Useless Peasant Archers & Archer Militia

[TheSavage]

Anybody else notice that Peasant Archers & Archer Militia are completely useless (except maybe as a morale sapper with flaming arrows)?

Almost all Peasant/Militia Archers have missle attack values of 1. Meanwhile, most of the mid-level archer units have missle attack values of at least 4. In addition to making the peasant/militia archers useless, it doesn't really make sense and doesn't seem realistic. Once an arrow hits the target, it shouldn't make all that much difference whether it was fired by a professional, skilled archer or a peasant with a hunting bow. (Sure, higher quality arrows and higher velocity will make a strike by better archers more lethal, but not 4-5x as lethal!)

I think the missle attack values for Peasant/Militia archers should be raised to at least 2, maybe even 3 in some cases.

This would not make them too strong, as Peasant/Militia archers are already disadvantaged (justifiably) in numerous other ways:
-Short range of 100-110 (vs. sometimes double that for other archers)
-Poor accuracy: .055 for militia and .075 for peasant (vs. .045 for the "standard" arrow and down to .0225 for the most elite archers)
-Low defense and melee offense values
-Untrained and with poor morale

With missle attack values of 2-3, Peasant/Militia archers would still be MUCH weaker than the more advanced archer units, but at least then they'd be worth recruiting and have some value in battle.

If anybody is interested, I've uploaded a modified EDU (derived from the Echad's Fix Pack EDU) that does just this. Specifically:
-All Peasant/Militia archers increased to missle attack of 2 (from 1)
-Highland & Balkan Archers now 2 (from 1)
-Norse, Lithuanian, & Prussian Archers now 3 (from 2)

[TzuDevil]

Cool, I uploaded your file... thanks!

Cheers!

[Vasquez]

Good argument. Yes I believe they are underpowered in an era when bow armed troops of any description were at a premium to raise and train. I mean what are "Peasant archers" compared to the Yeomen? What didn't they get to ply a bow since their early youth or something?
Yes increase their effectiveness with the bow, but keep quality/armor/morale considerations realistic.

My 2 gold coins.

[Point Blank]

The lower values were chosen more to limit the effects of simple bows on opponents in armor. Its a problem with M2TW that low values are too effective against heavily armored targets, but not effective enough vs unarmored targets. Since the majority of the targets encountered will be wearing some kind of armor, the lower value was chosen. But note that superior and elite units get +1 (while the militia and peasants get -1) attack to represent greater draw poundage, so they will have attack 3.

FYI an attack of 4 or 5 does not in any way make the heavier bows 4-5 times as lethal. It makes them somewhat more lethal versus unarmored, and significantly more lethal vs armored (up to mail armor anyway).

If you are going to boost simple bow attack values, and it is a reasonable change since many of the values are indeed judgement calls, for consistency I would suggest changing the attack values of all units that use the simple bow by +1. From memory that would be any unit that has ammo type peasant_arrow, militia_arrow, arrow, quality_arrow, elite_arrow, and the cavalry arrow types militia_cav_arrow, cav_arrow, quality_cav_arrow etc.

Yeoman have spent many years training in a systematic fashion within the English system to rapidly draw and fire a bow with a 125+ poundage, both directly and using plunging fire, at ranges of up to 300 yards. A peasant might go out a couple of times a week with a cheap, low draw weight self bow (which is also his weapon in the game) to shoot his dinner, direct fire only, at a range of 30-50m maximum.

[TheSavage]

Yeoman have spent many years training in a systematic fashion within the English system to rapidly draw and fire a bow with a 125+ poundage, both directly and using plunging fire, at ranges of up to 300 yards. A peasant might go out a couple of times a week with a cheap, low draw weight self bow (which is also his weapon in the game) to shoot his dinner, direct fire only, at a range of 30-50m maximum.

True, but the differences you mentioned in range and skill are already represented in the missle range of the unit and the accuracy of the projectile. The greater poundage and higher quality arrow might result in a more lethal impact, but not to the degree resulting from missle attack values of 1 vs. 4-5 (or 6 in the case of Yeoman).

Currently, a single decent archer unit (e.g. Muslim Archers, Longbowmen) can decimate 3 units of peasant or militia archers. The kill rate for the peasants/militias is so ridiculously low that they can't kill more than a handful of the superior (but still relatively poorly protected) archers before they're all cut down. And this doesn't really even factor in the huge range advantage, since after the first volley they are both in range of each other.

Basically, it boils down to the fact that peasant/militia archers, with an attack value of "1", are completely useless. This is completely unrealistic and pointless from a gaming perspective. Even an arrow fired from a low-quality bow by an unskilled peasant should be somewhat lethal at close range. Currently, if the enemy unit has any sort of protection, the vast majority of arrows that hit their targets "bounce off" somehow and don't result in a casualty. Even if the attack value was increased to "3" (my personal opinion), these units would still be FAR inferior to the next grade of archers.

