When do you favor hoplites over pikes?

[Kuukiz]

I was considering Sparta's units and wondered how would I approach my army composition when pikes becomes available. The main tactic I use is hammer and anvil. I wonder if I should replace my main line completely with pikes. I tried to outline the advantages of the units:

Advantages of hoplites over pikes:

• better armor when in formation

Advantages of pikes over hoplites:

• better reach (can exterminate hoplites, short pikes and pike hoplites if a long pike)
• better offensive potential when in formation (especially short pikes)
• more men in a unit (more ground to cover)
• faster movement

It's also worth mentioning that Spartan hoplites have good stamina, and they are cheaper when you compare them to e.g. Bronze Shields.

So in general, when do you favor hoplites over pikes? Do you consider them obsolete? Do you only use them if the enemy army is composed of mostly missile units? Of course, we can discuss more in general, not only in case of Sparta.

[Grigal]

I prefer using hoplites instead of pikes when there is alot of enemy ranged fire. Hoplites are better defended against ranged than pikes. For example I use a wall of hoplites and my own ranged units that hide behind vs nomads.

[geala]

I use hoplites to cover the flank of my pikes. Other than that I use cheap hoplites for most of my second class armies. Currently I (as Macedon) have 5 armies and only one has pikes, the rest is a mixture of epistratoi (or similar) hoplites, some cheaper cavalry and AOR units.

If I would compose armies for performance against special threats (which I do not do normally), the only reason for hoplites would be the seemingly better protection against ranged weapons.

I have however problems with this because it is actually quite strange that hoplites are better protected. Why should they? The armor and helmets of heavy hoplites and pikemen were essentially the same. The sarissa pikemen used shields too and actually only small parts of the body were unprotected. The hoplite's shield was about 20 cm bigger, sure, but the oblique and vertical pikes from the back rows to some extent protected the formation from missiles (which were not high speed rifle bullets with a flat trajectory but big, slow moving arrows or javelins, very susceptible for deviation). So in the end pikes should have better or at least the same ranged protection as hoplites.

[Ygraine]

Hoplites on flanks, yes

[Kuukiz]

Hoplites on flanks, yes

One Hoplite unit on each flank, or more?

[Ygraine]

One Hoplite unit on each flank, or more?

More, because I've noticed that having many pikes is often not such a good idea (unless you play with the 41-units per army edit). Better to have perhaps around 8 pikes in the center and the rest consisting of hoplites, light infantry, ranged, cavalry etc.

Then again it depends on your enemies set-up. If you're fighting sarmatians then you probably don't want pikes at all, I would just have a few heavy hoplites and lots of slingers.

[Tenerife_Boy]

More, because I've noticed that having many pikes is often not such a good idea (unless you play with the 41-units per army edit). Better to have perhaps around 8 pikes in the center and the rest consisting of hoplites, light infantry, ranged, cavalry etc.

Then again it depends on your enemies set-up. If you're fighting sarmatians then you probably don't want pikes at all, I would just have a few heavy hoplites and lots of slingers.

I totally agree with Ygraine here. It really depends who are you fighting against rather than wich unit is better.

[Kuukiz]

I totally agree with Ygraine here. It really depends who are you fighting against rather than wich unit is better.

I wasn't asking which unit is better, but when do you favor hoplites over pikes. Judging by the responses, other people have the same ideas as me - use them against missile focused armies or put them on flanks. Otherwise use pikes for the main line. It just seemed a bit limited, so I was wondering if people have better ideas.

[geala]

In my one good army I have 5 pikes in the center, 1 hoplite at each side, then 1 short pike behind the hoplites. The short pikes can defend/counterattack against flank attacks and later attack from the flanks. Then I have 4 peltast units, 1 archer, 1 slinger, 1 siege artillery, 3 cavalry (Thessalian, Tarantines and aspis-javelin elite).

[Tenerife_Boy]

Limited but that was their main role by this time period, so limited can certainly be translated as logic.

[Daemon_Blackfyre]

Been playing as Sparta and only use 2 Spartan pikes per army. They are great at holding the very centre of the line but since Sparta lacks short length pikes (as far as I'm aware) they are terrible as offensive units. I support with a mix of Neohomoioi, perioikoi and the hippeis general. This means that I can always count on the centre to hold and still retain some offensive capability even with the weak cavalry of the Spartans.

[JPrice94]

In my bactria campaign I spent a lot of time fighting highly mobile steppe factions.. I did not use pikes at all, as the enemy was mostly made of skirmishers or horse archers. Instead I opted for hoplites, which were mobile, good missile sponges, and able to beat cavalry. I would also build peltasts, and lots of them. This army composition worked well for beating the cavalry. However, for the southern lands, the indians and whatnot, I used pikes. They are especially good in urban combat, river crossings and open fields with hoplites, or other solid spear units on the flanks

[Goatse_Mare]

I think hoplites do much better when it comes to storming (and defending) city walls during a siege.

[Dardo21]

I think hoplites do much better when it comes to storming (and defending) city walls during a siege.

This, hoplites without the phalanx mode are essentially medium infantry, not as good as dedicated swordsmen, but better than pike units to take walls or cramped locations.

