How do pikes/sarrissa/spears work?

[HFox]

(Apologies if this has been aready asked/accounted for in the game engine.)

This question is brought on by:
1. A recent tranche of reading goldwothy, holland etc
2. Not having played for an age and forgetting how this worked
3. Thinking about how the mechanics of these weapons working against shorter hand weapons? Why was it so successful for a while.

So the question/idea is, do pike/sarrissa/spear 'walls' work by reducing the effectiveness of the opponents weapon rather than being inherently leathal themselves? The thinking being whilst not a relatively effective weapon one on one, in a massed rank they make the opponents life difficult in just getting close to use their weapon. That is they reduce the effectiveness of the opponents weapon relative to themselves. This would only really apply whilst the longer weapons were ordered and not disordered.

Also, do pikes/spears get the charge bonus of the cavalry attacking from the front? That is if the cavalry unit receveid a +20 charge bonus, the defending ordered spear/lance unit would get the same equivalent bonus.
And to the same extent does a charging infantry's charge bonus get added to the defending spear/pike/sarrissa.

The thinking being the energy of the aggressors movement would work in both directions, good old newton!.

[Ludens]

Since so-far there have been no replies, I'll have a stab at it, but keep in mind that I am neither a historian nor a reenactor.

The mechanics of hoplite-combat are actually up for debate. In "Greek Warfare: Myths and Realities" (which I have cited often, lately) Van Wees argues that hoplite formations were initially fluid and open, and only later turning into dense blocks. In other words: unlike pikes the hoplite spear is a viable weapon outside of formation-combat. A spearhead is certainly "inherently lethal": a short-sword with a far greater reach, if not quite as manoeuvrable. Yes, it can be batted aside, but if the spearman is any good that will be a lot more difficult than you think.

You are probably right about pikes, though.

As for the game mechanics: I recall reading that charging cavalry will have their charge values deflected upon themselves when frontally hitting spears/pikes. I can't find the post right now, though, but I am pretty sure it was for R:TW. There is no similar effect for infantry; nor am I sure there should be. Newton may be right, but it's a bit much to expect humans to impale themselves. (Horses probably won't either, but the game does a very poor job of simulating cavalry charges anyway.)

There is a further attack/defence penalty for "spear"-attribute units, but the effects are disputed and I don't know if these still apply to M2:TW.

[bobbin]

(Apologies if this has been aready asked/accounted for in the game engine.)

This question is brought on by:
1. A recent tranche of reading goldwothy, holland etc
2. Not having played for an age and forgetting how this worked
3. Thinking about how the mechanics of these weapons working against shorter hand weapons? Why was it so successful for a while.

So the question/idea is, do pike/sarrissa/spear 'walls' work by reducing the effectiveness of the opponents weapon rather than being inherently leathal themselves? The thinking being whilst not a relatively effective weapon one on one, in a massed rank they make the opponents life difficult in just getting close to use their weapon. That is they reduce the effectiveness of the opponents weapon relative to themselves. This would only really apply whilst the longer weapons were ordered and not disordered.

I believe this would be somewhat true for the longer spears of the macedonian phalanx, which were basically useless outside of formation, but they were leathal in their own right, mainly through sheer number of spear points they could level at a enemy soldier. Remember too that the formation wasn't a static one, they would press the attack, imagine trying to a couple of dozen spear points in short succession.

The Hoplite phalanx on the other hand was more up close, the enemy would almost certainly reach within striking distance, so the lethality of the spear was of more importance.

Also, do pikes/spears get the charge bonus of the cavalry attacking from the front? That is if the cavalry unit receveid a +20 charge bonus, the defending ordered spear/lance unit would get the same equivalent bonus.
And to the same extent does a charging infantry's charge bonus get added to the defending spear/pike/sarrissa.

The thinking being the energy of the aggressors movement would work in both directions, good old newton!.

Cannot answer that I'm afraid.

[CashMunny]

I don't know the precise answers to your questions, but I can tell you that spears most definitely SHOULD gain some bonus from the momentum the horses generate at a full charge.

That's precisely why spears are so deadly to a horseman, aside from their ability to pull a rider down from a slight distance. And although even proper warhorses would balk at the prospect of charging a line of bristling spear-points, they were specifically trained to charge a mass of men, and so you could sometime encounter tricks on the battlefield where spears would be concealed until the horsemen were irreversibly hurtling towards the ranks, at which point the men would take the spears up and form a row of bristling pikes/spears that could be devastating. It would serve to kill the horses, and the riders (if not crushed by their own horses) could then be quickly dispatched. I believe the Mel Gibson movie Braveheart actually has a scene where this exact scenario occurs. While that movie certainly won't be winning any awards for it's great loyalty to history, this particular tactic has indeed been used in warfare to great effect.

Stakes have also been used in warfare, and you will probably see this ability in EBII as it is included in M2TW, though I believe only for certain archer. They would be used to ward off cavalry charges, or as very hastily constructed fortifications. When a palisade would be too time consuming or impractical, a stake perimeter could be set up around a camp or other area, both to impale horses and to slow any infantry moving through them. And in the crush of pitched battle, infantrymen could even sometimes be impaled on these stakes, by accident usually.

