Best missile unit (non gunpowder) [Archive]

Alatien

11-30-2006, 17:23

I have beend experimenting a bit with various missile units and I came to a conclusion that the best unit is - Genoese Crossbow Militia.

This came as a suprise since I would rather expect English to lead the way, maybe with French Aventurier as follow up.

Meanshile I have done some testing, all on flat ground, Medium difficult and on still, not rainy day. Both sides deployed in loose formations, firing on long/medium ranges. The results below show the final numbers in units (starting 60) after depleting ammo by both sides:

Gen. Crossbow Mili. vs Longbowmen
36 - 20

Gen. Crossbow Mili. vs Yoeman Archers
33 - 6

Gen. Crossbow Mili. vs Aventurier
56 - 5

Gen. Crossbow Mili. vs Pav. Crossbow Mili.
42 - 25

Gen. Crossbow Mili. vs Musketeers (just to see how they do vs gunpoder unit)
0 - 41

I have also tried on Hard setting and i got
Gen. Crossbow Mili. vs Longbowmen
44 - 7
51 - 6

These all seem to be amazing results, especially since it is a Militia unit! And an early one! Add to this a decent melee skill and low price.
The main disadvantage is longer reload time, but if used correctly this doesnt hurt that much.

Anyone has other experiences?

cassiusdio

11-30-2006, 17:30

Genoese crossbow militia are very useful, both in that they have very good defence and their missile attack is excellent. Genoese crossbowmen (built in a castle not a city) are even better.

However, i do find that longbowmen are better overall, maybe not in a straight missile on missile duel, but in that they can deploy stakes befoe the battle, and even in an open field give you a strong defensive position. Retinue Longbowmen lead the way as far as English missile troops go, they are by far the most useful missile troops i have yet used

CaptainSolo

11-30-2006, 17:42

Must say i have to agree with Cassiusdio.

The main strength of the Longbowmen i have found when deployed in large numbers is the ability to decimate an enemy army very very quickly.
In large engagements 5 or 6 units of Longbows will cripple the enemy army quick time and leave very little for their armoured swordsmen to mop up,expecially when on the defensive as Cassiusdio says.

Thats not to say the Genoese are poor as i've played a Milan campaign and they are awesome units and at 100 florins upkeep they're a steal.For longetivity during a long battle they are worth their weight in gold due to the ammount of ammo they carry and are brilliant at defending walls.Having said that the Retinues are no slouches in melee either it has to be said.

I think CA got the balance between these two spot on as both are great in the right situation but in a large battle i'd take the longbowmen.

magnum

11-30-2006, 17:43

I agree that Genoese Crossbow Militia are a great ranged unit, but I'd still take the top of the line Longbow over em. In tests you can give both sides time to fire all their ammo, but even vs the AI, I seldom fire all my ammo when I'm playing with Genoese Crossbows. The longbows however I can fire everything I have quickly, then finish it all up with a charge (cavalry or otherwise.) For the ease and costs though, they are one of the best units.

Doug-Thompson

11-30-2006, 17:46

The obvious intent of this thread is for foot missile units.

I don't have a wide range of experience on that yet. I am anxious to seek how some of the Turkish units stack up.

PaulTa

11-30-2006, 18:09

Not trying out ottoman infantry sort of left a gap in this... :P

Spendius

11-30-2006, 18:11

Me too, I would like to see the same test with turkish archers. ottoman infantry is quite ok, and janissary archers kick *ss but are very expensive.

Nepereta

11-30-2006, 18:35

the unit I used the most for missles so far is the yoeman. The ROF is a decimating force and the range is fantastic the defensive power is great too and its not too hard to get them with silver shields in decent numbers the first 40 turns. The retinue requires more work especially to armour indecently also I find as english spawning archers from a base I use nottingham means the appearance of the Forresters Guild pretty quickly which eventually gives you the fabled sherwood archers too.

If you are playing english I would suggest 1 castle permanently dedicated to archery it pays great dividends in the long run.

rookie7

12-15-2006, 20:09

Can someone please tell me if English faction can train crossbowmen? I have added all "building" but still can't get crossbowmen. Sorry for the n00b question.

John Johnston

12-15-2006, 21:24

Just for kicks, I had to try my beloved Scots Guards. Several were killed during the time it took them to close the distance with the Genoese, but once hand-to-hand combat was joined the Italian dogs were soon routed, and only a handful survived to flee the field...

...just 'cause they've got longbows doesn't mean they have to kill with them. :beam:

myz

12-15-2006, 22:29

are the pavise xbowmen so inferior compared to Genoese xbowmen? they have virtually the same gear, same training,... why such big difference?:wall:

katank

12-15-2006, 22:35

@ rookie7, nope. No xbows for brits. Though longbows are far better IMHO.

To have both missile units expend all their ammo is hugely unrealistic as no semiintelligent commander would even dream of letting his longbows stay there and get shot.

Not only is the rate of fire devastating, ability to use stakes nerfs enemy cav charges and reroutes them. They also slow infantry significantly.

KARTLOS

12-15-2006, 22:46

thie dismounted dvor are a prity hard core unit - they should be included ina ny test

Midnight

12-15-2006, 23:08

Throw in some Byzantine Guard Archers as well - they seem pretty good.

Musashi

12-15-2006, 23:17

Mounted Dvor > All ;)

Shahed

12-16-2006, 00:27

Don Jacopo Caldora

12-16-2006, 01:02

After playing both the English and Milan campaign, I would say it is a toss up between the Gen xbow militia and the longbows. Each has it's unique advantages. The standard gen xbows are amazing too, but it is the economics of the militia units that make them amazing. Plus you have no need to convert cities to castles and can make tons of $$ and it is so simple to keep them replenished.

Husar

12-16-2006, 01:14

Well, you tested them all once, if the genoese always reload while an enemy salvo hits them, they will do a lot better than if they are just about to fire and thus exposed to the enemies' missiles.

andrewt

12-16-2006, 02:02

One on one tests aren't really a very good indicator of the strength of missile units. If I have longbows, dvor, ottoman, etc., I wouldn't get into a missile contest with genoese crossbow militia. I do more damage faster than they do, so I would just target something else rather than missile units that are armored and have a huge shield.

Shahed

12-16-2006, 22:38

That's wise coz killing missile is the domain of cavalry anyway.

katank

12-16-2006, 23:23

Yep, faking charges with cav is often enough to disrupt enemy missile firing. I can sometimes mess up their skirmishers at the very start with a quick charge of my cav units.

Casualties are quite low from enemy fire when I'm in loose anyways. Smashing their melee troops (who are always in tight) is more important. Later, my troops can sweep aside their depleted melee force and any remaining skirmishers with ease.

zulukiller

12-16-2006, 23:54

myz

12-17-2006, 00:00

can y'all post the stats of the missile units being discussed please?

