How the fudge can you defeat long spears??

Outrange them with actual ranged weapon, outmaneuver them (works especially well in difficult terrain) so they can't keep formation or are attacked from a flank, or send a bunch of guys with zweihanders to hack the pikes to splinters.

Cannons. Muskets. Black powder weapons.

Field cannons, smaller and more nimble than the old ones.

What if they have musketeers?

Don't send the pikemen alone.

That era's style of warfare is called "pike and shot" for a reason.

It's also boring as shit

Only if you're a pikeman.

Not if you find yourself into a push of pike.

Did the Russians and Poles ever adopted the Tercio? I've heard that their formations were much more offensive-oriented due the more open terrain.

What are you, gay?

Chop chop! Wood no match for steel!

With pic related.

It was called bad war for a reason. It's dangerous, bloody and boring.

Fieldworks so they can't be utilized well, wagonforts, use chariots or elephants backed by light infantry to exploit openings and break their lines.

Use staggered infantry to break up their lines, slowly cause their formations to disintegrate using terrain and mimble groups.

>you will never be a Muscovite infantryman shooting at Kievaniggers before rushing in and chopping them with your bardiche/musket-rest.

War is boring, user.

Who the hell would want to fight in that?

War is long stretches of boredom punctuated by brief moments of absolute terror

>Mangas
fucking weeaboos

It is just like a mosh pit... only no band... and rather than dodging beer cups of piss you are dodging sharp things.

Arrows
Pikes
Bolders

Oh really?
youtube.com/watch?v=IcMCVHJkSPA

Russians would sound the charge at 400 meters, it's not much of a formation by the time that hits.

Literally no way to defeat them on the open battlefield. Retreat and try to establish a superior position where they are forced to attack your own longspears.

>Literally no way to defeat them on the open battlefield
If you can break their morale, you can defeat them without even touching them.
Also without orders they're just going to stand there all day (many eyewitness accounts of this happening) so if you can kill the commander or hold his attention enough to forget about a few units, you have essentially taken those units out of the fight.
Aside from that, give me 1 WW1 era machinegun and plenty of water and ammunition and I will defeat a unit of pike.

How would a pirate dress in the 15th century?

Longbows and a hill.

They had arquebus and muskets at the same time? I thought that one mainly replaced the other.

Not until cannons became lighter and more accurate, muskets lighter and better at penetrating armor and reloading, and the bayonet entered the scene. The Pike and shot warfare dominated the battlefield before the introduction of the infantry of line, the later less vulnerable to the new an improved artillery fire.

Muskets are just heavier arquebuses. They did eventually supercede the arquebus as muskets got lighter.

Effective use of artillery. Tercios make excellent targets for cannon because they pretty much can't miss.

Muskets were better at penetrating armor but also slower to reload and carry around.

Lots of good answers in this thread. But while disciplined spears are tough to beat? They are rare. Rare as Swiss pikemen.

Do what the poles did and give your cavalry THE LONGEST SPEARS

Plenty of disciplined pikemen, the problem is they get used up in real fighting instead of kicking back as an honor guard.

And yet the Swiss are still around to twirl like dancers, while those others?

Pic related.

I always love playing as Russia in AoE3 and going full cyka with massed streletsy and oprchinika

A fighting man shouldn't be proud of becoming a twirling dancer, user.

Also still watching the pope with the same old halberds.

Didn't the romans beat the pikeboyz by outmaneuvering them into rocky territory and throwing javelins at them? Also: long spears need support troops, espacially cavalry to decimate pesky bowmen and such, since pikelifter were slow as fuck. If you beat the support, you beat the pikeboyz.

The Greek Phalanx used huge pikes, the Early Modern Pikemen were more nimble.

basically with long spears of your own, supported by great swords
or any kind of long range weapon (bow, crossbow, early firearms, you know what I mean)

Pyrrhus of Epirus repeatedly beat the Romans, but losses were high. Pyrric victory.

The Spanish gave swordsmen stout, metal round shields so they could slip under the pikes and get in close.

The English used two-handed Billhooks to counter pikes. cut the pike as you move in, then engage. You can actually fight well with a billhook, unlike a pike, so the individual soldier wins. By chopping the pike you force the pikeman into using his second weapon, which failed to have the length needed.

>The English used two-handed Billhooks to counter pikes. cut the pike as you move in, then engage
You got a source for that? I've only ever heard of bills being used to unhorse riders.

Artillery/siege engines. Or even longer spears.

