What to choose....hmm?

[Ar7]

I am having a lunch brake at work and thought i'd write this so i could get some good MTW reading when i get home

The first choice is:

Spears : pikes : polearms

Let's leave out the special ones like bills or SAP. If you could only build latest regular units of this kind, let's say Chivalric sergeants, halberdiers and pikeman. Now who of these would you choose to be the bulk of your army, to be the main mass to hold the line?

Another smaller question, how good are halberdiers against cav, can they take a charge head on and still win? Basicly this is the same as the first one, can they replace spears or pikes?

The second choice is:

Pavise Xbow/arbalest : no pavice Xbow/arbalest

Is the shield worth it, they do loose a lot of speed and that is bad while attacking?

The third choice:

Polearms : swords

Let's say you use spears or pikes as the main line, would you choose polearms or swords as the flankers that do the messy melee or would you use a mix of these? Also let's not caunt the cav, they are another story

Now put your thoughts below....the first speaker is?

[Ulair]

Quote[/b] (Ar7 @ July 19 2004,12:25)]I am having a lunch brake at work and thought i'd write this so i could get some good MTW reading when i get home

Quote[/b] ]
The first choice is:

Spears : pikes : polearms

Well, my replies are theoretical since I'm just in my first High game as the Italians (never used pikes/halbs before) but my plan is to stick with spears as the line, although of course I do have Italian Inf to play with . However, I'd still stick with CS or Saracens - I like the rows bonus vs. cav.

Quote[/b] ]
The second choice is:

Pavise Xbow/arbalest : no pavice Xbow/arbalest

Pavise for defensive armies, non pavise for attackers, don't bother with crossbows go straight for arbs is my rule.

Quote[/b] ]
The third choice:

Polearms : swords

My plan is to try a mix of halberbiers and CMAA (2 of each per optimal army) and see how it goes.

But, like I said, these are my current plans - it may all go pear shaped. I'll let you know .

[katank]

spear bonus vs. cav is +1 attack, +4 defense.

polearm bonus is +3 attack, +1 defense.

thus, polearms for killing and spears for staying.

I suggest using a mix of pikers and spears for the center wall and halbs close by to flank.

pin them with the staying unit and let the killers mingle from the rear.

polearms can eat a cav charge and win but it's no as costeffective.

spears are mostly replaced by polearms for killing and pikes for defense.

pikes are stronger but tire faster and also their frontage is short and are easily wrapped around.

[Magraev]

Spears will do nicely for the frontline. You can get them at +1 valor easily and this puts them ahead of the pikemen for me. Also as katank said the pikemen have less frontage so are easier to flank. pikemen from tyrolia would be nice though. In formation they are frightening.

I always go for the non-pavise arbalesters. The others are caught by every other unit in the game.

Polearms are clearly a better weapon than swords, but halbs are slow. Having to choose I'll go with chiv maa's and rely on my sergeants (and arbs) to stop the cavalry.

[English assassin]

I'd go for spears for the frontline: good but not the best against cavalry, but the shield means they can soak up missile fire. Halbs are too slow to be used for anything except a bridge defence IMHO.

Same goes for pavise anything. Too slow to be sent out onto a flank for enfilade fire, too slow for attacking full stop, OK if you knew you were going to be attacked you'd build a few (hello, Golden Horde) but otherwise why bother.

Polearms are basically better than swords for most killing but as I've rubbished halbs and we aren't allowed bills etc I'd agree CMAA. (Actually I choose lightly armoured and up-moraled Gallowglasses for the sheer madness of them but I am sure someone will show CMAA are actually better) Also means you've got a unit that fights just as well in a wood or out of it.

[katank]

pumped up gallows need so much armor to be useable.

the CMAA just have too much of a defence advantage over them.

if considering swiss halbs (accessible to most factions), then polearms are quite useful as semi replacement for swords and spear. otherwise, halbs are useless for anything except defending or attacking bridge or castle due to staying power to hold off enemy for a long time on defense and to hold a beachhead for other units to follow up.