IrishArmenian

12-17-2006, 00:12

If foot archers, go with Dismounted Dvor. I love those units.

Tuidjy

12-17-2006, 00:38

As many people have pointed out, the main purpose of missile units is not to
kill missile units, and if there is one missile unit that is not worth shooting at,
it would be one with a pavise shield.

I would not even rank the genoese crossbow millitia among the top ten
missile units. In the field I would rather have longbowmen with stakes (I'm
not even talking about missile cavalry), on the wall I would rather have dvor,
scots or aventurers (or anyone who can fight hand to hand), and on an
assault, pretty much anyone is better.

Handel

12-17-2006, 00:46

Nothing beats french "scot guards". They are almost heavy infantry as melee units. Besides they are trained in cities, which makes them the absolute city defenders.

Musashi

12-17-2006, 01:57

can y'all post the stats of the missile units being discussed please?

Mounted Dvor:

Ranged Attack: 10
Missile Range: 120

Attack: 11
Charge Bonus: 4

Armor: 5
Defense Skill: 7
Shield: 4
Total Defense: 16

Attributes: AP Missiles

Dismounted Dvor:

Ranged Attack: 11
Missile Range: 160

Attack: 11
Charge Bonus: 3

Armor: 5
Defense Skill: 4
Shield: 6
Total Defense: 15

Attributes: AP Missiles

Scots Guard:

Ranged Attack: 9
Missile Range: 160

Attack: 12
Charge Bonus: 3

Armor: 8
Defense Skill: 9
Shield: 0
Total Defense: 15

Attributes: AP Missiles

If you notice, Scots Guard may be slightly better in melee, but Dismounted Dvor are notably better at range, and with no shield, Scots Guard only have 8 defense against ranged fire whereas Dvor have 11 (5 from armor, 6 from shield), so a fight between the two would be relatively even.

Mounted Dvor would naturally turn Scots Guard into a red smear on the landscape however...

Spark

12-17-2006, 02:06

Nothing beats french "scot guards". They are almost heavy infantry as melee units. Besides they are trained in cities, which makes them the absolute city defenders.

They also cost much more to train and upkeep, and require the top level city upgrade to produce. Genoese crossbowmen are much easier to build (readily available in towns and castles), as well as much cheaper and more numerous. Also, and I know that the AI often loses, but my genoese crossbows with partial plate armor often manage to beat or at least tie scots guard in a custom 1v1 battle on VH.

Foz

12-17-2006, 02:17

As many people have pointed out, the main purpose of missile units is not to
kill missile units, and if there is one missile unit that is not worth shooting at,
it would be one with a pavise shield.

I completely agree with Tuidjy on this one. That being said, you can sometimes find yourself needing to fire on other missle units, and such head to head comparisons in the open field can be useful if done correctly. I would suggest that the primary useful thing to know is not how many kills a unit can inflict with all of its ammo, but rather how many it can inflict in a given length of time, as that tells you the killing power of the unit and therefore its effectiveness for you in battle.

Think of it this way: let's say the enemy infantry is closing with your stationary front rank of infantry, and you intend to thin his ranks with your archers. The unit has until the soldiers reach your line to get its job done, which is the same amount of time whether you have crossbows or longbows. It doesn't matter that crossbows could kill the entire enemy army with all of their ammo where longbows would only kill 60% of it - it only matters that the longbows will decimate those soldiers in that limited span of time far better than crossbows will, because their increased rate of fire is a huge advantage, and means they are more effecient killers in the kills-per-second sense. I've not had time to do empirical tests to determine kill rates against a given standard enemy unit, but it seems clear from in-game observation that high-end longbows do in fact wreck equal enemy units faster than any crossbows do, and thus should prove more useful if battles are fought at any reasonably aggressive pace (i.e. targets become engaged in melee sometime before archers are completely out of ammo). Crossbows could have an edge in situations where the armies just stand there and expend all missle ammo... but in theory, this should never even be close to happening as both armies should be actively engaging each other.

If you want to apply this to your missle vs. missle battles, the thing to do is stop both units when either is out of ammo, as then they've been active for the same amount of time. This is also the most realistic (as others have pointed out) because archers with no more ammo do not wait around to be slaughtered by crossbows unless they are commanded stupidly.

Somebody Else

12-17-2006, 02:48

katank

12-17-2006, 03:20

Not necessarily true. If you place archers out front like xbows, their trajectory becomes noticeably flatter as well and can easily hit units behind it.

Besides, faster rate of fire -> more kills in typical battles -> more valor -> sniping machines

Reapz

12-17-2006, 04:56

Alatien

Thanks for posting test data. You had the result of Crossbowmen doing so well because of this little detail

The results below show the final numbers in units (starting 60) after depleting ammo by both sides
As I'm sure you will have observed in your tests the longbowmen fire faster. If you look at the numbers at the time the longbowmen exhaust arrows as Sinan said the longbowmen own crossbowmen (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=74553). You are letting your longbowmen stand and take missile fire after they are depleted and that's when casualties accrue and flip the stats the other way.

If you play that way in campaign (let your units get riddled to allow the slower firing opponents to catch up) then you can expect the results to be as you posted. If you use longbowmen until they exhaust arrows and then move on to new tactics they will handily beat the slower crossbowmen.

I think the foz 4 was saying that

If you want to apply this to your missle vs. missle battles, the thing to do is stop both units when either is out of ammo, as then they've been active for the same amount of time. This is also the most realistic (as others have pointed out) because archers with no more ammo do not wait around to be slaughtered by crossbows unless they are commanded stupidly.

katank

12-17-2006, 05:07

I personally compare missiles 1 on 1 by having the unit that finishes firing first charge at the other and try to melee. Whoever wins combined shoot/fight is overall victor.

Shahed

12-17-2006, 07:13

Admittedly, longbows can get more volleys off in a certain time than x-bows, but I find, due to the trajectories involved, each x-bow volley is considerably more damaging than an archer volley - with the flat trajectory, x-bows are more likely to hit other units on the way/after as well.

This is where horse archers really shine. They can move fast enough to fire from the flanks. From where missiles which miss their original target can go along the line and hit someone else.

Reapz thanks for the refresher. Ofc that is what the problem with these tests is, the ammo-less longbows are just standing there.

Blademun

12-17-2006, 09:15

While many people stick up for longbows, I would have to say that Genonese Xbows do get a major advantage: Numbers. 8 Xbows vs 4-5 Retinues price for price, Genonese Xbows deal more damage per minute.

I think though that Xbows really shine when used in conjunction with pikes. Make a line of Pikemen milita, and then a line of Genonese Milita. Make the pikes 3 ranks deep and the archer 2 ranks deep. Place the Archers partialy inside the pikes, toward the front. Seperate, these two units are not so strong. TOgether they cover each others weaknesses perfectly. The Xbows act like human sheilds, their huge pavises intercepting enemy arrows for the vulnerable pikes. The pikes provide cavalry charge stopping power and offensive punch in cqc, while the Xbows are more defensive.

