Archery in M2 - Analysis from in-game testing

[Mandos]

On a side note, most people seem to ignore longbow units that aren't English. If you want to see a rediculously good missile unit use French Scots Guard, a powerful longbowman in plate-mail, who is also skilled in melee. In every test I've run myself SG have beaten every (non-gunpowder) missile unit in the game, including ret. longbowmen and Aventurier, supposedly the most offensively powerful xbow unit. The only really close duel was with sherwood archers, where both units always ran out of arrows, and the SG won in melee. Besides these unit vs unit tests, playing with the French quite a bit in the field has made me realize a far superior tactical value in the SG lonbowman over the Aventurier, and I rarely use just the xbow anymore.

My $.02

[CeltiberoMordred]

Reapz, did you manage the LB while AI always controlled crossbowmen in everytest?

[dopp]

On a side note, most people seem to ignore longbow units that aren't English. If you want to see a rediculously good missile unit use French Scots Guard, a powerful longbowman in plate-mail, who is also skilled in melee.

My $.02

Okay, so the most powerful longbow unit in the game isn't even English, it's French? Maybe rets need a boost after all. Then again, how many Scots Guard can you have and how easily, compared to longbowmen of all stripes? It might actually be okay play balance if the French get the best longbow unit but the English get more.

I'm not very sure about the history on this... were the Scots famous archers? I know they were good spearmen, but I always thought the Welsh (and later the English) were better at the shooting bit.

[Darkmoor_Dragon]

dont start the history again

[dopp]

dont start the history bollocks again ffs

Too late, it started about 5 posts back.

[Darkmoor_Dragon]

wake me up in another 300 posts then - might have returned OT by then

[katank]

Yep, French late game roster is amazing. Not only do they get lancers (best pure heavy cavalry), they get Scots guard (best archers).

Scots guard require huge stone walls to build and is in fact easier to reach than top level archery range IMHO.

[Mandos]

Yes, you can build SG out of cities. No need for all that money on archery ranges. The English do get longbows a long long time before French get them, the French ones are just better once you are later in the game.

[Kraxis]

Yes, you can build SG out of cities. No need for all that money on archery ranges. The English do get longbows a long long time before French get them, the French ones are just better once you are later in the game.

Getting SG from cities is not very great. I don't mind them being stronger, if only they were pretty hard to get. These guys should be fixed to the highest archery range. It is sad that there can't really be a requirement of several buildings anymore, or else these would be easy to limit out (all three highest unitbuildings at castles would be fitting).

But as to the tests, I think it is fair that the test ends with the longbows out of ammo.
Would I play Passive AI and stand around with my army while the enemy crossbows laid waste to it? Or would I withdraw/attack? It is limited how much more damage the crossbows would do in case of the latter.

[Kobal2fr]

Okay, so the most powerful longbow unit in the game isn't even English, it's French? Maybe rets need a boost after all. Then again, how many Scots Guard can you have and how easily, compared to longbowmen of all stripes? It might actually be okay play balance if the French get the best longbow unit but the English get more.

I'm not very sure about the history on this... were the Scots famous archers? I know they were good spearmen, but I always thought the Welsh (and later the English) were better at the shooting bit.

They're better archers all other things being equal (in the game I mean, don't know how true to history they are at all), but they're more expensive (both buying price and upkeep - city unit), and by the time the French get them, the English will almost certainly have at least a Master Woodsmen Guild, so they'll be able to crank out valour 2 retinue longbowmen, and of course they will also have been using and exping+retraining longbow units for much longer. Retinue'd have the same armor as the scots too, if the armor system worked properly.
Think the SG pool size and refill rate is quite low too, but I've never played my French campaigns that far TBH, so that much may be way off.

In MP, well, the English will be able to field 12 pure longbow units + 4 Sherwoods before hitting any unit cap, the French only 4 SGs.
Plus, and that's a big plus, SG's don't have stakes.

[andrewt]

I'm puzzled by both the SG and the French archers as well. Shouldn't the eastern factions (Egyptians, Russians, Turkish, Timurids, Mongols, maybe Byzantines as well) get the best hybrid archers in the game? The Turks' late-game missile cav selection is pretty disappointing to me.

[Reapz]

Reapz, did you manage the LB while AI always controlled crossbowmen in everytest?

I tried it both ways at the beginning. It made no real difference to the casualty numbers. So after a while I managed all the LB and let AI manage the XB

[CeltiberoMordred]

I tried it both ways at the beginning. It made no real difference to the casualty numbers. So after a while I managed all the LB and let AI manage the XB

In my custom battle tests, I always get more kills than AI when I face same units in a missile duel. In addition...

