Where are the pikes?

[thornwiegraf]

I've been playing Scttland on VH/VH mode/graculs mode . .. I've wiped out England, and control all of britain, Northern France and and a fair bit of northern spain. I get the regional troops (such as the longbowmen in Wales), the Aragon archers (forgot the name), and some other regional calvary, And even have viking warriors from taking over the now deceased norweigan enemy, but I've noticed something...

There's no pikes?

I get all these urban spearmen and spearmen militia, and I get lots of Dismounted Fuedal Knights, and Highland archers / nobles... but I don't have any pikemen whatsoever. Do they exist at all in this mod? The reason I love scotland so much is because of their use of pikes...

I'm not too sure when pikes came into mainplan historically... I started with the early campaign mod but I think I'm somewhere in year 1250-1270 in game years / turns currently. Gunpowder has been mentioned, but no troops have come out with it yet.. the Teutonic and Monglian armies are both there. Only Spain, Denmark, A little France, a little geona, Venice, the Papal States, Aragon and Scotland are left in France. . . .

I just did a bit of research. Are my pikes going to appear anytime soon? Because historically it mentions the scottlandish / flemish troops often used pikes regularily in the war of Scottish independance which is happening shortly.

If the pikes suddenly are unlocked due to some event that happens around this time, I will be extremely impressed. But If I play a whole campaign and get no such pike useage, i'm going to have to say, that's somewhat disappointing .

[thornwiegraf]

I mean, historically, the war of scottish independance happens when England invades just before the 1300s... so I'm expecting them to pop up some time soon...


or perhaps they're simply not available in this mod? that would be rather awkward.

[Vissewalde rex de Gerzika]

Pikes should appear at the new era event in 1300. You are the only faction that gets them recruitable as standard units. The only other pikemen available at 1300 are flemish and swiss AoR units.

You can also get some pike units early by having only 2 regions around 1215 when the William Wallace event will happen and 2 stacks with some pikemen in them spawn.

Another tip is to play late era with Scotland always because their roster is quite minimalistic, so you wont be stuck with basic units for 200 turns.

[thornwiegraf]

Aha! Wow! This mod is more amazing than I thought, then. It really does follow the regions and eras quite well. Yeah, I'm at like nearly turn 200 and keep fighting with the same units... so finally I should have my pikes around the year 1300.

Yeah, it seems scotland is ideal to play in the late period, but actually, I've had a really hard and difficult time playing with them. Leon/Spain keeps spamming me with Their eite cavalry and jinete groups and although I have highland nobles, their knights keep creaming my armies on Vh/Vh mode. It's been a real struggle, but In a few more turns, perhaps the tables will turn.

Great mod, and great for keeping up with the proper region / timelines. I noticed a few other events pop up while playing scotland, like the mounted crossbowmen, mention of gun powder, and the upgraded Urban spear unit in towns / cities . . . As well as the armour being available at the right turns.

thanks Baltic Warrior.

[Vissewalde rex de Gerzika]

You can check out http://stainless-steel-mod.com/ for other units availability years and other stuff, the site is slightly outdated, but its is still pretty good.

Yeah, it seems scotland is ideal to play in the late period, but actually, I've had a really hard and difficult time playing with them. Leon/Spain keeps spamming me with Their eite cavalry and jinete groups and although I have highland nobles, their knights keep creaming my armies on Vh/Vh mode. It's been a real struggle, but In a few more turns, perhaps the tables will turn.

You shouldn't be so frustrated, after all you are still way on top of anyone else because you own most of France and all of Britain, so thats a lot still.

[thornwiegraf]

You shouldn't be so frustrated, after all you are still way on top of anyone else because you own most of France and all of Britain, so thats a lot still.

Actually I own the two early campaign starting provinces of Norway, All of Briton, Ireland, and most of Northern France.

Spain controls all of spain as well as North Africa.... They spam swordsmen which aren't hard to deal with , but their cavalary are rather op at this point in the game, Portugal is gone.

Aragon Controls southern France and maybe A few provinces in the south.

Genosa is scattered all over. Venice owns the regular spots. The Papal States own a few spots, Byzantine empire has taken scicly but Denmark keeps fighting them..

