Archers vs Crossbowmen

[Norwegian_viking]

Depends what is best, but nothing beats the Longshanks archers

In reality crossbows is much more acrutate, i have been shooting with a bow for quite some time, but it still hard as to hit, while the crossbows ironsight helps alot, and in the middelages a unskilled warrior performed better with a crossbow then an bow

[Aurimas]

So in conclusion I want to say, that Crossbow has beaten bow.
But in some cases i would prefer bow rather than crossbow.
I would use bows on castle defending, becouse they have fire arrows ability, so they can light bettering rams and sieges towers.
BUT crossbows have more advantages.

[The Source]

genose or pavise??

[Double A]

So in conclusion I want to say, that Crossbow has beaten bow.
But in some cases i would prefer bow rather than crossbow.
I would use bows on castle defending, becouse they have fire arrows ability, so they can light bettering rams and sieges towers.
BUT crossbows have more advantages.

No they don't. You guys were saying "Hey, one specific type of crossbow can beat archers in a ranged fight, and have armor piercing. That means all crossbowmen are better."

Archers shoot faster, can cause morale damage, and generally have the faction's elite ranged unit status. Speed and flexibility are better than anything, including in modern warfare.

[Rakoua]

I use archers more, but nothing beats a a few merc crossbows on a hill...

Then again, I just had a SS6.3 debacle involving Granada and four peasant crossbow units.

Due to them failing to fire from the walls and then failing to fire at all I lost 1300 men. Lucky me my javelins were around to kill the general.

Never. Use. Crossbows. On. Walls.

[Double A]

I use archers more, but nothing beats a a few merc crossbows on a hill...

Horse archers running around and in loose formation.

[Somerandomdude2]

So in conclusion I want to say, that Crossbow has beaten bow.
But in some cases i would prefer bow rather than crossbow.
I would use bows on castle defending, becouse they have fire arrows ability, so they can light bettering rams and sieges towers.
BUT crossbows have more advantages.

Missile infantry is at it's biggest advantage on walls. In which case, I'd rather be using archers than crossbows because most/all wont be shooting in a straight line.

Archers morale damage allows them to rout and enemy after killing fewer of them. Fewer enemies have to be killed to remove the entire unit.

Periods of sustained fire under perfect conditions (i.e. nothing between your missile infantry and the enemy, whilst still being at a distance) are very limited. Unless one side is greatly superior to the other, nothing is going to be ideal for very long in a battle. I'd rather have something versatile.

Plus, crossbows get the edge in damage per shot, but shoot slower. Hmmmmmm, how big is their advantage per second? (or because crossbows reload so slow, maybe we should go 10 seconds)
- I really don't know the answer to this one.

Also, as I already mentioned: archers are cooler.

[Jambat]

I think half of the answer is the great cop-out, 'It depends which army you play'. English are of course going to use longbowmen, and some factions are just built to have far superior x-bow units compared to the l-bow options.

As to the question of if you had two same strength units, one with long, one with cross, which would you use? I think it will really come down to army composition and playstyle. Crossbows are better in a brute force kind of way, and Pavise Crossbowmen (which I consider more of a 'generic' option than a unique version like Scots Guard or Sherwood) may be one of my most loved and most hated units all at the same time. Bows however offer greater flexibility with the ability to plant stakes and use flaming shots.

I personally like a mix of both if using relatively same strength options. Flaming arrows have saved my bacon a few times, while the force of massed xbow shots have broken portions of a charging line just as much.

[Incomitatus]

The question is irrelevant. Both have their uses, and in certain situations either can be essential to victory. Use both. The only question comes down to how many of each to use, and that's as much up to playstyle as it is any attribute of the units themselves. I like having mostly bows and one or two units of crossbows in my missile corps, but going the other way is viable, too.

[Danoico]

Ok. I coincide with the most here. The two types have their pros and negatives.

I prefer the archers in a open battlefield for two reasons:
1) The rate of fire. This is useful at the moment of exchange arrows whit the mounted archers. You can stop them until other unit charge with them.
2) The lovely fire attribute, specially at close range. If you climb up a hill or mountain in an storm against the archers, you know that i mean.

I like use crossbows in
a) Streets fights in the assaults or
b) Over the flanks of the defenders in the square of the cities or castles.
c) Other use is for cover the retreat when i lost a battle.

Greetings from Mexico

[Gigan]

Archers have helped me win in sieges where I was vastly outnumbered because of fire arrows. Crossbowmen? Barely any of them shoot.

