Pikemen vs. Swordsmen - an analysis
After playing a good chunk of the way through a long Scottish campaign, I began to become intrigued with the mechanics of pikemen and how to use them, especially since much of their behavior and performance were baffling.
I set up a custom battle (VH) on a flat and mostly obstacle free plain between Scottish Heavy Pike Militia (exp3) and Armored Swordsmen (exp3) using vanilla M2TW.
I *always* used 4 deep rows of pikes. The swordsmen had 5 or 6 deep rows and charged head-on at me regardless of what I did.
I used 4 different strategies for meeting this threat.
1. Spear Wall - hold : My pikemen had spearwall and guard mode enabled and just sat 4 deep waiting for the attack.
2. Speark Wall - attack : Again spearwall and guard mode enabled and waited for the attack, but this time I single-clicked the swordsmen shortly after their charge (ie once the casualties from their charge registered on the unit card)
3. Spear Wall - advance : With spearwall and guard mode enabled, I formed 4 deep and then singleclicked on the enemy spearmen.
4. Infantry Charge : Disregarding pikes, i disabled spearwall and guard mode and just charged the enemy with swords. This case is our placebo as it does not include any pikes and allows us to gauge the effect adding pikes has to the battle.
I ran 10 tests for each. Results are given as (casualties sustained)/(casualties inflicted) and then V for victory (heh) or D for defeat
Spear Wall|-Spear Wall-|Spear Wall-|--Infantry
hold:----| attack: -| advance: | Charge
V(24/58); V(51/59); V(31/58); D(59/28);
V(16/59); V(25/52); V(32/52); D(63/27);
V(23/53); V(44/57); V(68/61); D(71/43);
V(27/58); V(30/55); V(73/61); D(66/52);
V(36/58); V(23/54); V(33/52); D(64/35);
V(55/60); V(27/58); D(74/47); D(62/34);
D(67/37); V(46/57); V(52/56); D(65/27);
D(63/42); V(30/52); V(54/59); D(60/35);
V(53/53); V(42/59); V(59/60); D(41/27);
V(32/38); V(36/56); D(71/35); D(65/36);
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An Infantry Charge clearly is the worst approach, but no surprise there. Spear Wall - hold or attack seem to be a bit better than Spear Wall advance. Though the test isn't really conclusive on Spear Wall - hold or attack, my gut feel is that attack will work better in general because it motivates those guys sitting at the ends of the line to move. I think it was stationary end guys who caused the two catastrophic defeats in Spear Wall - hold.
I didn't experiment with taking guard mode off, but I doubt that will help as guard mode only really comes into effect once the enemy flees. When ordered to attack a unit, the pikemen will attack and follow through regardless of guard mode. (right?)
What this means is that pikemen can hold up to superior swordsmen and almost always cause a stalemate or an outright victory, depending on how they are directed to conduct the attack and various random elements. I am not a history buff. However, this seems plausible to me and a good balance to the game. Pikemen must maintain a rigid formation or they go down like sheep, as we saw in the Infantry Charge. To balance that, they must be able to *always* win in melee when the circumstances are ideal for them, ie a solid formation and a head-on attack. Therefore, I'm happy with how they're currently balanced in this regard.
HOWEVER, the shield bug fix will dramatically change the outcome of these tests. Since the shield strength is currently being subtracted from the swordsmen, it is not hard to imagine what will happen when it's added as it should be. I ran a quick test of Spear Wall hold with the LTC mod which has the shield 'fix', and the pikemen were unceremoniously slaughtered. If CA is going to fix the shield bug, they're absolutely going to have to address pikemen as well (this may be why they are taking so long on the shield bug fix). *(Lusted, have you seen any problems with pikemen in LTC?)
The reason that the shield bug actually results in a balance between pikemen and swordsmen is that pikemen are horrendously bugged as well. I made several observations by watching the same battle play out 40 some odd different ways, some more or less startling than others.
1. Generals cause outliers in the statistics. Because they are so powerful in relation to the other characters, their position, which is mostly happenstance, can greatly influence the outcome. If anybody knows how to exclude the general from a test battle, I'd love to know how. (This doesn't have anything to do with pikemen, just an aside).
2. Pikemen don't always attack with their pikes when it seems like they should. The pikeman who actually gets a stab in with a pike is more the exception than the rule. Pikemen will sit, staring at an enemy engaged in a running animation who is stationary at the point of his pike (a la MC Hammer), and not attack him. This is annoying when it's only some of the pikemen. An extreme example which happened twice in 40 runs (that's 1 out of every 20 times) is when the swordsmen all get stuck like this. The pikemen hold the pikes without attacking and the swordsmen, though in the run animation, aren't moving beyond the tip of the pike, and the battle does not end. Literally. I've got a saved replay of this if anyone is curious.
3. Pikemen throw down their pikes too quickly. Everybody who uses pikes knows this. You see a whole row of pikemen one person removed from combat who could be poking about with sticks and instead are shuffling their sword from hand to hand waiting for their turn to die.
4. Pikes do not seem to reflect charge damage as they should. The way it should work is that 60 armored swordsmen barreling into 75 pointy sticks should result in many dead armored swordsmen. The actual result is that one or two swordsmen stumble and fall, and almost the entire front row of pikemen, whether actually attacked or not, perish beneath the strength of the charge. This seems like a pretty clear bug. Charging damage against spears should be relfected back on the chargers.
**************THE FINAL WORD********************
Pikemen are currently balanced. They are stationary or slow-moving defensive units which should be used to fend off attacks, not conduct attacks. Their flanks need to be protected by other melee units, their formation must be strictly kept, and they must not be exposed to missile fire. But then they can fight off almost anything that comes at them and for generally a fraction of the recruitment cost.
HOWEVER, with the impending shield bug fix (*hopefully* impending?), pikemen will be slaughtered wholesale unless their own bugs are corrected.
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Questions and comments encouraged.
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Originally Posted by Lusted