Heres a Example of the formation:

http://www.geocities.com/mia_zikorsky/Sheildwall.jpg

This is just with regular Pavise Xbows. Genonese provide even better results.

Typically, behind this I will put cheaper archers, like archer peasants unless I've got loads of cash. I like HRE for this best simply because I can mix in a couple Zwei handers and Gothic Knights. Milanese have great xbows but they seem to be lacking everywhere else.

Reapz

12-17-2006, 10:35

Blademun

I think it is a fallacious argument. Unit for unit Retinue Longbowmen beat Genoese Crossbowmen and inflict more damage per minute on targets. If you have to use 8 units in your stack to match 4 or 5 units in mine I am just going to use my extra slots to recruit other units (probably heavy cavalry) that add to the power of the stack. You don't win the fight because you built a cheaper stack.

Pavises do not protect any troops other than the crossbowmen carrying them. As long as you disable fire at will and manually target the longbowmen at the pikemen (or whoever is hiding behind the crossbows), they will be effectively targeted. I have repeatedly killed hundreds of pikemen or spearmen with single units of longbowmen this way. They are very powerful missile troops. Check out this set of pics (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showpost.php?p=1316171&postcount=14) in the amusing screenshots thread and look at the battle stats in the last pic - 5 units of longbowmen killed 1700 Danish troops in that battle and they were basic longbowmen (plus one or two experience), not Retinues.

I don't know how anybody can doubt the power of longbows if you use them to best advantage. Against an array as you describe with spears or pikes hidden behind crossbowmen I will ignore their missile troops in front and shoot over them to kill the pikes. I know I can kill their spears or pikes faster than they can kill mine with crossbows. I can then wipe out the crossbowmen, left at full strength, with cavalry.

katank

12-17-2006, 16:10

Also note that I don't need retinue longbows to get the 8 AP missile attack. I can easily settle for yeomen archers which are a helluva lot cheaper.

Skott

12-18-2006, 04:41

Crossbow men need to be out front moreso than Longbow men IMO. In RTW you could put archers behind the front line and just wipe out a enemy from safety but in MTW2 you have to put most archers up front to get any kind of good killing impact. Here they are subject to attacks.

However in battles, especially in defensive fights, I can put Longbow men behind main lines and get better results with them than I could with putting Crossbow men behind the main lines.

There are pros and cons between the two types of bowmen. But like mentioned earlier the person who uses the combined arms the most effecient will come out the winner. Wether it be defensive or offensive.

Skott

12-18-2006, 04:43

Double Post...Sorry

Blademun

12-18-2006, 05:23

Reapz

12-19-2006, 06:07

Blademun

You are assuming that the animations drive the outcome of the battle. That is not the case. The game engine decides the outcome and the animations give some graphical representation to what the engine is doing but calculations about units' casualties aren't driven by animations. You can't intuit what is happening from watching animations as sometimes thay just don't represent what the game engine is doing.

Foz

12-19-2006, 06:11

Pavises do not protect any troops other than the crossbowmen carrying them.

I disagree. The Xbows DO protect the Pikes. Arrows are actual physical entities in this game. If something intercepts them before they reach their target, they cease to exist. Xbows protect the Pikes by physically intercepting arrows that come at low trajectorys at the pikes. That happens to be the most accurate trajectory and best one to defend against. The archers arn't just infront of the pike formation, they are inside it, just 1 line out ahead of the pikes. When you target the pikes, the arrows hit both units. If the arrows come from a lower trajectory, they will mostly hit the Xbows.
There's no real way to eye this up, and I really doubt either of you has a real leg to stand on concerning evidence. If so, post away, as I've heard nothing with any substance behind it yet. If not, then if you want anyone to actually know what's going on, figure out a way to test it empirically and post the results. If the arrows really ARE physical entities then I imagine you'll notice the pikes take loads less damage with pavise X-bows parked in front as described vs the pikes just standing there naked. If they're not physical entities or for some reason the game ignores the X-bows since the pikes are targeted, then I'm guessing the pikes continue to get blasted as usual.

You'll also want to test separately to determine if this interferes at all with the firing of the X-bows, as it's possible the non-front ranks will have their fire interfered with by the pikes near them, and this almost certainly would negate the benefit of blocking some incoming missiles from hitting your pikemen.

Reapz

12-19-2006, 07:27

foz

it is really a much more general issue - does mingling units allow a weaker unit to capture the armor bonus of the stronger one - protect it in some way? I have never seen anything posted by developers or anybody else to suggest this happens. It has not been my experience in game either.

Again I think people are misunderstanding the way the game engine works if they think combat outcomes are contingent on the graphically depicted events, animations, etc that play out during battles. The engine calculates the results. The display depicts the combat but the results of unit combat don't wait for graphics to play out to see what happens. Remember there is an autoresolve function that calculates battle outcomes with no graphics. Of course it matters where you position units, formation, etc, but the actual animations do not drive the outcome. If arrows can't be seen to strike a target or swords aren't swinging enough that does not mean that the game engine isn't going to calculate a succesful attack. Bottom line - animations are eye candy but not driving the engine's calculations of combat, just depicting what the engine is deciding, and sometimes not accurately depicting it.

Spark

12-19-2006, 08:36

geala

12-19-2006, 09:56

Of course animations mean a lot in M2TW. It's far more than mere optic. You should take a look to the modding sections. But I think that's not the actual problem.

Missiles are calculated with a certain trajectory. If someone is between the missile unit and the aim he will (at least partly) be affected. If he is after the unit aimed at he will be affected if the bolt or arrow does not hit someone in that unit.

But I don't know wether it is a good idea to put two units together in one place because there should be some modifiers to create a negative affect for such piled units.

Reapz

12-19-2006, 10:42

You must be joking?

Custom battle, genoese crossbowmen vs. scottish pike militia and scottish highland nobles.

AI designates the pike militia as the general unit, places it behind the nobles. Both stacks march forward, with the nobles in front, towards your crossbowmen. Turn fire at will off, target pike militia. By the time they get close, the nobles will have suffered more casualties than the pike militia, despite the nobles' 9 defense compared to the pike militia's 1. It's clear as day that arrows do indeed behave as they should, as opposed to entirely based on some calculation. The pike/crossbow spearwall does work, the pavise will absorb a lot of the arrows.
I don't follow this at all. Where are the pavises in a combination of scottish pike militia and scottish highland nobles?

