On Warriors and Soldiers

Would it be better to have an army of warriors of superb individual skill fighting individually or an army of soldiers of marginal skill always fighting as a cohesive unit?

Taking out factors such skill of commanders, tactical blunders and that sort of thing, who would be a victor if two such armies came to blows?

Originally posted by Paul It would take 200 men 20 minutes to learn to use a spear and 200 hundred different men 20 years to master a sword. In a unit v unit scrap the spearmen would triumph.

so the soldier in your opinion huh? but hey warriors don't nescessarily have to use swords they could use anything they had on hand

I always go for the smaller force, irrigardless of how trained they are comparitively.  Mobility is my key factor, speed and unconventionality, perhpas I would do better with the elite warriors.  Nonetheless I agree that a well made formation of pikemen is better than any master swordsmen in an open battle.

Originally posted by Tobodai I always go for the smaller force, irrigardless of how trained they are comparitively.  Mobility is my key factor, speed and unconventionality, perhpas I would do better with the elite warriors.  Nonetheless I agree that a well made formation of pikemen is better than any master swordsmen in an open battle.

What about Roman legionaries vanquishing the Macedonian phalanx at Pydna, etc?

 

What about Spanish rodeleros doing the same to Swiss pikemen at Barletta?

Or their mauling of German landsknechts (in French pay) at Ravenna?

Or the fact that, even at the end of the 16th century, one prominent military writer commented that targetiers were "mortal to pikemen"?

Edited by Landsknecht_Doppelsoldner

I think I'd goi with dicipline over individual fighting skills. Medieval knights were superb warriors, but in quite many battles(Nicopole is the one of the best example) they were outclassed by an inferior force through tactics and cohesion.

As for spearmen vs. swordsmen: swordsmen would beat spearmen any day, by flanking moves, but if we talk about swordsmen+cavalry vs. spearmen+cavalry I would go with the spearmen(with protected flanks they are almost unstoppable)

Indeed. I assume most people think of trained warriors as swordsmen because:

1.It takes a lot more time and practice to become proficient with a sword than with other types of melle weapons.

2. Sword is probably the most versatile(and efficent overall) melle weapon avilable.

 The celts in gaul had better cohesion than most people think, at one battle they wher caught between 2 roman armies, the celts stood on a ridge and form two 4ranked sheild walls back to back to romans had to retire becasue they could never have pushed to Gallic warriors off the ridge and they couldnt break the formation, als the celts where all chanting similtanouesly and it sh*t the romans up