Need help with Archers

[bentlemp]

I've got to be doing something wrong. I've been playing TW games for a long time and I've never really 'gotten' archers. And, in all honesty, I've never really tried to 'get' them because I've always had fun with cavalry and infantry. But, since picking up this mod (which btw I think is one of the greatest efforts I've seen in a mod and I've been playing mod games since Quake 2), and reading these forums specifically, I'm hearing about how great archers are and how over powered they are, etc. I can't even make them a factor in the games I'm playing. Here are the problems I run into...

Archers shoot sporatically and no where near where I want them to. Example, if I'm defending E Osgiliath (which is damn near every turn), they just fire on the assault towers or battering ram uselessly. I have to micro manage the hell out of them to keep them wasting their arrows. And then, when infantry finally approaches after the gate is down, etc they just fire in the air and maybe do a few hits per target if I'm lucky. In truth, my infantry save the day every time by making use of choke points. Nothing like the masses I've read about on here.

Granted I'm playing as Gondor but I've tried it as high elves as well and given they are more reliant on archers I tried to focus more on them with no greater result than what I was getting with Gondor militia archers.

Help? I realize I'm probably missing something fundamental and will get the n00b sticker all over this post, but I genuinely think I'm missing something very elemental with this game and specifically this mod. I think it's fantasic effort and want to enjoy the hard work these guys put forth. Any suggestions or ideas would be most welcome....

[Swanny777]

I believe they automatically shoot at the nearest enemy to them (correct me if I am wrong) which can cause a few problems when the enemy sends the battering ram forward first. In this instance, be sure to tell them to attack someone else, preferably a swarm of the enemy.

They make their use when the infantry is able to cover them and force the enemy into clusters, because they are then able to slaughter the troops inside. They are excellent for hammering the enemy as they try to funnel through the battered down gate.

Personally, I love archers. I use stacks of them with only a few infantry to slow down the enemy all the time. I am not certain why it is that they ineffectivally shoot into the air at times, and it does get annoying. However, they are, in my opinion, the best units in the game.

[Nikos]

You need to have archers concentrate their fire power in a small area for them to be brutally effective. I've played Silvan Elf battles where my archers have gotten over 500 kills each, it's all about position.

[Magicana]

I've got to be doing something wrong. I've been playing TW games for a long time and I've never really 'gotten' archers. And, in all honesty, I've never really tried to 'get' them because I've always had fun with cavalry and infantry. But, since picking up this mod (which btw I think is one of the greatest efforts I've seen in a mod and I've been playing mod games since Quake 2), and reading these forums specifically, I'm hearing about how great archers are and how over powered they are, etc. I can't even make them a factor in the games I'm playing. Here are the problems I run into...

Archers shoot sporatically and no where near where I want them to. Example, if I'm defending E Osgiliath (which is damn near every turn), they just fire on the assault towers or battering ram uselessly. I have to micro manage the hell out of them to keep them wasting their arrows. And then, when infantry finally approaches after the gate is down, etc they just fire in the air and maybe do a few hits per target if I'm lucky. In truth, my infantry save the day every time by making use of choke points. Nothing like the masses I've read about on here.

Granted I'm playing as Gondor but I've tried it as high elves as well and given they are more reliant on archers I tried to focus more on them with no greater result than what I was getting with Gondor militia archers.

Help? I realize I'm probably missing something fundamental and will get the n00b sticker all over this post, but I genuinely think I'm missing something very elemental with this game and specifically this mod. I think it's fantasic effort and want to enjoy the hard work these guys put forth. Any suggestions or ideas would be most welcome....

Well you don't really need to micromanage your archers too much. In a siege, I usually set them to attack the unit bearing the ram or the general if he is in range. When I fire on a normal unit in this mod,by the time it reaches the wall it is usually in no fit state to charge through the gate and be a real threat. Archers are never more important than infantry, I will say that. The firing into the air problem is a combination of distance and the way the unit is laid out. They can't shoot straight ahead, so they have to adjust by shooting into the air. It sucks, true, but thats a problem with the M2TW engine.

[Leonidas480bc]

I play as the Silvan faction and will micro manage my archers to the enemy's death. I will place my spearmen behind me in a long shallow line covering my front, my archers are in front with my general unit in front of them centered on the archers to keep the infantry from rushing them. He will always fire first at the closest enemy giving me an idea of what is coming. Once my archers start to fire i pause game and order them to all fire on the same target whittling them down to below 100 then moving on to next enemy on the same flank. This way only one of his flanks will reach me and then it too will be greatly reduced in size. I order my archers to fall back behind the spearmen and remove the fire at will button, so they wont shoot my General's men in the back. They normally shoot at enemy archers/cavalry/General unit in that order. I am playing Real Combat modd by the way.