If your point is that the troops nearby a unit targeted with missile fire also get depleted - that is not in dispute. If your point is that the casualty rate is lower in units posted further away than units nearer to the archers firing - that is not in dispute. What is being argued is a scenario involving a shielded unit occupying the same space as a non shielded unit - here is Blademun's post:

I think though that Xbows really shine when used in conjunction with pikes. Make a line of Pikemen milita, and then a line of Genonese Milita. Make the pikes 3 ranks deep and the archer 2 ranks deep. Place the Archers partialy inside the pikes, toward the front. Seperate, these two units are not so strong. TOgether they cover each others weaknesses perfectly. The Xbows act like human sheilds, their huge pavises intercepting enemy arrows for the vulnerable pikes

This is your impression:
By the time they get close, the nobles will have suffered more casualties than the pike militia, despite the nobles' 9 defense compared to the pike militia's 1.Show me test numbers and then we can debate the reasons but I don't see any proof of this other than your impression.

It's clear as day that arrows do indeed behave as they should, as opposed to entirely based on some calculation.
Um, what do you think the game program does in computing combat outcomes other than calculations? The point is what type of calculation dictates the result? It is one independent of unit animations. The game engine does not compute the trajectory of every arrow before it can compute the outcome of combat. It computes the combat outcome while showing graphics of missiles flying.

Musashi

12-19-2006, 11:05

That's where you're wrong... the game does in fact appear to track projectile flights, and only units physically struck will be killed... If you put another unit in between the firer and it's target, particularly for a flat trajectory weapon, the unit in between will be killed and almost none of the other unit will.

PaulTa

12-19-2006, 11:11

I'd be really curious to hear something on this from the CA devs. From what I've heard, and this does make sense, calculating the kills based on the individual animations would be a huge drain on the computer. Having graphics that represent calculations, on the other hand, seems quite a bit more plausible.

I don't have any tests to back this up per say, but think about a unit of crossbowmen firing on some knights of the mounted sort. Some of those mounted knights will get pelted with ten or fifteen crossbow bolts before actually dying, while some take one or two and hit the ground. If the kills were calculated based on animations, I would expect the guy that sucks up fifteen crossbow bolts to be long past dead, not ready for more.

Musashi

12-19-2006, 11:15

No, because each "hit" is only a chance to score a kill. Much like in an RPG you roll to see if you caused damage after a successful hit.

More heavily armored units have a much higher chance to survive than less armored characters... Particularly against low end archers who don't have AP missiles. If you're talking about General's Bodyguards, they all have 2 hit points, so you have to actually hit them twice, and roll a successful wound twice to drop one...

Silvershade

12-19-2006, 11:48

Tuidjy

12-19-2006, 12:25

My feeling is that dismounted Dvor are not only the best bowmen in the game but also the best infantry of any sort, fully fledged heavy infantry that have a ranged attack better than most archers makes these a fantastic unit.

They are good, and they may be the best, but that is by no means certain.
The French have the Scottish longbowmen, and the adventurers. Both of
these have a nasty missile attack, and the longbowmen have amazed me
in hand to hand combat. Strangely enough, the adventurers don't seem
much worse statwise, but are not so overwhelmingly good at close quarters.

It's strange that the French, who early on lack any fancy missile units, have
three amazingly good ranged specialists: a longbowman, a crossbowman, and
a horse archer.

Temujin

12-19-2006, 15:37

Um, what do you think the game program does in computing combat outcomes other than calculations? The point is what type of calculation dictates the result? It is one independent of unit animations.
This is clearly wrong.

For instance, units using two-handed axes are currently bugged; some missing animations are causing them to NOT attack mounted enemies in melee, and they consequently die with 0 casualties inflicted in this situation. If the engine calculated the result and tried to approximate that in graphics, a couple of missing frames would only look odd, not affect the result. Yet the result is most definitely affected.

Reapz

12-19-2006, 19:08

If you think the game engine relies on graphical portrayal of individual troops within units, the trajectory of their weapons, the character of the strike of their individual weapon on individual opposing troops (not a whole unit but a single animated fighting man) to determine combat outcome that is wrong. The computing power required to run that kind of calculation isn't sitting on your desktop or mine. It is a nice idea but simply doesn't happen. Ask a dev or any game programmer.

The TW series game engine can do the whole thing with no graphics (autoresolve). THe TW series early games had flat 2D sprite animation for combat. You think the combat engine was transfromed when the game went 3D on the battlefield to wait for battleground physics for each of 10,000 animated men to be calculated before it gets a result?

Zenicetus

12-19-2006, 21:15

That's where you're wrong... the game does in fact appear to track projectile flights, and only units physically struck will be killed...

I think you have cause and effect backwards here. The game doesn't have to calculate individual arrow trajectories and then "find" a result and display it. If it did, the frame rate would crawl.... and it would be even worse with unit size set to large or huge.

If it works like other games of this type, then what's happening (roughly speaking) is that the combat algorithm is based on unit match-ups, not individual soldiers and missiles. When "unit A" fires arrows at "unit B", it matches up the stats and modifiers -- base attack rating, armor, defense, unit facing direction, terrain, experience, etc. -- and it calculates how many soldiers will die every time "unit A" fires an arrow volley at "unit "B". If the result is "3 soldiers will die", then the game shows a volley of arrows landing on unit B, with 3 of the normal soldier animations picked at random and replaced by the "stagger and drop to the ground, dead" animation.

It doesn't have to calculate an arrow trajectory to do this. If it did, then aiming in the game would be much more critical and results would be far more unpredictable. It would mean that a solider would be hit, or not hit, depending on whether he walked a few feet one side or the other of an incoming arrow.

We're not running supercomputers here, that can calculate results at the level of the individual soldier and arrow, with thousands of soldiers and arrows on the screen at the same time.

If you put another unit in between the firer and it's target, particularly for a flat trajectory weapon, the unit in between will be killed and almost none of the other unit will.

Sure, but the algorithm can still do that by working on the level of the whole unit, not the individual soldier or arrow.

PaulTa

12-19-2006, 21:45

I'd have to agree with Zenicetus on this one. One way is much more economic in terms of computer power, while the other seems like it would be a huge drain on your common PC. If minimum specs were anything less than a few gigs and a 2.8 intel proc, then I couldn't see it calculating the results based on the projectiles themselves instead of having the graphic reflect what the computer determined.

Blademun

12-19-2006, 22:10

Well, I went on and did those Impirical tests that were requested.

Setup: Enemy was one unit of Peasant archers, to rule out AP effects and other 'special abilities some archers get. I was HRE with a standard pike militia and Pavise Xbow. I let the archers fire their arrows till they ran out, then recorded the number of men left BEFORE the archers charged.

Pike/Xbow Formation: 49/33 respectively. Total Losses: 53

Xbows alone(pikes far away): 13. Total Losses: 47

Pikes Alone: 0 left (they went down to 6 then routed). Total Losses: 75

There you have it. While the total losses between the two were high, the damage was spread out between the two. This would suggest, that at least to some extent, flight trajectories are calculated and any units in the way get hit. Missiles are physical entities.

