Topic: Mercenaries

[Angerland]

I have read the excellent article in the war room about using mercenaries in our Empire armies, but my question is do you ever use them? How do they do for you? which ones do you use?

I am running a list with Gryphon Legionaires and so far they have done very well for me. Faster then heavy cavalry but hit very hard and do well in consecutive turns of comabt as well what with 4's in Initiative, Strength and WS.

But I have my eye on other mercenary units as well.  Dwarves, Ogres and Norse Maraders all have an appeal to me.

What do you more experienced Elector Counts think?

[spite]

Heavy Cav, Duellists, Light Cav and Slayer Pirates are the ones that I'd take they are awesome and cheap.

[Melvin the Melvin]

Duelists with pistols seem a particularly excellent choice if you may be facing the Skirmisher Army of Doom. They allow you to fight fire with fire (or rather water with water, as it were) and can blow most enemy skirmishers to bits in short range while remaining relatively cheap.

[Jobbe]

I'm planning on using light cavalry after changing my army-theme from Ostland to Wissenland. Before that I had planned to include ogres. I haven't tried either in combat, but this is my thoughts on them:
The light cavalry is mostly intended to be in my army for fluff reasons (the wissenland army is described as fast and mobile due to the lack of funds), I think that for tactical purposes, pistoliers will fill the role of fast cavalry as good or better.
The Ogres on the other hand are big and tough and would probably attract lots of fire, which would keep my infantry blocks out of harms way. And they would be great support for my infantery blocks.
I don't use regiments of reknown, but that's more out of fluff reasons. The chance of a certain (more or less famous) mercenary regiment being employed by my small army seems slight to no chance at all.

[Jobbe]

Duelists with pistols seem a particularly excellent choice if you may be facing the Skirmisher Army of Doom. They allow you to fight fire with fire (or rather water with water, as it were) and can blow most enemy skirmishers to bits in short range while remaining relatively cheap.

How would you arm them by the way?

[cisse]

Pistols, of course. It's those that make them so good!

[FlameKnight]

I use a 24 man unit of pikemen, deployed in a 6 wide, 4 deep formation. My enemies really try to avoid charging them at all costs, and I suppose for good reason as well.

[Jobbe]

Pistols, of course. It's those that make them so good!

Yeah, but also so damn expensive... Just wondered if it was worth the points.

[CountRommel]

Ogres seem good their big mean and they hit hard plus if they charge over six inches and the line includes at least four of them impact hits which is evil.
Norse Marauders are better than chaos marauders because of the frenzy but they are still bad i find they die very quickly.
Pikemen are good because most of this games calvalry is toughness 3 and only has a 2 up save so strength four and like 21 attacks before they get to strike that hits on 4's and wounds on 3 statistically 10-11 hits 8-9 wounds done 3 wounds not saved thus usually only the champion gets his 2 attacks which even if he wounds twice only way he is winning that combat is if he has 3 ranks banner outnumber and warbanner or some type of addition banner.

[Angerland]

Count Rommel,
I thought pikemen were only Strength three. This idea of yours seems good but wouldn't work against Bretonians in a lance formation.even if you kill three of them 5 of them get to strike back, and one of these is most likely the champion.

[xnet445]

Pikes are +1S on the turn they are charged by cavalry, as well as striking first.

Tends to keep the horsies away.

[Damage!]

Pikemen get +1S when front charged by Cav, chariots or monsters. This is why nobody charges a big block of pikemen from the front... not even Brets!

I've played one game with pistol-armed duelists, was very impressed with the results, and am planning on using them again. Light Cav look good, too. I have to admit, though, there's people in my gaming circle who don't like DoW at all, so I may cop some flak there...

 - David.

[BK]

Mercenaries I used and my opinions:

Ogre Bulls - took once unit of 8 - it actualy worked great as it was US 24 with fear - guaranting auto-break if (or with such amount of ogres it is reather when) you win combat. Disadvantage - tend to drow huge amount of missile fire (but on the other hands it keeps your other troops live). Best use - in mostly infantry army vs Undead of all sorts. Unit of 8 with musician and 2nd weapon is 322pts, so it is still reasonably cheap

Ogre Ironguts - Used units of 3 and 4, with and w/o banner, sometimes even with a warbanner. 3 w/musician are 154 pts and are great flankers. 4 with Standard and musician are 222 (247 if you give them War Banner) and are good hammer unit. As a nice benefi those are Ld 8, so can operate far away from general. Best use - 3 if you want to use them for flanking, 4 with standard and potentialy warbanner if you want to make a hammer. Tried and worked well in cavalry army, I use them mostly to support main hammer knight unit or to attack same unit as a STank (3 ogres + Stank are US19 - that will almost always make auto-break posible).

Ogre Maneaters - Kitchen sink. But a good one. Definetly only good for a larger battles, but they can work great, expecialy if you bring BSB (they are stubborn on a Ld 8 AND imune to psychology, so they are good vs undead also)... 3 of those are 270pts, no command posible, but pack 12 x S7 attacks... Basicly they are Greatswords on steroides. Disadvantage is that they use TWO rare slots, but try them in case you did not fill rare slots.

Duelists - 9 with a pistols are 81pts and are great for arty guards. They also do job of huntsmen well. Unfortunetly musician costs 10pts so it is not a realy good investment. They are actualy good for all cavalry army as they can be left to guard arty.

Pikeman - None in his right mind is going to attack them from a front so it is good. Disadvantage is that they die like a flies from a shooting, so take some archers to screen them... unit of 24 with FC and HA (smallest number that will work) is ~300pts so not cheep either. Watch for a flankes as even light cavalry can break them with a flank charge (they only have outnumber and banner). I don't find them better then a swordsmen with a detachment and a Grifon banner but if you like them take them.