Some time ago I tried peasant crossbows Vs peasant archers.

When I managed crossbows, crossbows got more kills than archers.
When I managed archers, archers got more kills than crossbows.

I don't do anything special, just let them fire at will (in loose formation, because AI do it too) and wait for all their ammo being expent.

Regards.

[Reapz]

In my custom battle tests, I always get more kills than AI when I face same units in a missile duel. In addition...

Some time ago I tried peasant crossbows Vs peasant archers.

When I managed crossbows, crossbows got more kills than archers.
When I managed archers, archers got more kills than crossbows.

I don't do anything special, just let them fire at will (in loose formation, because AI do it too) and wait for all their ammo being expent.

Regards.

Show me the numbers

[Horatius]

My Longbowmen are my ultimate units, English simply lack the ultimates of others in the game, so when I have my Longbows they should OWN ANY Militia, especially if they are retunue Longbowmen.

Winning a battle against a militia pavise crowsbowmen with 2/3 of my retinue longbows dead is as historically innacurate (English Longbowmen simply laughed at Genoese Crossbowmen during the great battles of the hundred years war) as it is imbalanced.

I am able to win as the English, but we conquered everyone we faced, we literally owned 25% of the worlds population, why should playing as English be especially difficult?

[CeltiberoMordred]

Show me the numbers

I didn't take notes. I remember I usually got nearly 1.5x - 2x more kills than AI, no matters which unit I took.

[SMZ]

I've noticed the same thing when doing tests... with both missile units and melee. Whichever I control performs marginally better, even when the task is as simple as advance to range and begin firing or advance slowly and charge.

The AI often advances closer than maximum range before firing, also it often reforms it's men while taking fire... this means the human player gets crucial initial kills, and more volleys off in the same amount of time. With melee troops the AI seems to sometimes approach at funny angles and/or wait too long before charging... the end result being that whichever unit the human player controls performs better.

This isn't really that important of an issue when you're considering campaign play, it would only matter if you're doing research for multiplayer battles. If the longbows win as long as you're controlling them... well, that's all that matters.

[Reapz]

My Longbowmen are my ultimate units, English simply lack the ultimates of others in the game, so when I have my Longbows they should OWN ANY Militia, especially if they are retunue Longbowmen.

Winning a battle against a militia pavise crowsbowmen with 2/3 of my retinue longbows dead is as historically innacurate (English Longbowmen simply laughed at Genoese Crossbowmen during the great battles of the hundred years war) as it is imbalanced.

I am able to win as the English, but we conquered everyone we faced, we literally owned 25% of the worlds population, why should playing as English be especially difficult?

Horatius your post is exactly the kind of post I meant when I said
"... if people are getting poor results against AI missile units in campaign perhaps they need to think more about how they are playing the game."
and
"I wish ... less people said nerf this and fix that without really thinking about what they are saying, checking their facts"

I didn't post any statistics on Retinue Longbowmen vs. Milita Crossbowmen so I am assuming that your reference to "a battle against a militia pavise crowsbowmen with 2/3 of my retinue longbows dead" is about an experience you had in the campaign or in MP?

However here are the statistics:

Testing Scenario:

Single unit of each type, grassy plain, AI set to default (Medium)
Tests conducted until unit under testing depletes all missiles.
Figures represent the number of troops left alive at that time.

Took default Retinue Longbowmen and varied experience plus 5 points

Repeated each test 5 times

Test Units:

Retinue Longbowmen
Missile Attack 8
Defence 14 (Armor 5, Def skill 6, Shield 3)

Pavise Crossbow Militia (Mail Armor and Pavise)
Missile Attack 12
Defence 14

Results

RL - Retinue Longbowmen
PXBM - Pavise Crossbow Militia
+5 is added 5 experience points
+0 is added 0 experience points
Red = loss
Blue = win
numbers are Longbowmen/Crossbowmen alive after missile exchange

---------RL +0 vs PXBM +0-----------RL +5 vs PXBM +0
test #
1--------------38/32-----------------------48/14
2--------------46/30-----------------------50/15
3--------------40/26-----------------------47/9
4--------------42/38-----------------------48/18
5--------------40/29-----------------------50/26

Average-------41/31----------------------49/16

% alive-------67%/51%------------------80%/26%

So the stats don't match your experience. As you can see base Retinue Longbowmen are usually at 2/3 strength. However if you use trained units you should have 80% of your archers survive, win every engagement, and reduce enemy strength to about 1/4. If you had a different experience in game you must have done something differently, perhaps used inexperienced archers against experienced crossbowmen. When people fight hundreds of campaign battles how hard is it to train your units up a little? The idea that newly recruited longbowmen with no combat experience are supposed to own every militia unit regardless of that unit's combat experience, armor, crossbow weapon type, is just ludicrous.

