Weapon Reach?

[Advo-san]

On the other hand, this is why spears should always beat cavalry

A unit of CS is holding its ground, and a unit of CK moves in for the kill. They are arrogant French nobles, so instead of flanking they will try a frontal attack.

a) The huge french warhorses begin galloping. Few meters before the contact, they will reach full throttle, in order to frighten the CS but also achieve a mighty impact. In such speed, the warhorse is like a locomotive, it won't stop, but it cannot manoever either.
b) The CS knee, bunker befind the shield in order to protect themselves from the CK lances and stick their spears to the ground. This move forbidds or at least leaves very little spear-manoevering capability, but as I said above, no weapon manoever won't be needed by the CS.
c) The CK, well trained in the use of their lances will probably destroy the first rank of CS right at contact. Shields will be cracked, flesh will be teared, men will die. As a result of this thunder strike, the armored locomotive-horse will take a few hits, but no serious injuries.
d) The CK, having lost some of his power due to the first encounter, will reach instantly the second row. But, this time things are way different. The CK having used his lance, is uncapable of re-locating it in order to achieve the same strike in row-two CSs. As a result, the second row CS, certain that no pointy stik is aiming their heads, can focus in killing the locomotive that can still run over them and kill them. The pike, used as a "palisade", will be tremendously effective because:
-the dislocated lance means that the horse has to reach zero distance in order to run over and destroy the CS.
-but zero distance means 3 ranks deep spears stuck into the horse, which is afterall made of flesh and tissues.
e) Most horses won't survive the distance to reach rank two, not to mention rank three or deeper. After the horse is dead, the rider, if he survives the fall (imagine wrapping yourself in iron and jump from the roof of a car that is doing 25 km/h or more...) he won't be able to fight; he will at least need a few seconds to stand up, straighten his helmet, etc, but in a hostile spear-forest few seconds are too long time.

[Zild]

Regarding swords vs spears...

Once the swordsman is past the first rank's spear, and assuming the spearman can't use it to attack (and assuming further that they do not ignore the frenzied swordsman in front of them to strike at the 2nd sword rank), the 1st rank of spears will change to defence - using their mighty (but not necessarily very tough) shield as best they can, purely focussed on defending themselves. Meanwhile, ranks 2 and 3 of the spears are still attacking.

So not only does the swordsman have to try to down the spearman in front of him who is in full defence mode, he also has to dodge the pointy sticks of the men behind.

Still, I think that a sword is much more versatile (it can stab and slash, whereas traditional pointy sticks can only stab), and let's assume most swordsmen have a shield to help defend themselves as well.

I think that overall, the swords should win.

But I think that all units (especially, but not only, cavalry) should get certain penalties when charging the front of a spear unit. Say a free, higher-than-normal-value attack on every unit on the front rank, which is of greater value still against cavalry.

I mean, seriously, even foot-troops are taking considerable risk when running into the front of a wall of spears!

[antisocialmunky]

Your analysis is right.

One of the best ways to kill knights was to basically trap them in a formation of men and then beat him to death. It's not so much impaling them on a spike BraveHeart style, but getting rid of his momentum so he's stuck and an easy target. Fighting against impact cavalry is really more about the inertia of the horse. Though the lance is a powerful weapon, the horse is a powerful weapon in itself with the ability to just run over men Lord of the Rings style.

[EatYerGreens]

Yup,

done right, the horseman doesn't even need to swing his sword, he could just casually hold it out to the side, crash into a (loose-ish) formation, slashing everything he passes like the proverbial kid rattling a stick against a set of railings. The horse's momentum adds considerable force to the slashing action.

Of course, the density of the spear formation is supposed to stop them breaking in like this but it shows why archers etc are so vulnerable.

Cav impact obviously worked well for some time but the spear unit was developed to counter it. Faced with a wide spear line, Cav is left with nowhere it can make a real impression except out on the flanks where it meets... other cavalry. Depending on the relative qualities of Cav involved, most of its intended impact value has been evened out. Meanwhile, the infantry gets to take and hold ground as well as dictate where the Cav has to go, in order to be of any use.

Need I mention that pointy sticks (bayonet ends, to be precise) were still successfully baulking cavalry charges in the Napoleonic era?

If you've ever watched showjumping trials, you'll realise that, even now, a hedge or a few planks of wood at the wrong height will make a horse 'refuse' and even throw its rider.

By rights, frontal cav charge into spears ought to result in the Cav grinding to a halt, just short of being close enough to start fighting and thus lose no casuaties, thanks to equine common sense. Meleé should not start at all unless the spears actually advance by the few feet required to initiate contact.

[Mithrandir]

Merged 2 threads into 1.

[EatYerGreens]

Thanks muchly, Mithrandir.


@ antisocialmunky,

Haven't checked that link yet but will do... as soon as I've recovered from today's MP session!

Learning curve gradient currently at about 1 in 7.