One unit of archers can only be selected to attack one unit, yet it did damage to two. THere is no possible way this could be possible judging by this:

If it works like other games of this type, then what's happening (roughly speaking) is that the combat algorithm is based on unit match-ups, not individual soldiers and missiles. When "unit A" fires arrows at "unit B", it matches up the stats and modifiers -- base attack rating, armor, defense, unit facing direction, terrain, experience, etc. -- and it calculates how many soldiers will die every time "unit A" fires an arrow volley at "unit "B". If the result is "3 soldiers will die", then the game shows a volley of arrows landing on unit B, with 3 of the normal soldier animations picked at random and replaced by the "stagger and drop to the ground, dead" animation.

This is NOT Age of Empires, by any means. Its a far more advanced game then that. Arrows and all other projectiles in this game have physical presence.

Foz

12-19-2006, 22:29

This is clearly wrong.

For instance, units using two-handed axes are currently bugged; some missing animations are causing them to NOT attack mounted enemies in melee, and they consequently die with 0 casualties inflicted in this situation. If the engine calculated the result and tried to approximate that in graphics, a couple of missing frames would only look odd, not affect the result. Yet the result is most definitely affected.
Yes, the result is affected, which also seems to indicate what blademun has seen - that attacks are caused by entities interacting. I think the mechanics of this need explanation though for people who may not be familiar with what is and is not possible.

Some people probably imagine that the game engine can somehow tell when an arrow or hand-held weapon on screen impacts a man, a shield, or whatever. Well yes... and no. In reality it has nothing to do with what's on screen. Identifying an arrow in a graphical scene by visually searching for the arrow and calculating whether or not it is currently intersecting anything that can be recognized visually as a man is probably far outside the scope of this game.

What IS possible, however, is that the game calculations for kills and the kill animations are directly tied to each other. From the way things seem to behave, I'm guessing the game tracks arrows and hand-held weapons (for melee perhaps the entire man) as separate entities, which are then checked to see if they have hit a man or an obstacle, using the coordinates of each thing in the scene... and this is where I think people get fuzzy. The calculations are based not on the picture you see, but on the numerical representation of the scene in coordinates, from which the scene you view is ultimately rendered. In short, the visual display on-screen doesn't dictate in any way what is going on, but rather is derived from what is going on at the calculation level. The game doesn't need to know that an arrow on your screen has gone through a man in the enemy unit - it simply calculates the position of the arrow object it is tracking, finds out it is inside the space defined as man #173 at the current moment, and so he has been hit and some piece of code that deals with arrow impacts executes to do something about it (and presumably determine if the man dies, and that the arrow must cease to exist). So the displayed picture doesn't matter at all, except to note that the game is probably displaying everything in the scene directly from the coordinate-based model of the scene that it uses to calculate everything.

As for hit detection, it seems likely that it's based on the intersection of objects as I suggested for arrows, in the case of melee too. This would illustrate why the bugged 2-handers get no kills: their weapons never intersect enemies when they attempt to swing, therefore the hit-code never triggers, and no kills result. I must conclude that all evidence points to the game keeping the entire battle as a physics-driven scene with interacting entities, as a simpler resolution of battle (at least none I've heard or know of) can not account for units with missing animations failing to hit anything, or arrows impacting objects that are in their path aside from their target.

Reapz

12-19-2006, 22:32

Blademun

If you look at some of the archery tests I did that are posted here (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=74553) you will see that the results vary markedly from test to test with exactly the same conditions - basically restart the same test and get different numbers. One test result doesn't tell you much as you can get a result you wont see even if you run another five tests.

Two units in the same location under missile fire will both sustain casualties. This does not negate what Zenicetus said.

You wrote "Arrows and all other projectiles in this game have physical presence." They are graphical representations. The developers could write code to show animations of the archers drinking beer instead of firing when you right click order the attack, and still have the target unit die when they are "fired" on. The animated men onscreen do not have to fire their arrows and hit their individual targets. This has been shown in other tests, that animations sometimes do not match the combat calculations from the game engine.

Zenicetus

12-19-2006, 23:35

This is NOT Age of Empires, by any means. Its a far more advanced game then that. Arrows and all other projectiles in this game have physical presence.

I'm not sure this has been proven by your test. I would be more convinced if people here reported that their frame rates dropped in half, when they doubled the number of soldiers and projectiles onscreen with the army size setting in Options. And that's not happening, as far as I can tell.

Different army size settings may cause a slight reduction in frame rate (depending on your video card) due to increased 3D rendering load, but not the kind of drop you'd expect by forcing the CPU to double or triple the number of individual projectile calculations it's (supposedly) doing. The fact that we can double or triple the number of soldiers onscreen with fairly minimal impact on frame rate, suggests to me that battle calculations and results are based on units (which don't change with army size setting), and not individual soldier/arrow calculations.

Foz

12-20-2006, 00:17

I'm not sure this has been proven by your test. I would be more convinced if people here reported that their frame rates dropped in half, when they doubled the number of soldiers and projectiles onscreen with the army size setting in Options. And that's not happening, as far as I can tell.
You are assuming many very shaky things by suggesting that double unit size should cause 1/2 frame rate:

1. That the battle calculations, not the rendering of the scene, is the limiting factor in your frame rate. I, on the other hand, would suggest that any bottleneck comes from something to do with the graphics processing as opposed to the battle calcs. It seems to me that some simple mathematical computations for moving an extra man and arrow around in a battle physics engine are completely miniscule compared to the thousands of computations that must be done to draw and dynamically light a single extra man and arrow into the scene. I don't think you could imagine enough detail into the battle mechanics to make the calculations even remotely compare to the ones done to render the scene.

2. That nothing else in the scene affects frame rate except the units. Look at the field of battle we're talking about here. The game draws a hugely complex scenery, including detailed blades of grass and numerous highly-detailed buildings often. As they account for a huge percent of the scene a lot of the time, it's misguided to suggest that doubling the unit size should halve the frame rate, since the unit drawing clearly can't account for 100 percent of the scene rendering time in the first place. If it's for instance 50% of the drawing time (not trying to guess the amount here, it's just as an example), then doubling it makes 150% of the original scene draw time, and your frame rate would be 2/3 original. Also, this isn't accounting for any non-unit-based calcs or routines the game does during a battle. There obviously are some.

3. That thousands of object computations should horribly lag your system. Consider chess engines for a moment. The Chessmaster engine can permute the game of chess 9 moves deep in less than a second (as soon as I get the window open to look at the best line of play it has found, it's 9 deep). That's 667,438 different board positions brought about by every possible 9-move sequence that's legal to play. And not only has it figured out each position, but it's run in-depth calculations on each one to determine whether the board favors continued play by white or by black, and to exactly what extent, AND it has compared all eventualities to find the best one for me. Stop and think about that. Can you even begin to think about 667,438 different chess board positions, and the implications of each position, in your head? Of course not. Try it for a few thousand men on a field of battle firing arrows at each other, though. Easier? It was for me, and I bet for you as well, and that means the computer can easily do it by comparison.

