I don't really think that the problem is archers. I think the problem is the AI is incapable of dealing with archers if there are more that 1 or 2 of them. In MTW the AI would NOT split his forces up to chase archers unless he had cav to do it with. In RTW the AI will break his lines into many pieces to chase archers with units that can never catch them. This allows the archers to chew them up with ever being engaged. If you add in the ability to flank those broken up lines with cav and the AI completely fails to provide a battle at all!

I did have a nice surprise by the AI last night though. I was attacked by a vastly superior force of almost entirely infantry. I had 2 units of slingers and 4 cav against about 12 mostly heavy swordsmen. I ran around a lot and managed to break the AI up into many pieces. Then I could charge all my cav into a unit from different directions and wipe out a company while losing very few units. There were, what I assumed to be, 2 units chasing one of my slingers around and when I attempted to avoid the corner one of those turned out to have cut the corner and they were slingers too and just anialated my slingers. One of the only nice ploys I have seen the AI make, or maybe they just got lucky. Anyway, I did win that battle (barely).