[Andurath]

Archers , if you are playing Elves are a bit 'easy mode' if you pardon the expression. Thier range is almost that of a Ballista so as Elves you get stand-off ability. In that case you can position your Elves in a couple lines and step back several times before you ahve to actually melee your opponent. I find that to be a very good tactic with elves unless they are gainst Harad or other highly mobile opponents.

As other races archers become more conventional. If using more than 5 units I tend to split into two groups and then alternate fire depending on situation. I find that hitting the enemy on thier right flank with archers as being the most effective next to shooting them in the back(brutally effective), So I sometimes peel 2 or 3 units off in a flanking position and hide them in the woods. Then I put my general in a position that will place the enemy's back or right side right in the archers crosshairs. Of course when hiding archers you have to take autofire off or they will blow their own cover. I also always at least put a unit of spearmen with them because when they start raping the other side they will get chraged, but that is also usually to my advantage , because that's when I like to pull the cav charge off. This often starts the chain reaction rout. Units pulling out of melee with my main line take additional casualties and with the archers switching to flaming ammo and the cav charge I often have thousands of prisoners to decide upon.

As a previous poster said position is everything. I agree a lot with that. But using archers is also a question of timing, like so much about combat in general. Sometimes it makes sence to take your time and empty your quivers, as a matter of fact I do that as often as possible. But many other tactics are often neccesary.

[Falconpilot]

You're fighting as gonder so your archers aren't the best in the game. Like said before position is everything, attack clusters with archers they will do alot more damage (hit more troops).

Another tactic I used with the high elves is to put your archer line in front of your spearmen or other infantry. When the enemy gets close your archers will almost fire in a perfect horizontal way dealing alot more damage, if the enemy isn't routing yet, set of the fire at will button and pull them back behind your infantry line and see how the enemy gets slaughter by the infantry.

Now for gondor, I don't really remember if east-osg is at the side of minas tirith or the other side. Do you gave both the osgiliath cities? if you only have one it might be smart to place an army on the bridge, they will attack your army instead of your city which will result in a battle with a bridge. Now battles like that are just archer heaven, position 3-5 infantry squads near the bridge, all your archers should be on hills right after the bridge (normally there are hills, if not place them behind your infantry) and just watch the enemy comming over the bridge being slaughtered by your archers ^^ beautifull

About the archers shooting in a bow instead of directly, this happens because of 2 main things.
1. they want to avoid hitting friendly units in the back so they shoot in a bow in order to hit the enemy
2. there is an object blocking their direct firing path (this can be when they're on a wall and the enemy is to close near the wall)

anyway hope this helps,
greetz,
falcon

[bentlemp]

Now for gondor, I don't really remember if east-osg is at the side of minas tirith or the other side. Do you gave both the osgiliath cities? if you only have one it might be smart to place an army on the bridge, they will attack your army instead of your city which will result in a battle with a bridge. Now battles like that are just archer heaven, position 3-5 infantry squads near the bridge, all your archers should be on hills right after the bridge (normally there are hills, if not place them behind your infantry) and just watch the enemy comming over the bridge being slaughtered by your archers ^^ beautifull

Well I've got the use of choke points down to a science. In fact, that's the only thing that's made this game playable for me because I have absolutely no use for the archers at all (hence the post).

But, I think what's frustrating me is I'll have 15 units....3-4 archers, 3-4 cavalry, and the rest mostly light infantry. Mordor will bring full stacks against me and my archers dont really even soften them up but my light infantry will take advantage of the choke points and knock off their heavy infantry. Ok that's great and I have fun with that, but just once I'd love to see the archer impact everyone is talking about.

There were some suggestions on here I haven't tried thoroughly so I'll do that tonight when I get home and let you know the results. Thanks everyone for the responses.

[bentlemp]

I play as the Silvan faction and will micro manage my archers to the enemy's death. I will place my spearmen behind me in a long shallow line covering my front, my archers are in front with my general unit in front of them centered on the archers to keep the infantry from rushing them. He will always fire first at the closest enemy giving me an idea of what is coming. Once my archers start to fire i pause game and order them to all fire on the same target whittling them down to below 100 then moving on to next enemy on the same flank. This way only one of his flanks will reach me and then it too will be greatly reduced in size. I order my archers to fall back behind the spearmen and remove the fire at will button, so they wont shoot my General's men in the back. They normally shoot at enemy archers/cavalry/General unit in that order. I am playing Real Combat modd by the way.

This is exactly what I'm talking about. I've tried these tactics. Putting infantry in front of archers and having them shoot over them isnt exactly a breakthrough concept. I get that. What I don't get are the results you guys are seeing. I've NEVER seen that kind of efficiency from any group of archers before.

So maybe I'm asking the wrong questions...
How many groups of archers are we talking about here to get those results? In a full stack of units, how many are archers to see that kind of impact?

