Durrati | 02 Dec 2014 11:16 a.m. PST |
I rather like the look of the Artisan Swiss figures. But they do not have any 2 handed weapon / Halberd equipped figures. Can anyone recommend a way around this? Another ranges figures that can be used? Another range entirely? Thanks |
Cerdic | 02 Dec 2014 11:48 a.m. PST |
Not sure myself, but there are several possibles to investigate on this list….. link |
Malatesta1500 | 02 Dec 2014 11:49 a.m. PST |
The Artizan figures are open handed so you can simply add Halberds from another range if you want them to carry polearms. I quite like the Old Glory Swiss for the very early 1500s, Landsknechts can also be quite easily changed to represent Swiss in the 1510s-1520s. Have a look at some of the conversions I did for this: link link |
olicana | 02 Dec 2014 12:17 p.m. PST |
Durrati, what Swiss do you want? if you want figures for skirmish games then I can understand that you might want figures carrying halberds. If you are gaming at 'army' level then you are probably wasting time and effort. The Swiss fought in big pike squares, sometimes over 5000 strong, and secondary weapons were proportionately irrelevant. My advice, if army is your choice, forget the halberds, etc., and concentrate on the meaty bit.
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Zargon | 02 Dec 2014 12:35 p.m. PST |
Oh no you don't olicana0:) that block is just stupendous, wowee that looks painful. Excellent looking kiel there, how many in it? And your wrong got to have some halbardiers to move to the flanks and up to the front to hack out the opposite pikes. I use the TAG and Redoubt for weapon buys. Cheers happy gaming all. |
GurKhan | 02 Dec 2014 12:58 p.m. PST |
If you are gaming at 'army' level then you are probably wasting time and effort. The Swiss fought in big pike squares, sometimes over 5000 strong, and secondary weapons were proportionately irrelevant. I'm not sure that's entirely true. Halberds were a small minority, true, but they are found in some tactically interesting and important incidents. For example Florange describes how at Novara the Swiss detached a body of 400 halberdiers who drove off his landsknecht arquebusiers and then fell on the flank of the main landsknecht body: "Et furent constrainct les dicts Suysses d'abbandonner iiij c hallebardiers qui'ils avoient, et allerent donner sur les hacquebutiers lantskenecht qui estiont huyt cens, tellement que les rompirent, et adoncque les hallebardiers qui donnerent sur les flans des dicts lantskenecht." I suppose if your rules are high enough level they might abstract out details like that, but it would seem to be the sort of detail worth representing in most games. |
olicana | 02 Dec 2014 2:26 p.m. PST |
Agreed, at Marignano the advance guard might also have included many halberdiers – I'll certainly be including them in my refight next year. But they will be a unit of 16 halberdiers with two units of 16 arquebusier. Following behind will be the meat. Three units of Swiss pike each 96 figures strong each with a unit of 16 arquebusier. There is the rub. There were halberdiers, but in this army, a typical army, they are 16 figures in an army of almost 400. As I said, it is largely a question of what you see as 'army scale', supposing that is the scale you wish to play at. My swiss army, at Marignano, represents about 18,000 Swiss. My French army, scaled accordingly represents 30,000 and includes over 100 Gendarme figures, 300 Landsknechts and as many French foot, plus light cavalry, etc. I realise that not everyone games with this number of figures, indeed I think most don't, which is why I wonder why halberdiers would pose a problem to the average collection. for what it's worth…….. |
Puster | 02 Dec 2014 2:32 p.m. PST |
I would estimate the number of helbards at 10-20% in the second & third decade, and they would be placed inside of the pikeblock. 3-6 ranks would be pikes, with some ranks of helbards behind. The internal workings of the pikeblocks are not really researched, afaik, but they would be pretty sophisticated with helbards weighting in where needed, either bolstering the ranks (and probably putting up pikes where necessary) or exploiting faltering ranks with the opponents. The depiction of Dorneck – a battle in 1499 – shows the helbards waiting in the ranks behind the front pikes, and if you look in the (fictional, but modelled after the real thing) Alexanderschlacht you also see ranks and blobs of helbards within the pikeblocks. Its not visible in all contemporary depictions of pikeblocks, but in sufficient to realize the pattern. Two handed swored would be rare with the Swiss. |
The Beast Rampant | 02 Dec 2014 4:07 p.m. PST |
If you are gaming at 'army' level then you are probably wasting time and effort. The Swiss fought in big pike squares, sometimes over 5000 strong, and secondary weapons were proportionately irrelevant. My advice, if army is your choice, forget the halberds, etc., and concentrate on the meaty bit. If you are playing DBA, yeah. If your pike blocks are, what, 1:7, like you show, why WOULDN'T you put halberds in there? They would be present in some numbers. You'd be more justified in leaving out the command miniatures! |
Daniel S | 02 Dec 2014 8:20 p.m. PST |
