Late era tactics

[Flavius Merobaudes]

This is intended to be a thread to discuss tactics for late era units such as gunmen or pikes. I don't know much about this topic and therefore can't post too much.

But I hope to learn something new from other players, and maybe we can exchange some new ideas here.

1. I tried a new tactic to use pikes in combination with melee infantry recently and it proved to be very successful for me. The main problem for me when using pikes was that they can't take the impact of an assaulting melee unit. The first rank would be killed instantly with the others switching to their daggers and getting chewed quite fast. My mistake was that I wanted to use them on the frontline like a phalanx in RTW, but refused to realize that their defence was too weak for this.

Now what I did was to stretch my pikemen out in a thin line three ranks deep only (not very historical), spearwall formation, guard mode off. I then had my melee inf take up their place in front of them within the range of the pikes so that they were approximately as wide as the "pikeline".

When an enemy unit storms into their front now, the melee inf will take the charge which they are quite good at and the pikes won't take damage. They will not switch to daggers either but poke down the enemy that is now engaged in melee with your other unit. You will take very few losses while the enemy will suffer massive casualties. Chances are they will rout very soon.

2. I observed this and couldn't explain it to myself: I tried to refine the above used tactic for the Portuguese using Portuguese Arquebusiers instead of just plain melee inf. When the enemy moves towards me all works fine at first. My gunmen fire their three salvos recircling as they should with the fire per rank animation. But after these three salvos they seem to take a break. There would be enough time for one or two more salvos until the enemy is there, but they just won't shoot. Why do they do this? Is there some historical/technical reason behind this or is it what I would call a bug?

3. Here is some "New Model Army" which I intend to use in my current HRE campaign.

Erstes Kaiserliches Reichfeldkorps:

1 General
4 Reiter
4 Arquebusiers
4 Zweihänder
4 Pikemilitia - substituted by Landknechts later on
2 Serpentines
1 Basilisk

deployment:

RR  RR  RR                                                       RR





                       AAAAAAA AAAAAAA AAAAAAA AAAAAAA         S
                  B    ZZZZZZZ ZZZZZZZ ZZZZZZZ ZZZZZZZ     S  
                       PPPPPPP PPPPPPP PPPPPPP PPPPPPP
                                    GGG

I expect this army to be able to deal with anything...
Let me know what you think. Critics welcome.

[Monsieur Alphonse]

Why the basilisk? Your serpentines are the best anti infantry guns in the game. Three serpentines can destroy with some difficulty a city wall so you don't really need a basilisk.
Unless you are a Harry Potter fan.

[Flavius Merobaudes]

No, I ain't no fan of the magician-idiot! I don't want to offend any fans, but personally I think Harry Potter is boring. And all the hype is really getting on my nerves.

Well, breaking walls is exactly what the basilisk is intended to do. The serpentines 10 attack vs. buildings seems very weak. They might do one wall, but what if it comes to fortresses or even citadels? This army will move slow due to the arty, I don't want it to be even slower by having to siege.

[Per Ole]

My gunmen fire their three salvos recircling as they should with the fire per rank animation. But after these three salvos they seem to take a break. There would be enough time for one or two more salvos until the enemy is there, but they just won't shoot.

Gunpowder infantry (and cavalry) take a lot of time to reload. If you deploy them in three ranks deep, they won't have time to reload before they're at the front line again. This explains why they didn't fire at once.

Also, I tend not to use pikemen, but when I do I deploy them 5 ranks deep, and put gunpowder infantry mixed with them ("on top" of them) so they can fire, but still be protected by the pikes.

[Galapagos]

Just wait a bit i will post my tactic but it takes long to describe it....

[Askthepizzaguy]

So... there's a late era to this game. How interesting!

Marvelous things you can do with mods. Unless... nah, it couldn't be. Perhaps it is a hidden feature you can unlock in the regular game?

Someone please share with me your method for unlocking this secret mode.
I remember one time I actually got all the way up to turn 90, for the explicit purpose of slaying Mongols. Perhaps this mysterious era of the game happens sometime after this.

Might there be units involving this "gum... pow... er" I've heard so much about?

____________________
This is the only way to demonstrate how insane I am

[Galapagos]

I place my troops just like that.75% of my cavalry is on the left side with 25% of my missile units,this way the enemy believes that i am going for a flank attack and he will place the majority of his cavalry on that side.He will usually place his missile troops behind his infantry and maybe some cavalry on the right side.

All the army will move forward engaging the enemy.I have superiority on the right side so i must kill or rout all the enemy's cavalry and then move my remaining troops behind the enemy infantry and attack his missile units keeping them occupied,a few units should attack the enemy's infantry on the left flank because your troops need a bit of support.In the left side my troops have to resist the enemy attack just a few minutes till i finish the enemy's infantry.

In meanwhile ,this is how it should look in the middle of the battle..

The two "arms" of your army should squeeze the enemy like that....

When you get here there is no escape for the enemy......muhahahaaaa


P.S. I am a noob and don't know how to make them smaller.....

[Askthepizzaguy]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biE_xQRQUQM
MY EYES! THE GOGGLES DO NOTHING!

-Rainier Wolfcastle









Please wrap a "spoiler alert" around those!

[DisruptorX]

I like the sticking a melee unit right in front of a pike unit tactic. In multiplayer, I do this to my friend with muskets. The muskets stand directly in front of the pikes, so that if charged, the pikes slaughter the attacker. Then I use my cavalry and ranged units to harass the enemy untill they decide to charge into my line, at which point my zweihanders countercharge after he hits my pikes.

I do prefer using obsolete spearmen to protect the flanks though, since pikes can't turn well at all.

[Ramses II CP]

I have to confess, I've never used pikes. They can't *move* dangit! My primary tactical advantage over the AI is in maneuvering, so I can't stand to use units that are terribly slow. So my late period tactics primarily involve drawing off the enemy cavalry, chewing up his infantry with my guns, and crushing his guns between wings of my own cavalry right in time to sweep up the remanants of his infantry with my cavalry.

I imagine mounted gunpowder units would give that idea trouble, but I've never seen an AI army with more than one of those in it.

[Flavius Merobaudes]

Pikes can be the fastest infantry units on the battle field. Just put them off guard mode and off spearwall and they'll run like Carl Lewis.
But remember to switch back to spearwall once they are in position.

[Fußball]

Interesting play Flavius. Try placing the the arquebusiers directly in front of the pikes and position your zweihänder behind the pikemen. In the event of a calvary charge your arquebusiers are almost sheltered by the pikes and any charge that even catches a man or two will catch pikes as well. Beside that, when ordering a missile unit to fall back, the men who are reloading or about to fire tend to continue their animation before actually performing the order.

Tschüß!
Erich