Repels and the pike square

[Taqwus]

Units don't get a repel benefit from being in the same square as a unit with a long weapon, correct? The manual at least seems to indicate that it's only the target's weapon that matters, not anybody else's.

For instance, if one mixed pikes and crossbows in the same squad, and a knight attacks one of the crossbowmen who shares the square with two pikemen -- the pikes do not repel the knight?

[Teraswaerto]

I believe so, and repel would not be useful against knights in any case, since they have so high morale.

[Endoperez]

Even a 15 morale gives 18% chance of not attacking...

But yes, only the defender's weapon matters.

[Dedas]

But the defender also needs to attack/repel the attacker and score a hit before the attacker must pass a morale check. So units with low attack and long weapons against units with high defense and shorter weapons is not very effective. And if they also have high morale they are almost never repelled. They do take a one HP damage though (protection counting) if they pass the morale check and the defender succesfully hits them with their repel attempt. All this according to the manual.

[Wauthan]

I'm curious if anyone someone feel that pikeneers (odd word) are tactically viable as a unit. As far as my own testing shows it's a lot better a few burly high protection units with shields at the front, than a whole regiment of pikemen.

ME Tien'Chi is a good example of this. The pikemen have just barely better survival rate then a common militia. His shield and sword wielding "brother" however tends to actually survive half of the time.

Perhaps I'm not using them right? Based on the mechanics of the game what is the best use of these kind of units?

[Horst F. JENS]

Pikemen should have an defense & attack bonus against mounted units

[Endoperez]

Dedas said:
But the defender also needs to attack/repel the attacker and score a hit before the attacker must pass a morale check. So units with low attack and long weapons against units with high defense and shorter weapons is not very effective. And if they also have high morale they are almost never repelled. They do take a one HP damage though (protection counting) if they pass the morale check and the defender succesfully hits them with their repel attempt. All this according to the manual.

1) repeller must hit the attacker
2) attacker must succeed in morale or abort his attacks. 3) only happens if attacker passes the morale check.

3) damage for repeller vs attacker is generated; if repeller would deal any damage to attacker, 1 point of damage is dealt

A hit is enough. Shield's don't help when you want to avoid getting hit... they only make it harder to get that 1 point of damage.

Knights of MA Man have:
morale 14
base defence 12: +3 mounted, +1 weapons, -6 armor+shield
parry: +6

Knights of MA Man have defence 10 before shield parry. That's not hard to hit, thanks to Pikes having att value of 1.
One note: I'm not 100% sure about shield parry being ignored. I think it is ignored, but haven't tested it in any way.