Spears are weak.

[dealman]

...perks still not working as of 1.3.0, btw.

**sigh** so much for my hopes of seeing Push Back/Keep at Bay in action. **rolls eyes**

They aren't gonna work for a while because they're re-working the whole perk system instead. Your best bet would be to use the community patch mod.

 

[King Yngvar]

The problem with spears is that they are not a physical object in the game world. They are magical objects that just come into existence once you release left click. Horses can run into them and take no damage at all. A sort of couched lance damage reversed using the speed of the horse coming towards the spear could work.

 

[chiconspiracy]

That's rather peculiar because I tried his spear mod and also got the supposed dependency, some troop collision mod. For me they really didn't improve too much against cavalry, they still got absolutely steamrolled. Maybe using square formation isn't the best tactic - how did you fight 'em?

Personally I dunno if I agree that they should be more effective against infantry. Sure I think their minimum distance should be reduced, or even removed entirely. Damage I think it's fine as even a T3 spear deals a nice chunk of damage if you stab them in the face.

I quite like the concept of units countering one another instead of attempting to rely entirely on realism or historical accuracy.

I'm not really sure why you want to decrease damage towards cavalry? Cavalry is already vastly overpowered(rightfully so) and reducing spearmen's effectiveness against horses would make them far, far more powerful.

The way I modify the damage is by making my own MissionBehaviour which inherits from MissionLogic class. Then I just override OnScoreHit to track whenever an agent was hit and I can get all kinds of juicy data from there.

The better way would probably be to make your own damage model, though. Since my damage is hidden, for example it may say you did 27 damage to a horse but in fact did like 40 or 50 or so.

But it's solely for testing purposes at the moment so will switch to a damage model later. But yes, that is very much possible to do.

Damage is not fine... it's nonsensical, and spears were used against INFANTRY in real life, even by people who also had swords.

The BASE damage of a spear is equal or even lower than a sword that should weight 1/3rd as much... that is complete bull****. Then you add the fact that cuts achieve a considerable amount of that base damage even if they hit very shortly in the attack window, while thrusts can be interrupted for for single digit or even ZERO damage at close range. Then you have the fact that the spear point has to land practically dead center during the correct portion of its attack animation, or it looses massive amounts of damage from that as well. I've literally stabbed a bare headed looter in the eye and got 10 damage. Stab the heart instead of the sternum? Same thing.

 

[Mastigos]

Damage is not fine... it's nonsensical, and spears were used against INFANTRY in real life, even by people who also had swords.

The BASE damage of a spear is equal or even lower than a sword that should weight 1/3rd as much... that is complete bull****. Then you add the fact that cuts achieve a considerable amount of that base damage even if they hit very shortly in the attack window, while thrusts can be interrupted for for single digit or even ZERO damage at close range. Then you have the fact that the spear point has to land practically dead center during the correct portion of its attack animation, or it looses massive amounts of damage from that as well. I've literally stabbed a bare headed looter in the eye and got 10 damage. Stab the heart instead of the sternum? Same thing.

The longer the spear, the more important momentum becomes.

Spears were used in infantry combat, but they were primarily used in formation. They're not the kind of weapon you want to run off and 1v1 someone with. Which is why spearmen almost always carried a sword, mace, or axe when they had a spear.

Again: spears are an anti-cav weapon, that also happens to work far better on horseback than a sword, axe, mace, etc
It's alright if you want the spear to be the end-all, be-all weapon, but I don't believe TW devs share your desire to imbalance their game.

Spears already have a hugely important place in the grand scheme of combat. And they do their job well.

TLDR: spear are fine.

 

[bm01]

Except that spears aren't even good against cavalry (in-game, I mean).

 

[Lord Irontoe]

The longer the spear, the more important momentum becomes.

Spears were used in infantry combat, but they were primarily used in formation. They're not the kind of weapon you want to run off and 1v1 someone with. Which is why spearmen almost always carried a sword, mace, or axe when they had a spear.

Again: spears are an anti-cav weapon, that also happens to work far better on horseback than a sword, axe, mace, etc
It's alright if you want the spear to be the end-all, be-all weapon, but I don't believe TW devs share your desire to imbalance their game.

Spears already have a hugely important place in the grand scheme of combat. And they do their job well.

TLDR: spear are fine.

Spears are NOT fine. Not by a longshot. Its fine if TW wants to keep most spears as thrust-only even though anything shorter than a pike should be very effective at swinging cuts. But if that's the case, then spears can only do one thing, thrusting, and they do that worse than even a one-handed sword, which violates the laws of physics. Thats ridiculous and unbalanced. A swinging polearm can do well over 200 damage but one that's designed solely for stabbing, backed by a heavy oak shaft can only manage around 45 at best? How is that balanced?