Are you using flame arrows? regular arrows? does it make a difference? I've read on here both sides to that argument. Personally I've never noticed any difference but I can keep track of what they are firing on better with the fire arrows.

Are you shooting at angles? or straight ahead?

Is there a trick to shooting off castle walls? I've noticed that in a lot of cases my units wont even be lined up that well because of the dynamic of the castle. Fair enough not a whole lot can be done. But, what urks me is when they are lined up how they end up 'spraying' their fire and hitting almost no one.

[Withwnar]

If you're fighting a swarm of large enemy units (eg. 250 orcs each) then micro-managing is usually necessary so that you don't run out of arrows. Sometimes I turn off "fire at will" right at the start and keep it off. That way no archers are wasting arrows on units that are nearly destroyed anyway: I make them aim at other 'fresh' units; make the arrows count.

This can be immersion-breaking but necessary sometimes.

I don't know if it still applies but M2TW (used to?) have a problem where if you select more than one archer unit at once and tell them all to fire at the same thing then they would ignore you and just do their own thing; firing at different units. You may need to individually tell each unit to attack unit X.

As mentioned, if they don't have a clear line of sight then they'll shoot in an arc which is less damaging. Unfortunately that includes when the enemy is nearing your gate and your archers are on the walls - because the battlements are in the way. You can alter one of the TXT files to let them shoot at a lower angle and lessen this effect. I can look it up if you want more specific info.

Try flanking. All (?) units are less protected on their sides and even less on their backs. Try to get some archers around beside/behind the enemy and let em have it. Preferably with that clear line of sight.

Turn fire-arrows off. It's good for demoralising but it's slower and way less accurate.

Get their experience up: it improves their accuracy.

[miniwally]

I don't know if it still applies but M2TW (used to?) have a problem where if you select more than one archer unit at once and tell them all to fire at the same thing then they would ignore you and just do their own thing; firing at different units. You may need to individually tell each unit to attack unit X.

thank you now Gondor will quiver even more in front of my armies i was getting annoyed when they decided tlo just carry on individually shooting different people so it seems like there's no point to grouping them anymore then.

[Graviak]

If you're fighting a swarm of large enemy units (eg. 250 orcs each) then micro-managing is usually necessary so that you don't run out of arrows. Sometimes I turn off "fire at will" right at the start and keep it off. That way no archers are wasting arrows on units that are nearly destroyed anyway: I make them aim at other 'fresh' units; make the arrows count.

This can be immersion-breaking but necessary sometimes.

I don't know if it still applies but M2TW (used to?) have a problem where if you select more than one archer unit at once and tell them all to fire at the same thing then they would ignore you and just do their own thing; firing at different units. You may need to individually tell each unit to attack unit X.

As mentioned, if they don't have a clear line of sight then they'll shoot in an arc which is less damaging. Unfortunately that includes when the enemy is nearing your gate and your archers are on the walls - because the battlements are in the way. You can alter one of the TXT files to let them shoot at a lower angle and lessen this effect. I can look it up if you want more specific info.

Try flanking. All (?) units are less protected on their sides and even less on their backs. Try to get some archers around beside/behind the enemy and let em have it. Preferably with that clear line of sight.

Turn fire-arrows off. It's good for demoralising but it's slower and way less accurate.

Get their experience up: it improves their accuracy.

...the thing with the individual order is VERY CORRECT !!!!! Thank you for, me beiing on the right side. NEVER order groups of " range-units-including-siege ", to attack. They will not obey!


this was one of the first lessons for playing with archers.

... but,... i can not play them,... but if people can play with archers,...

...High Elves and Mordor are incredible strong in MP.!.!:!:!:

...high elves kill everything,... and then get beaten by MoRdOr! ( 15k no rules! )

[Andurath]

If you're fighting a swarm of large enemy units (eg. 250 orcs each) then micro-managing is usually necessary so that you don't run out of arrows. Sometimes I turn off "fire at will" right at the start and keep it off. That way no archers are wasting arrows on units that are nearly destroyed anyway: I make them aim at other 'fresh' units; make the arrows count.

This can be immersion-breaking but necessary sometimes.

I don't know if it still applies but M2TW (used to?) have a problem where if you select more than one archer unit at once and tell them all to fire at the same thing then they would ignore you and just do their own thing; firing at different units. You may need to individually tell each unit to attack unit X.

As mentioned, if they don't have a clear line of sight then they'll shoot in an arc which is less damaging. Unfortunately that includes when the enemy is nearing your gate and your archers are on the walls - because the battlements are in the way. You can alter one of the TXT files to let them shoot at a lower angle and lessen this effect. I can look it up if you want more specific info.