Denmark owns all of denmark, the rest of scandanavia in the north and west, as well as most of the old Holy Roman empire area..

well, as you can see... Europe is in a big mess. The Tuetonic Knights expanded to three terriroties taking them from the now destroyed Lithuanian provinces... Poland and Hungary died a while back to Byzantine / Rus/ cumans.. and Im not even sure what else is beyond that point. Just know the Egyptians and Kwazermian's have sooo much land .. but it seems the mongols are dealing with that.


Whew. Love this mod too much. But I think the pikes / other units that will soon be out are going to make this much much more interesting. I guess the way I played was good, but when I started in the first 30-40 turns I basically spammed Highlanders and Border Horses and zerg rushed Britain and fell into excomunnication twice, fought off norway, as well as invading portgual and spain.. but after they were defeated and much money saving, I was eventually able to gain ceasefires and alignments. I think it costed me a princess, 50,000 Gold and one province to Aragaon and denmark to ally and stop attacking me.

Anyways, I enjoy discussing the rounds of this mod / game as you know, playing this one takes a lot of time up. It's quite fun Thanks again for your response on the pikes.

, France owns three random scattered provinces in the middle of the now non-existant Holy roman Empire,

[Vissewalde rex de Gerzika]

Sounds like a really interesting game you have going, you should do toggle_fow and check what the map is really like. You have invaded pretty logically, you should try and own all of Norway and Sweden and possibly later on establish yourself as the ruler of the northern coast of Europe.

[MDCCLXXVI]

Take a couple stacks and establish a Scottish foothold in the Holy Lands.

[thornwiegraf]

The game has been going along swimmingly, since I got the pikes. My armies now consist of many many heavy pike / scot pikemen. But they're very defence oriented. I'ts been a real challenge in this mod because I haven't relied heavily on Feudal Knights or Dismounted Knights in the EArly Campaign. I've been using spear miltia, urban spearmen, Longbowmen from Britain, Mercenry horses, and Javelineers from my conquered spanish area. I get a little impatient waiting for 8-12 turns for all these noble units though I did produce a large amount of Noble ARchers / Highlanders for a good round in the earleir campaign. I also make good use of Crusades and use those mercenary troops to full extent. I have nearly conquered all of Spain, nearly all North AFrica, and practically all of France. Briton and Ireland are still mine. I own the two starting norway cities, (Denmark has Oslo).... I'd love to attack DEnmark but they're insanely powerful, controlling much of eastern Europe and the old HRE area... and they're keeping the "Imminent Defeat incoming" factions, the Egyptians and Kwazermians at bay. Right now, my pikemen and highlanders and spearmen have a lot of trouble dealing with the remaining spanish swordsmen / gunmen that they keep spanning... not to mention, men at arms. It's challenging and I am loving every minute with it, thanks to graculs and others mods. . . . . . The remaining large European factions are Scotland (me) and I am permanently allied with Denmark (well, maybe ill break it or they'll braek later)... and our super enemies Kawzermian (Biggest) allied with Egypt (Second biggest faction) are pretty tough. we keep starting wars and ceasefiring... ANd they're huge. They control well over 50% of the map together! The other factions include France (Two minor provinces which are not even in France anymore..but in East and West Germany, lol), Venice (five) ,... They are allied witH Denmark and I. The Papal States have about five provinces... And allied to me... and Genoa and Spain are minor thorns in our sides that are permanently excommunicated. I though the Geonese crossbowmen would be bothersome for my Pikemen, but they keep spanning Merchant CAvlary units on me.. which break easily and are easily crushed by pikemen... The Teutonic Order has four provinces but they seem really idle... Kiev has one province and is Egypts vassal... Cuman Khanate is also a vassal with one or two provinces to Kwazermian . . . and the so called scary Mongolians keep travelling around, gaining and regaining their capital city. Aragon, England, HRE, Hungary, Crusader States, Lithuania, Moors, Poland, portugal, novgorod, Siciliy, Seljuk Sultanate... The rest... , The rest of the factions are all dead... ALl in all.. it's very epic, but I've got two huge, dominate muslim powers to defeat. . . Though I'm finding Scotland to be much more defensive than offensive. I guess it is time to start recruiting more Noble Swordsmen and knights to get the job properly done.