Just to add to the answers already said:

-Rocket shields.
greatmingmilitary.blogspot.com.br/2016/09/weaponised-shields-of-ming-dynasty.html

-The double-armed man, mixing longbow and pike into one weird combination weapon. One of the many "it's-totally-gonna-work-guys-trust-me!" moments of history.
books.google.com.br/books?id=jLg-AAAAYAAJ&pg=PA354&lpg=PA354&dq=double-armed man&source=bl&ots=5D2bVojnEs&sig=6Fbx3ZLKha211GAYijXZkzzkLc0&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi58fHUra7VAhUBayYKHRzeBBoQ6AEITTAK#v=onepage&q=double-armed man&f=false

-Pic related. Plough them dead.
greatmingmilitary.blogspot.com.br/2017/01/chong-di-tie-tou-che-Ming-bulldozer.html

-Heavy cavarly, seriously. The polish hussars had longer lances that could outreach foot, the crazy bastards.
>The hussar's lance was from 4.5 to 5.5. M in length. It enabled the hussar to overreach western infantry pikes ( which were always under 5 meters).
kismeta.com/diGrasse/lance.htm

>I am both astonished and interested that the Hussars, as it happened, were consistently able to defeat much larger foes with low losses, and suffered surprisingly low losses from the fire of squares of infantry protected by pikemen. For example at Kircholm, where about 100 Poles perished and some 200 were wounded, the losses of the Swedes are estimated at from 6 to 9 thousand men. In order to solve this riddle, several things need to be considered.
kismeta.com/diGrasse/HowHussarFought.htm

>How to beat stout foot with horse and "firepower"
l-clausewitz.livejournal.com/150862.html

pastebin.com/MVqh7Yi9
>Sources about cavarly warfare and related topics

pastebin.com/RZifh6nu
>Real Life European Dual Sword Wielding

pastebin.com/2jRuVQt1
>Fantasy smut should read the ancient classics

mounted crossbowmen

Greek fire

Which led to Cynoscephalae.

I read somewhere once that you have your foot soldiers equipped with shields made out of material just soft enough that the spears become embedded in them, but just solid and heavy enough that when the soldiers throw the shields down it drags the entire spear down with it.

After which your soldiers simply draw their sword, step over the now useless spear, and hack the idiots to pieces.

No idea if it would work IRL or not. But the entire concept was interesting enough that it stuck with me.

An arquebus is also marginally cheaper to make.

Beating pikemen once you're in the push is no more difficult on the basis of discipline. When you're closing or the push though, discipline keeps your ranks from faltering, and makes the enemy think twice. When you have two pike formations without shields marching towards one another its literally a game of chicken.

A Brief History of Longspears

>785 of the King's Reckoning:
>High Chief Rannock of the Dunei people is crowned, has a slightly longer than average spear created to commemorate his rule. Chief's guards adopt similar length spears in honour of him.

>785-867 KR:
>Following Rannock's example, successor High Chiefs have longer and longer spears created to commemorate their rule. "Longspears" become symbol of wealth and power among Dunei people.

>867-872 KR:
>Dunei Civil War. Tallkin clan emerge victorious, credit their victory to their prodigious longspears.

>872-1001 KR:
>Era of peace, High Chiefs come and go, longspears continue to grow in length.

>1001-1020 KR:
>High Chief Kulvin, seeking to expand his kingdom, sails across the sea with an army of 10,000 warriors, and conquers the Hereni people of North Gander. Dunei longspears are approx. 7 meters long at this point.

>1020-1045 KR:
>Intense fighting on borders of Dunei kingdoms as Ganderian lords attempt to retake their old lands. Ganderians adopt Dunei longspears, arms race ensues as both sides try to outdo each other in longspear technology. Both sides eventually adopt multi-man spears. First appearance of "siegespears", longspears long enough to stab defenders stood on castle battlements.

>1045-1046 KR:
>High Chief Kulvin is assassinated, stabbed with a poisoned longspear while riding along the banks of the Terrion River. His assassins were on the opposite bank. A succession crisis ensues, during which the Dunei's holdings in North Gander are significantly reduced.

>1046-1052 KR:
>High Chief Kulvin's nephew, Kalin, is crowned High Chief, begins epic campaign of conquest, retaking all lands lost during past year's crisis. Spends time securing territory from Ganderian counter-attack.

>1052-1055 KR:
>Kalin begins further campaign, crushing all Ganderian resistance, and uniting North and South Gander into one kingdom.