Try flanking. All (?) units are less protected on their sides and even less on their backs. Try to get some archers around beside/behind the enemy and let em have it. Preferably with that clear line of sight.

Turn fire-arrows off. It's good for demoralising but it's slower and way less accurate.

Get their experience up: it improves their accuracy.

Great points, the only thing I have an issue with is the Turn Fire Arrows off. It's definitely true that you'll inflict less casualties, but I have routed much larger forces than my own by using fire arrows. Also the idea of thinning thier ranks without the fire arrows and conserving your ammo is excellent.,However, In many instances you need to Flame them. I turn them on right when a unit is thinned enough that it might rout and I tend to keep them on if I am facing superior forces and know I don't have time to thin them. At close range you will find the accuracy is acceptable.

I like high kill ratios but the best kill ratio is no ratio. The less casualties I take the better. The running enemy is the best. CHARGE!

[Withwnar]

As I said, flaming arrows are very inaccurate. And the loop/arc shooting makes it worse. Did you see my bit about adjusting the stats so they shoot downward more from walls?

I play Silvans and would typically have at least 7 units of archers in a full stack. As high as 12. Depends what the enemy has.

Personally I rarely make them fire at the same target. I give them one each. Unless there's a particular unit that I really need destroyed before they reach my melee guys.

[bentlemp]

As I said, flaming arrows are very inaccurate. And the loop/arc shooting makes it worse. Did you see my bit about adjusting the stats so they shoot downward more from walls?

No I sure didn't. Got a link? I'm not too keen about altering the stats but that might be one I would venture toward.

[Withwnar]

No I sure didn't. Got a link? I'm not too keen about altering the stats but that might be one I would venture toward.

The link I had doesn't work anymore but this is what I did...

The file is called desc_projectile.txt in the TATW data folder: M2TW_install_folder\mods\Third_Age\data

Save a copy as a backup. Open the file in a text editor (Wordpad/Notepad/etc.).

The first entry in mine (after some comments) is this:

projectile arrow

effect			arrows_new_set
end_effect				arrow_impact_ground_set
end_man_effect			man_impact_tiny_set
end_package_effect    	arrow_impact_wall_set
end_shatter_effect		arrow_impact_ground_set
end_shatter_man_effect		man_impact_tiny_set
end_shatter_package_effect	arrow_broken_impact_wall_set

effect_offset	-1.5
damage		0
radius		0.1
mass		0.05
accuracy_vs_units		0.06
affected_by_rain
min_angle	-75
max_angle	45
velocity	20 48
display		aimed
effect_only

It's the min_angle value. I have already changed mine to -75. Not sure what it was originally (-60 perhaps?). The lower the number the steeper the angle they can shoot down from walls. At least that's how it was explained in the original page I found.

You will need to change this for various types of arrows. For example, below this block of code is another one for flaming arrows (arrow_fiery). And so on. Some are cavalry ones (cav_XXX) which I didn't bother changing and there are other projectile weapons too (ballistas etc.).

I think Elves use bodkin_arrow types.

I'm pretty sure that this is save game compatible - no need to restart a campaign. Please someone correct me if I'm wrong. Otherwise: just save it and off you go.

You can experiment with different values. -75 is the lowest I've ever gone.

And of course this means that the enemy can shoot at you more easily now, when it's you attacking their town.

EDIT: sorry; looks like -75 is the original value. From memory I tried -85 instead.

thank you now Gondor will quiver even more in front of my armies i was getting annoyed when they decided tlo just carry on individually shooting different people so it seems like there's no point to grouping them anymore then.

Grouping them is still useful. I just don't rely on saying "you, group 3, fire at that unit there". And like I said: it might not be a problem any more. It could have been fixed in a patch since I read about it. But if you are seeing that behaviour then I guess not.

[Legolose]

I've been playing TW games for a long time and I've never really 'gotten' archers. And, in all honesty, I've never really tried to 'get' them because I've always had fun with cavalry and infantry....

Wow that is exactly what I do, except I always get archers and infantry and not big into getting cavalry, "maybe its because I almost always play the Elves" never have really used cavalry in any TW game now that I think about it

[Swanny777]

Wow that is exactly what I do, except I always get archers and infantry and not big into getting cavalry, "maybe its because I almost always play the Elves" never have really used cavalry in any TW game now that I think about it

Exactly. I can see the use of cavalry; in flanking, routing, and charging they are nearly unstoppable. At the same time, I just don't like babysitting them enough to lose sight of the battle as a whole. I love the Elves because the only cavalry unit I have worry about takes care of itself by simply running away against any enemy.

I love the Elves.

[miniwally]

it's still a problem and that's the only reason i grouped them

[Withwnar]

If they're grouped some commands will tell all of them: stop firing, flames, guard, skirmish, run, go here, and withdraw (yeah, like we need that).