The sarissa phalanx was so successful primarily because of their incredibly long reach, (more than two and three times the length of a man!) their highly cohesiveness in battle due to regular drill, and the ability to have three to five ranks able to fight the first rank of the enemy at once. Not only was it very difficult for enemies to get within reach of the pikemen, but it was also nearly impossible to survive for more than few moments with multiple people stabbing at you at once. You might dodge the first few thrusts, or block a few, but you're not going to be able to do much against five people at once, especially when you can't even reach them. The sarissa phalanx was like the hoplite phalanx in that it worked in concert, and pushed enemies backward, but unlike close-quarters hoplite push-warfare, the pikes also kept the enemies away from the men, and multiple ranks had the ability to fight from behind the front rank.

Hence why the sarissa dominated warfare for centuries after it's invention. Even the legions of Rome had a difficult time defeating them, and only with auxiliary support, and a much weaker array of successor states than they would have faced 200 years before. Had the Greeks been able to afford proper cavalry wings, and equipment more on par with that of the Romans, the outcome may have been different. The power of a tightly packed pike formation is evidenced by the fact that more than a thousand years later, the tercio formation dominated 16th century warfare. Not until repeating firearms and the disappearance of shock cavalry did the pike become irrelevant to warfare.

[QuintusSertorius]

If this was such a successful and well-practised system, why did the Successors struggle against the Gallic invasions? Was Ptolemy Keraunos just that incompetent, or was there something special about the invaders?

[Parallel Pain]

@CashMunny

The sarrisa certainly successful, but I do not believe it was as successful as you described.
For one thing the ability of the sarrisa to "push" seems to be more limited for whatever reason. The combat stances perhaps (with both arms already holding the pike less force could be put on the guy in front of you with your shield, besides it'd unbalance him). Instead the formation relys on long range fencing (often while advancing, but not push-charging).
And the other side wouldn't be facing 5 spear points at the same time. Yes the guy would need to get through 5 spear points, but only about 2 of the 5 can actually stab at him. When he's outside the formation, he doesn't have to worry about the last few spearpoints, and when he's almost through, he doesn't have to worry about the first few. Of course the frontage covered by say two Roman legionaries would be taken by about three phalangists, but still. And at 16~20 feet how do you even stab something properly, you can't.
Which would mean the formation would be bloody difficult to break from the front, but far from impossible. And even the slightest disruption would tip the favour to the other side.

Also you forgot that in the pike-and-shot formation, there were very often men equipped with other melee weapons. And that the ratio of pike to shot kept decreasing and decreasing until the pike became irrelevant. And no this was not because of repeating firearm, which wouldn't become more useful than muzzle-loaders until the American Civil War (at least if we talk about mass-issued instead of isolated units) nor the disappearance of shock cavalry (come on Lancers, Cuirassier). I feel the need to differenciate between heavy-armored cavalry and shock cavalry here. The former is cavalry with heavy armor for protection. The latter is any cavalry that charge head-on to break the enemy formation. The former is almost always the latter, but the latter is often not the former. There were lots of very effective shock cavalry and cavalry charges in the Napoleonic Wars, and shock cavalry were still very effective as late as the Crimean War. Both are long after the pike became obsolete. What made the pike obsolete was the introduction of the bayonet. This proved that a dense formation with its men equiped with pointy sticks can beat back a cavalry charge. It didn't matter if the stick in question was 7 feet or 20 feet.
And it also meant that by the time the pike became obsolete circa 1700, the pike's potential as a melee weapon was not enough to balance the fighting power of the musket-bayonet combination. Considering the amount of logistics required by the musket for ammunition, and that only one in a couple hundred shots caused a casualty, the pike mustn't have been particularly leathal either (unless you were Charles XII).

So I would say the sarissa took center-stage among the Diadochi Wars, but it didn't "dominate" in the sense that it wasn't the battle-decider. Instead the battle-decider was anything (else) that could break the sarissa formation. If it was so overpowering, everyone would've adopted it (like the pike-shot was if I may point out). But that wasn't the case. So while the Macedonian phalanx probably had more holding power than any other formation of the time, something was simply "missing" from the phalanx that others had.

[Ichon]

Above post is good an explanation and reasoning as I've read on these forums about this subject- nice job.

Its rare any tactic or weapon is so decisive or if it is remains that way more than a few engagements.

[B-Wing]

This thread is easily one of the most interesting that I've read on these forums or over at TWCenter. Great information, and very well put.

If this was such a successful and well-practised system, why did the Successors struggle against the Gallic invasions? Was Ptolemy Keraunos just that incompetent, or was there something special about the invaders?

I'd really like to know you guys' thoughts on this question. I've got no expertise on the time period, so I could only offer guesses, but I would suspect the Gallic successes were largely due to the Greeks being outmanned and overwhelmed by the concurrent Successor Wars, moreso than Gallic tactics or skill. But that's only a guess.

[antisocialmunky]

They are Gauls, everyone had problems with Gauls. Heck, they sacked Rome and ran amok in the Balkans for a while too.