Your Favorite Archer Unit

[Furious Mental]

Well if you can only so have archers in your army quality does matter. I'd have to say retinue longbowmen or janissary archers simply because I love to watch cavalry impale themselves. Somewhat disappointed the English didn't get a proper bodyguard longbowman in plate as well.

[ninjahboy]

byzantine guard archers - as joshwa said, purple ninjas + very very very very nice attack
retinue longbowmen, look cool when all upgraded with their armour and stuff + they can deploy stakes, can rape most other archer units + decent melee attack (killed enemy faction heir in melee, that was embarressing :D)

[Magraev]

As egypt I love the desert archers. Cheap and long range and capable of shredding anything not wearing heavy armor. They even get bonuses in the desert making them even better at killing crusaders.

[Frederick_I_Barbarossa]

Pavise Crossbows...the Lords of northern Italy

[Zajuts149]

Well if you can only so have archers in your army quality does matter. I'd have to say retinue longbowmen or janissary archers simply because I love to watch cavalry impale themselves. Somewhat disappointed the English didn't get a proper bodyguard longbowman in plate as well.

Though the common man often used the longbow in war, the nobles would rather hire crossbowmen into their retinue. Perhaps the English should have that instead. Or they could just hire mercs

My Fav is the Sicilian Muslim Archers,but I love the plain Longbowmen with light mail armour for looks

[Furious Mental]

The English didn't have much need for crossbows after they started using the longbow- the longbow fired quite far and very fast, even if it was less powerful than an arbalest. Gascon or Norman crossbowmen were common auxiliaries, but the English nobility didn't seem to use them as bodyguards. For instance, even though he was Duke of Gascony, the Black Prince had English longbowmen in his military household, not crossbowmen.

[phonicsmonkey]

Venetian archers are a favourite of mine

"Lookin' great in plate since 1208"

[Zajuts149]

The English didn't have much need for crossbows after they started using the longbow- the longbow fired quite far and very fast, even if it was less powerful than an arbalest. Gascon or Norman crossbowmen were common auxiliaries, but the English nobility didn't seem to use them as bodyguards. For instance, even though he was Duke of Gascony, the Black Prince had English longbowmen in his military household, not crossbowmen.

True, but I'm not talking about bodyguards, which would have been knights or Men at Arms. I mean the professional soldiers which they would retain out of campaign. The early archers where often just hired for specific campaigns, or called out in emergencies. It was only later that you get retinue longbowmen as modelled in the game

[Caliburn]

I loved Futuwwas, they were the bread and butter of my Turkish armies. Ottomans were quite interesting in Late as well, not too impressive but cool. Janissaries never were quite as much fun for me.

It would seem that M2 is missing high attack/low defence archers altogether, as all the "elite" archers are pretty tough in defence as well. Thus most early archer units often seem useless at later times, when in Medieval I you could mix and match some of the older troops with the new ones. Especially archers were useful this way, at least before Arbalests entered the field. Now all you can do with militia/peasant archers at later times is as speed bumps (though that was always my secondary use of Trebizond Archers as the Byzantines in M1 -soaking up charges).

I think they've improved the M2 tech tree over Rome's: "decent - better - best" -system. I like the fact that few units lose their usefulness, though, for example, there aren't basic/good/better spearmen if we don't count the militia ones, but usually one type of Spearmen/armoured sergeants that will do ok anyway. Maybe it's just archers that need a bit of rethinking? Or maybe I'm not using Peasant Archers enough, after all they're fast skirmishers and stable enough if backed with a General's Bodyguard unit.

Low defence archers would also mean they would finally be creamed by cavalry un-charging their rear...

[CMcMahon]

After playing a custom battle with a full stack of Sherwood archers versus a full stack of Highland Nobles... and taking out 65% of them before they even touched me... I'm going to change my vote to them.

[Shahed]

After playing a custom battle with a full stack of Sherwood archers versus a full stack of Highland Nobles... and taking out 65% of them before they even touched me... I'm going to change my vote to them.

What experience level did they have ?

I love those guys. At gold chevrons they are killers, taken out a few enemy captains/generals with them. My nick for them: Sherwood Snipers.

[Ars Moriendi]

After playing a custom battle with a full stack of Sherwood archers versus a full stack of Highland Nobles... and taking out 65% of them before they even touched me... I'm going to change my vote to them.

In my first campaign (England, of course) I completely ignored the Robin Hoods.
After reading your post, I ran a test to see if they're really worth it, and damn you're right :



Ten sherwood archers, 20 highland nobles, perfect victory - no losses for my side. Impressive performance.
(this was played on Medium, but still...)