People have a lot of weird ideas that spears were some kind of second class weapon for poor peasants who couldn't afford anything better. Thats simply untrue. For centuries, spears were the supreme weapon of war because they dominated the other weapon types.

 

[Jagati Khan]

If i had bothered looking i would have found this thread instead of making a seperate one about lances lol
I find it pretty annoying that my lance barely extends beyond the horses head making it utterly pointless as it negates one of the biggest strengths of the lance its reach.
Down to the fact that it is being held centre mass which is completely wrong.

 

[chiconspiracy]

The longer the spear, the more important momentum becomes.

Spears were used in infantry combat, but they were primarily used in formation. They're not the kind of weapon you want to run off and 1v1 someone with. Which is why spearmen almost always carried a sword, mace, or axe when they had a spear.

Again: spears are an anti-cav weapon, that also happens to work far better on horseback than a sword, axe, mace, etc
It's alright if you want the spear to be the end-all, be-all weapon, but I don't believe TW devs share your desire to imbalance their game.

Spears already have a hugely important place in the grand scheme of combat. And they do their job well.

TLDR: spear are fine.

Yeah... wouldn't want a spear for a duel... except these knights who have been trained in combat practically since they could walk... but what do they know?

You realize shorter spears are good not just in a formation right? Melee combat masters light George Silver considered a polearm of the "perfect length" (about 7 feet tall) to be superior to both one handed and two handed swords, as well as the sword and shield, even in a one on one duel.

Artwork and literature from the Greek heroic age (when duels were common and authors would have known how to wield both.) show two combatants retaining their spear while wearing a sword on their hip... not just dropping the spear and grabbing the sword.

Hannibal's Libyan spearmen used a spear that was under 7 feet long (according to Polybius), and they massacred many times their number of Roman pilum+swordsman.

Two handed spears should be MUCH, much faster than swords. Their speed of point thanks to superior leverage meant even Samurai police used short yari (as short as 4 feet long) over their katana for close quarters fighting, and they preferred a regular sized yari even for one on one combat in the open.

 

[Spooky7]

i think Spears are designed to take advantage of the Speed, Spears are especially strong against Horses that Charge u(one hitting Horse or the Rider) and u can with a good spear or lance oneshot enemy from a long distance with a good Horse almost everytime, when u got a couched lance u oneshot like 99% of the time.

but 1v1 in tournaments, yaaa... they could need some more damage.

 

[Jagati Khan]

The longer the spear, the more important momentum becomes.

Spears were used in infantry combat, but they were primarily used in formation. They're not the kind of weapon you want to run off and 1v1 someone with. Which is why spearmen almost always carried a sword, mace, or axe when they had a spear.

Again: spears are an anti-cav weapon, that also happens to work far better on horseback than a sword, axe, mace, etc
It's alright if you want the spear to be the end-all, be-all weapon, but I don't believe TW devs share your desire to imbalance their game.

Spears already have a hugely important place in the grand scheme of combat. And they do their job well.

TLDR: spear are fine.

 

[sjblack2014]

If i had bothered looking i would have found this thread instead of making a seperate one about lances lol
I find it pretty annoying that my lance barely extends beyond the horses head making it utterly pointless as it negates one of the biggest strengths of the lance its reach.
Down to the fact that it is being held centre mass which is completely wrong.

You can mod the game so you hold the weapon at a point further back, however, that's not a good enough solution, since a couched lance would have less reach than a thrusting lance/spear no matter what.

What would be a good mod (and I'm trying to make it) is to have you hold the lance further out ONLY when it's couched, thus giving you the reach advantage that matches the reach of the active thrust. This is realistic as the act of couching allows you to bring much more of the shaft forward than if you were to hold it normally.

Another solution is to make knightly lances with huge reach like in your picture but make them couch-only, as in unable to thrust.

 

[Jagati Khan]

You can mod the game so you hold the weapon at a point further back, however, that's not a good enough solution, since a couched lance would have less reach than a thrusting lance/spear no matter what.

What would be a good mod (and I'm trying to make it) is to have you hold the lance further out ONLY when it's couched, thus giving you the reach advantage that matches the reach of the active thrust. This is realistic as the act of couching allows you to bring much more of the shaft forward than if you were to hold it normally.

Another solution is to make knightly lances with huge reach like in your picture but make them couch-only, as in unable to thrust.

