useless Archers?

[Nyarla]

i noticed myself using less and less archers in my armies until i got rid of em for good. now they are the ones i use for guarding towns and castles but i don't put em inside my main army anymore. there are some rare situations where they ain't a liabilty that being bridge battles or when deployed on really high mountains but i consider both of those battles exploits since the AI won't do the same.

i deploy aggressive all out battle tactics, that render both mine and enemy archers useless. usually archerunits get to shoot once, before they are annhilated or routed.

my own archers had like 10 -20 kills per battle and did more damage to my own units than the enemies.

[PerXX]

They might be useless for your tactics, but good archers are amongst the most valuable of my troops.

Perhaps you're using this tactic?


General: I beg your pardon, sire. Won't we hit our own troops?
Longshanks: Yes, but we'll hit theirs as well. We have reserves. Attack.

[Alesianduke]

I use about 3 units of archers/crossbowmen in my army... and in castles/cities 2 units. On the battlefield i place them in 2nd row and in front of them spearmen (or if I have some, mercs)... and I always command them to shoot the back of the enemy troops or, if the case presents itself, the enemy general (had some battles in which the AI sent the general during it's first wave, right in front of his troops).
Anyway... I only recruit archers which have some defence / close combat stats (not militia or levy etc.). They come in hand once in a while... depends of the battles.

l.e.: and if I have mercs in my army I always send them in the first wave of attack / defence and use flaming arrows onto the battle area (I can live without those mercs).

[ihranator]

I rarely use them in field battles, but in sieges they are priceless.

[Lazy-Hamish]

archersare my most precious troops, with all factions, even the worst archer units can be used to an advantage, even with agressive tactics, just station them behind your main force then pepper the enemy with arrows, or position them on the flank and hit the engaged enemy from the side.

[ziserman]

Archers' uses depend on your tactics and the enemy you are facing. If for example you love horse archers, then have half your stack with them and, with the proper protection (light cavalry for enemy foot archers, heavy cavalry/inf for enemy heavy cavalry) they may annihilate the enemy for you. Make sure to try to surround enemies as they are more vulnerable to arrow fire from behind!

Another example of good use of archers is when you have the high ground. Foot archers with long range missiles (who usually also have fast rate of fire) can cause heavy damage in enemy armies closing in, especially if you target cavalry. Before the 1300s all north and western cavalry are sitting ducks for any non-militia archers and they go down like flies to mass arrow fire. Even generals' bodyguards.

For smaller armies when I lack cavalry, archers/javelinmen can cause extremely heavy casualties if I commit my infantry to the battle then move my archers from behind the enemy troops and start firing. Probably this can also be done in a large battle if your troops, say, are positioned across a forest in which you've hidden archer squads. When the fighting starts the archers should blow their cover and start firing to the enemies' backs. Tricky but very effective.

Also, flaming arrows can cause a rout much faster than normally. Flame arrows, charging on the flanks, the presence of a cavalry unit behind an enemy unit, a dreaded general and some scary troops if you have them all decrease morale as far as I'm concerned. Of the above, flame arrows are the easiest thing to get and probably the most reliable as well.

------------------------
Regarding your tactics if you have plenty of infantry/cavalry you can easily win most battles without archers. I still find them absolutely necessary (foot archers that is) when fighting factions that use a lot of horse archers like Turks, Mongols, Hungarians... beware for mounted crossbowmen as well!

[Alfonzo over Innsmouths]

I use archers all the time, because I've noticed something - using fire arrows actually does affect enemy morale in a noticable way. I first noticed this when I was defending against sieges as Aragorn, vs France. I had about two units of archers just pumping in normal rounds in one battle, led by a captain. Killed a few, and ran out of ammo pretty quick, but I did take quite a few casualties before the enemy broke broke.
Out of curiosity, in the next battle (The french were pretty much throwing the same full stacks of dismounted knights, men at arms and sergents at me anyway), under similar circumstances, I had the archers fire flaming arrows. The effect was immediate - in the first battle the sergents were able to quickly scale the walls and put my men at arms to a bit of bother before they ran away. With flaming arrows on, however, they broke before even reaching the wall. I took significantly less casualties,and the enemy were pretty much wiped out more (because they'd recover, come back, and then break again, and once I had whittled down the enemy I had mailed knights and that light cavalry unit the Aragornese get to cut them up).

