I was reading in the WOTR section and someone mentioned how the Greeks used shields to balance their pikes as do the Easterlings.

Do you guys think the Easterlings were based around the Greeks?
I thought models needed both hands to hold the pike? e.g. Uruk-hai or Men-at-Arms(?) Are the Easterlings exceptions?
I'd like to hear your comments.

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The Greeks never used pikes, just one-handed spears. As for the Easterlings, GW just wanted a rule to represent their close unit cohesion depicted in the film, several were thought of and this is what they ended up with. The models don't even have pikes!

I think the easterlings are mostly inspired by the Samurai rather than greeks, especially their helmets. Although it is only for some of them, not all of it. Khandish models are very similar to Korean/Mongol type armies.

You are right, the Greeks never used pikes. My mistake, I mixed them up with the Macedonians. However, Alexander the Great's made good use of the pike (sarissa) with a small shield strapped to their forearm.

In any case, I believe the Easterlings are based more on a blend of armies. The Easterlings use a scale armour which has only been used by the Romans and the Samurai. Their phalanx special rule makes them more of a Macedonian style of infantry fighting. Their cavalry resembles the kataphrakts of the Eastern Roman Empire and Parthians. Their use of the large rectangular shields is distinctly Roman/Myceanaean Greek. Its hard to tell exactly what nation/army they were designed around.

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Probably the mark of a decent design process really. It's fine to draw inspiration from the real world, but it shouldn't always be immediately obvious.

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Right. Apparently, my memory needs improvement. I thought I saw pikes in their wargear.
I believe my questions have been answered. Thanks.

On a side note, I always think of the Asiatic armies such as the mentioned Koreans or Mongols when I see the Khandish troops. Do they play anything like those armies? (Hit and Run tactics?).

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O'h they have pikes in their wargear, it's just that the models don't have one.

Sorry for necromancy but I saw a big mistake...
Macedonians are Greek

From my vague memory of studying Ancient Civs (so I'm probably wrong) didn't the Macedonians under Philip consider themselves quite distinct from the Greek city states of the time? It wasn't really until Macedonia took control of the entire 'country' that the history books deem them 'Greek' in the same sense as say, Athens or Sparta.

Probably one of those things that you can easily argue both ways for, and for the purposes of this discussion I believe it was Philip of Macedon who popularised the use of a phalanx in battle; so I'd say it's slightly more accurate to distinguish Macedonians from Greeks.

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They are 2 Macedonias. One is a country north of Greece former Yugoslavia. Another is a reigon east inside of greece.

Actually the kingdom of Macedonia started from Dorians one of the the grooup of Ellines(Greeks for you)... It later expanded north and normally today that region belongs to Greece... Anyway I think Easterlings were inspired most from the east( Strange uh?) and I think mostly from the Persians

How so from the Persians?

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Well there's a book tribe of Easterlings called the Wainriders who seem like a good match for the historical Pechenegs, who were an Turkic, (though maybe a bit Iranian) and moved against Byzantium in the 9th century (Minas Tirith maps pretty well to Byzantium, especially when one takes into account how it shows up in Germanic sources).

The "default" Easterlings, however, probably map better to the Huns, who were an earlier bunch of Turkic or Iranian sorts who show up in Germanic sagas (including the very-much-an-influence-on-LOTR Heruvor saga). The Huns are an especially odd and interesting bunch in that they may have been fighting the Chinese for a while before wandering off west to fight the Goths and so forth. Oh and sack Rome (very politely, I might add).

There's some Persian influence on the mounted Easterlings, however - the ancient Persians had mounted heavy cavalry which were a lot like the far far later European knights.

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Lol, never argue with a Greek about who is greek and who is not... am I right Hilbert?

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Yeah don't mess with us... We have no logic

As does your language .
Just outing my frustrations at having had to learn 20 different verb types, each with 6x6=36 different forms. And then I didn't even start on the nouns... (ps. I'm referring to Ancient Greek, I don't know whether it's any different in modern Greek)

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Actually with Diiki form it's 20 verb types with 8x6 forms so, 960...
Umm the nouns are less but more complicated...( Each noun five types along five types of plurar and around 10 types go to ~100)
We just have one of the most hard language to learn...

Then it's got worse, or I've decreased the amount I had to learn subconciously...

I know... the ancient Greeks must have thought: "Our culture is so brilliant that after 2300 years people will try to learn our language, so will make it as difficult as possible, just to annoy them"

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"... Telchar wrought it in the deeps of time."
-On Andùril, The Lord of the Rings

Actually there is another thing... Each form it's for each person I has a different form , you another one and etc...
In Greek we don't say in each line I/YOU/HE/SHE/IT/WE/YOU/THEY... But we just put the verb with the right form alone...
For example:
" I go to the kitchen" -> (Ellinika) " Eγω(I) πηγαινω(go) στην(to the) κουζινα(kitchen)."
Now other way around...
"Πηγαινω στην κουζινα." -> (English) " Go( Πηγαινω) to the(στην) kitchen(κουζινα)"
So no person given... Who did it? You see the last letters of the verb...
Πηγαινω= go ( I go)
-ω shows I...

I recognize a few of those letters from my Calc classes. I never want to learn the rest!

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