Faction with early pikes and long range?

[Zanshin]

Title says it all. Which faction gets earlier pikes (not spears) and long range bows?

[Somebody Else]

Rebels. Flemish pikemen, welsh longbowmen...

[JeffBag]

Seriously though, no such faction exist. Quite a number of factions get long range bows, but only the Scots get earlier pikes, in minor cities, I think. Unless fast teching to the huge city barracks to get pike militia counts as early.

[dopp]

Teching to huge city and military academy (4800 fl and 4 turns) gets superior Tercio pikemen for Spanish.

[chunkynut]

Teching to huge city and military academy (4800 fl and 4 turns) gets superior Tercio pikemen for Spanish.

But they don't have long range bows ... if they do why haven't i got them! ;)

[Daveybaby]

and huge city and military academy isnt exactly early...

[dopp]

But they don't have long range bows ... if they do why haven't i got them! ;)

Musketeers are okay (but of course they are among the most expensive troops in the game). Their range is shorter than longbows but beats everyone else.

On VH/VH you can crank out Tercios in Cordoba by turn 60.

[Quillan]

Tercios are available earlier than pike militia, though. It's faster to build the military academy (cheaper too) than to build a militia barracks (6 turns and 9600 florins by comparison), and that's assuming you already had the level 4 barracks built when the city was upgraded. There are no prerequisites to the military academy. The Spanish don't have any bows other than peasant archers, but they do have pavise crossbowmen who have long range missiles. They've done extremely well for me in the time prior to musketeers.

[Zanshin]

Rebels. Flemish pikemen, welsh longbowmen...

A clear example of high analytic intelligence.

Seriously though, no such faction exist. Quite a number of factions get long range bows, but only the Scots get earlier pikes, in minor cities, I think. Unless fast teching to the huge city barracks to get pike militia counts as early.

Sorry I said "long range bows" when I meant "any long range", as in Milanese crossbows, i.e.: longer than peasant archers.

However you answered my question. Scots get pikes earliest, I'll have to live with whatever bows they have.

Thanks everybody.

[Guillaume le Batard]

Theoretically, as Scots, if you hired longbow mercs and/or bribed an English or Welsh army, you could have an early pike & longbow stack or two...

Guillaume

[dcd111]

Theoretically, as Scots, if you hired longbow mercs and/or bribed an English or Welsh army, you could have an early pike & longbow stack or two...

Guillaume

Is it possible in this game to keep and use units from a bribed army that are not trainable or hirable by your own faction? I believe in RTW those types of units would disappear. I'm not much for bribing, so I haven't tried it out myself.

[Alatien]

Try Milan.

They have Genoese Crossbow Militia with long range and high damage, and they have Italian spear militia, which has stats of armoured sergants. Both rather early and cheap.

If you want to check the effectivity of Genoese crossbows check the thread 'best missile unit' or sth like that. There is a test comparison with other ranged units.

[Quillan]

Any units in a bribed army that you can't recruit yourself, nor are available as mercenaries, disbands when you bribe them. Any that you could recruit or hire, you get. Mercenary longbowmen are a good option there, as you can retrain them to restore losses anyplace you could hire them. It makes mercenaries a viable option for forming a permanent part of an army in a locale where they are available. I used a lot of mercenary spearmen and mercenary crossbows in the early part of my Spanish campaign, and I have 5-6 units of Turkopoles over in the middle east that I keep around. I just wish I could upgrade their equipment.

[Zanshin]

Try Milan.

They have Genoese Crossbow Militia with long range and high damage, and they have Italian spear militia, which has stats of armoured sergants. Both rather early and cheap.

I'm playing Milan right now. The italian spear militia is what made me think how wonderful would it be to have real pikes instead of spears that somehow seem unable to hold a simple city street against a unit of peasants.

[Quillan]

I've grown fond of Spain. While the French are training Voulge Militia, the English training Bill Militia, and the Danes are training Sword-Staff Militia out of their level 4 barracks, Spain is building Swordsmen Militia. These guys are Sword & Buckler men with slightly worse stats. They eat peasants and spear militia for breakfast, and will give a decent fight against dismounted knights, though they will lose that fight.

[Musashi]

It is kind of sad that the Scots have the most uber awesome pikemen in the game (Seriously, Scottish Noble Pikemen are amazing) but don't have any worthwhile missile troops for them to protect...

[Goofball]

Title says it all. Which faction gets earlier pikes (not spears) and long range bows?

Try Sicily. They get militia pikemen and muslim archers, which I believe are long range.

[IrishArmenian]

Sicily is your best bet. I love that faction.

[Drucius]

It is kind of sad that the Scots have the most uber awesome pikemen in the game (Seriously, Scottish Noble Pikemen are amazing) but don't have any worthwhile missile troops for them to protect...

More baffling than sad.

[KhaderKhan]

Early long range units? Have you tried Turkish Archers?

(Long range and decent defence stats)

[dopp]

No pikes for Turks. He wants them both.