Tips dealing with pike phalanxes?

Boy, those phalanxes are tough - even the levy ones. I'd like some tips on dealing with them. It isn't that I'm losing or anything - I dominate any game I play. But I certainly find either going against them, or using them myself, difficult.

An example of going against them, I'm currently playing a Koinon Hellenon campaign. Since it's very early in the campaign with Macedonia all over me like white on rice, I figured the only way to survive was to group all my generals into a single stack and abuse the crap out of them, since they are good units (I'm guessing?), and also regenerate. At any rate, I find that a pike phalanx isolated and completely surrounded by Spartan hoplites will not only continue to fight, it will continue to last a long time, and even take down the numbers of Spartans. I have to severely micromange this combat also, i.e. run the Spartans away who are getting hit by pikes, then when the phalanx turns around to get the ones in the back, charge his back with the ones I just pulled away, and do that over and over again for like forever (this while Spartans are hitting from the sides too). Spartan hoplites are good units... right?

So am I doing this right? Should I be using their secondary weapons (if they have any)? Any tips?

As an example of trying to use pikes myself, in a different campaign (Carthage, Pontos, whoever) I will have a battle line of pikemen standing there, and I find that the enemy simply will not engage them (except with pikemen of their own). They simply go around the pikemen and attack my other units. Even if my other units are elephants, they will attack those other units instead of the pikemen. They just leave pikemen to stand there, and the pikemen never get used. And it isn't as if pikemen can force an engagement by running down enemy units.

How do you force the enemy to engage pikes?

Thanks.

The Battle AI is generally programmed to avoid phalanx capable units unless they have their own phalanx units. So if you are facing euro-barbs, best bet is to take a long phalanx line and a bunch of missiles with strong flank protection. They will advance and scatter towards your flanks while you pick them off with missiles.

Fighting phalanxes is easy as well. Hoplites are pretty bad at it because they are meant as defensive units rather than offensive ones. But even poor AP or high lethality units like Anatolian Hillmen and the like can eat into the side of a levy phalanx with minimal casualties. Of course hammer and anvil with cavalry works best though.

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The Battle AI is generally programmed to avoid phalanx capable units unless they have their own phalanx units.

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Yup, found that out the hard way. Glad it's not just me.

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So if you are facing euro-barbs, best bet is to take a long phalanx line and a bunch of missiles with strong flank protection. They will advance and scatter towards your flanks while you pick them off with missiles.

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Actually, fighting Romans. I've never been able to pick off Roman soldiers with missles. What I have done quite a bit is have a bunch of elephants on the flank (not because I thought this was the best thing out there to put on the flanks, I just happened to have built a bunch of elephants earlier on in this Ccampaign, so I have to use them), and when they advance on that flank, charge them with the elephants. But they will never engage the pikes, and the pikes have had 0 kills throughout my taking all of the boot of Italy. It's like I never even built these expensive pikes, LOL. I guess instead of the elephants guarding the flank of the pikes, the pikes are guarding the flank of the elephants, because the AI simply will not attack the pikes. In fact, I wonder if that's a good use for pikes - guarding flanks. Of course, perhaps not in the real world, but in the game world?

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Fighting phalanxes is easy as well. Hoplites are pretty bad at it because they are meant as defensive units rather than offensive ones. But even poor AP or high lethality units like Anatolian Hillmen and the like can eat into the side of a levy phalanx with minimal casualties. Of course hammer and anvil with cavalry works best though.

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Thanks for the advice. I guess the problem is, with the Koinon Hellenon campaign I pretty much only have access to hoplites, at least at this juncture (that may change later on). And no cavalry nor pikes to do a "hammer and anvil."

You are certainly right though - either hoplites suck at attacking pikes (even the Spartan ones), or the things are nearly impervious.

