What's with the archers?

[TerranAce007]

Okay, need some advice here...

Archers are lightly armed and lightly armored missile troop, but I have the hardest time killing them with anything. I charged a group of 80 thracian archers with a group of roman cavalry. They didn't lose much in the charge from the arrow fire, but they ended up routing and the archers still had at least 50 men! How do 80 archers withstand and defeat a cavalry charge of almost the same number of armored cavalry?

I have experienced the same thing with infantry. An early legionary cohort has much heavier weapons and armor than archers, but in the same battle, while the archers were shooting up my main line, I managed to flank them with a spare cohort and charge them. The cohort that charged did not take much arrow fire, but when they got to hand to hand combat, the archers beat & routed them!!!

Also, what is the best way to defeat thracian flaxmen? I had my cohorts on fire at will, as well as having archers behind them. 2 groups of 80 flaxmen charged my line from a distance, and each was down to 50 before they even hit my lines, but they still managed to rout the cohort that they charged, which by the way was only twice their size, 80 men. It seemed like the 50 yard sprint under arrow fire, then the barrage of pila (+2 btw) didnt phase them.

I wanted to play a "very hard" campaign to get better, but this is almost rediculuous.

I saved my progress luckily the turn before I the thracians attacked me, and I fought the battle over five times using different strategies and they repeatedly decimated my army, which outnumbered them by about 400 men.

I am not the best at this ga,e, but I have beaten the imperial campaign twice already, but this is really frustrating me. I can't win any battles because my men run away from the enemy.

I had a group of 47 archers that I rallied from routing, and they were shooting at a unit of flaxmen charging them. By the time the flaxmen got close, there was only 1 left, AND MY F***ING ARCHERS, ALL 47 OF THEM, ROUTED AND RAN AWAY FROM ONE FLAXMAN! This happened far back from the main battle where my army was being slaughtered, there was no enemy archer fire on this group, and no other friendly units routing near them either. I couldn't get them to rally again even after I ran down the one flaxmen with my captains cavalry!

[desdichado]

on very hard ai troops get plenty of combat bonuses (attack/defence & morale probably)- not sure how much but have a look through the forums and you should find exact figures.

this turns crap troops into good ones and elite troops into supermen.

very hard is just that, very hard!

I don't like it personally because of results like archers beating cavalry but on normal diff the ai is crap tactically and it makes the battles too easy. possibly vh has been overdone but still on my 1st campaign (vh/med) so not sure.

[Jeanne d'arc]

Thracian archers are plain useless in melee even with the bonuses they get on very hard.Unless you are using mods to reduce killrate u should have no problems in such battles.However when the initial charge didend kill enough men causing your cavalry to be outnumbered then u should not be surprised in taking losses.Try multiple charges to completely brake the unit and only engage into prolonged melee combat when u outnumber them 2 to 1.Also try a wedge formation charge for maximum effect in the beginning, then switch to normal formation and continue charging.

Falxmen have a good charge and with the bonuses on very hard that charge is devastating, the shock from that charge probably routed your cohorts.Perhaps u could charge in some cavalry from behind once they hit your main line of cohorts.Hope this helps.

[Red Harvest]

Single light cav units vs. archers and skirmishers often run into trouble (esp. on VH where the AI gets +7 attack.) Speed and small unit size play a factor. The missile units are very fast and this seems to sap the charge because you have to chase them so long (tiring and disordering your men.) They seem to take losses a bit more slowly because they are dispersed, sapping the charge bonus as well. Hit them with two units of cav and they usually rout rapidly with few losses to your side.

The answer with cav is usually to double up! Head-to-head much of the heavy infantry is decently matched vs. cav. However, if you hit the units with two units (and preferrably one of these in flank or rear) the infantry usually succumbs rapidly before they can gain support. I often end up with a mob of four light cav units working down a line starting at the end and working toward the center. As soon as a unit routs I hit the next one. It is a "disassembly" line process. Momentum is the key.

[HopAlongBunny]

You might find that re-charging helps a bit. I really noticed this with the light lancers: charge_make contact and dbl click away from the unit quickly; reform and re-charge; works much better with pairs to keep unit under continuous cav charge.

[Spuddicus]

You might find that re-charging helps a bit. I really noticed this with the light lancers: charge_make contact and dbl click away from the unit quickly; reform and re-charge; works much better with pairs to keep unit under continuous cav charge.

Yup ... charge and re-charge.
I usually keep my cav in wedge formation; helps break apart enemy lines and it appears to help in breaking off the attack so I can pull back a little and then charge again.

[Doug-Thompson]

Single light cav units vs. archers and skirmishers often run into trouble (esp. on VH where the AI gets +7 attack.) Speed and small unit size play a factor.

emphasis added

Small unit size in particular is important. On large, an archer unit has 80 men. A typical light cav -- say, Greek Cavlary -- has 54. So, when the archers lose 27 men they've lost about a third of their men. When the Greek Cav lose 27, however, they're down to half strength and are about to rout.

Put another way, you only have to kill five or six cavalrymen and you've given the unit 10 percent casualties. You have to kill eight archers to get the same effect.

This is one reason Egyptian Desert Cav are so effective -- they are a bigger unit that can take more losses. Head-to-head, Desert Cav and Arabic cavalry are about equal in the stats -- until you look at unit size.

[Slon]

I played on med/med and experienced a similar thing. I charged an almost unscathed unit of Hastati into a group of Cretan Archers and they routed my Hastati in hand-to-hand combat.

[lancer63]

Being so used to old, reliable MTW tactics I've found that charging archers with cav. head on is like swating at a swarm of bees with a sledgehammer. Too much effort for too little results and the horsies suffer dearly. but if I can manage to get a flank charge to an already busy unit the results change dramaticaly. You can almost hear men droping like bowling pins.
But the most efective counter archer unit in melee is another archer/javelin unit.