[Rolepgeek]

I have found this: Crossbowmen and Archers are more or less equally effective, not counting pavise and longbows. They are effective in different ways. I had a four half dead crossbows, with an enemy unit of feudal knights coming down on them, and the crossbows tore them to pieces. Whereas archers would have been decimated. I also did a comparison in the custom battle, of four peasant archers vs four peasant crossbows. Archers won, when they weren't armored. By quite a bit. Crossbows, meanwhile, won, when I had them both armored, but only barely. Archers run out of arrows quicker too, because they fire faster. But in general, it depends on how you use them. Always use archers against things like spear militia or highlanders, but Crossbows will destroy armored swordsmen or just about any knights.

[Aymer de Valence]

Back to basics, I prefer archer militia over crossbow militia anyday because of the ability to fire faster. However, if I had to choose between longbowmen and pavise crossbowmen, I would choose the latter. The slow reload is countered thankfully by their shields

[Maklodes]

Bodkin arrow archers are probably close to being the best of both worlds, to some extent. (Bodkin arrowhead archers: all English archers except militia and peasant archers, French Scots guard, and mercenary Welsh longbowmen and Free Company longbowmen.) Not to mention that, with the exception of Scots Guard, they can lay stakes. (Mysteriously, a sharp piece of wood stuck in the ground is deadlier to a knight than an armored sergeant with a steel-tipped spear who can actually thrust, dodge, feint, etc. ) Although some non-bodkin arrow archers can also lay stakes (Lithuanian archers and Janissary archers))

As for crossbowmen vs. archers, I'd say that there's too much variation within the groups to judge them. Crossbowmen go all the way from peasant crossbowmen to aventurier and Genoese crossbowmen. Archers go all the way from peasant archers to Ottoman infantry and Scots guard. Except for a few obvious points (crossbows are better against armor, arrows can be flaming and archers are better on walls), I'm not sure.

As for range, my understanding is that crossbowmen and archers vary, but they vary in the same way. "Short range" archers and crossbows both have a range of 120. "Long range" archers and crossbows both have a range of 160.

Incidentally, Moorish peasant crossbowmen are better than the professional crossbowmen of France, Hungary, or Denmark. Hungary's militia crossbowmen (pavise xbow militia) are also better than their castle-trained professionals.

[lolIsuck]

I prefer normal archers over crossbowmen, higher rate of fire and more effective from the second line as they can shoot over the first line instead of through it. I ignore the lower tier crossbows but the higher tiers and pavise crossbowmen are so badass and rip apart the enemy that they can't be ignored or disliked.

[SturmChurro]

I like to use both. Archers in the front Crossbowmen in the back.

[Ferdiad]

I rarely mix them f I can help it. If I have to I keep the Xbows on the wings with some archers staking the ground in front of them.

[Maklodes]

That's a good point. If you people aren't including the most powerful archer units in the game, don't include pavise crossbowmen. Both longbows and pavise shields are exceptions to the general rule.

Seven default-playable factions get pavise crossbow militia, pavise crossbowmen, and/or Genoese crossbowmen/crossbow militia. (For the record: Hungary and Venice get Pavise Crossbow militia. The Holy Roman Empire, Portugal, and Spain get Pavise Crossbowmen. Sicily gets both. Milan gets Genoese versions of both.)

Of the seventeen default-playable factions, five don't use crossbows at all (Byzantium, Egypt, England, Scotland, Turks), so only twelve factions have crossbows. There are five factions that use crossbows, but not pavise shields: Denmark, France, Moors, Poland, and Russia.

Which is to say, if you have access to crossbows at all, the chances are better than even that you have access to pavise crossbows. Yes, there are some factions which have crossbows but not pavise crossbows, but I don't think I'd call pavise crossbows "exceptions to the general rule."

[MDCCLXXVI]

Last campaign I just got tired of fighting waves of stacks which were 90% pavise crossbows... Such a pain in the ass to deal with, as they have no capability (in the hands of the AI) to take a city, even against just one unit of heavy inf.

And they fire for a full hour, so you cant just press 3x speed and hope they melee eventually.

The pavise spammer was Hungary.

[SturmChurro]

Last campaign I just got tired of fighting waves of stacks which were 90% pavise crossbows... Such a pain in the ass to deal with, as they have no capability (in the hands of the AI) to take a city, even against just one unit of heavy inf.

And they fire for a full hour, so you cant just press 3x speed and hope they melee eventually.

The pavise spammer was Hungary.

You don't want to try out Byg's Grim V new mod then. This is one unit the AI loves to use. Don't get me wrong though the ai is no pushover.