Topic: The Pike

[der Hurenwiebel]

It is unlikely that the DOW armies will return in their old form, perhaps and this is a thin perhaps they will return as a tilean army, with a human focus.  For this reasoning I propose as well as many others already stated here that the empire have pikes, and not merely as a 0-1 restricted type of unit.  Pikes epitomised infantry combat from the middle of the 15th cent to the end of spear armed troops in the late 17th century, they really were the queen of battle.  At their heyday which was during the landesknecht period from 1480- 1550ish the armoured pikeman was what armies were built around.  Not handguns not armoured cavalry, not artillery.  As these other branches of the army grew better able to deal with rate of fire, or mutated into lighter more modern forms like the carabiners of the Kaiserlicher Ritterknecht the landesknecht period closed and the pikeman was no longer as important. 

     So in our fantasy version of the Holy Roman Empire is is not unreasonable to want pikes, its also not unreasonable to not have pikes and lots of pistol or handgun armed light cavalry or nearly any variant of handweapon armed soldier, the RW HRE was a fecking huge place with many cultures within it and by all accounts the fantasy version is bigger.  So why fight it let the soldiers of the empire of sigmar fight in the manner that seems best to them and build an army list to reflect that.  Go for choice. 

Pikes as a weapon option for statetroops 3 points from base
this would mean +2 points to an off the shelf spearman=7pts
add heavy armour for 1 point per model=8pts since they cannot have shields

allow this as an elite infantry weapon as well replacing the greatswords greatweapon with pikes for free, -3pts +3pts =same price.  Afterall an Emperor from our world fought in a landesknecht pike phalanx why wouldn't KF also fight with that same weapon with his own personal bodyguard. 
and there is precedent for full plate pikes in the DOW.

Nuff said for now

[Derek Contyre]

Second that

[murass]

Hi All,

I personally think that adding a pikemen unit in Empire army list is great idea. This is my arguments:

1. Units should reflect what is in fluff of the army. You can find many information about Empire army in the book Riders of the Dead by Dan Abnett (quite good book by the way). It is written there that Empire army consist mainly of pikemen, and pike block is the standard formation in this army.

2. Empire is similar to HRE in our world, and in landsknecht armies pike was the main weapon (many of you stated this before).

3. Bringing pikes into Empire makes it's infantry useful again, and I think useless infantry is one of the main problems in Empire army nowadays.

4. Pike blocks makes detachment rule more important, because pikemen have very vulnerable flanks. So this makes other infantry units also more important.

5. Empire has rather defensive army. It don't attack its neighbours, but usually have to fight back. And pike is great defensive weapon, which fits ideally into Empire army.

6. Empire is full of great commanders, who could invented such sophisticated system of fighting like detachments, so I think they also can see that pike is just much better weapon than spear.

[Derek Contyre]

Second this

[burad]

It should be remembered that pikes, over time,  generally caused the opponent to do one of two things:
1. Shoot them, or
2. Use TACTICS and outmanuever them.

Tactics should consist of more than figuring out which units to send against what.  (What's the weakest unit I can send my uberkilly elite unit against) 
It should also consist of how to manuever so as to apply overwhelming force at the desired point.  Pikes might force some of us to actually manuever instead of just lining up and going at it.   What a concept. 

[commandant]

A terrible thing I know.   What would demons and vampire counts do..............

[der Hurenwiebel]

pout.

[commandant]

I have discovered a problem with this new shiny light of the empire.   I have been play testing it using the following rules.

Pikeman follows states for halbardier. (8 points, 9 with Heavy Armour)   One unit can be ungraded to elite pike and can have full plate Armour for +2 points and +1 WS for +2 points.   The list I end up with tends, at 2000 points to have two blocks of pikes and other stuff.   The rules I use are as follows.

1) ASF on first round of combat
2) Fight 4 ranks deep
3) +1 S Ap verses anything of US2 or movement of 6+
4) State Troops

The problem is simple enough but it is a big problem against a good foe.   These units will shred anything that attacks them from the front, more so if they are the elite pikes but their flanks are a problem.   A really problem.   I three games I have had my foe crash through the flank support and roll up my line.   Even given the powerful rules for them I have been using they are not an easy troop to use.   Anything of movement 7/8 can get around the flanks, more so if they are light cavalry.   I think all this argument about pikes been too powerful from the front is a bit redundant because after my first foe charge in a unit of empire knights of the white wolf and got butchered I suddenly found his entire army wheeling around to head for my flanks and because of the large units and cost of a pike army I found that my battle line was quite short.   Yes in play testing they are a powerful unit but only when they are used right

[Derek Contyre]

Why are they eight points base?
so for weapon skill four, 4+ save your looking at fourteen points? that is not cricket. for two more points i can get a chaos warrior with a 2+ save in combat and the stats of a captain of the empire.

Play them with a points reduction next time and dont let the opponent flank you lol. . . I think I will start a play test soon. . .

[commandant]

the problem is that if I lower them to seven points or even six points they would conflict with other state troops

[Uryens de Crux]

Pike and shot bocks were supposed to make mincemeat of everything to the front, thats why they got the crap shot out of them by...

great cannon
pistoleers
handgunners
mortars

lots of tightly packed troops, lovely artillery target.

And a unit representing 3-400 points, upto 20% of the army? Got to be worth shooting at?

[Inarticulate]

And a unit representing 3-400 points, upto 20% of the army? Got to be worth shooting at?

Sounds like my Dogs of War army.

I'd say use the rules for pikes in the new Dogs of War book on dogsofwaronline. They're trying to get it accepted for the next Indy.

[Perius]

I liked Michael W's suggestion at the start, but, having skipped several pages of discussion, don't feel qualified to argue for it.

Other than saying, of course, that making Pikes 4 ranks/Defended Obstacle fits in with the 'simplify' theme running in GW at the moment, and would happily decrease their points cost.


On a historical note, the bill (a weapon a lot like a halberd) was used against Pikes with great effect. The battle of Flodden was lost by the Scots pike blocks after a smaller number of English bill-men simply lopped the ends of their pikes and then slaughtered the now defenceless pikemen up close.

In other words - against trained infantry, a pike block should not be invincible. If English bill men can wreak merry havoc with Scots pikes, then ASF High Elves should be able to do the same with Empire pikemen.

[der Hurenwiebel]

yeah the english bill was a gardening tool adapted for war.  It was basically a blade curved into a hook for chopping limbs off trees up high or out from the main trunk where a gardener couldn't climb.  This hooked blade invariably had a crossbar beneath it which would be used to rest the pike blade against while the hooked blade was against the wood, a few tugs to cut into the wood and a bit of leverage against the haft bye bye pike head. 

and yeah light cav/ flanking units were the bane of pike.

the a la carte menu of adding skills, weapons and armour for building a pikeman should begin at base 4 points.