Improving vanilla archers

[caravel]

I would leave the archer reload at 4 seconds. If you go to 36 arrows as we did in Samurai Warlords, that provides 2.5 minutes of shooting.

I believe I will go for the ammo increase, as per your recommendations and see how it goes.

In Samurai Warlords, crossbows are an entry level unit. They are not trainable after guns become available in the campaign. This works out well since both weapons are flat trajectory, slow reload and have armor piercing capability, so guns are the tactical substitute for crossbows. We did have to substantially reduce the kills per volley of crossbows for playbalance, and reduced the reload time slightly.

Xbows: range velocity accuracy power AP reload

MTW...5000 250 0.7 1.00 2 0.4 15
SW.....5000 240 0.5 0.68 2 0.4 12

We didn't alter the SBOW because the same parameters worked well in STW.

SBOW 5000 150 0.6 0.68 1 1.0 4

That seems like a good idea and will work well in SW. However for this mod, I'm not so sure. I currently have the crossbows available from early, the Arbalest and the Pavise shield is introduced from the High era.

MTW has both the primitive "touch hole" hand guns and the later match lock arquebuses. I am not so sure that the arquebus belongs to the 15th century, I have always thought of it as a 16th century weapon? I'm probably wrong however, not being an expert in these things. AFAIK the early hand guns were as ineffective as they are in the game, the noise and the smoke being their main effect, whereas the aquebuses were more musket-like, more accurate and less likely to blow up.

[Puzz3D]

MTW has both the primitive "touch hole" hand guns and the later match lock arquebuses. I am not so sure that the arquebus belongs to the 15th century, I have always thought of it as a 16th century weapon? I'm probably wrong however, not being an expert in these things. AFAIK the early hand guns were as ineffective as they are in the game, the noise and the smoke being their main effect, whereas the aquebuses were more musket-like, more accurate and less likely to blow up.

The matchlock was invented around 1450 which is when MTW ends. While more primitive guns would be available in late era, the problem is they are less effective than the arbalest or even the crossbow. Therefore, it's difficult to incorporate guns in MTW in a way that makes them useful. Some advantages are that guns do impart a large, short term, morale penalty each time the target unit suffers at least one casualty, and they could carry more ammo. However, if shooting time is extended too much, fatigue will make them useless. This can happen with crossbows as well which is why we went to 12 second reload. In SW, guns have enough ammo to shoot for 7 minutes.

[caravel]

The matchlock was invented around 1450 which is when MTW ends. While more primitive guns would be available in late era, the problem is they are less effective than the arbalest or even the crossbow. Therefore, it's difficult to incorporate guns in MTW in a way that makes them useful. Some advantages are that guns do impart a large, short term, morale penalty each time the target unit suffers at least one casualty, and they could carry more ammo. However, if shooting time is extended too much, fatigue will make them useless. This can happen with crossbows as well which is why we went to 12 second reload. In SW, guns have enough ammo to shoot for 7 minutes.

That makes sense. I suppose Arquebuses could be justified by increasing the build requirements and extending the game until 1500.

[ULC]

The only Problem I see with that is it would make a mess of GA mode, something that seems to be preference to many players.

[caravel]

I'm not sure about that as I never play GA, but if it does then we'll have to forget that idea.

[ULC]

I could be wrong though, and it could be when the game starts. Either way, points are still counted, just no one has any Idea when.

[The Unknown Guy]

Personally I don't like GA too much, even through the majority of my games have been in that mode. The reasons being that I might get tired before 1453, and that the AI does NOT play the GA game, but the conquest one. (That some factions have an inbuilt conquest juggernaut point mode is not a reason because it's easily modded).
In the PM, GA mode is a bit wobbly anyways, because of the addition of factions without GA (Novgorod so far. Maybe Granada and Portugal -AFAIK-), so it wouldn't be that dramatic.
One thing to bear in mind is that the last years of history would be utterly discarded: namely: the discovery of America and Vasco de Gama's explorations around Africa.. Unless trade goods could be added to Spain and Portugal to represent those things, I guess. (Other -minor- points to bear in mind would be the absence of the historical fall of Constantinople, the unification of Castile and Aragon, and some others)

Query: Perhaps the Arquebus could be removed altogether and that projectile slot used for some other kind of weapon type, and leave only the gunners standing?

BTW: Is the difference between the Mongol bow and the standard Hun compound bow widespread in Eastern Europe that big as to merit two in-game projectile types?

[The Badger]

I hope this helps someone a touch?

I had noticed while playing D&D that even people who know better accidentally say compound instead of COMPOSITE( a composite of materials; usually its horn on the outside bend to absorb the stress that would splinter most wood) bow...

or they say compound meaning RECURVE or re-flex bows-
and usually its someone who knows better but doesn't realize this is confusing to people who aren't as interested in bows :).

I won't get into the fantsay games adding COMPOSITE LONG BOWS to the mix; lol


A compound bow is a modern bow that uses a levering system of cables and usually cams and pulleys to draw the limbs back.

The compound bow was first developed and patented by Holless Wilbur Allen in Missouri in 1967 and has become increasingly popular. In the United States, the compound is the dominant form of bow

I hope that clarifies something for somebody; somewhere?

so maybe someone can clarify for me if the mtw/stw engine diferentaites skill level for accuracy and SHORT range (direct shots) versus longer range/high-trajectory shots in terms of acuracy and penetration...

because neither my Samurai nor Yeoman have impressed me; not even at short range.