Missile fire effectiveness question

Getting some raking or crossfire makes all the difference in infantry battles, not angles and such.

I spent a whole evening refighting the same fight between three armored sargents vs. 3 Saracen infantry, with three peasant archer units on each side. Green fields, average difficulty.

I won all the battles except the ones where I tried something truly goofy. However, he only ones I won crushingly — causing 30 percent more casualties (excluding prisoners) than I suffered — where ones where some crossfire or raking fire was acheived.

Even in defense, the only way to win decisively was to push out a "bulge," get around a flank or draw the other guy into a situation where he had arrows ripping down his line or where he had a unit that was put under fire from more than one direction.