Archer Mods - your views

**Shrike** · 05-22-2006, 19:06

So as I was poking around the various forums (including the archived ones) I came across several discussions regarding missile stats. The two that most inspired me dealt with the amount of ammo carried, and with the relative power of bows and the units that carry them.
Are Archers/longbowmen too weak or do they just need more ammo?
and
ProjectileStats
I was impressed by the discussions on how many arrows were typically carried by archers in the period (1st URL), and also enjoyed the discussion about composite bows (2nd URL, about page 3). I'd noticed myself that the archer units seemed pretty unimpressive - short on ammo, and the ammo spent didn't seem to inflict very much damage.

In pursuit of a more realistic experience, I modded the correct files along the lines described in both: Doubled the ammo for "dedicated" archer units, increased the range of the Longbow, Added the "composite" bow and gave it to the eastern archer units, and things like that.

Over the weekend I noticed a HUGE difference. Now archers - even my vanilla ones - are capable of raining some severe doom on the enemy, and it seems right to me - an unshielded, unarmored infantry unit that's not moving around should die quickly under a rain of arrows.

So how common is this kind of modding? I notice that those threads are pretty old, and I see a lot of people playing XL or BKB (which I'll get to - I already have 'em downloaded), but are many people modding their vanilla MTW or VI game for "combat realism"? Does anyone have strong feelings pro/con?

**Unforgivable-Fenrir** · 05-22-2006, 21:20

I also felt that the archers were under par from what they should be. I think that a army marching up the hill to attack you, should lose more than just ten guys. At first i didn't even make archers because they seemed pointless. but now after i modified them like you did, they are actually useful.

**Martok** · 05-23-2006, 00:00

Welcome to the Org, Shrike.

Yes, I believe quite a few of us (myself included) believe that archers are somewhat underpowered in MTW. I'm mostly okay with their range (although I personally feel that Desert & Trebizond Archers should probably shoot somewhat farther), but they definitely should be killing more men than they do currently. I don't want them to be ridiculous like they were in Rome, but they do seem to take out fewer men they ought to.

**ShadesWolf** · 05-23-2006, 08:02

The game is very easily tweaked to change little things. My regular change was on Flags, I hated the flag used for England and Burgundy so I did my own research and placed the correct ones in there place.

Please bare in mind that any tweaks you make to your version of the game will mean that if you go online to play your game version will be uncompatable with all other peoples games unless they have made the same changes as you.

I must admit tweaks do add to your enjoyment of the game. Good luck in your experiments.

**Shrike** · 05-23-2006, 15:14

Hey all - Thanks for the warm welcome!

So I take it that "rolling your own" is pretty common for Single-Player - I know that online play'd be compromised, but all I've got is 56K so I'm not planning on "going there" anytime soon. . .

I gotta say - I'm waaay impressed with the TW designers for leaving the game mod friendly!

**Ludens** · 05-23-2006, 17:01

Archery never really got popular as a battlefield weapon in Western Europe, and there is a reason for that. The western bow, the so-called self-bow, was not very good compared to its eastern equivalent. Thus it never became a major battlefield tool and archery training and tactics were not very developed in Europe. The exception to this were the British isles, where they did have a good bow. Therefor I am not that really bothered by the low perfomance of the common archers. They were mainly a harrasment tool anyway.

On the other hand, Eastern archery was far more effective (again because they had better bows) yet in game they are carry the same bow as the western archers. Perhaps one of the unused entries in projectile files (ninja star? Mounted longbow?) can be turned into a composite bow with about the same performance as the longbow.

**Shrike** · 05-23-2006, 18:08

Originally Posted by Ludens

Perhaps one of the unused entries in projectile files (ninja star? Mounted longbow?) can be turned into a composite bow with about the same performance as the longbow.

That's what I was referring to in my first post:

Originally Posted by Shrike

ProjectileStats
... and also enjoyed the discussion about composite bows (2nd URL, about page 3).
... I modded the correct files along the lines described in both: Doubled the ammo for "dedicated" archer units, increased the range of the Longbow, Added the "composite" bow and gave it to the eastern archer units, and things like that.

Y'take the NinjaStar, mod it to be a pretty powerful bow, and then give it to the eastern archer types.

Good info on the Western Eurpoean Archery tradition, though. . . I'd guessed that since the English obviously had a serious tradition, the neighboring countries did too. Maybe I'll mod the sbow down a bit. . .

**The_678** · 05-25-2006, 00:18

Before I learned the moddability of the game I never bought archers unless I was English(longbows). Then I learned to mod and made it a bit better so that archers weren't useless. Made the game alot better because I really like archery tactics and thought it was way too weak in MTW.

**Vladimir** · 05-25-2006, 19:24

The only reason I use archers in early is to kill horses. While infantry may be difficult to kill with arrows the horses are far more vulnerable. Killing the general is far more effective than killing a few more soldiers.