Rock/Paper/Scissors vs Stone/Javelin/Arrow

[Red Harvest]

You know, thinking about the experience and upgrade bonuses, perhaps archers should start out with really poor missile attack for vanilla units (probably no more than a 3). That way they would typically end up at 5 missile attack after a missile upgrade and a little combat experience. RTW is so stacked towards giving huge offensive stats that I can't help but wonder if that is also distorting archery so much.

[Watchman]

AFAIK archery turned out to be the deadliest of the three antique missile weapons. Slings actually did tend to have more power at shorter ranges, and had the nasty habit of battering shields into matchsticks, but in long-range killing power a major bruise and a few broken ribs just don't compare to a yard of wood and a sharp metal point in the lungs.

Sling bullets to the head were nasty, though. Medieval commanders found peasant slingers useful in sieges, and when the Spaniards rampaged in South America the sling was just about the only native weapon they were truly worried about - a hit could kill or blind even through a steel helmet.

That aside, I understand that both slingery and archery are rather demanding pursuits and it takes lots and lots of practice to become proficient in either. Well, peasants chase off beasts and hunt small birds with them, so they get their practice right there, and hunters (usually also peasants) get their archery practice "on the job" too; commanders found both useful.

However, especially with the more powerful bows - longbows and composites - the effective range appears to have been rather greater than even the best slingers could aquire. I have, for example, read that around the Persian Wars the maximum effective range of Persian archers (with composite bows) was about a hundred meters. Well, that worried the Greeks enough that they instituted the sport of 100-meter Dash In Armor specifically to counter it; it paid off in at least Marathon, and probably elsewhere too. Sure, the hoplites were pretty winded after that spurt, but by that point they were in close combat where the archers were understandably reluctant to shoot into (or they might well be in close combat with the archers, an even better result).

Javelins always suffered from poor range and the fact that they flew so slowly open-order troops could easily dodge them; they worked better against close-order troops who had to deal with the javelins poking through their shields as well as they could (armor helped) and soldier on.

Notice that the Roman pila were (well, one of the pair anyway, the other was for longer ranges) specifically weighed for extra impact at the expense of range with a lead ball under the "socket". This plus their very long, thin heads meant they punched through most anything, hence the AP ability in the game. (The Cilician Mercenaries with their harpoons have the same, incidentally; dunno if their range is longer.)

On the other hand, javelins were cheap and cheerful and simple to use, hence their popularity among the poorly-equipped sections of Roman and Greek armies.

[Red Harvest]

Slingers had a range of over 100 meters from what I've read. Even though the "art of slinging" has long since been lost, modern tests with novices seem to confirm this. The composite bows of the time seem to have had effective ranges of 100 to 150 meters. For each type of weapon the extreme ranges are much more than this of course.

I suspect that in this period you would find that (other than the horse archer cultures) many times as many potential soldiers had access to/experience with slings as had access to composite bows. So making a recruit into an effective slinger would be more likely than making them into an effective archer. I don't believe you would be after marksmen either. You simply need folks that can stand in formation and volley to given ranges in a general area, and repeat. Sure you would practice individual marksmanship and try to improve their skill level, but what you really want is to get a large number of shots into a "box" at once, rather than picking specific targets. The elite types would be the truly accurate ones compared to typical militia/conscripts.

The real historical comparison in RTW should probably be between the elite slingers, and the standard archers. The Achaeans, Balearics, Thessalonians, and Rhodians were renowned slingers. They should definitely outrange vanilla archers and be more deadly as well. In RTW the elite slingers have a small missile attack advantage, but the same range as the weakest archers. So rather than being used to drive off weak archers, they will often be held back to protect themselves as they are more expensive and a more difficult asset to replenish.. I'll grant elite archer units greater range, since to me they represent later more advanced bows. I'm not sure what to make of the merc. Cretans greater range. I suppose it would be fine if the missile attack value was not so high (11!) It should probably be slightly higher than the standard archers since this would apply at a greater range. (Same could be said for the Balearic/Rhodian slingers--give them a missile attack of about 6 or 7 vs. their present 9.)