Horse-Archers, nuff said :P

in general when having pikes its just forward forward forward! and catch them before they split formation and then use cavalry simplesimplesimple

if you have hoplites, use 1 hoplite as an "anvil" put it in guard formation and they will take very few casualties and use slingers from behind to drop morale and numbers, optional: use hippakontistai for the same task as the slingers and ofcourse cutting down routers

Spartans are pretty decent for pinning units, because they have great stamina and staying power. They won't beat a Makedonian-style phalanx from the front, but they'll hold out for a while. Also, Peltasts. Use them for shooting phalanxes from behind whenever possible (phalanxes are priority target #2 for Peltasts, Number one being Elephants). They'll probably cause less casualties by friendly fire than slingers, and be more effective than archers. You can also use Akontistai for this, especially seeing as they can lob even more javelins, but they may rout upon (accidental) melee "contact" with enemy units, so you'd have to be extra careful with them. Peltasts are also good flankers unless you've got something better.
If you like using mercenaries, Botroas are excellent flankers against light and medium phalanxes. Or if you have too much money, Tindanotae. Also Galathraikes and really just about any kind of Thrakians, should you get your hands on them. Thraikian Peltasts carry missiles and AP swords and are useful for attacking elite phalanxes from behind.

I found phalanxes to be too tough in EB - so I went into the EDU file and reduced the shield value of all phalanx units by 2 points (usually taking the value down from 5 to 3). This made them easier to kill, and no longer completely invulnerable to missiles from the front.

This seems more accurate to me since phalangites have a much smaller shield than hoplites, so shouldn't get as much benefit from it.

I believe Phalanx-dominated armies are more a pain in the butt to fight than other armies, and somehow the engine seems to interpret phalanx units always to my disadvantage. Having them myself they get molested and cavalry just walks right through them. If I don't have them myself, they molest my troops and my cavalry dies in droves if they stay for more than the charge in the back.

In my Roman campaign it's the first time I had to fight strategically and tactically to gain an advance and counter the phalanx-full stacks the Seleucids throw at me. It's too early for you to have access to horse arches but taking Kallatis has been the best move I have made for my campaigning in the east as it gave me access to angry Scythians with bows and horses. Together with some Leuce Epos I use them to basically "seek and destroy", to hunt small units of phalanxes down before they join other troops and kill generals whenever they are dumb enough to wander around with only two or three units. I also use them to randomly lay siege to cities to engage relieve-forces or to sack them and cripple their war economy.

In battle, relying mostly on a somewhat "historical" army composition, it's actually challenging to engage a whole army of pikes without risking too many casualties, especially when my own troops are green as Irish plains and they have atleast several silver chevron untis. In sieges I try to single out units, pepper them with spears from behind, encircle them, charge them, make them rout and chop them to pieces before the next units arrives. In open battle it's harder, especially when he's brought some other decent troops. I usually sacrifice my Hastati to pin them down and take a beating while my other units hopefully can make a turn around and engage them from the flanks or allow my cavalry to maneuver into their rear and finish them off there.

I also use defensive chokepoints when I march my armies around to avoid landing in the middle of a forest where I can't see anything, or to defend at the bottom of a hill. Recently I had to engage a veteran pike army near a bridge. I hired a merceneary phalanx as sacrificial lamb and to pin them down long enough to allow my skirmishers and Cretan archers to cross the river and launch missile mayhem in the back of the army. Protected by some Pedites and my cavalry they made some decent killing but I still had to engage them hand to hand. Medium Phalanxes with loads of chevrons are not going to break without horses trampling them into the ground - bridges being bridges that was hard to do - so I still had a lot of hand-to-hand combat where I was actually driven back, positive thing being that I finally could charge in and finish them off.

It is an interesting learning curve though - never having played as Roman so far into the campaign before it is interesting to test out units and tactis that use mostly Roman units and work against the Phalanxes of the Arche.

Hmmm... on my Pontos campaign, I just whipped several selucid levy phalanx with nothing but hellenic native spearmen. The pikes didn't act like supermen at all. Sure they were tough but once they were surrounded on all sides they were beaten in short order.

Something else is going on in my Koinon Hellenon campaign. I didn't think about it before, but it must be the command stars of those Makadonian generals. I mean, they'll have 10 stars no problem. That must be it.

