Slitherine

Irmin wrote:Armoured spearmen hey, OK so other than Greek hoplites what are the other choices to get armoured spearmen?

Anglo-Danes

Anglo-Danes

Better to go for drilled Greeks, less thinking about if your guys can turn around or not.

Suggested armoured for close combat and resistance to shooting, and drilled to avoid being wrong-footed by mobile opponents, although having undrilled spears in the center of the line is pretty safe if they are headed in the right direction.

There are other troops, even cheaper ones, as good or better in particular situations, but armoured spears meet your mission objective by being solid enough to throw in front of anything - knights, pikes, legionaries, elephants, archery. Average ones are toughened by having (cheap) Average troops positioned for rear support at the critical spot.

Many medieval armies have lots of spears. One in particular to mention is the one at page 82 of Storm of Arrows that I must refer as the "Santa Claus" list.

For 500 points you can get for 20 Offensive and 20 Defensive Armoured Spearmen (between 6 and 10 BGs), and (to meet minimums) two BGs of 4 Drilled Crossbow (rear support for Spears or sniping at mounted with 3 dice each) and two BGs of the formidable Jinetes (Protected (could be Armoured) Jav/LS Light Horse (all average). Other toys under the tree are drllled or undrilled Superior Knights, Swiss Pikemen, the useful Almughavar MF as Impact Foot or Offensive Spearmen, and various missile and melee troops.

madmike111 wrote:

Anglo-Danes

Better to go for drilled Greeks, less thinking about if your guys can turn around or not.

Yes, agreed. That's true to an extent. However if you have a wall that's just going to 'move forward' then you really don't need to have much in the way of tactics (see my AAR on Strategy and Tactics - totally over-rated).

Ian

grahambriggs wrote:If you want a 'get stuck in' style army (a good option if fiddly tactics aren't your thing) then you could do worse than medieval French - lots of proper knights plus a backing group. a TC with each group of knights, keep them together, point at something crunchy and off you go.

Any idea how the early med french will differ from the later french list in SoA? I'm reading a book about the cathar crusades and it's got my mind onto Simon de Montfort's army.

How would this Later Ptolemaic army suit my needs?

TC
TC
TC
TC
2 BGs of Xystophorai - 4 Cv, Arm, Sup, Drilled, Lancers, Swordsmen
1 BG of Light Cavalry - 4 LH, Unp, Ave, Drilled, Javelins, L.Spear
1 BG of Ptolemaic Phalangite - 12 HF, Prot, Ave, Drilled, Pikemen
2 BG of Thorakatoi - 6 MF, Arm, Ave, Drilled, Off Spear
1 BG of Ptolemaic Archers - 6 LF, Unp, Ave, Drilled, Bow
1 BG of Cretan Archers - 6 LF, Unp, Superior, Drilled, Bow
2 BG of Anthony's legionaries - 6 HF, Arm, Sup, Drilled, Imp Ft, Skilled Swordsmen
1 BG of Thracians - 6 MF, Prot, Ave, Undrilled, Heavy Weapon
1 BG of Ptolemaic javelinmen - 6 LF, Unprot, Ave, Undrilled, Javelins, Light Spear

IMO the Ptolemain needs some level of skill to use. The genuinly tactical inept needs an army that removes skill as much as possible and maximises the luck element - so knights and/or impact foot is in order IMO.

An army with no thought at all. Italian Condotta. Almost all Knights. But can be used to learn as they are drilled Knights.

As I said earlier HYW French, colourful, small number of BGs, you only a minimum of three troop types, crossbow men, peasants and knights being superior helps out on the luck side because of rerolls.

Keith

Knights are definitely the better of these two options. The impact foot dont benefit from too much thought but simply dont win all that often (life is tough as a barbarian with nothing but enthusiasm on your side)

Martin

If we're talking knights how does Komnenan Byzantines sound, 4-8 bases of Byzantine Cavlary (as knights) and 4-16 Latinkon. The 2supporting" troops look nice as well.

Irmin wrote:If we're talking knights how does Komnenan Byzantines sound, 4-8 bases of Byzantine Cavlary (as knights) and 4-16 Latinkon. The 2supporting" troops look nice as well.

Definitely not an army for the tactically inept.

rbodleyscott wrote:

Irmin wrote:If we're talking knights how does Komnenan Byzantines sound, 4-8 bases of Byzantine Cavlary (as knights) and 4-16 Latinkon. The 2supporting" troops look nice as well.

Definitely not an army for the tactically inept.