I usually use about four units of archers, and have them rain fire down on anything they can. When combat is truly engaged, and it'd be silly to fire into melee, I have them take down enemy cavalry. Archers can make an absolute mess of early cavalry with flaming arrows.

Also I use them to counter annoying mounted horse archers. Pechenegs and Yari cavalry come to mind.

Also also I use normal crossbows in sieges where they can shoot into the flanks or rear of the enemy, however I never really use them in field battles.

Also also also I note that Pavise crossbowmen aren't really worth a lot, considering that they take too damn long to reload to be effective. In the time it takes for the pavise to loose two volleys, normal peasant crossbowmen can get off three. And peasant crossbowmen are easier to replace.

[PerXX]

... I first noticed this when I was defending against sieges as Aragorn, vs France.

Well if you had elven archers, that would do the trick!
Did Gandalf and the Rohirrim come to your aid at just the right time?

[Alfonzo over Innsmouths]

Well if you had elven archers, that would do the trick!
Did Gandalf and the Rohirrim come to your aid at just the right time?

They weren't elven, you idiot. I'm not playing that kind of campaign, what were you thinking? I mean, honestly, elves.
















































They were dwarves. Obviously.

[Abyrvalg]

They weren't elven, you idiot.

Good God. Where is you sense of humor?
PerXX's post was caused by your mistyping. Aragorn instead of Aragon. Twice. And by the fact that elven archers are extremely powerful in TATW.
I don't see any reason for your offensive post.

[elzahr]

Seriously? Don't you think winning a battle with 0 casualties on your side isn't an advantage? OMG

I've crashed a lot of enemy armies with long-bow archers and missile cavalry only. No contact, no casualties. Close combat is just for them realize that are just half the men that they were at the start of the battle. Instant route. Win.

Maybe because i love playing with islamic-african factions which usually have the bow as their main weapon

PD: I've to said that there's nothing more pleasant that seeing the enemy bodyguard/heavy cavalry running after your missile cavalry and seeing them getting tired and dead

[Larsel]

i agree with OP..archers are in my opinion so useless. And with just some cavalry (which you always have) you can easily kill of enemy archers like nothing..there are no tactics that can make really good use of archers if the enemy rush you with infantry+cavalry.. and as OP points out your archers will usually kill a lot of your own troops too. One thing i tried tho, was getting full stacks of archers only who had stakes and long range bows. This is pretty powerful vs half stacks of enemy armies who will literally get nuked to death by 1000's of arrows. But when it comes to ranged troops i prefer using ranged cavalry both javelins and archers and javelin infantry over crossbow/bow infantry in general

[ziserman]

And with just some cavalry (which you always have) you can easily kill of enemy archers like nothing..

Well of course, since the AI barely knows how to handle archers. But they AI really can't handle much anyway. Try doing this versus an army of Mongols by the way. If you only use *some* cavalry they will die too fast to inflict casualties.

there are no tactics that can make really good use of archers if the enemy rush you with infantry+cavalry..

How about defending the enemy charge with your own cavalry/infantry? Of course, an all-archer army will lose to all-cavalry armies in the open field, just as an all-heavy infantry army will lose to an all-horse archer army in the open. Notice the "in the open" part.

Oh and people here have explained how they are using archers. At least some of the archer-users aren't retards who love to lose stacks against the AI so don't be so absolute.

[napoleonic]

i noticed myself using less and less archers in my armies until i got rid of em for good. now they are the ones i use for guarding towns and castles but i don't put em inside my main army anymore. there are some rare situations where they ain't a liabilty that being bridge battles or when deployed on really high mountains but i consider both of those battles exploits since the AI won't do the same.

i deploy aggressive all out battle tactics, that render both mine and enemy archers useless. usually archerunits get to shoot once, before they are annhilated or routed.

my own archers had like 10 -20 kills per battle and did more damage to my own units than the enemies.

