9th ed = ETC
I thought ETC and 9th Age were different. Now I'm confused. How do we call these different versions?
I know the part about spearmen/handgunners ofc. What i wonder is if it is a decent tactic in WHFB.
Normally, you take perhaps one horde with supporting detachments, in this case a Spearmen horde with two Handgunner detachments. This ties up 400-600 points, depending on how you support them with characters. It's no more than a quarter of the now normal 2,400 pts, and should work about.
Now the big question is, do you want to take another similar parent/detachment combo and go heavy with Pistoliers and cannons, in order to actually make your army look like a Pike & Shotte army? That might take 2/3rds of your army points, and might be a challenging combo to play against the more fantastic armies.
How would you support it? Would you go heavy with characters, wizardy and magic wagons, would you allow yourself a STank or Demigryphs? Where do you draw the line with pike & shotte on one hand, and Warhammer Fantasy on the other hand? Is looks and feeling more important than game efficiency?
How would you deploy it? Two Spearmen hordes with detachments and supporting guns and cavalry have a big footprint and wide frontage. They're not terribly effective without buffs from magic, magic items and characters. More than that, they're not very mobile. They don't bring to the table anything unexpected. It's a decent tactic for WHFB Dwarfs. Empire, I think, is more of a combined weapon army, and a lot more mobile. Pike & Shotte style line tactic with shooting might not play to its strengths.
I only have experience of this kind of infantry&shooting-heavy lists from the 6th to 8th editions. I love them, mostly because of their looks on the battlefield. But more often than not, they were clumsy and caused considerable problems for me. Terrain hampered their deployment and movement, they could be outmaneuvered, they didn't deliver much in ranged combat, and didn't shine in close combat against heavier and bigger opponents. I often lost.
I don't know how much the various post-8th ed fan projects change the playability of such lists. Even if both Spearmen and Handgunners are made cheaper, I'm afraid they're not keen on making such lists a competitive choice. Warhammer battlefields are not 16th-17th century European battlefields, so 16th-17th century European troop choices and tactics are a bit odd choice.
Kings of War offers a fantasy battle game iteration where pike & shotte tactics are considerably more balanced. It allows pikes in at least two human armies. If you like pike & shotte but want the fantasy, I think KoW would be a good choice.-Z