Your other points:

"I am able to win as the English, but we conquered everyone we faced, we literally owned 25% of the worlds population, why should playing as English be especially difficult?"

Um so the Dev's should basically write the game code so that England wins easily?

I don't know where you learned history but get your money back.

- The "English" as of the start point of this game have just had their butts kicked by a bunch of French knights descended from vikings who have sailed over the channel and taken over the entire country sending the English out to tend farms etc. while they party it up in the Castles. Many of them didn't bother to learn to speak English.
- The English couldn't subdue Scotland in this game era let alone own 25% of the world's population.
- While the English fought a few limited campaigns in France with some memorable battles the English basically spent this game era losing all their possessions in France
- The English fall into obscurity on the world stage compared to the Mongols and their descendants - they would be perhaps the only nation that could claim to "own 25% of the world's population" during the era of this game.- Maybe you are referring to later British success during the colonial era? If so longbows were not part of that success.

[Reapz]

I didn't take notes. I remember I usually got nearly 1.5x - 2x more kills than AI, no matters which unit I took.

Then if you have no notes why don't you retest it and take some - and post the results?

This kind of vague I remember such and such doesn't serve us well - there is no way to further the discussion without you providing details. You aren't providing anything other than a vague impression from an unspecified number of trials, in unspecified conditions, with unspecified units sustaining unspecified casualties, etc. - you see my point?

There might be an effect from handling the unit vs. letting the AI do it, there might not. I didn't see it. However in executing my missile attack my control of the unit being tested was limited to a single right click attack on the target. I did no micro after that. Maybe you did. If that is the case and it affects outcome that is important to know - got to micro your archers to increase kill rate. Without data it is of no value in helping us understand the game better.

[Carl]

I didn't post any statistics on Retinue Longbowmen vs. Milita Crossbowmen so I am assuming that your reference to "a battle against a militia pavise crowsbowmen with 2/3 of my retinue longbows dead" is about an experience you had in the campaign or in MP?

I think he thought the initial test was with retinue Longbowmen, I did until I re-read it.

[Kraxis]

I think he thought the initial test was with retinue Longbowmen, I did until I re-read it.

I thought it was pretty clear they were basic Longbowmen. But it matters not.

[Not directed at you Carl] Did the Genoese carry their pavises in said battles? And how many times did the Genoese face the longbow? And how many times were the longbows in a higher position while the crossbowmen had damp strings?

When two Israeli tanks held off an entire Jordanian armoured brigade it must have been because the Israeli tanks were invulnerable and could make any lesser tanks blow up in flames by looking at them. Bah!

[Carl]

Did the Genoese carry their pavises in said battles?

Good point, although I would imagine plunging arrow fire might have been able to bypass the passive to a degree. Not that it actually matters, the Longbowmen really would have still lost. But it's an interesting idea nonetheless.

[Carl]

p.s. I thought the where retinue longbow men because the Crossbowmen where high level, I thought he'd miss typed at first, (it wasn't until I read more carefully that I caught on).

[Kraxis]

Good point, although I would imagine plunging arrow fire might have been able to bypass the passive to a degree. Not that it actually matters, the Longbowmen really would have still lost. But it's an interesting idea nonetheless.

I don't know if the longbowmen would have lost... It didn't happen like that so I can't tell, but I'm sure that the pavises and dry strings would have helped a alot, as would a level field.

Plunging arrows could perhaps have been used, but the higher the arrows goes the less accuracy you get over distance and lateral movement. Try throwin a ball almost directly up as compared to throwing it at 30 degrees. At 30 degrees you are fairly accurate and you have an instinctual feeling of range and distance ect. Directly up is near impossible, they should really make an olympic disciline of throwing an opbject directly up to a certain height and then land in the same spot... A perfect 10 would be near impossible.
But anyway, plunging shots might have done the trick, though I believe the longbowmen would have sniped the crossbowmen, or at least attempted it. They would likely count the seconds from shooting to the next shot and try to hit the crossbowman as he looked out.

