No Prisoners! - The Victories of The Swiss

[Paisley]

A chicken bone leftover from his latest orgy (those poor chickens... being eaten was merely the final indignity) and a splinter plucked from his corpulent arse, most like.

[neil123]

and you wonder why you are excomunicate

[grumblefish]

I'm sure the Eidgenossenschaft will indulge your anachronistic desire as they have already crushed a Late Roman Republican army. Set up a challenge. Password = papalbull. The Swiss would prefer 600+ pts, but will field less if your pathetic and obsolete state cannot muster so many due to decadent and unmartial population.

Just designed a nice Seleucid army to show you how pikes are really used; join when you gather up the courage. Password is as you stated.

[Paisley]

Ah... the travelling circus.

Performing elephants, routing camels, clown pikemen with their hilarious bendy rubber weapons, pretty boy horsemen and tin plated monkeys riding armoured donkeys, archers suffering from gigantism and cretin archers too. Fighting Seleucids... it's better than a play.

[Paisley]

Updated with today's victories. I'm ashamed to admit I nearly lost faith in my Swiss in the most recent battle against the Burgundians. Deeter had to give me a good talking to to convince me to attack.

[deeter]

You left out a poll option: I blow snot bubbles through my nose whilst trying suppress my delight at seeing their antics on the battlefield.

As for the Seleucid circus, if no one else cares to do it, I'll send in my clowns so you may see how it's done.

[Paisley]

The option I forgot was 'I've never fought the Swiss and am alive to prove it.'

Grumblefish has kindly agreed to sacrifice his clown circus as it happens.

[omarquatar]

i'm going to enroll a couple of tercios and send your dumb mountaneers to hell
Charles V

[grumblefish]

Here's an honest battle report, first one in the thread:

The Swiss are spotted... cowering on a hill?

Yes, that's right. The "travelling circus" is to do battle with a bunch of pikemen who are camped together on a hill, likely too terrified to come down. Apparently dense pikes don't mix well with thorakitai in the trees, and elephants in the scrubs.

Good thing I brought along a good 15~ ranged units against his 6 or so. Time for the Swiss to play pin-cushion for once.

[batesmotel]

Put up a challenge with password batesmotel and I'll teach your Schweitzers proper respect.

Chris

[Paisley]

Challenge posted, batesmotel. Please remember to tell your men to bring their coffins with them.

Seleucid eyes obviously aren't what they were, nor does their mathematical ability seem terribly advanced. And of course we all now their grasp of truth has always been tenuous at best.

[Retreat_in_shambles]

What exactly was it about Swiss pikes that made them so effective in their era? Was it that you just couldn't get close to them without ending up skewered? It seems like such an ungainly weapon - but it obviously worked.

What were the main reasons?

[Paisley]

As I understand it (and I'm not an expert on the Swiss) the main factors were:

They operated in small sub-units of 100 men in 10x10 squares, giving them the flexibility of a Roman century and the potential for all round defence and readiness to about face or turn to a flank with no rearrangement of ranks. These small units would have been grouped int larger formations (much like the century was) but the small intervals between each hundred would allow them to advance at a far more rapid pace than a monolithic line. The large number of sub-units helped the Romans tremendously and it seems to me to be the same for the Swiss. While one hundred stood fast to receive cavalry, another could charge in its support when the cavalry wavered and failed to press home. I'm not suggesting they operated in a chequerboard formation, merely that their hundreds stayed distinct from one another within their columns, allowing much faster movement than more solid block like that of a 500 strong Macedonian pike unit.

Speed. They advanced fast, linked to the above.

Drill. Allowing them to manoeuvre rapidly whilst keeping formation.

Aggresssion and morale. Probably stemming from their relatively egalitarian society (note relatively). There seems to have been a fierce communal loyalty, and the Swiss were prepared to take horrendous casualties pressing an attack.

Their weaponry made them relatively immune to the enemy nobility, if mounted and they most certainly felt themselves superior to any enemy on foot.


On another note, i notice there's a lot of bluster and big talk in the poll responses...

[Xiggy]

Other notes on the Swiss. They had sub units of halberds within the pike blocks. These would run out and attack the mounted after the pike block stopped the initial charge and carve up the mounted knights. (Guess they liked horse meat XD)

They were willing to take horrific casualties because they were very religious. They did not have formal generals. Their town burgers lead them by commitee. (kind of odd, but it worked)

This is a personal comment. They seemed almost like Sparta since they drilled so much and were so fast.

I think historically most of the infantry of the times was not very good. That made the Swiss look even better.

[arsan]

Whats the story behind all those draws in the swiss battles record??

[Paisley]

Draws?

[arsan]

Ops! it seems i read bad badly your battle records on the first post and saw a lot of draws that are not there
There goes my conspiracy theory!

[grumblefish]

nor does their mathematical ability seem terribly advanced.

That's rich, coming from an army that just crept out of the dark ages.

Anyway, Paisley and I were hoping to fight the whole battle out in one go, but it appears several of his units left something cooking on the stove:




:'(

[Paisley]

Grumblefish wisely crops his shot to show the one area of the field where his men are not running screaming like little girls.

[grumblefish]

Grumblefish wisely crops his shot to show the one area of the field where his men are not running screaming like little girls.

Actually, it was out of service to you, too. It appears you have 3 more routing units to join those 2. When I get done with work I'll be sure to see if I can't present a more accurate picture of your sorrow.