[meerkatology]

This, hoplites without the phalanx mode are essentially medium infantry, not as good as dedicated swordsmen, but better than pike units to take walls or cramped locations.

bit wishful thinking, hoplite out of formation are way worse than swords, swords have +1-3 damage and hidden 1 or 2? bonus to infantry, as well as generally higher attack. result is much much faster kill speed than hoplites out of formation, in addition to throwing weaps.

but ya they are better than pikes on walls of course.
in sieges, hoplites bonus armor and frontal missle defense in formation are good at soaking missles kinda like a minitestudo.

and as far as forming your anvil, hoplites probably do pretty much just as good as pikes when not vs pikes (lol). as long as you dont shift their formation, when their formation gets shifted they lose men even faster than pikes. maybe some kind of bug. most of the time i end up fighting them out of formation as 2nd class melee infantry just because hoplite formation so terrible unless u have a perfect immobile line. IIRC - hoplites have alright charge, and when needed can somewhat perform the role of flanking , which pikes are much worse at

i find sword infantry are by far the best if you can afford high quality ones. but low quality swords will not hold the line very well and mainly are just good for flanking or reinforcing, but lower quality pikes/hoplites can still last a while as your battleline

[hoho96]

Some of the best garrison units are the greek citizen hoplite just because they can hold a chock point for quite a while until your slingers kill them all in the back^^
I never came across any other garrison unit as good as greek citizens

[hoho96]

Standard Pikes (at least the common bronze shields) are great at holding melee armies but unless heavily supported on the flanks, they leave much to be desired in forward offensive capabilities.
Short pikes however are amazing on the offence. They can butcher literally hundreds of enemies if you keep them on the offence (double clicking attacks every few seconds).
The Hoplites (especially the super Spartan Hoplites) have great armor (holds much better against arrows and javs than pikes), quite the staying power vs melee (actually better than pikes in some special cases) and a far better killing power than long pikes (not as good as short pikes, but you get the idea).
In short the quality Spartan hoplites are far more well rounded than Pikes. However, since they're very compact they can't cover as much land as every other unit, and so they're easily flanked.

So what I tended to do in my Macedon campaign is to have 2 VH Spartan Hoplites in each of my 2 main armies, 4 long pikes, 2 short pikes, 4 peltasts, 5 various cavalry, and 2 archers.

If I'm up against skirmisher heavy armies, I tend to have the hoplites in the center supported by some peltasts to absorb the javs and arrows until the infantry close in then I run them back behind the pike line.
Otherwise I tend to send the hoplites out of formation in support of the cav to kill of enemy cav, and hold any infantry that try to follow my cav.
One thing that could easily get overlooked is the charge attack. Hoplites generally have better charge than Pikes which makes them especially great for attacking enemy cavalry if they're bogged down with your cav or infantry (if the enemy is charging your hoplites you might as well stay in formation and absorb the charge).
Moreover, if you don't have short pikes (I'm not sure if sparta have those at all) good hoplites should form the flanks of your pike line and use them to contain the enemy until you charge them in the back with peltasts and cavalry. Due to the hoplites being reasonably good with killing stuff, they can effectively keep pushing enemy flanks until they break.

At least that's how I use them

[KYREAPER]

Very simple, Hoplites vs pikes:

Pikes are supreme #1 unit in front2front battle. Sure, some units can beat pikes 1v1 frontally(2H units) but those units have more negatives in other fights than pikes.

---Anyways, Pikes are the most powerful overall unit in front2front combat... when in formation. They cannot fight well at all out of formation. They are solely dependent on being IN formation to be Godly.
--If you exit phalanx and attempt to use Pikemen with their swords, they will perform worst than hoplites(also using swords).

-- HOPLITES have better base melee stats(when out of formation) than pikemen... thus making hoplites better when using swords.

Pikemen get a BIGGER melee buff when using formation than hoplites do using formation....

Decision:

Use pikemen if you want a VERY specialized and SPECIFIC tactic that does not have much adaptability(as they struggle when using swords and when formation finally breaks).
Use Hoplites if you want a slightly less godly front2front unit which more adaptability.

Basically, with hoplites, you can exit phalanx formation and let them use swords and they can still kick butt. Pikes cannot.

Also, sometimes your hoplites and pike units will take casualties and have their formation "breached" or broken, and when this happens, the individual soldiers will draw swords and drop their spears.
Hoplites can defend themselves better when this happens... pikemen will die fast when this happens... once their formation is broken, pikes are screwed. Hoplites can remain somewhat effective.

Also, versus ranged units, hoplites are better as their shields are larger and can block more arrows than pike units.

Hoplites = more adaptable, give you decent sword units as well as a dominant frontal fighting unit.. and if flanked, can still be effective.
Pikemen = #1 frontally dominant unit, in a perfect world without getting flanked, with adequate support units

[KingRudiger]

Playing as Sparta nearing my first ever completion of a campaign, I'd say Spartan Pikes are useful after the Cleomenes reforms, but once the Nabis reforms hit, I've found that my armies that have 4 thorax hoplites 4 thorax swords have much more killing power than 4 pikes, 4 thorax swords. Spartan Thorax Hoplites, with 3 gold chevrons destroy everything on the battlefield unless you run into some elite pikes in a frontal attack. I still have a few armies that use pikes as an anvil, but have found that my more heavier armored armies perform better.

Every army i have has atleast 1 arty piece to coax the AI into attacking me. Once they get close enough, I charge my 4 hoplites into their center, and use the swords supported by thureos spears (or any AOR Spear unit) and cav on the flanks. I don't even really use the hoplites in formation.

[Basilius]

I use pikes in the center, hoplites on the flanks, and peltasts in the reserves. I often notice the computer ignore/tie-up the center and try to maneuver entirely around my army to engage the reserves and ranged. This is smart, as the pikemen are too strong to be engaged directly, and too slow to reorient themselves in time.

The problem is that, by engaging the reserves, the enemy troops expose their backs to my cavalry, and even if they kill my peltasts, they still have to address my melee infantry at some point.