Musashi

12-20-2006, 02:42

Try the test using musketeers. It's far more decisive because of the very flat trajectory of their projectiles. They basically can't hit a unit standing behind another unit at all.

PaulTa

12-20-2006, 03:03

That doesn't necessarily mean that the projectiles are determining kills. The computer could show the results of a volley from muskets in a different manner than from, say, longbows because of different trajectories.

Let's take a look at this for a moment.

The Computer generates the kills and then the graphics represent such-

For- The drag on the computer would make the game unplayable without a high end system. I've personally played out battles with tons of archers, but never did I see the reduction in frame rates (I run a mod to ATI tray tools that allows me to see framerate) as significant as the opposite of the above would suggest.

I also have seen multiple hits on units that don't die, while the same hit on a different unit of the same type does result in a kill.

Against- ?

I think that we also need to consider which one is easier to program. I'm sure that the developers wouldn't make a bunch of unecessary extra work for themselves without any benefit.

Zenicetus

12-20-2006, 03:17

You are assuming many very shaky things by suggesting that double unit size should cause 1/2 frame rate:

Apologies in advance for cherry-picking text to reply to, but I didn't want this to get too long:

1. That the battle calculations, not the rendering of the scene, is the limiting factor in your frame rate. I, on the other hand, would suggest that any bottleneck comes from something to do with the graphics processing as opposed to the battle calcs. It seems to me that some simple mathematical computations for moving an extra man and arrow around in a battle physics engine are completely miniscule compared to the thousands of computations that must be done to draw and dynamically light a single extra man and arrow into the scene.

This would have been true several years ago, but much of the eye candy has been off-loaded to graphics co-processor cards. Calculating a ballistic trajectory is actually non-trivial, compared to shuffling soldiers around on the terrain, or melee combat:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trajectory#Physics_of_trajectories

2. That nothing else in the scene affects frame rate except the units. Look at the field of battle we're talking about here. The game draws a hugely complex scenery, including detailed blades of grass and numerous highly-detailed buildings often.

Yes, but try a frame rate test in simple terrain (see below).

3. That thousands of object computations should horribly lag your system. Consider chess engines for a moment.

I would rather compare to a combat flight sim, some of which actually do calculate true ballistic trajectories, and none of which can show 2400 guys onscreen firing at each other, like M2TW does.

Okay, I just did a frame rate test. Custom battle, Spain vs. Portugal, each army using 10 Peasant Crossbows and 10 Peasant Archers. Setting is desert beach with clear weather, noon (no grass or buildings to interfere with framerate). Frame rate reported with FRAPS, at the start of the battle with missiles in the air, before there were too many losses.

-----

Small-size Armies: 960 men total, both sides

FPS looking away from army: 50 fps

FPS zoomed out to show all: 28 fps

FPS zoomed in on action: 20 fps

-----

Large-size Armies: 1800 men total, both sides

FPS looking away from army: 45 fps

FPS zoomed out to show all: 16 fps

FPS zoomed in on action: 20 fps

-----

Huge-size Armies: 2400 men total, both sides

FPS looking away from army: 35 fps

FPS zoomed out to show all: 10 fps

FPS zoomed in on action: 20 fps

Now, what this suggests to me is that we can easily see the graphics hit from the CPU and video card having to render 2400 individual soldier animations and 2400 missiles per volley, compared to 960 soldiers and missiles. The results from looking away from the action shows that the computer is crunching battle numbers that do slow it down a bit, but not that much. When zooming in on the action, whatever the computer has to do to calculate battle results, isn't taxing it enough to affect the frame rate.

Yes, it could be argued that CA's algorithms for "individual arrow trajectory" are just hyper-efficient, and it doesn't matter if there are 960 arrows in flight, or 2400 arrows. But that wouldn't match my experience with other games like combat flight sims, that actually do calculate real bullet stream trajectories. I can't begin to imagine a combat flight slim that could put 2400 planes in the air at once.

P.S. System specs, if it matters:

Athlon 64 3800+
2 gigs RAM
Nvidia GeForce 6800 Ultra

Spark

12-20-2006, 04:51

To be honest, I'm not sure why we're going off-topic arguing about how the game engine calculates arrow hits. It's pretty much anyone's best guess. This was all started with the following comment posted a while ago:

Pavises do not protect any troops other than the crossbowmen carrying them. As long as you disable fire at will and manually target the longbowmen at the pikemen (or whoever is hiding behind the crossbows), they will be effectively targeted. I have repeatedly killed hundreds of pikemen or spearmen with single units of longbowmen this way. They are very powerful missile troops.

This is clearly not how the game works, since units standing in the flight path of archer fire will get hit and absorb fire. Whether the arrows are physical entities that are modelled by the engine and can hit other physical entities in the way, or are just a calculation kicking in as soon as a unit moves in between the flight path to divert a percentage of the damage to the unit standing in a way, is not too relevant.

What we really care about is the end result - that arrows behave like they're supposed to. i.e. if arrows are flying from point A to point B, and something gets in between, that something will get hit by most of the arrows. This is evident when your crossbowmen target a stack of units sitting behind another stack, and the non-targetted stack in front takes most of the damage as a result. It's even more evident with musket fire not hitting much farther than the first couple lines of troops, nevermind a unit standing behind another unit. Longbows from long range will have a considerable arc and hit more pikemen than crossbows, but the pavise in front of the pikemen still takes a considerable number of the hits. Try it yourself - make a proper spear wall with pavise crossbows right in front, against archers, and compare the casualties to a spear wall without anything getting in the way.

By the way, I also think that graphics cause the biggest hit to the CPU. In my case (3.2GHz, 1gb RAM, GeForce 6600GT), if I turn graphics down to bare minimum, the game practically flies compared to when I have them on medium/some on high, where large battles get very sluggish. I'm assuming all the calculations are still taking place regardless of graphics setting.

Zenicetus

12-20-2006, 05:30

To be honest, I'm not sure why we're going off-topic arguing about how the game engine calculates arrow hits. It's pretty much anyone's best guess.

(snippage)

Whether the arrows are physical entities that are modelled by the engine and can hit other physical entities in the way, or are just a calculation kicking in as soon as a unit moves in between the flight path to divert a percentage of the damage to the unit standing in a way, is not too relevant.

I think it is relevant, to know how this works in the game. If each arrow is being individually modeled for trajectory, and then the game is doing a collision detection to see if a soldier is located where it lands (which I don't believe at all).... then you're going to get a different result than if the game is simply operating on a "unit level," comparing unit stats and then throwing up randomized animations to show the results.

Take the case of mixed units, for example. Let's say you have two units placed in the same physical location, which the game allows. The enemy AI 's archers can only target individual units, not a mixed physical space. So when the arrows fall out of the sky, are they falling as individually modeled physical objects that will damage both units in the mix indiscriminately, as would happen in real life? Or do they affect the "targeted" unit more than the unit mixed in with them?