Given the Swiss reputation as an army focused on pikes it is interesting to read the letters and documents left behind by the Swiss themselves. There are frequent, at times almost endless complaints about the lack of pikes and the all too abundant surplus of halberdiers. The Novara campaign of 1513 was the foremost example of this and the Swiss were forced to beg the Duke of Milan to supply them with pikes in order to make up at least some of the shortage. In particular the "free soldiers" who volunteered to serve without formal pay were prone to turning up with little more than a halberd and a Schweizerdegen. The "regular" formations raised by the Cantons and cities were better equiped but even among them a fair number of men who were supposed to serve as pikemen turned up with a halberd instead. And as Puster have already mentioned there were always some pikemen present, they were an essential part of what made the "pike block" work. Without halberdiers you lost the ability to defeat cavalry which broke into the formation, had no force capable of rapid movement nor an effective defensive line centered around the colours. |
olicana | 03 Dec 2014 4:03 a.m. PST |
The thrust of my argument is, I think, being lost in translation. I'm not saying that there were no halberdiers. I'm saying that except on rare occasions they didn't form separate units or even sub units. They were generally so tied to the pike formation that they should just be factored in as standard. If that is the case, and as the percentage is still quite low, why bother representing them at all outside a few figures at the flanks of some figure bases (but counting as pike for combat). I suppose it depends on how much detailed action you want to fight. I play quite big games where pike square A hits pike square B and a result of combat is required. Because there are so many other combats to resolve we don't want to be messing about with a few halberdiers moving and in combat as individual wargame figures. We assume, because that is how pike squares worked, that it is happening and it's factored into the overall result.
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olicana | 03 Dec 2014 6:58 a.m. PST |
Excellent looking kiel there, how many in it? And your wrong got to have some halbardiers to move to the flanks and up to the front to hack out the opposite pikes. My blocks do have the odd halberdier, even the odd 2 handed sword with the Landsknechts. But I don't bother with the nitty gritty of inter-unit organisation or tactics. There is very little known about how pike squares worked in reality – almost everything is historical speculation. I've been interested in this period for twenty years, I've even bought the odd book (my book shelf contains: link ) but, very little is actually known for sure. It just wasn't written about at the time. A shot of dopple types mixed in with the rank and file – pre basing tighter.
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Don Sebastian | 03 Dec 2014 7:34 a.m. PST |
Guys, is there any good book or thesis that tries to figure the "internal workings of the pikeblocks"? |
olicana | 03 Dec 2014 8:17 a.m. PST |
Guys, is there any good book or thesis that tries to figure the "internal workings of the pikeblocks"? Here's hoping…….. |
Daniel S | 03 Dec 2014 4:02 p.m. PST |
"There is very little known about how pike squares worked in reality – almost everything is historical speculation. I've been interested in this period for twenty years, I've even bought the odd book (my book shelf contains: link ) but, very little is actually known for sure. It just wasn't written about at the time." Actually there was a fair bit written about it at the time but the surviving manuscripts do contain gaps and the odd contradiction. (Not to mention the problems caused the passage if time which have left more than one text faded or damaged in the most inconvenient places) The problem is that using the manuscripts for research require not only being able to read 16th C handwriting and the language in question but you also have to have the right connections to gain access to the manuscripts. (And the later could be quite hard unless one had the right academic status & connections.) Still at least a couple of German historians have written books that at least provide a partial look at the subject such as Volker Schmidtchen's "Kriegswesen im späten Mittelalter" which despite it's title provides detailed descriptions of several tactical manuals from the late 15th and early 16th Centuries. In the last few years however a lot of older manuscripts have been published in digital form by German libraries, the Bavarians in particular have been making an impressive effort to put the conten of their State library's collection of old texts online. |
khurasanminiatures | 04 Dec 2014 6:17 a.m. PST |
Quite true Daniel and you don't even need to read German to read some of it! Delbruck has a wonderful review of the period sources which went into considerable detail about pike column tactics. And he's been translated of course. I think the fact that the halberds were behind the pikes doesn't make them at all irrelevant from the perspective of representation. That's why our early 16th C Swiss infantry are made so that they can be depicted holding either the pike or halberd. Interestingly the Halberdiers are more popular! (I think that's because people use them to depict Empire troops to play WFB in 15mm.) True that most rules systems just blob them all in together but that's a shame. If two large pike blocks collide and begin to push, and one has Halberdiers to come forth whilst the other doesn't, it seems clear which one should have an advantage. |
Midlander65 | 04 Dec 2014 3:30 p.m. PST |
As a comment to khurusanminiatures I'd suggest another reason for people choosing halberds is that they will use wire pikes anyway and a load of spare cast halberds will be useful for other figures, markers and camps. At least, that was why I did. |