Phalanx300 said:
When you are facing a shieldwall from the front (Seeing the guy with the shield in front of you just died) without a shield your as good as dead. How do you block multiple strikes? There's a reason that pictures show shieldwalls with shields.
And Reenacting as nice as it looks and fun as it might be, are more portraying the smaller scale battles where second line spear buddy would be pretty usefull. Rather then the full scale battles I'm talking about.
... you're outside of the reach of the man who just killed your friend, seeing as you're a pace further back. And you can remain there- fighting with a long-reach weapon. You can sidestep slightly, and deflect with the spear, and step back. And yes- shieldwalls do show shields. And there's a reason that more and more long-hafted two handed weapons are pictured behind them, especially in later period documents, and that the mass of polearms eventually forced the shieldwall out of history.
... and I'm not sure what you think of medieval warfare. Most combat was skirmishing- most nobility avoided direct army-to-army clashes, given their expense and their relative risk level. Most of the time the warfare was economic- destroying the enemy sources of food and wealth, and then laying a siege when they are forced back to strongholds. The average clash was less than a hundred aside- pitched battles were the exception, not the norm.
Reenactment is also the closest you will get to simulating the form of the combat, and highlight the physical limitations of the gear and the formation. Intrestingly enough, if you were correct, there should be no dane-axes, early bills or two-handed weapons pre-1300. As long as there is a skin of shield-bearers on the front line, the formation can hold. If you've got a weapon that allows you to fight from a pace or two outside of your opponent's reach, and you've got someone covering you to the front right and front left, who do you think is going to kill you? And how many people trying to kill you do you think you can prevent with a spear and shield?
However, to illustrate the point- the gap...
OOOOOO OOOOO
OOOOOOXOOOOO
'X' is our two-handed spearman. Now- the combatant to his front has died. Whoever killed him is either at spear's length (no immediate threat to X) or at shortarm's length (sword, sax, axe, etc.)- if so, he's close enough to also be fighting the left and right hand partner of the man he killed, leaving X to thrust him backwards, aiming blows at his head or feet with his spear. If it's a one-handed spear, X can edge forward half-a-pace, and make some shots at people just outside of reach using a longer spear (which two hands makes possible). So the idea that because his shield isn't slung on his arm, X is dead, isn't really borne out by battlefield physics.
And Azrooh- I know, to an extent, that the engine makes it clunky- hence questioning how it would translate- but the staggered line does work; I think the problem is you're envisioning the centre of the line. You do briefly (in the front rank) have to fight two opponents. But the whole concept is you tie two people up. This means when your second rank advance, your enemy is off-balance for the sudden switch. It also means in a standard two-line compact fight, your line is longer, and has more 'lapping' to the flanks- and allows your second rank more mobility to enter the front-line conflict. It generally works best with lighter troops who are pacing forward, striking, and pacing back- skirmishers more than grinders- think 12th C Welshmen rather than 9th C Danes.
For interest, though, the formation above is born from fighting to win- but I agree, it does take a degree of training and co-ordination, but so would most of the things I suggest- reenactment of course means a lot of training time with the same old comrades, so formations that you practise become second nature and well-drilled. I'd be intrigued to see how it would translate, at all... but there is the simple problem that a front ranker cannot 'block' diagonally effectively in-game... or bind, or pressure for that matter.
Banned
