"Pike and Shot - Best represented combined?" Topic

Followed a discussion some time ago about how to represent best Pike and Shot troops on the battlefield, with people arguing those should never be represented as different units/stands/elements but rather as one integrated entity.

I wonder from what time approx. this integrated approach should or could be followed? Surely that approach needed time to be developed, or not? I'd guess that in late 15th or early 16th century both troop types would act rather independently, although in mutual support of course.

How would you represent Bill and Bow? Just the same as Pike and Shot? Where there integrated Crossbow/Hallberd/Pike units like later Pike and Shot?

There are valid arguments in favour of both positions and to a certain extent it depends on which level of action one wants to simulate.

Pike & shot units were not static, there is a lot of movement going on in the battalion/brigade as it carries out even basic duties like movement. At least in professional armies the formation could be altered depending on the situation.

As an example this is the 6 basic formations of the Swedish infantry squadron (a battalion sized unit)

Not exactly a static unit is it? And the "Swedish brigade" was made up of 3-4 of those

Another example is Snayers painting of the battle of Honnecourt 1642

You not only see pike & shot units line up in the "classic" formation with pikes in the middle but you also have battalions who have advanced 1/2 of their wings of shot while engaging in a firefight with the enemy and in the middle musketeers are advancing as skirmishers up the ridge to take the eartworks under fire.

And armies would separate their pike and shot if needed musketeer squadrons by detaching 500 men from each brigade when the terrain proved too difficult for the use of the entire brigade. At Nördlingen the Spanish commanders detached much of the shot from the Italian and Burgundian units waiting in reserve and sent it as reinforcements to the Albuch hill. An ECW example would be Adwalton Moor were the Royalists sent their musketeers forward to fight in the hedged while the pikemen remained behind in the open terrain.

If I were doing battles with two or three units on a table then maybe I'd have the shot more mobile around the pike.

I play in 10mm though with more units than that on the table and it really just works out better for my games to assume that the shot are moving around into the best spots for them. If they get charged and do badly in the melee then that means they weren't as quick as they should have been in getting into that position that would have been best for whatever it was.

It is abstracted but feels a lot less fiddly to me and I'd prefer to see the bigger picture, commanding as the general not the colonel.

I mostly agree with pictors. if you are wanting to play with a brigade or less on the table, then havinga battalia represented by independent pike or shotte elements make sense.

if you are planning to represent anything higher then a single brigade, then going with one "element" per battalia(albeit maybe with 2 or 3 different formations) would probably be the way to go.

Nice discussion
Thanks lads
Clif

I have struggled with the same question when it came to representing tercios, whether to break them up into smaller sub-units instead of one massive unit. The game scale works against doing this unless you develop your own rule set to deal with the tactics of big unit integrity based on the status of it's sub-units.

I think regardless of era or troop types the answer comes down to what type of game you want to play. I don't see why you would use one method for mixed troop types when you are dealing with crossbows and heavily armored pike and another when dealing with matchlock muskets and minimally armored pike.

A fairly low level game, it would make some sense to have the individual elements operate as separate entities.

I prefer to play at a high level and have no problem representing a mixed unit as a single entity.

Interesting post.

This question, about how the formations worked in detail, is exactly what the period is about for me. The move from arquebus to musket, etc, is relevant, but it is not crucial.
All the technology features are part of the story, but implementing those features and transitioning from the medieval approach to the linear approach of the late 17th century, is what really defines this period.

And I think, no matter what "level" of game you are playing, this question should impact your games, otherwise you risk missing the point.

Surely the point is putting your toys on the table and having a great game with your friends?

Cheers
Ian

Thank you for your input, Gentlemen.

Daniel, very interesting information (and a nice picture, anyway), I just read somewhere else that 17th century infantry was not sooo badly trainded/efficient after all, and the possible variantions in formation (if they were more than an ideal but used in real life) confirm that view.

Bill, seems like I will go your way. Regardless of the way I will approach that question, I will do it consistently for earlier and later troops/armies.