I'm kicking around the following:
Vanilla slingers: range = 100, missile attack = 3
Elite slingers: range = 120, missile attack = 6
Vanilla foot archers: range = 100, missile attack = 4
Elite foot archers: range = 150, missile attack = 6

I haven't thought through the horse archers that carefully yet. Since they come from archer dominant cultures with good bows, and the units are smaller, I'm less inclined to adjust the vanilla horse archers as much. I've been playing the horse archer factions so I have a feel for their predicament. The upper end types could probably use small trimming to their missile attack values. On the other hand javelin cav seem about right in their punch and range.

I'm not keen on boosting the javelin numbers too much. I think the pila are about right and the javelin aren't too bad as weapons. There is a problem though, when comparing to pila we see both higher missile attack for the pila, plus armour piercing, while the pila has the same range (50 yards/meters.) No it doesn't, it is 35 not 50, wish I could read It's sort of a "double whammy." Pila should hit hard and that iron tip will be powerful, but Pila range should be shorter than javelin (although it seems short enough in the game due to the delays), so perhaps the jav range should be extended by 10 or 20 yards. This would give them a chance to actually get off a volley now and again without being run down... It should take awhile to inflict casualties with javelins, which is why I want to leave the AP and missile attack alone. If it weren't for friendly fire and timing issues, they would probably be about right. However, it might make sense to given them another 2 javelins (a boost of 33% in their eventual kill potential.) That would make them more effective as harassers--a typical use where they proved effective--without giving them short term advantage.

[Kraxis]

Xenophon writes in his Anabasis that their 250 something Rhodians (previously hoplites so obviously not the elite slingers) managed to drive off thousands of Persian horse archers due to better range and killingpower. The horse archers were scared of the slingers... And he continues to like the slingers all the way through the march, they do very well at a crossing of a river if I'm not mistaken. But remember that these were apparently the guys that were not good enough to be merc slingers, so they had to become hoplites.

Thus I'm inclined to give vanilla slingers a slight advantage in range:
Vanilla slingers: Range 110
Elite Slingers: Range 130
The archers should stay the same as Red presents, but I'm willing to let the Elite Slingers have AP (the slingbullets were something all armoured men feared as it cuncussive effects were astounding). That way, all in all the elites are rather much equals. Archers have better range, flame arrows and better basic attack, but the slingers deal better with armoured foes. Thus a wellbalanced army would have both in its employ. If AP can't be tweaked it is perhaps not so great to do this (instead of halving the armour I'm thinking of a 0.7 modifier).

About javelins... Well 10 more in range won't hurt, but will help the javelineers a lot. 2 more ammo is nice, but I don't think that is where the problems are (I seldomly use up their ammo). Upping their basic attack to 9 (and upping the Illyrian Mercs to 11) on the other hand would be good. I equate that into about 30-40 kills generally if all javelins were used against a medium armoured enemy (Warband head on for instance). Of course this elevates FF a lot.
Pila range is in fact 35 (as opposed to javelins of 50), and since we have made javelins stronger they need a slight boost, perhaps a basic attack of 12-13? Maybe 40 in range? But later legionaries would have better pila so of course they need to be better thna the first ones. And then we have a problem as the pilum is already where I want it to be. Could it be that it should just stay where it is and be happy that it has AP?

By the way, not all peltasts are equally weak. The macedonians, seleucid and thracian peltasts are rather powerful in melee, as are the Velites (the same units actually). The barbarian javelineers (excluding the spanish) are quite possibly the most useful of them being stong in attack (better charge also) and missile. It is the peltasts of Egypt, Carthage, Armenia, Pontus and Spain that are the weak type.
Then of course there is the Mercenary Peltasts and Heavy Peltasts which both are quite useful in melee, not to say that the Illyrians are any less useful with their stronger missile and attack+charge.
The Cilicians on the other hand are rather hard to get to use their harpoons, which they also have two of, as their formation is that unformed type (round). That means the unit covers a lot of space, and thus it is hard to get them to use their weapon properly, especially in Huge and Large settings.

[Red Harvest]

Kraxis,

You are right about the pila. I originally thought the range was 35, then checked the file...read it wrong as 50...DOH!!! So my "fact checking" before posting was actually self defeating because I was sloppy, LOL at myself.

I did some tests with 65 range for Carthaginian peltasts and that helped the javs to get off one round vs. charging Gaul warbands in skirmish (before they couldn't manage to get off that one shot.) It also allowed them to retreat and throw again. I still think it is CA's hardcoded order delay for the first round that is causing the trouble for skirmishers (and pila attacks.) Because the pila already has AP and it seems OK, I probably wouldn't adjust it. It might not be bad to adjust the peltast/jav missile attack up a notch or two though.