[Kobal2fr]

I am able to win as the English, but we conquered everyone we faced, we literally owned 25% of the worlds population, why should playing as English be especially difficult?

Hahaha, this one I really, really like. Let alone the fact (already picked on by Reapz) that you're talking about the British Empire, not the English Kingdom you play in M2... But do you really, actually believe the building of said British Empire was EASY ?

[Shahed]

That one almost had me losing my voice, I was laughing so hard.

I love LBs, I did a lot of custom battles with them.
Awesome steel rain, I love it !

[dopp]

But anyway, plunging shots might have done the trick, though I believe the longbowmen would have sniped the crossbowmen, or at least attempted it. They would likely count the seconds from shooting to the next shot and try to hit the crossbowman as he looked out.

The pavise was usually held by someone else, so he could always vary the angle at which it was held. Another thing is that arrows and quarrels are noticably slower than bullets (you can even see musket balls in flight), so the crossbowmen should have been able to see the incoming volley and take cover at the right time, especially if said missile duel took place at long range. No laser sniper rifles in 1415, sorry.

The Genoese at Crecy were sent into battle hastily and left their pavises on the wagons, with predictable results. BAD example of longbow pwning crossbow. But, as I said before, I don't see why longbowmen expecting shielded enemy archers wouldn't a) take cover between volleys and b) pay someone to hold pavises up themselves, instead of standing around complaining about the unfairness of it all, how their longbows should pwn everyone etc.. Don't Retinue Longbowmen have small shields, giving them half the bonus of the pavise? A nice compromise on CA's part. Result: Retinues outshoot pavise crossbows (and have more total armor than Scots Guards).

Conclusion for all: longbows are fine, train them up for best results. Don't expect them to beat everything out of the box. Imagine playing AGAINST the English, killing off all their experienced longbowmen in a miraculous stroke of luck involving a bridge and a monster ribault, only to discover that the newly assembled replacements still pwn your 3-gold crossbowmen. Nasty.

[Carl]

The pavise was usually held by someone else, so he could always vary the angle at which it was held. Another thing is that arrows and quarrels are noticably slower than bullets (you can even see musket balls in flight), so the crossbowmen should have been able to see the incoming volley and take cover at the right time, especially if said missile duel took place at long range. No laser sniper rifles in 1415, sorry.

Maybe it's a case of bad documentries again. but all the pasives i've seen where bassicly just big sheilds, if the arrows where coming in mostly vertical their wouldn' be anything to take cover under if you kept the passive vertical, and if you tipped it horizontal you'd have to be crouched which would prevent you reloading the Crossbow in all probability. (Arkward position and all that.

[dopp]

Erm completely vertical, satellite-rain-style (hands up anyone who remembers that weapon)? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't know if ballistics work like that. Is it really possible to produce an almost vertical rain of arrows and still maintain a decent range? Even so, I still don't see the difficulty. The pavise is held by someone else (leaving you free to reload the crossbow) and you all take cover only when the arrows fall on your position, which is relatively easy since archery is mostly volley fire and you can see it coming. It's not that difficult to hide under a big shield. I could see the longbows keeping up a continuous rain of fire (by firing in ranks or something) to "suppress" the crossbowmen, but then they usually only have 24 arrows apiece... Still, it is possible that after a few volleys the crossbowmen might have decided that enough was enough (some arrows would have caused damage, plus its rather unnerving being under a potentially lethal barrage), tried to run and got shot down in the open, but that is all conjecture on my part, applying a bit of Inherent Military Probability (as I understand the concept).

Besides which, the famous incident between bows and crossbows at Crecy didn't even involve pavises, so this is all hot air (and Darkmoor_Dragon can stay asleep for now).

[Kraxis]

Some pavises also had a foldout leg for it to lean on. That would make it protable and useable for a single man, if not as mobile under fire. But pavises were just portable fortifications.

And the longbowmen would of course find some sort of cover for the next battle after having experienced some sort of unpleasant casualties to pavises (doesn't have to be a loss though).
But the longbowmen were good, so I assume they also knew how long it would take for their arrows to arrive at the target. That should make it a bit more effective than the crossbowman just ducking behind cover again. Longbows were after all pretty good against men on walls, and they had better cover than pavises.

Techinally speaking you could get completely vertical arrow-rain. Since if you shoot upwards above 45 degrees the arrow will land at a steeper angle than the one you shot at (drag slowing it down and gravity doing it's stunt). But that would hardly be viable though.