>1055-1111 KR:
>Long period of peace, Kalin secures his dominion over Gander, dies peacefully aged 37. Succession proceeds peacefully, longspears start to diminish in length, as they are no longer needed.

>1111-1194 KR:
>Trade with southern barbarians introduces war axes to Dunei society. Several peasant revolts occur during this period, with rebels using war axes to great effect against noble forces, hewing the heads off their longspears before they can do any damage. Dunei nobility begin to fear this new "peasant weapon", worrying what it could mean for their traditional power-base.

>1194-1200 KR:
>Worst of the revolts are finally crushed. Fears of further "Axe Revolts" assuaged when generals realise they can attach axeheads to their longspears.

>1200-1350 KR:
>Succession crisis explodes into outright civil war. Empire of Gander collapses into dozens of feuding kingdoms. Longspear arms race takes off once again. Demand for longspears starts to outpace supply - many ancient forests are cut down to support further longspear production.

>1350 KR onwards:
>Ganderian forests are totally depleted. Lumber becomes worth more than gold. Southern barbarians get rich selling lumber to Ganderian warlords. Ecosystem begins to collapse, society follows soon after. Ganderian Dark Age begins.

How to defeat long spear?? I tell you how to fucin defeat longspear ratatatatatata reloading ratatatatatata

>Muh memeskriegs >:(
You mean
>SPAIN SAVE ME, I STUCK MY COCK IN A HORNET NEST AGAIN!

Is it just me or does that picture look like soldiers escorting small fields of wheat?

Fucken ez mode

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caracole

GOTT MIT UNS

>Well, What Is It?

This only applies to basic personnel.

Are you autistic?

lol, okay kiddo.

youtube.com/watch?v=7oFz5dViy2A
Prepare for an extremely autistic explanation of how pike formations actually worked in history.

TL;DL, classical pikes aren't actually good at destroying enemies on their own, they pin enemies down so that you can run them over with cavalry.

THE GUN IS GOOD

Line battles are boring as shit

I didn't know they still made historians with alcoholism. This guy sounds like he was drinking while he gave this lecture.

What awful taste.

It's the /sos/ lead dev. If you want to hear him sober, he was on Tabletop Terrors once.

These guys did alright, historically

inb4 accuracy screeching, couldnt find a picture of romans in historically proper kit for the greek conquests

good post, I'll be reading all this
thanks

historians without alcoholism aren't real historians

Manga is the spanish word for sleeve

THE PENIS IS BAD

Help me burgerbros, is this guy from New York or something? The accent is barely intelligible.

The guy has some good points, but I think his problem is that he's focusing on the Macedonian phalanx specifically, when Macedonians were generally known for having top tier cavalry even prior to Philip IIs reforms. He doesn't really get into the shorter spears that the Greek style phalanx used (with the Greeks having worse cavalry than the Macedonians). I'm no historical expert admittedly, but I imagine that such a Greek style phalanx would be more deserving of the steamroller reputation (assuming they could even reach the enemy, something the Macedonian phalanx made nearly impossible). After all, if Greek cavalry wasn't too good and archers don't singlehandedly win battles, what remains is infantry.

Agreed. We need now games about politicians intrigue and kissing boys.

It's not NYC, might be a suburb. He sound more west coast. I'd guess Oregon.

why are soem of them so depressed? they look liek they are goign on a real war.
i thought the fact that pixes by themselves couldn't do everything was the common opinion of hystorians?

FUDGE OFF

That didn't actually happen.

california
Archers do win battles if you pin your opponent down with pikes. I don't know if that's what the Greeks used, but it is what the Tercio was (but with guns), and it's kinda what the English did pre-pike and shot.

Can't unsee now.

You're welcome.

>Horsemen running straight on the way of own sides musketmen

And then the bastards are gonna cry about friendly fire, i swear, retards never die out, no matter how many you shoot!

>outmaneuver them (works especially well in difficult terrain) so they can't keep formation or are attacked from a flank

Line infantry didn't so much obsolete pike-and-shot formations as the latter slowly morphed into the former. The large square formations gradually widened and included more light artillery support, as firearms got more accurate and long-ranged, and eventually the pikes got weeded out slowly over time as they declined in their importance and ratio of kills.

Push the spears up with a barricade of shields and then use smaller spears to kill the front lines. Retreat, regroup, repeat.

You get a spear that's 5 feet longer than the other guy and put it on a horse.