I'm getting confused

Knights are good for tactically inept but not Komnenan ones? Or do you believe Knights in general aren't suitable?

i think the point is that some knight armies work well for the tactically inept (i'd include myself in that btw) while others may be less helpful?

I generally look at an army that can have lots of troops, when learning a game, since you will loose some troops and having more to loose means you can make a few mistakes, in this case if going for knights make sure you have some cheap BGs to bulk out the army so you can loose some of those knights to the errors that will get made and still have some left to fight with?
the other thing worth looking at is keeping the number of different troops to a minimum, so knights and maybe one type of support troop?
Later crusaders might be an idea? lots of knights with foot support (spear and crossbow) take the cheaper foot and use it to guard the baggage, then ride forward with a horde of knights? not the best tactic ever, but simple and potentially scary to the enemy?

Ben

philqw78 wrote:An army with no thought at all. Italian Condotta. Almost all Knights. But can be used to learn as they are drilled Knights.

I strongly disagree with this. The Condotta depend heavily on outmaneuvering and "wrong footing" the enemy with their drilled knights and LH. They will lose repeatedly if you just charge head on with them.

Furthermore, I think they are better when run with pikes, knights, and light horse as a combined arms force.

Irmin wrote:

rbodleyscott wrote:

Irmin wrote:If we're talking knights how does Komnenan Byzantines sound, 4-8 bases of Byzantine Cavlary (as knights) and 4-16 Latinkon. The 2supporting" troops look nice as well.

Definitely not an army for the tactically inept.

I'm getting confused

Knights are good for tactically inept but not Komnenan ones? Or do you believe Knights in general aren't suitable?

The reason players are tactically inept is because they lack insight into the appropriate use of different troop types. Which makes it hard for them to see why one army might be more suitable and another one less so. Without that insight, it is hard to understand the benefits and disadvantages of different army compositions, and hard for others to explain.

If your army entirely consists of "hard" troops it is easier not to make inept mistakes like, for example, engaging enemy cavalry in close combat with your light horse because they "might win". This is the sort of thing that we see beginners doing all the time.

The Komnenan Byzantine army has many "soft" troops, and works best in a relatively dispersed formation. There are far too many ways for the tactically inept to throw the game away.

An army for the tactically inept needs to be able to form up in one big block and advance to contact with a reasonable chance of winning when it gets there. If you can successfully handle an army that doesn't work like that, you aren't really tactically inept.

I would look for an army primarily composed of troops that are relatively match-up insensitive with a simple deployment and battle doctrine. Basically, look for an army that can dice out of trouble.

Hoplite Greeks, especially armoured ones, make a lot of sense. Armoured offensive spear are not terrible against anything and in fact are reasonable against most things. The other troops you are likely to fill the army with are of reasonably obvious use (LF, maybe some MF and cavalry), you deploy in large openish part of the table and try to secure your flanks, then march forward.

Superior Heavily Armoured Knights are somewhat similar, they are a bit more fragile and have a few more bad match-ups, but are faster and are dangerous in combat to just about anything.

I think the key thing I would look for is being primarily composed of one troop type that is solidly capable going forward in one on one type fights. Don't look for armies you have to engineer a numerical or troop type match-up (which rules out Komnenans and mosty cavalry and LH armies) and avoid things that are composed of very match-up sensitive or brittle troops.

Earlier Romans and some English Longbow armies are probably ok choices as well, some of the pike armies are probably ok.

Adding in to Ethan's comments.

1) the downside of HF is uneven terrain can be common.
2) Do NOT deploy with both flanks un anchored. This is a HUGELY common mistake. If you are getting picked apart in a lot of games. deploy from the center to one board edge and be prepared to wheel. Obviously faster troops on the outside. And just understand the anchor of the wheel is going to get rushed by the enemy.
3) If you are tactically inept, probalby drilled infantry is more important to you to avoid escalating badness. So the drilled troops go on the position where the enemy is MOST likley to approach from a flank.

nikgaukroger wrote:IMO the Ptolemain needs some level of skill to use. The genuinly tactical inept needs an army that removes skill as much as possible and maximises the luck element - so knights and/or impact foot is in order IMO.

Thanks a good point Nik.

Perhaps even Medium Impact Foot (Ancient British/Gauls). My thought is that you have one less thing to worry about. You only are affected by being Medium if you lose (or are up against mounted).

The fact that you have to think about mounted may make it something more 'tactically challenging' but that is offset a lot IMHO by not having to worry about terrain.

hazelbark wrote:1) the downside of HF is uneven terrain can be common.

You can say the same about knights. At least legionaries don't lose PoA in disordering terrain, unlike spears and knights.