[RollingWave]

My personal take...

Spear is better overall for anti cavalry... because MOST of the time the MAIN problem against cavalry is the charge... not the fighting afterwards... in fact if no charge are invovled calvarise in general get's beat by most efficient melee infantries.... (price effective wise) thus spear>>>polearm as anti cav... but spear is far easier to access and hoard than pikes... unless u start a late game usually spears are more useful....

I personally just go with no pavise ... for sevearl reason.... 1. if you have a master bowyer.. u can get either v1 arbs or v0 pavise arbs.... 2.tiring faster does have a siginificant effect on ranged performance... 3. arbs are pretty high in defense/armor anyway (for a archer) combined with teh longer range they do well enough in range duals without the pavise....

As for \polearm vs sword... i usually go for both but if i must pick one i go with sword .... the main problem is in general the most common polearms are from poor to horrible in moral, and they fare quiet horriblly against low armor high attack units... they arn't as overall useful and are usually quiet specialized whereas sword inf and usually generalized.... they can handle most situation from well to very well.... in my usual army i have more sword than polearm when i get my way.

[katank]

the thing is that polearms can do the jobs of both spears and swords although neither too well.

they can kill cav easily and also maul armored troops so I find them useful.

swiss halbs work great for me.

[RollingWave]

True katank but i was more referring to overall units... when you generalize obviously i'm basing on more common/accessable units of that type which for polearms are obviously urban milita/milita sergents/halberdiers.

all 3 of these dudes have horrible moral.... urban milita is somewhat of a neccesity for most factions in the early fights but become quiet useless afterwards due to how weak they are to arrows and their defense overall... milita sergent and halberdiers have decent damage against armor and decent defense in general....

but milita sergent doesn't get any bonus against calvary... and halberdiers are slow as snails while have only a tiny bonus on defense against cavs (remember that spear/pike's bonus against cav is more than what it seems due to rank bonus) combine that with their low moral means that in a head on combat situation they most will often rout after the initial charge..... which makes them quiet unreliable as a head on anti cav unit and u must use them to flank... but then sword units also beat cavs when flanking (hell almost anything beats anything on flanking with being a jedi....)

where as ofcourse the specialized units of that class such as billman/swiss halbs etc are obviously better and more useful

[katank]

don't agree. now the UMs and MS are poleaxes, not polearms due to not having anticav.

the spears get their rank bonus even fighting noncav.

have you ever used halbs in a headon fight against cav?

if halbs get flanked by the cav, it's true that they are sunk but headon, they'll win easily.

they have 1 AP attack base and 6 defence. this turns into 4 AP attack and like 5-6 due to heavily armored cav and 7 defence due to cav bonus and AP bonus.

they are not at all unreliable. it's just that you dont want to lose a bunch in the initial charge but I've seen maybe 8-10 go down in the charge and then next to no casualties in massacring the cav.

they are by far one of the best defensive troops you can find.

[Servius]

Spears over pikes, even in late, because the shields help reduce missile casualties, their frontage is longer, and, as the old saying goes: "if it ain't broke, don't replace it with a throwback to the Macedonian Phalanx"

Something like that.

Pavise for defense, non-pavise for offense. If you can only have one, go with non-pavise.

Spears for defense, halbs for offense. If you can only have one, you've done something wrong. Stop being cheap and upgrade your buildings

As for swords, head to head CMAAs are better than suped-up Gallows, but as far as flanking swords, Gallows have excellent attack, irresistable charge, and if they're defense is that bad they must be wearing T-shirt armor (and thus be pretty fast) so mod in a speed advantage like the Highland Clansman :-) But if you can only get one, CMAAs.

[solypsist]

i like pikes
the upkeep cost is the same as for spears

it's worth comparing upkeep when changing troops over

[katank]

pikers can also be used as attacking force which spears often cannot.

I love flanking gallows, don't forget tht they have 5 AP attack and thus can crunch through armored units on the flanks like butter.