Heavy cavalry - What is the point when you have core knights, expect maybe if you don't give them barding when they are both cheep (19pts IIRC) and fast.

Light cavalry - nice and cheep, but don't overload with options - spears are all you need. Musician is 15pts, so I prefer to leave him home. Light cavalry is always nice, but recently I use 5 knights with musician for a lot of LC duties.

Griffon Legion - nice as it can give you 3rd S6 cavalry. Not extremely expensive at 26pts, and if given War Banner can be hammer unit. They die easily from missiles, so screen them with something until you want to charge. Glorious Charge is nice rule - but be carefull as you can fail charge if oponent fails panic check - so try to charge from as close as posible.

Only RoR I have used are Long Drong Slayer Pirates - they are EVIL - 20 of them are ultimate tar-pit, and can actualy win combats. And as aditional benefit they are not much more expensive then flagelants.

[RendeR]

Ogres and pikemen, I never leave home without my "Golden Arms". In my last battle I faced high elves, and he brought a level 4 mage with the book of hoeth. he spent the first 4 turns throwing everything at the pikes. The level 4 mage a level 2 mage 1 boltthrower 10 archers a light chariot and 2 units of silver helms. they finally fell, but it took half his army and all his magic to do so.

unfortunately I suck and made terrible decisions with the majority of my forces and still lost =(

[CountRommel]

Arn't any of you good enough tacticians to make your opponent do exactly what you want.  I may not be able to do it all the time but there are many times when Through tactics bluffing and a poker face that makes some of the masters gaze in awe I will have your uber good units go where I want them.

[Graf von Carroburg]

I am a pikeman addict, mostly for fluff reasons (I'm a history nut), but also as a throwback to last edition when the detachment rule really blew.

Usually I take one pike block, and one block of spearmen as "reserve pikemen", modelled the same, but working on the premise that, without sufficient drill or combat experience, they can't use their pikes to full effect.

Cheers,

Eden

[CountRommel]

Pikes do Rock house if you can attarcat the enemy calvalry to them.

[Kulgan]

@ Countrommel : Against most Cavalry they will only do verry little wounds.

[CountRommel]

okay very little is still usually enough to cause them to break and run because think about it like this before the calvalry even charges
you have 3 ranks + 1 for a banner and +1 for outnumber than you add the possibility of say 2 kills thats a combat res result of seven

now if they do the 8 man cav unit at most +1 for rank +1 banner +2 for kills because remember pikes strike first maybe add +1 for warbanner so thats a con result of 5 to 7 pikes win

on 2d6 statistically your most likely to roll a seven or an 8 so a 6 may be good enough to break them and if not the next combat round since you won and unless it is chaos or elves which keep in mind COK suck as a DE player they are the worst buy other than that stupid hydra and chaos calvalry eats anything so it doesn't matter but the next round of combat you still have 3 ranlks a banner outnumber and maybe again one or 2 kills they have at most banner warbanner one kill maybe so now it is 5-7 to 3 so now the difference is 4 ld 8 which is on most knightly units is dropped to a four.

Thats if the dice roll the way they should statistically roll now remember you most of the time do roll that and i know that there are times when the dice say I'm Rick James b1tch and roll phenominal.  But that doesn't always happen and there are times when the dice are your worst enemy.

[towishimp]

Sorry to butt in...I have no particular advice or experience with mercenaries.

But please, let me introduce you to my friend the period.  Use him sometimes when you post.  It'll make your writing infinitely more readable.

[CountRommel]

yea sometimes I forget him you know how it is multitasking between about 5 ims age of mythology and a forum.

[Midaski]

yea sometimes I forget him you know how it is multitasking between about 5 ims age of mythology and a forum.

Well if this forum is that important to you, please do not bother.

We will not tolerate the poor quality of your recent posts anymore.

If you do not have enough respect for your fellow members, to give the appropriate time to typing a decent well punctuated post, then your membership will be terminated.

[CountRommel]

sorry dude.
Pikemen rock.
Combat res of at least 4 before the enemy does a wound is awesome.
than add that if they were charge by calvalry and it isn't filthy chaos, theres 20 attacks on average 10-12 hit.  Now since we are not including filthy horrid chaos at str 4 they wound on 3+, so on average 6-9 wounds.  Now unless your playing empire and your not facing knights of that unimportant god you know the one ulric, they will fail maybe 2 armour saves.  But if your facing ulric's knights and any other knight in the game they will be dropped to a 3+ and on average they will fail three saves.  If they have the frontage of 4 or 5 now they only have a champion and one knight attacking you back at most.  which will hit on 3's so only 2 hits of the three should hit.  Now they both wound ohh well no armour save on the pikes. than 2 horses maybe one wound.

so they have done 3 wounds all together lets be generous and give them a rank and a banner and warbanner.  So they have a Com result of 6.

the pikes have 3 ranks, +1 for a banner bearer, +1 for outnumber, and +3-2 wounds.  That makes a com result of 8/7.  Now the calvalry is beaten by 2 or 1.

most calvalry has a ld of 8 so if their beaten by one point only theres a decent chance they won't run like high elves away from paper that just cut and killed one of their buddies.  But if they are beaten by 2 because on 2d6 ld your most likely to get 7 or 8 which means they will run unless the dice gods are against you.

I wonder why you can't buy elven mercenaries unless you buy whats his face the dragon lord or menghils "i wasted a ton of points and money" manhides manflayers.  Elves are a capricious wicked and sinful bunch.  Hell they have a rule for whose there general that shows how corrupt their system is.  Don't you think a few elves would get all i am sick of this and just become sell swords.