Lances were much longer than the vast majority of spears but shorter than pikes your second solution is how lances should be.
Once on foot you switch to your secondary weapon the way lances were weighted you wouldn't want to use it on foot.
In the OP the 2nd line of pictures the one on the right is not a spear it is a pike.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pike_(weapon) You can see that image here with its description.
Should also add a pike is unwieldy and was a formation weapon a spear being shorter could be used in individual combat aswell as formations.

 

[Mastigos]

For centuries, spears were the supreme weapon of war because they dominated the other weapon types.

Melee combat masters light George Silver considered a polearm of the "perfect length" (about 7 feet tall) to be superior to both one handed and two handed swords, as well as the sword and shield, even in a one on one duel.

Yeah, I thought that this would turn into some kind of weird "which weapon is best" scenario. The entire thread had, from the start, some odd undertones of favoritism and crying about desired imbalance under the guise of "realism" or some such nonsense.

1) This is a game. This game contains combat. Games, by design, seek balance - especially games with PvP in them. But even single player games should have balanced combat in them.
As I said before, spears are great on horseback. They are also great again horses, because they cause a horse to rear up. I'd had formations of spearmen cause a mass cav charge stop cold. No other weapon can do that.
Glaives are the best weapon against a horseman who has been stopped, but spears are hands-down the best weapon against a cav unit in a full speed charge.

This being established, spears should not be equal to swords/axes/maces against infantry. Weapons don't get to have enhanced effects against cav and still be equal to weapons that are far worse against cav. That's the very definition of imbalance.

And yes, anyone who has ever played this games combat knows that spears are way better against cav than a sword or axe.

2) Quoting random historical figures means very little. I can reference Miyamoto Musashi -- who fought over 60 deathmatches in his life, and never lost a single one -- and say that dual wielding katanas >> spears, as he himself said (dual wielding > all) and backed that up with amazing results. Yet how much does that change your mind? Exactly.

Again, spears have very strong niche uses. They're never going to be, and should not be, as strong as swords or axes at infantry combat. Just as swords and axes are never going to be as strong as spears against cav or used by cav.

 

[sjblack2014]

Again, spears have very strong niche uses. They're never going to be, and should not be, as strong as swords or axes at infantry combat. Just as swords and axes are never going to be as strong as spears against cav or used by cav.

This is terrible logic. On the battlefield the spear is king, it is better than swords or axes against infantry. Swords are niche secondary weapons used in other situations, like when you lose your spear, when indoors, in a city, etc.

One on one unarmored duel wise, sword+shield is superior to spear+shield, but sword without shield is worse than spear without shield.

Your balance shouldn't come from cav>sword inf>spear inf>cav. It should come from other sources, such as tactics, formations, positioning, etc.

 

[chiconspiracy]

Yeah, I thought that this would turn into some kind of weird "which weapon is best" scenario. The entire thread had, from the start, some odd undertones of favoritism and crying about desired imbalance under the guise of "realism" or some such nonsense.

1) This is a game. This game contains combat. Games, by design, seek balance - especially games with PvP in them. But even single player games should have balanced combat in them.
As I said before, spears are great on horseback. They are also great again horses, because they cause a horse to rear up. I'd had formations of spearmen cause a mass cav charge stop cold. No other weapon can do that.
Glaives are the best weapon against a horseman who has been stopped, but spears are hands-down the best weapon against a cav unit in a full speed charge.

This being established, spears should not be equal to swords/axes/maces against infantry. Weapons don't get to have enhanced effects against cav and still be equal to weapons that are far worse against cav. That's the very definition of imbalance.

And yes, anyone who has ever played this games combat knows that spears are way better against cav than a sword or axe.

2) Quoting random historical figures means very little. I can reference Miyamoto Musashi -- who fought over 60 deathmatches in his life, and never lost a single one -- and say that dual wielding katanas >> spears, as he himself said (dual wielding > all) and backed that up with amazing results. Yet how much does that change your mind? Exactly.

Again, spears have very strong niche uses. They're never going to be, and should not be, as strong as swords or axes at infantry combat. Just as swords and axes are never going to be as strong as spears against cav or used by cav.

1) By your logic, why don't we make daggers do more damage and severely outclass both one and two handed swords too? They'll be especially useless against cavalry, and still have a reach disadvantage against swords and axes, so that will fulfill your desire for balance.

I'd be happy for spears to lose any bonus damage against cavalry (and penalties for those used by cavalry) if they behaved somewhat effectively against infantry, which is what they were used to fight in reality the vast majority of the time.

