How useful do you find spears after 1.02?

**Doug-Thompson** · 06-11-2007, 22:40

My favorite infantry units are spears, the five units that share the same traits:

Good resistance to missiles, which helps most in siege battles.

good attack/defense against knights.

Can survive attacks by good infantry long enough for my missiles to do the killing, and,

low cost and building requirements.

These are:

Saracen Militia
Pavise Spearmen
Mercenary Spearmen
Crusader Sergeants
Armored Sergeants

Of those, my favorite are Saracen Infantry because they are a free-upkeep unit in cities.

**Kobal2fr** · 06-12-2007, 00:02

Doug : you forget Italian Infantry in that list. Not only do they have the same stats as Armored Sarges except for the -1 in armor, they can also get 2 armor upgrades compared to the sarges' 1. Meaning that if Lusted is right in thinking that armor upgrades really add 2-and-something to a unit's actual armor instead of the displayed 1, then they're actually better than them.

Lusted being Lusted, I trust what he says to be right

**Lusted** · 06-12-2007, 00:19

Well from my testing it definitely looks like armour upgrades give a +2/2.5 bonus to armour.

**Doug-Thompson** · 06-12-2007, 16:49

Originally Posted by Kobal2fr

Doug : you forget Italian Infantry in that list. Not only do they have the same stats as Armored Sarges except for the -1 in armor, they can also get 2 armor upgrades compared to the sarges' 1. Meaning that if Lusted is right in thinking that armor upgrades really add 2-and-something to a unit's actual armor instead of the displayed 1, then they're actually better than them.

Lusted being Lusted, I trust what he says to be right

Point taken. Italian Spear militia too.

**alpaca** · 06-12-2007, 19:05

Actually unless I have some of the bad-ass spears (like Saracen Militia or Italian City), I'll just use them as sacrifices to stop charges until my good units move in (foot knights or two-handed units).
An exception to this rule is schiltrom, I lately adopted a tactic with the English where my Longbowmen would pin down their stakes and I put spear militia on schiltrom in the free spaces between the stakes - the enemy will still attack the spears while my longbowmen shoot them from a safe distance through the stake-induced gaps. Then I'll bring my cav or heavy inf around the flanks and then the enemy will run. Worked every time so far. However in that case even the spear units will usually do quite some damage because schiltrom is quite good if the enemy can't wrap themselves around your unit because of the stakes.

**HoreTore** · 06-12-2007, 19:17

Well, the good spearmen(the ones with attack 7 and defense 14) can easily kill an enemy bodyguard unit charging them. So I say they're good.

**FactionHeir** · 06-12-2007, 19:30

Spear and peasant units are useless at charging. Not in terms of damage but in terms of target seeking. Each individual targets a specific enemy cav individual, even those at the very backrow. So instead of ever hitting them, they just run through the cav without attacking, letting the cav slaughter them, while their mates are blocked from attacking due to their running on the spot mates.

**rvg** · 06-12-2007, 19:49

Originally Posted by HoreTore

Well, the good spearmen(the ones with attack 7 and defense 14) can easily kill an enemy bodyguard unit charging them. So I say they're good.

Yep, Armored Sarges mess up cavalry pretty badly. Heck, now that 1.2 is out even the previously good-for-nothing Byzantine SPearmen are good for something -- defending city/castle gates during siege battles.

**Doug-Thompson** · 06-12-2007, 20:22

Originally Posted by alpaca

Actually unless I have some of the bad-ass spears (like Saracen Militia or Italian City), I'll just use them as sacrifices to stop charges until my good units move in (foot knights or two-handed units).
An exception to this rule is schiltrom, I lately adopted a tactic with the English where my Longbowmen would pin down their stakes and I put spear militia on schiltrom in the free spaces between the stakes - the enemy will still attack the spears while my longbowmen shoot them from a safe distance through the stake-induced gaps. Then I'll bring my cav or heavy inf around the flanks and then the enemy will run. Worked every time so far. However in that case even the spear units will usually do quite some damage because schiltrom is quite good if the enemy can't wrap themselves around your unit because of the stakes.

This is extremely effective even when the enemy wraps around, because then the cavalry turn their backs to your missile units and the rest of the world. Their front faces the spears. They also turn their vulnerable sides to the open while marching around, looking for a place to squeeze in.

**FactionHeir** · 06-12-2007, 20:26

Schiltrom generally still seems rather useless to me.
Units in schiltrom die much faster and kill considerably less units of the same type even if the schiltrom unit is upgraded and has more experience.

**Doug-Thompson** · 06-12-2007, 20:50

Originally Posted by FactionHeir

Schiltrom generally still seems rather useless to me.
Units in schiltrom die much faster and kill considerably less units of the same type even if the schiltrom unit is upgraded and has more experience.

Ah, but it's not the schiltron that does the killing. Its the javelins and arrow and crossbow bolts do. You don't even suffer from friendly fire. All your shields are turned outwards and some enemy gets hit and stops the missiles.