Pikeman

*This is about Kingdom Two Crowns.*
#Spearman

* Idle
* Walk
* Thrust

A **pikeman**, like a ninja in Shogun, is a temporary military and productive subject that can be hired in Europe and Dead Lands.

He fishes on the riverside during the day and helps defending the walls at night.

A pikeman cannot travel with the Monarch when leaving the island.

## Hiring

#Pike  #Spear

## Pike vendor

### Unlocked at

Stone fortifications
+ stone back wall

### Operated by

Pikeman

The pike vendor is required to hire **pikemen**.
This vendor requires a stone or iron back wall on his sector.
There can be two of them on a Kingdom, one on each side.
The first one generally appears after two stone walls have been built on each side of the town (four walls total).
With the expansion of the Kingdom, the pike stand changes its location to be as near the outer wall as possible, always requiring a stone or iron wall behind it.

A pike can be purchased there for two coins each.
Up to four pikes can be waiting on the weapon stand at a time.
If a villager picks up a pike, he is assigned to being a pikeman.

Like knights and ninjas, a pikeman will protect the side of the town where he has been hired.

Each pike can be used for fishing or stabbing greed a limited amount of times, after which the weapon breaks and the pikeman returns to be a common villager. The fish they catch during the day more than pays for one pike, making them economical.

## Defending

Like other military subjects at the sunset, the pikemen run to protect the outer walls on both sides.

### First pike

On each side, only one pikeman pierce the Greed through the wall. As long as the greedlings are there, this pikeman will stab until his pike breaks. If there are more pikemen at that side, up to three others stand waiting in a row for their time to engage, as soon as the first man's weapon deteriorates.

### Pikes formation

More pikemen will also be organized in groups of eight men per wall: if there is too many at a wall, the rest will set up at the wall behind; if there's too many there as well, they will continue to on each will until the closest wall to the town center.
At the wall, those groups of four pikemen have a very distinct angle at which they point their pike.

* The foremost pikemen thrusts his spear through the wall.
* The pikeman behind him tilts his pike at a 65° angle in the air, and will also attack enemies at the wall.
* The third one tilts his pike at a 90° angle from the ground.
* And the last pikeman tilts theirs backwards a bit, similar to the second pike, but in opposition.

They are good defenders against floaters and crown stealers thanks to the pikemen positioned behind the first one, guarding the top of the wall with their pikes in the air. If crown stealers jump over the wall, the pikemen behind the first can jab at them.

### Damage

A pikeman thrust has an area of effect damaging by one hit point many greedlings at the reach of the pike. This means that a large group tier one greedlings bunching up at the wall vanishes at the first pikeman blow. This ability fills a relevant gap left by the ballistic units (archers, catapults and ballista towers), which couldn't hit targets too close to the wall, especially the tier four tall stone wall.

### Pike durability

Pikes have a durability based on the number of greedlings killed. If greeds approach sparsely, pikemen will perform multiple hits before their weapons disappear. If greedlings press against the wall in dense groups though, pikemen will kill a great number of them in a single thrust, after which the pikes break unavoidably. So, the pike durability is tied to the number of creatures killed and not to the number of thrusts performed.

In any case, pikemen are not only military units.

## Fishing

Once the morning bell rings announcing a new day, the pikemen start their profitable activity. While archers hunt deer and rabbits with their bows, pikemen use their pike to catch fish from dawn to dusk. They can do it inside or outside the walls perimeter, but never too far from the town center or the walls.

They sell each fish right after catching it for one coin, and drop the coin at the fishing spot. The coins can then be picked up by the Pikeman, other subjects, or the Monarch.

Fish do not disappear nor diminish with the winter, and the fishing activity becomes a good source of income during this season.

Fishing does not affect the pike durability.

## Appearance

They wear medieval style helmets, a metal chest plate and wield an incredibly long pike more than twice their size made of stone or iron.

## History

>
>
>
> | “
>  | In *Two Crowns* we've added a new citizen which is a pikeman.
> So basically their role is to really defend and protect the wall.
> Because what ended up happening, the way the behavior of the greed, they kind of collect against the wall.
> And your archers kind of had bad aim, so they would often hit the wall or it would bounce off.
> And it just kind of became frustrating.
> So we like to try and solve issues within the game, if possible, with smart gameplay features.
>  | „
>
>

In *Two Crowns* we've added a new citizen which is a pikeman.
So basically their role is to really defend and protect the wall.
Because what ended up happening, the way the behavior of the greed, they kind of collect against the wall.
And your archers kind of had bad aim, so they would often hit the wall or it would bounce off.
And it just kind of became frustrating.

So we like to try and solve issues within the game, if possible, with smart gameplay features.

 2019-02-04
 2018-12-19
 2018-12-11
 Introduced.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Game director Gordon on Q&A livestream. *Youtube*. 24 July 2018.