2) Yeah... who cares about history in a game utilizing historical arms and armor in a gritty, realistic setting? And nice try, but Musashi said the spear (yari) is the king of the open battlefield, seconded by the naginata.... You might also want to realize that Musashi hardly fought in any real battles due to the peaceful era he lived in, and STILL said that. It's not just "random historical figures", the evidence that spears and other polearms were the preferred weapons of the warrior elite (with a sword as a backup weapon) from western knights and vikings to samurai is overwhelming.

Ah right, but maybe you don't care about history? We've been very clear that spears in this game are not just historically inaccurate but imbalanced RUBBISH. They are pathetically slow, even in two hands, they have limited attack angles, and swords magically thrust with more force contrary to all logic and reason. They also can do SINGLE DIGIT damage if you stab at someone and hit them in the eye rather than the center of the face, while swords can do massive cutting damage even at the beginning of a swing. They are also completely useless in a shield wall (where they should be the most dangerous due to mutual support) due to collision, as the AI keeps interrupting each other constantly.

 

[Mastigos]

1) By your logic, why don't we make daggers do more damage and severely outclass both one and two handed swords too? They'll be especially useless against cavalry, and still have a reach disadvantage against swords and axes, so that will fulfill your desire for balance.

I'd be happy for spears to lose any bonus damage against cavalry (and penalties for those used by cavalry) if they behaved somewhat effectively against infantry, which is what they were used to fight in reality the vast majority of the time.

2) Yeah... who cares about history in a game utilizing historical arms and armor in a gritty, realistic setting? And nice try, but Musashi said the spear (yari) is the king of the open battlefield, seconded by the naginata.... You might also want to realize that Musashi hardly fought in any real battles due to the peaceful era he lived in, and STILL said that. It's not just "random historical figures", the evidence that spears and other polearms were the preferred weapons of the warrior elite (with a sword as a backup weapon) from western knights and vikings to samurai is overwhelming.

Ah right, but maybe you don't care about history? We've been very clear that spears in this game are not just historically inaccurate but imbalanced RUBBISH. They are pathetically slow, even in two hands, they have limited attack angles, and swords magically thrust with more force contrary to all logic and reason. They also can do SINGLE DIGIT damage if you stab at someone and hit them in the eye rather than the center of the face, while swords can do massive cutting damage even at the beginning of a swing. They are also completely useless in a shield wall (where they should be the most dangerous due to mutual support) due to collision, as the AI keeps interrupting each other constantly.

Musashi lived almost half his life in the Japanese "Warring States" era. It is said he participated in the losing side of the battle which ended that era - which would mean he did, in fact, have experience in a large-scale battle. Not that he would need it to know what the hell he is talking about. (60 duels proves he knew a lot more about combat than pretty much anyone he came in contact with, and pretty much everyone he didn't meet as well.) He also said nothing about the yara or naginata... although he did defeat a yara specialist in a duel.

However, I did come across this when reading a treatise on Musashi:
"Likewise, halberds and spears were specialized weapons, primarily for fighting in formation and especially for dismounting and anti-cavalry actions."

Which sounds close to exactly what I've been saying all along.

The more you guys talk, the more obvious it becomes that you're actually spear fanboys (which I had no idea existed before a few weeks ago) and want that particular weapon to be overpowered. And you base this on a skewed and inaccurate view of history.
(No, the spear isn't "king of the battlefield" and no, Musashi never made a statement about yara or naginata being the best battlefield weapons.)

I can only hope any mods who read this see your opinions as the biased spear-worship that it has become.

P.S. as for your mini-rant about daggers: they're not designed as a primary battlefield weapon, while swords/axes/spears/maces/bows/crossbows etc are all considered candidates for primary battlefield weapon. But to quote you: nice try.

 

[kweassa]

The longer the spear, the more important momentum becomes.

Spears were used in infantry combat, but they were primarily used in formation. They're not the kind of weapon you want to run off and 1v1 someone with. Which is why spearmen almost always carried a sword, mace, or axe when they had a spear.

A bit of a misconception.

The primary reason spears were usually used in formation, was because when not in formation spears were simply cumbersome to carry around -- ie. outside of war-time, where one would take part in such formations, the spear was a very cumbersome tool to carry around for a lot of obvious reasons. When someone would carry around a spear, when that someone wasn't a part of a mustered army, during peace-time, it draws attention -- in the same way a person carrying around a shield when not in wartime, that was not a part of the guard forces, would draw attention.

In formation or no, spears were the primary weapon.

Again: spears are an anti-cav weapon, that also happens to work far better on horseback than a sword, axe, mace, etc
It's alright if you want the spear to be the end-all, be-all weapon, but I don't believe TW devs share your desire to imbalance their game.

Spears were simply a universal weapon to fight against whatever the enemy.