I guess you don't play eastern factions if you were able to say that archers are useless...

but on the eastern front, archers = gods of war (especially elite HAs); not only the archers themselves, the battlefield also give them enormous advantage if done right at extreme case you could have annihilate your attackers from almost half a mile due to you archers positioned on top of a mountain/big hill

archers are unlike their counterparts on shogun 2 that is one of the reason I can't play that game

[Gogolometro]

Murtadoi plus turkish archers, the combo who kill MONGOLS!

[xxxMoRaVexxx]

At those people who says archers are useless: It's probably how you use them that renders their advantages being nullified. Even if you're an aggressive player, charging head-on into the enemy lines, the archers can pepper the enemy before both battle lines met and can go into the flanks or the back to where the arrows hit harder(right side and back side of any units).

I actually don't worry myself being outnumbered and be attacked while my archer dominated army(england) peppers the french from some high terrain.

[Ichon]

A few archers/crossbow will help most armies achieve lower casualty ratios since even if they get only 20-30 kills each that is 60 kill for 0 losses if you have only 3. Also forces AI to attack if you have some archers which can be useful. Alot also depends on the era and what sort of army you are fighting. Archers aren't always useful but saying hardly ever useful is going pretty far. Of course cavalry or elite infantry are more useful but you don't have unlimited numbers of those so a few archers instead of some extra militias seem better.

[Nyarla]

A few archers/crossbow will help most armies achieve lower casualty ratios since even if they get only 20-30 kills each that is 60 kill for 0 losses if you have only 3. Also forces AI to attack if you have some archers which can be useful. Alot also depends on the era and what sort of army you are fighting. Archers aren't always useful but saying hardly ever useful is going pretty far. Of course cavalry or elite infantry are more useful but you don't have unlimited numbers of those so a few archers instead of some extra militias seem better.

i don't need unlimited numbers, and charging the enemy archers with cav (as long as i don't go uphill) results in 300 dead archers and me having less than 10 losses. just start your charge the moment he moves his archers forward to get into range and the charge hits while his archers are still "reorganizing". then when his infantry tries to join the battle, i pull back the cav, and the infantry looses their momentum + get tangled with the surviving archers that try to run. thats the moment my infantry charges.
no archers also means i can have a longer battleline enabling me to overpower the enemy flanks with infantry, surrounding and then destroying the army shortly after the first charge. keeping the enemy locked from 3 sides and charging HC in from the back, no one likes that.

fact is i end up with less than 10% casualties. mainly infantry and some light cav units that charge the enemy cav on the flanks. they are only there to keep his cav in place until the rest of my cav arrives.

another nice addition is, i don't have to worry about light cav units trying to snipe the archers during battle. happened frequently during my games, suddenly its "where are my archers" ? oh they got hit by some light cav that somehow managed to get there, so skirmish mode told em to retreat.

so to add up archers may be usefull if i'd draw out a battle or defend a hill, but thats bad when the enemy comes with 2 or 3 stacks at once. then its finish em fast and take care of the reinforcements.

i could always drag some mangonels along, never been more devastating then against the tight AI formations. just aim the general, since hes at the rear of the army and his whole army gonna get caught up in the flaming oil

as for horse archers the skirmish mode makes em slow to react, even with HC u can catch those guys simply by not targeting the archers directly until your units are really close.

[ziserman]

Again, these are viable tactics that can net you victories against anyone except Mongols. But you can also have victories by using archers with similar tactics. I'm playing as the Byzantines late era currently and I have sent a princess with charm to get a French general and to initiate an invasion in the British isles starting from Galway. I assume you're fighting in west battles as well, yes? Well against western nations and the fatimid infantry spams it's not rare to have less than 100 casualties often beating 3000 men armies. Depending on their army as well. And I use plenty of foot/cav archers. Longbowmen, Turkish HA, Skythikon, Mourtatoi, Turcomans. They comprise 20-40% of my army in total.

The reason we both suffer so little casualties (in these 2 cases at least) isn't our awesome tactics but the AI's inability to adapt to them.

i don't need unlimited numbers, and charging the enemy archers with cav (as long as i don't go uphill)

Or as long as you don't get ambushed, fight in mountains, forests. And of course, the AI rarely ever protects its archers.

[Nyarla]

yupp the AI can hardly deal with anything that goes beyond a frontal infantry charge or archer skirmishing if it didn't have the vh/vh bonus it would be even worse

maybe i should rename topic: archers are useless to me