Archerix: Devastation?

Firstly. We all know normal arrow fire is more accurate. We also know flaming arrows are more demoralising and less accurate, or as the game calls it, 'devastating'.

My issue is with the word 'devastating', which is like telling me that RTW is 'really awesome' i.e. it tells me nothing.

It all boils down to one question: Which sort of fire is more capable of inflicting kills? Making them run is one thing, but making them die is more important; that's what people created war for.

In siege battles it is my favourite habit to fire upon breach defenders with normal shot to seriously whittle them down since flaming arrows may eventually make them waver enough to rout to the town square where I can't get at them (and time is wasted), because I work like the American army in siege battles--minimal cost, maximum effect.

But which will kill more, faster? Normal shot, or flaming? In field battles naturally I almost exclusively use flaming shot, but will normal shot actually do more damage as they approach?

I agree with your use of it. In sieges I want to kill all of the oppositions infantry, and even Cavalry and Elefants if possible, so I use normal fire mode. The fire arrows may cause fewer casualties (personally I haven't found this to be true in flight by flight comparisson, it is simply that the rate of fire is slower with Fire Arrow mode), but the moral effect in the field is priceless. With normal fire mode the archers do nothing more than cause a few casualties, and they rarely cause enough (unless positioned perfectly, i.e. flank or high ground) to cause enough to break a unit (this is all playing on huge unit size).

As to your question about casualties, I have not notices a difference in Flight by Flight number and actually the fire arrows seem to have more effect on 2 hit point units than normal fire mode.

IMHE I think the fire arrows are better for some troops than others.

For instance, today I was firing flaming arrows from two units of Cretan Archers at a unit of Hoplites. After several vollies, they had suffered 0 kills. I extinguished flame, and immediately they started taking damage.

I have found that flaming arrows aren't as effective on the heavier armored troops, but they seem to be more effective on the lighter troops.

I have no idea about the possible demoralizing effect of flaming arrows, though I always start out with flaming arrows just in case it does have a demoralizing effect. If I notice that the enemy unit is not taking kills, or only taking a kill every 2 or 3 vollies, I switch back to regular arrows.

I use normal fire mode when i am trying to eliminate most of the unit to make it an easier target for my cavalry to decimate with a charge to the rear. However, if i am in a pitched infantry battle, or if my cavalry get bogged down, I use fire arrows to hopefully cause them to rout under the strain of the attack and the hellfire that is falling on their heads.

From my experiences, I have found that fire arrows do not cause a unit to get demoralized unless the unit is already in combat with another unit. I have found it best to use regular fire mode until the lines engage, then switch ro fire arrows.

Unless I am fighting elephants in which case I just use fire arrows to make them rout.

Generally, I have three or four sets of archers in my stacks later on in the game, and I simply set one of them to use flaming arrows, and have them mass their fire on the most dangerous targets (not that a solid wall of armored, Athenian, Corinthian, and/or Spartan hoplites really has anything that's all that dangerous to them).

I normally fight with 2 units of archers, cretans if I can help it, apart from playing as Eggy when I actually had as many as 5-6 bowmen in each army. But most of the time I make do with none when I'm away from archer-producing areas, or in early game. So in truth I haven't actually had much experience with archers, and in fact, I rarely even use archers, even on flaming arrows, in field battles because once they fire upon enemy formations in combat with mine they tend to hurt my units as much as they do the others. So I just keep them out unless I can get a clear field of fire, which is rare because my style is upclose, personal, deep-battle and everywhere-at-once.

My favourite activity with archers is to storm poorly-defended armies, rout their defenders with arrows by making them run away from the breach while charging cavalry in, then once I've secured the lower/outer city I will just run my archers to the town square and fire upon the remaining defenders who will rout the moment they leave the town square being broken as they are, and will not leave the square if they're the last unit left, being the perfect sitting ducks. 0 casualty assaults are common when I have 2 units of Cretans in my arsenal.

It's sad to know there doesn't seem to be much difference, though; I was hoping I could find something that would make archers worth their while in a larger variety of situations.

I only use fire if I fight animals or very big, slow and dense targets. Then it does not matter if the fire is accurate.
It is also good if you play Britons and use merc archers. Britons are not made to fight but to frighten the enemy to death ~D
And Pez, I think making the enemy route is the first step. After that you can kill him easily!

yeah, but I want the best of both worlds... I want to kill AND rout the enemy! But if I can't have both then I'll settle for killing :-D My infantry need practice, not just the cavalry... ;-)