A decisive example? Greeks -- entirely spearmen in formation. The classical Greeks did not use cavalry at all.

In other words, the spear actually WAS an end-all be-all weapon. In terms of efficiency, as well as actual combat prowess be it in formation or 1v1.

Spears already have a hugely important place in the grand scheme of combat. And they do their job well.

TLDR: spear are fine.

They are not fine.

The element that makes a spear a spear, is the range advantage it has over other weapons.

In the game, no other weapon loses its essence so easily. The very fact that most people give up thrusting spears and rely on swinging weapons if they want to use polearms as main, is because swinging weapons do not lose their essence as easily. The very fact that you need to build a character with very high athletics, to do well with thrusting spears, is also because that the spear loses the range advantage so easily, that they have to compensate and "simulate" the range advantage by back-pedaling faster than the enemy can advance.

I am totally willing to wait until the perks "Push Back" and "Keep at Bay" start working to see if things are remedied, but even if those perks start working, it's preposterous in the way a main, fundamental advantage of the weapon is stripped away and thrown in as a perk.

Imagine a scenario, where your bow only fires up to 10m distance. And in order for you to shoot further, requires you to skill up over 100. That's the predicament the spears are in right now. (Actually, have been in since MB1)

 

[dealman]

If i had bothered looking i would have found this thread instead of making a seperate one about lances lol
I find it pretty annoying that my lance barely extends beyond the horses head making it utterly pointless as it negates one of the biggest strengths of the lance its reach.
Down to the fact that it is being held centre mass which is completely wrong.

Personally I think couched lances are perfectly fine, if their range were to be extended and their massive damage kept as-is, they would become ridiculously overpowered.

Cavalry already reign supreme in Captain and Skirmish modes. Couched lances take some kind of skill and thought to use now as you can't blindly charge into spearmen, you have to catch them unaware or hit them at an angle.

So long as you don't go blindly charging into spearmen from the front, the lance is by far the best weapon in the game as it very reliably one-hit kills everything.

Hell, I think couched lances should have a durability meter similar to that of shields simply because of how strong they are. Since cavalry can just do hit and runs with it indefinitely. It's so ridiculously overpowered that one Vlandia Knight/Khuzait Lancer player in Captain mode can single-handedly kill half the enemy team.

And then look at Skirmish where lancers are readily available from the get-go. Those that are decently skilled with them will very, very easily get 4+ kills in the first round.

So no, I very strongly disagree that their range needs to be buffed.

That said, that's for MP. As for SP I don't really know nor care since there's so much combined arms going on anyway.

 

[Jagati Khan]

Personally I think couched lances are perfectly fine, if their range were to be extended and their massive damage kept as-is, they would become ridiculously overpowered.

Cavalry already reign supreme in Captain and Skirmish modes. Couched lances take some kind of skill and thought to use now as you can't blindly charge into spearmen, you have to catch them unaware or hit them at an angle.

So long as you don't go blindly charging into spearmen from the front, the lance is by far the best weapon in the game as it very reliably one-hit kills everything.

Hell, I think couched lances should have a durability meter similar to that of shields simply because of how strong they are. Since cavalry can just do hit and runs with it indefinitely. It's so ridiculously overpowered that one Vlandia Knight/Khuzait Lancer player in Captain mode can single-handedly kill half the enemy team.

And then look at Skirmish where lancers are readily available from the get-go. Those that are decently skilled with them will very, very easily get 4+ kills in the first round.

So no, I very strongly disagree that their range needs to be buffed.

That said, that's for MP. As for SP I don't really know nor care since there's so much combined arms going on anyway.

They can leave MP alone for balance i don't play it i am talking about for single player and currently lances are ridiculously short.
If the lance was at least held correctly it would be far less of an issue and they would not have to extend them.
And for all the spear waffle i think people are forgetting that spears come in a variety of lengths.
A spear for individual combat ideal length is between 4 and 6ft anything above that is too unwieldy and better used in formation.

 

[dealman]

They can leave MP alone for balance i don't play it i am talking about for single player and currently lances are ridiculously short.
If the lance was at least held correctly it would be far less of an issue and they would not have to extend them.
And for all the spear waffle i think people are forgetting that spears come in a variety of lengths.
A spear for individual combat ideal length is between 4 and 6ft anything above that is too unwieldy and better used in formation.

While I agree SP and MP balance would benefit from being separate, that's probably a wee bit too much for TW to keep track of.

I still do however wholeheartedly agree that lances are in need of a buff in any way, shape or form. If anything maybe the AI could use some improvements in terms of their ability to charge.