BTW, I'm not suggesting that line-of-sight blocking isn't active.... I do think that's part of the picture, but that too can be done on a per-unit basis, not individual soldiers and arrows.

Blademun

12-20-2006, 05:32

I think Foz has got the right idea. I saw arrows hitting two units even though only one was targeted. The overal losses were spread between the two units, with a higher rate of casualties on the Xbows who were up front. I'm wondering if the Xbows have to be turned around and reloading in order to get their shield defense bonus against the arrows. I also wonder if the AI archers were targeting the xbows or the pikes. I am assuming they targeted the Xbows, in which case I wonder what effect targeting the pikes instead would have.

As far as how I feel about mixing the pikes/Xbows:

They do to an extent aid and protect each other. Its pretty hard to deny that the Xbows are abosrbing hits that would have otherwise killed pikes. WIthout Xbows, pikes are annihilated completey by one archer unit. Mix Xbows and they survive with 2/3-ish men remaining. THats pretty big. Its safe to say the two are better off together then apart when facing a intelligent opponent who knows the pikes stand between him and victory. Also, its not like the archers are going to help defend the flanks or anything. THey were going to be out front anyway, may as well have them help protect the mission critical pikes Who MUST stay alive.

Against the AI it is probably better to keep seperate because the AI is too stupid to target the unarmoured pikes as opposed to the armoured Xbows. Against human players I'd definately mix them so I don't lose my pikes entirely. If you are facing a cavalry/CavArcher army and you lose your pikes, well, you lose the battle. Pikes are the only unit I've seen that can -stop- a cavalry charge. Every other infantry unit, including spears, are decimated by a formed cav charge.

As far as this whole argument regarding whether missiles have presence or not, I'm not concerned. I'm already 120% convinced that arrows do have presence in some form or another or otherwise I would not have got the results I did. I don't care about the exact game mechanics behind how the devs made it work this way. It just does, and thats good enough for me.

Foz

12-20-2006, 06:38

This would have been true several years ago, but much of the eye candy has been off-loaded to graphics co-processor cards. Calculating a ballistic trajectory is actually non-trivial, compared to shuffling soldiers around on the terrain, or melee combat
I was talking about calculating ballistics versus the rather lengthy calculations needed to render a 3-D scene at all, not just shuffle some guys around. If you've taken any physics dealing with simple parabolic flight paths, you'll recognize your ability to fairly readily calculate the flight path of something based on its fired velocity and angle of firing, by hand. Rendering an object, however, requires some rather unwieldy math to accomplish, and I'd never want to try to do it all by hand, I'd be at it for a long time just for a single simple arrow. I'm not trying to trivialize the trajectory computation, but drawing the arrow on screen is many orders of magnitude worse. I don't really expect anyone who hasn't had a computer graphics class to understand why, so just trust me when I say rendering a 3-D scene on the scales we're talking about is more numerically intensive than you can imagine.

Also, Z, as you point out, graphics are primarily not in the processor's hands anymore. This begs the question: when you get 20 or less fps, does the actual speed of your battle slow to a crawl, or does it happen at regular speed, just choppy as all hell? If it becomes choppy but with regular play speed still, then the problem is all graphics. I know this because if the problem is battle calculations, the game play has to slow down, as the game cannot go forward at all until it knows which men are being hit by arrows or slain in combat. In short, the game must wait for battle calculations since they determine outcomes and therefore ARE the battle - if they are slow, the battle is slow. Graphics are just your occasional snapshot of the battle the computer is carrying out in computations, so the corollary is that if the game speed itself slows down, then either the calculations are the cause of the bottleneck, or the game speed is forced down in low fps situations to alleviate the chopiness - in other words, devs may decide to slow the battle speed down to facilitate users being able to see the battle and make decisions reasonably (since you probably couldn't control a 5 fps battle for instance happening at regular speed). Either way it goes though, that knowledge from you will tell us something potentially useful.

Another useful thing to note here is that in order for the game to draw arrows in the dynamic fashion from each archer and through the air as it seems to, it has to be keeping track of them already in the coordinate system. If units were cookie-cutter (aligned in nice neat blocks of fixed dimensions always) then a "group firing code" could be used, but as I've seen groups of archers in disarray let loose volleys that seem to originate one from each archer's particular position, this strongly points to them being distinct in the code. Individual men certainly must be distinct from the group in code, or there'd be no way to draw them in unique positions doing their own things. If these are both the case as seems likely from a scene-rendering perspective, then the extension to arrow and weapon hit detection just requires collision detection, something that causes very little overhead.

One last note: I didn't mean to suggest the graphics were slowing down the processor necessarily... just that they IMO are the likely source of any bottleneck that occurrs. This could be due to the video card not being able to keep up with its heavy load, or the memory bandwidth being in too short supply, or any given data channel on your motherboard being backlogged with data - I just wanted to be clear that I think the graphics, for whatever reason are the source, since I'm so certain they require much more power to crunch out than the battle calculations do, even if you assume the individual entity tracking we've been so hotly debating is in place.

Reapz

12-20-2006, 07:12

OT we are talking about the effectiveness of Crossbow Militia vs. longbowmen.

The OP said

I have beend experimenting a bit with various missile units and I came to a conclusion that the best unit is - Genoese Crossbow Militia.
This came as a suprise since I would rather expect English to lead the way
I stated that in my testing (even basic) longbowmen are far better; the difference in results came from subjecting longbowmen to unreturned missile fire - allowing slow firing crossbows to catch up.
Blademun then said

While many people stick up for longbows, I would have to say that Genonese Xbows do get a major advantage: Numbers. 8 Xbows vs 4-5 Retinues price for price, Genonese Xbows deal more damage per minute.

I think though that Xbows really shine when used in conjunction with pikes. Make a line of Pikemen milita, and then a line of Genonese Milita. Make the pikes 3 ranks deep and the archer 2 ranks deep. Place the Archers partialy inside the pikes, toward the front. Seperate, these two units are not so strong. TOgether they cover each others weaknesses perfectly. The Xbows act like human sheilds, their huge pavises intercepting enemy arrows for the vulnerable pikes.
I then said that even against mixed unit targets the longbowmen still do well.
Blademun responded:

Well, I went on and did those Impirical tests that were requested.

Setup: Enemy was one unit of Peasant archers, to rule out AP effects and other 'special abilities some archers get. I was HRE with a standard pike militia and Pavise Xbow. I let the archers fire their arrows till they ran out, then recorded the number of men left BEFORE the archers charged.

Pike/Xbow Formation: 49/33 respectively. Total Losses: 53
Notice the change here? He's testing PEASANT archers against his mixed unit cocktail and it is still doing poorly.

Nothing that anybody posted has argued against the power of longbows as they are used in the campaign, unless you use them in a non-sensible fashion.