@Titus Marcellus Scato, I had you on my ignore list, and I believe you had me on yours. So I never saw any of your posts. Now, all of a sudden I'm seeing your posts again, and apparently you are seeing mine. Is this list not working or something?

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Originally Posted by Nightmare

Hmmm... on my Pontos campaign, I just whipped several selucid levy phalanx with nothing but hellenic native spearmen. The pikes didn't act like supermen at all. Sure they were tough but once they were surrounded on all sides they were beaten in short order.

Something else is going on in my Koinon Hellenon campaign. I didn't think about it before, but it must be the command stars of those Makadonian generals. I mean, they'll have 10 stars no problem. That must be it.

@Titus Marcellus Scato, I had you on my ignore list, and I believe you had me on yours. So I never saw any of your posts. Now, all of a sudden I'm seeing your posts again, and apparently you are seeing mine. Is this list not working or something?

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Why would you have anyone on your ignore list? Unless they are hardcore porn spammers, I can't really see a reason. If only to avoid looking like an idiot when you repeat something that has just been said because you can't see it.

As athanaric already pointed out, Hoplites are crappy at killing anything, but they are pure gold when defending. For the KH this means you have to pin the Phalanx with your hoplitai(be it Haploi or or Spartans) and then kick them in the behind with ANYTHING but Hoplitai, in the Early campaign this means Peltastai, Akontistai, slingers, Toxotai, Hippakontistai, Ekdromoi(just if you don't have anything else). If you already have money mercenaries with big choppaz are better or cavalry off cource.

The advantage of Hoplitai over Phalangitai in EB is rather ahistorical: they are more flexible. - with Hoplitai it is easy to outmaneuver the more sluggish Phalangitai. They can isolate them, pin them down and give other units the opportunity to kill them from behind. I remember two units of Hoplitai, one FM, a unit of Eastern axemen, Hippakontistai and Ekdromoi defeating a Fullstack of mixed Seleucid Phalangites. Simply by Distracting, Isolating, Pinning and annihilating. The KH lack factional anihilation troops(apart from a handfull of lancers) tho but their Economy allows for mercenaries and Regional troops are always an option ;) For pinning Phalangitai are best but Hoplitai can change positions more often, allowing more elaborate isolation maneuvers.
Don't get me wrong that's not how it was in history, one reason the Phalangitai won :D and Hoplitai were reformed, btw Reformed hoplitai in EB are somewhat sucky you can train a few of them but don't rely too much on them ;)

As a general Note: when the 10 star general still lives, you need Evil fear monsters flaming arrows and a generally bad shape of units(of your opponent) to rout a hostile unit at a usefull point(3 guys running away is not that much of an achievement ) so don't engage your Ranged troops in attemt to rout the enemy via superior numbers before you killed that chap.

Yup, I definitely figured out the hard way it must be the 10 star enemy generals. I just beat even more selucid levy and medium pike phalanxes with pontus using native hellenic spearmen, axemen, etc. Don't get me wrong - the pike phalanxes are very excellent infantry, as they should be. They just don't appear to be unkillable supermen now, when facing superior numbers and tactics.

Seriously, I would surround a levy phalanx ON ALL SIDES with spartan hoplite generals, and charge the back of the enemy over and over again for half and hour and they'd still be there killing my units. It was extremely tedious. The whole time I was saying to myself "Holy crap! Those pikes are THAT tough?" Either that, or I figured Spartan hoplites sucked, but I couldn't imagine why that would be the case. I kept trying to think what I was supposed to be doing different than surrounding them on all sides and hitting them in the flanks over and over again.

As to the 10 star enemy macadonian generals... they are unkillable, unfortunately (LOL). They can charge into spartan hoplites and stay there for 30 minutes hacking away. Then run away with one dude remaining.

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Originally Posted by Nightmare

As to the 10 star enemy macadonian generals... they are unkillable, unfortunately (LOL). They can charge into spartan hoplites and stay there for 30 minutes hacking away. Then run away with one dude remaining.

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You should get yourself some axemen or falxmen (mercenary Bastarnae should be available in your provinces) to back up your spearmen when dealing with these guys.
Also, a unit of Hippakontistai in reserve to hack down the general in case he runs away. Tier 3 or 4 barracks should provide you with heavy lancers, which are quite decent.

