Tactics & Strategy

[Sasaki Kojiro]

2)If they aren't fighting, the units will try to separate themselves. You don't want your archers clumped together anyway, since they will have a harder time seeing the enemy and won't be as accurate.

1) Perhaps hold formation? Or fire at will (ie don't click on the unit)? It may be that they can't fire obliquely.

[Drisos]

Option 2 is not really doable, but luckily it's not necessary anyway, like Sasaki explained.

As for 1, I think the only times ranged units change their position is when you ordered them to fire an enemy unit and it walked out of range without routing. Then your unit will do whatever is takes to keep firing - so, it may change direction if the enemy is walking to the side, or chase the enemy when they walk out of range.

[Togakure]

If you want larger units in general, you can increase the unit size up to 120 men in Options. This will increase the size of all units, however, and increase both the training time--and I believe, cost--correspondingly. With many large units like these on the battlefield at once, you may notice a decrease in performance depending on your PC's processing and graphics capabilities.

I often put ranged foot units in Hold Formation / Hold Position to alleviate their tendencies to move out of position. This usually keeps them from pursuing targets that move out of range. I'm not sure if this will prevent them from turning to face a target which they've been ordered to shoot if their current angle won't allow them to shoot effectively though.