Nothing posted shows the mixing of units allows armored units to "protect" weaker units. The mixing of units does dilute casualties - they are spread over several units. Whatever viewpoint you have on the physics of combat, longbowmen are very powerful missile troops and pavise crossbow militia can't stand up to them. Adding pikemen doesn't help.

Foz

12-22-2006, 06:52

Nothing that anybody posted has argued against the power of longbows as they are used in the campaign, unless you use them in a non-sensible fashion.
Even so, I think some people are not yet convinced, as actual evidence of longbows vs XBows is a bit lacking. I haven't run them 1v1 in custom, or seen a reasonable confrontation between them that didn't get ruined by other units. Maybe I'll get a chance to do it soon, and we'll know more.

Nothing posted shows the mixing of units allows armored units to "protect" weaker units. The mixing of units does dilute casualties - they are spread over several units. Whatever viewpoint you have on the physics of combat, longbowmen are very powerful missile troops and pavise crossbow militia can't stand up to them. Adding pikemen doesn't help.
"Diluting casualties" is protecting the weaker unit, is it not? If the aim was to prevent pikes from being slaughtered before they enter combat, which it sounded like it was... then it has been done.

I suspect a few points about the 2-unit-in-one-space theory, though:

1. It has a more pronounced effect when the shooters are closer to your 2 units. They will fire on a lower trajectory, and the XBows should be right in the way and almost totally protect the pikes. From further away, arrows may fall in at a 45 degree angle or even steeper, making it much less likely a XBow body is in the way of an arrow that would otherwise nail a pike.

2. You are probably taking considerably more total casualties by putting 2 units in the space of 1. This follows from simple logic. A loose formation alleviates losses from archers because arrows fall between the men more often, so clearly less men per "unit area" (think square foot or square meter) is tougher to kill for enemy archers. Conversely, putting more men per unit area (tight formation) gets them killed more often. By stacking 2 units on top of each other, you make this even worse by cramming even MORE men in the same amount of space, thus making it much more difficult for arrows to make it to the ground safely. Arrows that would fall harmlessly around the pikes if they were alone are now likely to slam into the XBows who are taking up most of the non-pikeman space, so it's easy to see why you should in fact be suffering greater losses than would a single unit from an equal number of enemy salvos. Even if you are putting the 2 units into loose formation, a single unit in loose formation itself should suffer less total casualties, so this strategy seems like a poor idea if my assessment is correct.

Blademun

12-22-2006, 09:43

Nobody wants to argue against your Longbows anymore Reapz. That was dropped a long time ago. I'm glad you love your Longbows so much you have to pick peoples posts apart. IMO, I hope Longbows get nerfed, since you've proven so irrefutably that they are uber powered. I hope your happy.

My impirical tests were made to deal with the argument that projectiles can't be intercepted before reaching a soft target. The two statements you pulled out are completely unrelated. THe topic of the post shifted between those two posts.

And as for the last poster. I agree partially, but it depends on which unit we're talking about. Pikes by themselfs get totally slaughtered by a single unit of Peasant archers. Pikes/Xbows suffered less overall losses. Infact, at 53 losses, the combined unit suffered less overall then the single pikemen.

I think because pikemen are so vulnerable to arrows, they are one of the only units that actually benefit from having another, heavily armoured unit, mixed in their front to absorb arrows. I'm not sure how it would do against an AP archer like Xbows or Lonbows, since i haven't tested that. I imagine, it would be alot worse with 80+ casualties.

Lord_hazard

01-14-2007, 12:46

I have to say that i dont have the feel of missile superiority when i field longbowmen because they are far from unique enough, alot of factions have units that are just as good are even better. This takes away alot of the english firepower. Its also historically inccorect that so many other factions could field ranged units similar in power to the english longbowmen who were prob the best ranged units in the world until the invention of rifled guns. I just dont get the feel of this when i play the game, so i would really like the game to be balanced somewhat more in this regard and make the english more powerfull as they should be. And limit or remove the mass recruitable elite units that ruin the game balance.

zstajerski

01-14-2007, 15:57

Lord_hazard

01-14-2007, 17:14

still....
the best non gunpowder missile unit is retinue longbowmen,....
they have extremly god defensive stats, extremly good missile attack, long range, the ability to fire flaming missiles ( which devastates all peavise crossbowmen, cause their shilds on teh back when they reload catch fire extremly quick), but their best feature is sharpened stakes, .....

when used right these stakes have won much a victory for me!!!! :)

so: ENGLISH RETINUE LONGBOWMEN takes them all :smash:

True but that shouldnt be why the longbowmen are better then the others, it should be that they have longer range and a faster rate of fire, and you cant use the stakes for anything when your attacking an opponent unless your opponent is stupid enough to charge you first.
My problem is that i feel that the english longbowmen are just like any other elite archer unit excepr for the stakes ofc, but thats not enough for me. I want to see the longbowmen as they should be, and i think its stupid that CA gave so many other factions longbowmen as the only country to ever really use the longbow in a large scale was england and not france or some such.

locked_thread

04-03-2007, 03:50

To have both missile units expend all their ammo is hugely unrealistic as no semiintelligent commander would even dream of letting his longbows stay there and get shot.

At Crecy the French sent forward mercenary Genoese crossbowmen to engage the English longbows. The outnumbered longbows let them have it full bore and the crossbows hastily withdrew, only to be trampled by the french knights.

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crecy:
But the crossbowmen would prove completely useless. With a firing rate of three to five volleys a minute, they were no match for the longbowmen, who could fire ten to twelve arrows in the same amount of time.....

rvg

04-03-2007, 18:15

On the other hand, because of their arched trajectory bows are infinitely more useful in sieges and in rough terrain, since buildings and hills are no obstacle for bows while making xbows totally useless.

IrishArmenian

04-03-2007, 22:26

I think this test is a little flawed, because it only tests on the missile grounds.
When all is said and done, I cannot get enough of dismounted Dvor as the best foot missile troops without gunpowder.
They have a Missile attack of 10, good defense (good armour) and a Melee attack of 11 right out of the gate.

SirMoric

04-04-2007, 05:18

If you fire a volley of arrows, it's usually those you see getting hit that dies. I've never seen a man die without getting struck by an arrow.

Ofcourse, sometimes they may take more than one hit.

If the enemy fires a volley of arrows and you quickly start moving the targeted unit, the arrows won't change direction to hit a particular man.

If you fire a cannon through moving units only the units getting struck by the cannonball dies, try placing a serpentine across a brigde when the enemy charges across and see the carnage. two long rips in the enemy lines, 100 casualties in one volley compromising of soldiers in different units, but nevertheless in a line.

I really don't think this is calculated before the arrows/cannons are fired, if it was the effects would be odd if you start moving targeted units around after volleys are fired, like arrows/cannonballs changing direction or people dying when not struck by arrows/cannonballs.

Just a thought?

rgds