Firing volleys vs. 'at will'

[Sirrvs]

In M2TW, you can only have arquebusiers and musketeers fire in volleys it seems, while certain units like reiters and handgunners fire at will. Is this historically accurate? For instance, right now I'm playing as the Spaniards in the Americas campaign and my musketeers have been fairly useless so far. They can barely get off one volley before the enemy charges straight into them. Seems to me letting each individual musketeer reload and fire at will would be quicker. Then again, I don't know if they did this, historically. Any idea?

[WhiskeyGhost]

In M2TW, you can only have arquebusiers and musketeers fire in volleys it seems, while certain units like reiters and handgunners fire at will. Is this historically accurate? For instance, right now I'm playing as the Spaniards in the Americas campaign and my musketeers have been fairly useless so far. They can barely get off one volley before the enemy charges straight into them. Seems to me letting each individual musketeer reload and fire at will would be quicker. Then again, I don't know if they did this, historically. Any idea?

?

Keep them stationary, a moving gunpowder unit is useless especially on the offensive. It takes them forever to reform to line up and fire against an enemy, so let them come to you. Also, they are long ranged, so you should at least get a good 3-4 volleys off, then you can pull em back while your melee troops holds the line

[FactionHeir]

There was a discussion like this a while ago in the Citadel about the historical accuracy of firing by rank (i.e. volley fire).
This type of firing wasn't developed till very late, and only Western factions did so then.

You can disable this by removing the fire_by_rank attribute off the units.

[mir]

Which also begs the question:

If my melee units are engaged with the enemy, and my Musketeers in the rear open fire on the enemy, will my troops incur casualties too?

Logically, I'm thinking yes, since muskets fire in a straight line as opposed to arrows which can be fired in an arc...

[Shahed]

They will, most probably.

Unless you are using a mod, your muskets will fire just like arrows, IIRC. Your musket shots arc just like xbow bolts arc. I have'nt played a great deal with gunpowder (sadly) in Kingdoms so correct me if I'm wrong.

[FactionHeir]

Gunpowder infantry and cavalry can also friendly fire, although not as commonly.

[Sirrvs]

You can disable this by removing the fire_by_rank attribute off the units.

Do you know if there's a mod that does only this? M2TW sure is a lot more confusing to mod than the previous games. :(

[ReiseReise]

Its should be pretty simple, i've never done it but I believe you just need to unpack your files, look in the export_desc_units or whatever it is called, find the gunpowder units and delete the word fire_by_rank for each of them. Then add the -io filefirst (i forget the exact syntax, i think its in the unpacker readme) switch to your shortcut.

[FactionHeir]

Do you know if there's a mod that does only this? M2TW sure is a lot more confusing to mod than the previous games. :(

Not to my knowledge. Most mods change a lot more than 1 thing. If you want a file that changes only this though you can PM me your email address and I can send you a file that changes only this.

[Cheetah]

First of all, musketeers have fire at will option. If you enable it you will get a more or less continuous fire.

Second, if you have them on fire at will they wont fire into friendly troops. Which means that if you have them on level ground behind your engaged troops they wont fire at all.

If you have them on a hill behind your lines they will fire, but ofc they still can get friendly kills (though not much).

Best place is a cliff overlooking the battlefield.