20 with rebalanced stats ? 1.13 was perfect and actually I still have'nt uninstalled it.
@Sinan: Yep, I've only just come online and noticed the patch is out though, it's at 44% downloading. I'll need 24-48 hours depending on how my Rebuild-ProblemFixer compatibility testing goes. Thats pretty much ready to go and i need to check it's fine under officio 1.2, then i'm gonna get onto V1.14 of PromlemFixer-Pure, thats ready for compatibility testing too, but I need to make a few checks on that with regards to the new 2-hander animations.
Great news !
By the way could you please see if chasing routers is ok in 1.20, then don't change it. Just a suggestion as that was the only aspect where I felt 1.13 could have been better.
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