[Point Blank]

As I said, the attack values are more of a representation of the relative effects vs armor, eg line up some peasant archers vs some Dismounted Gothic Knights and they will kill some (shots through the visor?), sometimes more than a few. Add that to the effect that about 40% of all hits in M2TW, regardless of lethality, will not kill, and are regarded as non-disabling wounds.

You could perhaps think of attack values of 4-5 being 3-4 more than the peasant bow, not 4-5 times a much.

The arrows shot by peasant bows, delivering about 30-40J if they are lucky, should be pretty ineffective against any armor more than padded, which should also stop it at any but minimum range. Unfortunately range effects on penetration are not well modelled in this game.

A trained archer unit (and highly skilled archers have almost arbitrary accuracy at duelling ranges with peasant self bows) will shoot 3-4 times more accurately, at least twice as fast, more lethally and likely be somewhat better protected.

But as I also said, its certainly reasonable to boost the attack value by 1. Boosting it by 2 would place a superior quality self-bow shooter ( 2+boosted by 2+1 for superior = 5) pulling as much poundage as a longbowman, which I doubt that weapon could generate tbh.

Unfortunately we are somewhat constrained by the game's dynamics in this situation, it really would be great if range effects on penetration etc were better modelled.

[Turbo]

Personally, I like the current settings. Peasant and militia archers should be only a minor annoyance against infantry, particularly infantry with shields. Archery in volleys takes considerable skill and untrained units should cause little or no casualities. I found the vanilla arrow damage to be ridicious.

[ryankaplan]

i'm not on expert on bows and arrows, however what gets to me more is how little damage small arms such as the arquebuis and muskets make. I know these aren't modern rifles, but i still don't see any kind of medieval armour stopping a 80 caliber musket ball at anything less than a hundred meters. At the moment my 120 men volley of Lithuanian arquebusiers shooting at a tight pike line swiss pikeman only kills about 5 or 6 if im lucky, at point blank range. I have not even tried them against properly armoured targets, but in my opinion, coupled with the fact that gunners can't fire thorugh eachother in one massive volley like the crossbowmen and that they are generally less armoured and less manuvarable compared to their arrow spewing counterparts, makes these units alot less effective than they should be. They are the 'highest tear' units in most armies in SS, and yet are comparitively useless compared to other high tear units.

[TzuDevil]

My 2 florins... In playing with RC/RR I have found that I use Peasants as reserve units in the early game (and as fodder/ram pushers through the whole game), and Peasant Crossbows are just a great value, so I use them a lot. The unit I use the least by far is the Peasant Archers because they are almost completely ineffective.

@PB I understand your dilemma, as I like the fact that Peasant Archers are so weak against heavily armoured units. But at the same time, they are useless enough to make them difficult to justify recruiting even in early armies... which was not the case historically, as they were used extensively.

The small increase of 1 to 2 for Peasant Archers does not unbalance the game much, and anyone with better archers will replace Peasant Archers ASAP. An argument could aslo be made that Peasant Archers are reasonably trained in the use of their bow, as they did use them for hunting (and bow hunting is really tough if you have ever tried it!)... so one would think Peasant Archers would be more effective then simple Peasant Infantry with respect to the use of their respective weapans and role in combat.

For factions such as Spain with no other archer units, it would be nice to have this as a more viable option (as added with their flaming arrow ability it could justify more recruitment). It would definitely help encourage players to field more "historical" armies early, while not unbalancing the game much when more effective ranged units become available as Peasant Archers would not be recruited much except in cases of desparation.

Cheers!

PS RC/RR rocks!

[Echad]

Well, I managed to use them more-or-less effectively... Just look at their cost! They are much MORE effective than the same cost peasants.

[spartan117]

yeah I agree.

I remember in vanilla and other mods, the construction of archer militia for egypt, byzantine, and russia was a nice addition. But as it is now I almost never build archer militia. The arrows are really ineffective and should not be even used against unarmored town militia.

[fightermedic]

well just an idea,
what about increasing the accuracy of the low-cost archers
so they would do as few damadge as they do now to high armored units even if they would hit more often because their atack value would be to low??? (realy not sure about this)
and would be more effective against low armored units..
well and it would not be to far from reality cause they are so near to their opponents??
what do you think about this?
sry 4 my english hope you got the point ^^

[TzuDevil]

well just an idea,
what about increasing the accuracy of the low-cost archers
so they would do as few damadge as they do now to high armored units even if they would hit more often because their atack value would be to low??? (realy not sure about this)
and would be more effective against low armored units..
well and it would not be to far from reality cause they are so near to their opponents??
what do you think about this?
sry 4 my english hope you got the point ^^

I like this idea fightermedic, good thinking!

