I need help editing crossbowmen to work on walls

[kichinko]

Hi, I haven't played M2TW in like 5 months becuase I just haven't had the time. So I sat down today and loaded it up, and continued one of my old campaigns.

I'm running stainless steel 6.1 btw

anyways, my genoese crossbowmen are completely useless during sieges, like 5 guys out of 100 will actually fire their crossbow... before I installed SS 6.1 they used to fire like crazy, decimating advancing troops..

- They won't fire from the walls at an approaching enemy
- They won't fire at enemies that have come inside the city that they have a clear LOS on.
- They won't fire lined up by the crenelations
- They won't fire in almost any formation while on the walls


I've edited the projectiles.edu for Heavy bolts a few times, and changed the min/max angles to 80/85/90 with no luck, they still wont fire!!

What do i need to change? I seem to remember these genoese xbowmen firing like maniacs!

please help, this is a deal breaker for me enjoying my genoese campaign!

[Grandmaster Ryu]

1. Make sure you have skirmish mode turned on,

2. Sometimes Fire at Will will not work for them - so you'll have to fire manually

Should work =/

[Chim]

That will not solve his problem. It's the game itself really that's messed up on that part. The crenelations should be lower on the walls so that they can shoot over them.

Many modders have tried to make them more effective, but only got slight improvements.

[Wolfgrin]

I feel your pain, Kichinko. I had almost given up on xbows on walls until recently. I realized that three things helped a lot:

Position them in as thin a line as you can on the wall (more can then have a line of fire.)

As Chimaera said, target manually. More men will shoot at targets that are in front of them rather than to the side of them. Try different targets and watch each time to see how many men shoot.

Once the enemy gets inside, and if your xbows aren't firing much, take them off the walls and let them fire at enemy that have gained your walls or let them fire indirectly over walls and buildings. It's not authentic, but it's what they do.

These things have improved the usefullness of xbows A LOT in my games. Hope it helps you.

[Grandmaster Ryu]

As Chimaera said, target manually. More men will shoot at targets that are in front of them rather than to the side of them. Try different targets and watch each time to see how many men shoot.

* As Grandmaster said ^^

[pwf224]

Archers on walls is severly bugged in M2TW. It is something hardcoded and hard to fix. What I do sometimes is after the enemy beats back my wall defenders and makes some room on the walls, I have my xbowmen in the streets below waiting. Once they have a clear line of sight (aka not gonna hit too many of my guys by accident) I let them fire at the enemy from below. This will destroy them. It's not the best way but it works pretty well. Good luck

[Gorrrrrn]

I find that sometimes you can get more to fire if they target units at the further end of the range rather than those nearest - that way the width of the crenellations doesn't get in the way so much.

If you make the crenellations lower then the units on the walls suffer far more casualties from attacking missile troops.

[jepva]

I also find difficulty in getting the x-bows on walls to fire on the enemy once the enemy are inside of the gates below the x-bows. Forming the unit into a rectangle-shaped formation the width of the wall seems to help. Then toggle between fire-at-will and fire on command to see which works better under the circumstances.

[Gorrrrrn]

Missile units will find it difficult to target enemy units in the midst of a melee and be reluctant to shoot. Fire-at-will may enable some to shoot if they can get a clear shot. Not sure what the minimum angle (downwards) that x-bows can fire - it may be amended in various mods? If the angle is too steep then early x-bows will have difficulty keeping the bolt from falling out before it gets shot.

[crsutton]

It is the same old problem from MTW2. Xbow and gun unit will work fine if left in the original set up. That is set them up thin on the walls before the battle and do not move them at all unless you have to. They will shoot just great. Once you move the-even a little bit, they will never again shoot off the walls more than one or two shots at a time. This is not new.

Gun units won't fire off of a wall that they have captured either. So they are useless in an overwatch position after you take a wall. Xbows are not too good either but archers are fine.

One of the real reasons that I don't use gun units as much.

[crsutton]

It is the same old problem from MTW2. Xbow and gun unit will work fine if left in the original set up. That is set them up thin on the walls before the battle and do not move them at all unless you have to. They will shoot just great. Once you move the-even a little bit, they will never again shoot off the walls more than one or two shots at a time. This is not new.

Gun units won't fire off of a wall that they have captured either. So they are useless in an overwatch position after you take a wall. Xbows are not too good either but archers are fine.

One of the real reasons that I don't use gun units as much.

[kichinko]

It is the same old problem from MTW2. Xbow and gun unit will work fine if left in the original set up. That is set them up thin on the walls before the battle and do not move them at all unless you have to. They will shoot just great. Once you move the-even a little bit, they will never again shoot off the walls more than one or two shots at a time. This is not new.

Gun units won't fire off of a wall that they have captured either. So they are useless in an overwatch position after you take a wall. Xbows are not too good either but archers are fine.

One of the real reasons that I don't use gun units as much.

so to get them to work, do i have to leave them where the AI originally places them? or can place them in my own thin lines?

and can the thin lines be 1 or 2 divisions deep?

obviously this will need some testing, unfortunately I'm at work at the moment =D

[Gorrrrrn]

You can move archers and missile troops around the walls once they have been placed.

Provided you don't mind micro-managing them to make sure every one in a unit moves when ordered - if you're really lucky 90% won't - and keep ordering them to move onto the section of the wall where you want them to be.

Then you can try re-arranging them into a nice thin line.

Provided nobody is taking a garderobe break in one of the towers, in which case you can't.

By the time you've finally got them neatly arranged the enemy you wanted to shoot at will have moved and its time to move them again. If the rest of your garrison hasn't been defeated whilst you were busy elsewhere.

It's a M2:TW issue. Some walls are worse than others. If you can, place your archers where they are most likely to be needed and don't move unless you absolutely have to.

[MoToM]

Rather than defending directly, try ofsetting your xbows so that when the enemy troops deploy on the wall your xbows are about 30 or 40 feet further down the wall. Now set them to autofire on defensive stance and they will pepper the enemy who are busy lining up inside your defenses. I have had much success with this.

[BLASPHEMER]

Can you artificially adjust the "height" of the crossbowmen on the wall, so in theory they can clear the crenelations? I think that's the reason they are borked in all directions.

[chewy]

try putting the missile units further away sideways. If you place them further away they start shooting sideways and the whole unit can usually fire. It works very well when their inside too since they can just shoot directly into the mob that rushes the gates.

[JaM]

Wouldnt be easier to edit walls?

[BLASPHEMER]

Wouldnt be easier to edit walls?

Quite probably.

[delra]

This is one of the biggest **** ups in this game. Crossbowmen don't work in any of described ways. And they should excel in it, it should be their specialty. What better unit you can have on your walls than cockroaches (pavise crossbowmen)? They have a crossbow with big range, they have their shield (which they never use in hand to hand combat) and they have quite big swords. Not to mention their quite decent general armour. They should be the best possible unit to be placed on walls.

And they just suck there, suck more than peasant archers. So sad. :-(

[LuiSius_ScutaRuS]

Just keep them on the streets, like I do, and once the enemy has the walls or have entered the city, my crossbows start killing them like insects.... for example if they have broken then gate and are fighting against my army which won't let them enter, place your crossbows behind them...