Bloody forest bandits, how is it possible to counter them?

[Jew Bear]

For real tho, first the clear out the hideout quest where I and some 10 of my elite units went in to kill the buggers but we got swarmed by about 30 of them standing around in large groups, and they just rained arrows on us from every direction, one could not lower the shield for a second.
Then it was the escort caravan quest where over a hundred of the bastards rolled up and started spraying my charging cavalry with arrows.
Even if some did get a couple of lucky hits an elite horseman could kill about 2 or 3 of the archers before getting turned into a hedgehog. The infantry following didn't do much better since once they start duking it out with the vanguard, the guys at the rear just shot them to ♥♥♥♥. And my 20 or so archers and skirmishers didn't stand a chance against massive volleys of arrows. I'm already sporting the best armour money can buy and managed to capture a castle with that force but some basic bloody archers whipped my arse. How do I counter that ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥?

[Click]

yeah ive noticed that also.
The Forest bandits are a little bit to OP, they need to be tweaked just a bit.
when im sitting with 30 vet spearmen, and a group of 12 forest bandits roll up and challenge me to a fight, and kill 10-15 of my spear guys before they even get within shouting distance, they are a bit too strong.

[Moe~]

you think thats bad, you should try attacking steppe bandits in a hideout they literally have bows that deal nearly 15 damage and most of them have them

[Kettlesworth]

So the hideouts are sometimes a bit bugged. They shouldn't have 30+ people in them. I've found that non bugged hideouts, taking a group of elite ranged units with me works best. Sure, the bandit archers are good, but inferior to armed and armored palantine guard archers.

On the field, I've found that if you have enough cavalry, you can overwhelm archer spam. Especially helpful is if you put the rest of your army on F6 delegated command, and just have your heavy cav follow you in. That way you can keep your horsemen cycle charging the archers or melee brawling with them. Also, swing around the side before turning and charging in as your own footmen get closer. If they gotta choose who they shoot at, it goes worse for em.

[Jew Bear]

Originally posted by Kettlesworth:

So the hideouts are sometimes a bit bugged. They shouldn't have 30+ people in them. I've found that non bugged hideouts, taking a group of elite ranged units with me works best. Sure, the bandit archers are good, but inferior to armed and armored palantine guard archers.

That's what I usually bring 7 or 8 archers and the rest is melee for the hand in final boss fights, didn't work out that one time as I expected. However don't take archers to the desert caves, in close quarters their bows don't do them any favours and desert raiders like to use javelins.

Originally posted by Kettlesworth:

On the field, I've found that if you have enough cavalry, you can overwhelm archer spam. Especially helpful is if you put the rest of your army on F6 delegated command, and just have your heavy cav follow you in. That way you can keep your horsemen cycle charging the archers or melee brawling with them. Also, swing around the side before turning and charging in as your own footmen get closer. If they gotta choose who they shoot at, it goes worse for em.

That was what made me ragequit 1/3 of my army were elite horsemen and they got wrecked by a hailstorm of arrows. The bandits were dispersed and didn't even care if a cavaleryman just ran through their lines, more often then not they'll fail to land a hit on anyone anyway and will make his back exposed to about couple of dozens of arrows. And circleing won't do much good against 100+ archers since they'll shoot the horse from under you eventually

[Thane_Ragnar]

If we are talking skills, the Forest Bandit is a Level 21 Troop with a Bow Skill of 150. Normal Troops have a Skill Value of 100 at level 21. So they sport 50% more ranged Goodness.

Even the Forest Bandit Hero (which is higher Level) has lower Skill Values.