I hadn't tested the Cilicians. It might be easiest just to change their default unit formation. The "horde" formation is awful for skirmish units--since they are already handicapped. Plus the Cilicians are "untrained" so they are looser as well (training defines how "tidy" the unit formation is.) The range calcs are made from the middle or rear of the formation to the middle of the opposing formation from what I've seen putting archers in column during tests. Their effective range is much shortened by a long formation (vs. wide.) This also explains why large dispersed units like jav cav are so hard to shoot at in cities...both you and the target tend to be in column. Even though you might have individuals almost touching, the units don't want to shoot.

I'm still trying to work out what ranges I like best. I tried setting the vanilla slinger attack and range the same as vanilla archers at present. With the same exact settings the slingers seemed to get slightly (~10%) fewer kills than the archers vs. Gaul warbands who have light armour (4 tests of each.) I think that is OK and is probably caused by the difference in penetration. So increasing the base slinger range to 110 or 120 with 3 missile attack and decreasing the vanilla archer range to 100 with 4 attack might be a decent representation. It causes me some other headaches though...

I'm not sure what to do with elite slingers if I increase vanilla slinger range so much (to 110 or 120.) They should have more range in a relative sense, but I think their current kill rate is already too high--hence cutting them back to 6 on missile attack. So if I move them up to 130, 140, or 150 range I might make them too strong again and need to cut their missile attack some more. I agree about the armour piercing of the lead bullets, but am not sure of all the consequences.

I'll have to work on this some more. I wonder what 0 attack does...curious...

[Kraxis]

Naw... I think it is safe with 130 range and 6 in attack. AP perhaps, but if it is too strong then away with it.

Vanillas with 110 range are quite a bit strengthened, but if we put javelins at 65 they have only 15 in range over a javelin...
With 3 in attack I can't believe they would cause much more than a dent in Roman or Greek units head on. They are already rather weak against them with 4. I think it would equal out.

Also, I have considered a thing.
One of the reasons the javs are so weak is because there is no real elite type for them. There are the Rhodians and Balearics for the slingers and plenty for the archers, but only a weak representation for javs in the Illyrians.

[Red Harvest]

Negative values, and zero for missile attack all result in zero...and no missile ability. That makes the bottom of the range clear. The entries appear to be integer only. 0.6 and 1.5 give values of 0 and 1 respectively.

I did a test on medium diff/large units with Roman archers (81 men total) at 1, 4, and 7 missile attack at 120 range vs. Gaul Warband (122 men total) on the grassland map with "calm" summer weather specified. I left them in skirmish and fire at will and counted the kills from their first 5 volleys as the warband approached. Each time the warband stops and does a war cry right about the time the 2nd volley strikes. They take another volley while making a racket, then advance into two more volleys before I halt the kill count. They squeeze off another two rounds before they withdraw.

Results for 4 tests each:
Missile attack 1: 7.5 kill average (5 three times, and 15 once!)
Missile attack 4: 15 kill average (12 - 18 range)
Missile attack 7: 27.2 kill average (24 - 32 range)

I was surprised at how many kills they got with only 4 attack, (and even 1 attack started to deal some kills as the range closed.) Yes it doesn't sound like much, but two units working together will cause quite a bit of carnage this way in a very short time. Considering that 7 is the default vanilla archer...I'm satisfied that archers have a lot more hitting power than they should. Gaul warband only have 2 armour but they do have a 5 shield, so they are relatively well protected. The decent hoplites and armoured hoplites should fair a bit better with their armour. My vague goal is to have acceptable casualty levels for a good hoplite phalanx absorbing 5 volleys each from 2 archer units. Losing 10% or so would be a reasonable facsimile of what I've read so far. It would definitely weaken hoplite combat effectiveness to take that many casualties, but would not be crippling. If the hoplite has to chase around taking even more punishment, they are going to lose all combat ability, just as they should.

I am definitely going to change the Cilicians to square formation. They just don't work as pila bearers in a round formation. The range is far too short for that to work, and they are spread all over the place.

Did you notice that the bull warriors get very good pila attack? I attribute this to being a representation of the soliferrum pila