As I said, Spartans are great warriors(tho terribly overpriced and bad AoR) but they suck at flanking, they can pack a mentionable punch in a frontal charge but that's rather secondary. As a rule of thumb - Spartans ought to be in the minority, they can hold against superior numbers but as soon as they have the numeric upper hand you are throwing your mnai away ;) - or in this case they are no good at surrounding the enemy. Just use ANYTHING else than Hoplitai(exeptions being Massilians, Hypaspists, Ekdromoi and red sea hoplites, maybe Saka heavies aswell but I'm not sure about that) get your Akontistai killed if you want but not the line masters^^

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which are quite decent.

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which are real nice, especially If you are the KH ^^ and can't train hetairoi.

About the AI not engaging phalangites from the front: Try having a frontline consisting only of phalanx troops, and keep your flank troops behind them. This way, the AI seems to be more likely to engage your phalanx; at least from my experience.

That's a great tip, thanks. Can the flank units actually be on the flank, but a little way behind the phalanx, or do they actually have to be behind the phalanx and then stream out from behind after the phalanx engages?

With the latter, it would take longer to deploy flanking units, I think.

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Originally Posted by Paltmull

About the AI not engaging phalangites from the front: Try having a frontline consisting only of phalanx troops, and keep your flank troops behind them. This way, the AI seems to be more likely to engage your phalanx; at least from my experience.

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I also suggest not to use phalanx formation until the last minute. Usually the enemy will try to engage my pikemen from front if they don't use phalanx.

Tis called flanking .

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Originally Posted by Titus Marcellus Scato

That's a great tip, thanks. Can the flank units actually be on the flank, but a little way behind the phalanx, or do they actually have to be behind the phalanx and then stream out from behind after the phalanx engages?

With the latter, it would take longer to deploy flanking units, I think.

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I find that a partial overlap works. For example, three phalanx units (P) in the front line with two thureophoroi units (T) set back and partially overlapped - the underscores represent open space, they seem to be necessary to stop the forum software from compacting spaces:

__PPPPPP_PPPPPP_PPPPPP__

TTTT________________TTTT

I've also exaggerated the gap between the phalanx units to make it more obvious. The tactical AI (at least in ALEX.EXE) will respond by trying frontal attacks on the phalanx with most of its units, while sending one or two units (often cavalry) out to set up for a charge against each flank. By this time its attackers on the front of the phalanx will be fully engaged, so now you can either move up the thureophoroi to close the gap and stop attackers working their way around the phalanx, or pivot them outwards to face the flank attack. Below I've shown the left-flank thureophoroi pivoting, while the right-flank thureophoroi have moved up to close the gap with the phalanx:

__PPPPPP_PPPPPP_PPPPPP__
_T____________________TTTT
_T
_T
_T

At this point I'd probably be thinking about counter-charging whoever's on my left flank before they can get a damaging charge in themselves, and sending my own flankers (often axemen) around the right flank, where the enemy is now fully engaged and my thureophoroi have moved up to a good blocking position.

Brilliant description, Friendlyfire, thanks very much! I'll try that out.

Or just use haploi as a main line and gaesate on the flank.

Get yourself some Belgians, they will break any formation with ease.... on a more helpful note remember the Battle of Pydna. Greece has some really jagged terrain which is great for breaking phalanx formations up into small, easily flankable groups. Tempt them to follow you with some skirmishers and light cavalry and then swoop on their flanks one their front splits.

really? Belgians? you mean the spearmen or the swords?

I think he means milnat, the sword wielding Naked fanatics with trousers

That's them! Scourge of the Sweboz I call them.

hey brennus i saw your private msg, did you need some advice on an AS campaign?

I just wanted to exchange pictures of our empires.

i own all the victory condition provinces plus all of the stepple provinces in the north, sarmatians are wiped out. i also own all of greece macedon eprus and dacia. and i aslo own all of the black sea. i havent gone into south arabia yet
oh and i also own sicily and most of italy

oh also ethipia and axum