It could be justified more easily. I am sure every boy of that era who had access to a bow, would have learned to use it at a young age. I know if my dad had had a bow when I was young, I would have been out killing small animals and birds on the farm all day long! Actually, we probably would have had bow fights with the neighbors kids too (we did with pellet guns - thank God I still have both eyes!). So, having the ability to fire faster, and more accurately with a weapan they have used all their lives would be reasonable.... and the inherent weakness of their low quality bows and low mass arrows would remain.

I will do some tests and post so we might have some additional discussion points.

Cheers!



PS @TheSavage, FYI I noticed in the file you provided, that the stat_sec weapan for peasant archers was 2, unlike the s-peasant archers and archer militia, that simply have a stat_sec value of 1.

PPS RR/RC still rocks!

[Inhuman One]

well for the french peasants werent put in the army, they shouldnt even have peasant units. they could get archer militia instead though.

[Point Blank]

We can assume, that peasant units grew up using their weapons (given that medieval society can be characterised as essentially military), which has given them the accuracy they have already.

As soon as you alter peasant accuracy, then militia accuracy, then average accuracy, and so on, also have to be altered. Then, all other weapons also have to be altered, because they all have accuracy relative to eachother. Its generally not just 1 change.

Also, don't forget that about 40% of all hits are non-lethal. You could fire muskets with a 13AP attack and it would still be 40% of all hits non-lethal. So lethality is working within that remaining 60%.

I do however wish that arrows could be made both more effective vs unarmored, and less vs armored targets.

Damage boosted by 1 would probably be OK. As long as they remain what they are meant to be: the very, absolutely, worst missile unit in the game.

Note we have some people above pointing out how essentially useless they are, then others that they are underpriced for how effective they are.

[Echad]

PB - I read somewhere, that a penetration force of Longbow was alike, or even superior to Arquebus or Musket, and X-Bow as well... Concerning armour as well, i.e. piercing plate only on very close range, but taking good care of lighter stuff... Was I misinformated, or is it really true? Need to read some more on it, but AFAIK, you have AP on Firearms and X-Bows, but not the Longbow, which is a little weird. =\

[Zel]

I guess you refer to the battle of Agnicourt. I remember hearing and reading some newer research data that dismisses the "armor piercing longbow" and deceisive use of Longbowmen in the battle. Ive seen some documentary that also showed that most Longbow arrows actually couldnt breach plate armor effectifly. In contrast to X-Bow bolts and bullets which were designed to do exactly that. Ginving them AP would be exagerating their effectivness (they are fine the way they are).

[Echad]

I also read the facts dismissing the armor piercing X-Bow and early Muskets, as well as the Arquebus... They were just easier to fire and train to use. IN FACT, X-Bows were developed much MORE early than plate armour, so they WERE NOT designed to pierce it... And early firearms could pierce the armor only in Point Blank range.

I am not bragging about the Longbows' effectivness, but that the X-Bows and Arquebuses were NOT more effective at AP. =\

[Zel]

The X-Bow as such yes. But the later evolutions could. Point is that the development of X-Bows and later early firearms was countered by ever more refined plate armour. Like with cannon and walls this was a technological race. In the end the firearm won as one can only apply so much weight to a knight/horse before they become completly ineffective in battle (add to that the impact of more organized infantry tactics).

[Point Blank]

Agree with Zel.

Other than extremely early firearms, they delivered considerably more force to the target than a bow/crossbow.

However, that force was relatively less effective because it was spread over a round ball rather than applied through a sharp arrowhead/bolt.

As such, early firearms, eg handgun, generally had less penetrative power than a good crossbow, and significantly less than a later (steel) crossbow.

The arquebus would typically, if not always by a great deal, penetrate heavier armor than a later crossbow, and make armor that would stop it impractically heavy. It was at this point that armors started their decline.

The statements regarding firearms above apply at close range. Due to the extreme aerodynamic inefficiency of the round ball used as ammunition, velocity, accuracy and power were rapidly lost. The arquebus might be able to penetrate heavy plate at 100m, but beyond that it could be questionable.

Arrows/bolts carried their energy far better.

The longbow's capability vs plate armor varied considerably with the quality of the plate's metallurgy. This is part of the reason for such varied results. At Agincourt the quality wasn't necessarily of the highest, so with a straight-on hit, the longbow might have penetrated at anywhere from 10-30m maximum, and that is not to speak of any under-plate leather/padding. Vs later, heavier and better-quality plates, its doubtful.

The bodkin was not a good killing head.

The penetrative power of an arrow/bolt was also dependent on the arrow's weight and partially on its stability. Heavier 'war arrows' penetrated better than so-called 'flight arrows'. A high-poundage bow with a heavy war arrow could penetrate quite well.

A skilled archer could pull extremely high poundages, 160 pounds, which for a composite bow would be the equivalent of about 200lbs. That would likely out-penetrate an early firearm.

Unfortunately, to simulate all the above in M2TW is impossible , though simple penetration-to-distance tables would have done it