Archers | please fix them

[Lera]

Hello there,

It's really annoying that you can have 200 archers and only 20 of them in the first line fire upon the enemy. This makes no sense at all. Can you please fix them so they can shoot up in a curve instead of doing direct hits (line of sight) at the enemy?

What's the point of having archers if they can't even shoot properly? c'mon man

[GIJoe597]

I have noticed, bow archers will fire in an arc, but crossbowmen generally require that straight shot. On very long shots they may fire up. When possible go for longer engagement distances.

Have you tried loose formation?

Consider making more than one archer squad? I accomplish that by having one crossbow and one bow squad. I sometimes have one bow squad of fully upgraded units and one of next to last upgrade, which I never upgrade unless the 1st sq suffers losses.

[TaleWorlds Community Team]

Thank you for sharing your feedback. Balancing is an ongoing task, so you can expect to see changes to combat AI throughout early access.

[Fryskar]

Originally posted by GIJoe597:

I have noticed, bow archers will fire in an arc, but crossbowmen generally require that straight shot. On very long shots they may fire up. When possible go for longer engagement distances.

Have you tried loose formation?

Consider making more than one archer squad? I accomplish that by having one crossbow and one bow squad. I sometimes have one bow squad of fully upgraded units and one of next to last upgrade, which I never upgrade unless the 1st sq suffers losses.

Imo hills help a lot for xbows.
That is if you keep the enemy at an angle to them.

[Feudal]

After about 30 archers just do F3-F3 and they'll go into loose formation. Both better at not getting hit by arrows and more archers can shoot.

[SgtSorrow]

Like Feudal wulf wrote, F3-F3 is your friend. Then drag them into a more manageble depth, like no more than three archers deep, then most of them will fire unless it's completely flat/shieldwall infront

[GIJoe597]

I suppose I took it for granted the op knows he/she can click drag from left while any squad is selected and draw the formation. Maybe he/she does not know. Well, you can.

[Feudal]

Originally posted by GIJoe597:

I suppose I took it for granted the op knows he/she can click drag from left while any squad is selected and draw the formation. Maybe he/she does not know. Well, you can.

I did not know this either until now. Now I understand why sometimes my formations would get really tightly packed despite being in shield wall.

[GIJoe597]

Ha, alright. That happens to me at times when I order a move while at full speed on a horse. I hold the button a tad too long and it draws a new odd formation.

I thought that was fairly well known. Apologies.

[SgtSorrow]

Hah, right. I was 300h deep before i realized I actually COULD move around troops during the prefight stage in a siege (when you get to move around siegemachines etc). With no real manual or guides, there will be a lot of gaps in everyones knowledge

[Lera]

Originally posted by GIJoe597:

I have noticed, bow archers will fire in an arc, but crossbowmen generally require that straight shot. On very long shots they may fire up. When possible go for longer engagement distances.

Have you tried loose formation?

Consider making more than one archer squad? I accomplish that by having one crossbow and one bow squad. I sometimes have one bow squad of fully upgraded units and one of next to last upgrade, which I never upgrade unless the 1st sq suffers losses.

I've tried the loose formation and I have never experienced my archers properly firing in an arch. They may shoot one arrow and then just stand there watching as the first line continues shooting. It's really frustrating. I want to have a rain of arrows going down on my enemy, not 20 arrows every 5 seconds. There's a reason I have 100 archers in my troop, and the reason is not for them to stand around collecting paychecks doing nothing.

[Lera]

Originally posted by Feudal Wulf:

After about 30 archers just do F3-F3 and they'll go into loose formation. Both better at not getting hit by arrows and more archers can shoot.

Originally posted by SgtSorrow:

Like Feudal wulf wrote, F3-F3 is your friend. Then drag them into a more manageble depth, like no more than three archers deep, then most of them will fire unless it's completely flat/shieldwall infront

Those might be good solutions for now. But it still isn't the point.
The point is that arrows/archers can shoot in an arch no matter how they're standing. It makes no sense for them to make more space between to even be able to shoot. They should be able to stand right behind a shield wall and shoot the arrows in an arch to hit the enemy on the other side. It feels really whacky right now as it is, and I'm aware it's an EA, hence my suggestion/complaint here so they can see.

[𝔗𝔢𝔞 ❀]

I always try to use a hill, even a gentle slope will do for my crossbow with some archer armies.

[Doc Savage]

So is there a train of thought archers should shoot when they can't see anything but the person in front of them vs only when they can actually see something..?

I'm of the mind that I like the fact sight lines matter. Even firing in an arc, you still need to see where the arrow flew and landed so you can adjust your arc.

I love the fact I can use terrain in this game like I can. I love the fact I have to either give my archers space or elevation to fully utilize them.

I honestly don't want a game where all the archers just point up and fire volley after volley that magically find their targets.

Might be different if I could set some sort of angle or range for them to fire at, but that adds a little too much micro for my liking.

F6 under command maybe could do this automatically. Or maybe if you have a companion in charge they could handle that...

I dunno... I think they're working OK as is having to see what they're shooting at minus command decision making.

That said, perks, skill points and/or direction could used quite well to introduce "auto volley" behavior to an angle or point of players choosing to blanket a section of field with wooden rain.

"Wood" it be effective..? Or would you just get the shaft for wasting arrows..?

Cheers..!

[Lera]

Originally posted by Doc Savage:

So is there a train of thought archers should shoot when they can't see anything but the person in front of them vs only when they can actually see something..?

I'm of the mind that I like the fact sight lines matter. Even firing in an arc, you still need to see where the arrow flew and landed so you can adjust your arc.

I love the fact I can use terrain in this game like I can. I love the fact I have to either give my archers space or elevation to fully utilize them.

I honestly don't want a game where all the archers just point up and fire volley after volley that magically find their targets.

Might be different if I could set some sort of angle or range for them to fire at, but that adds a little too much micro for my liking.

F6 under command maybe could do this automatically. Or maybe if you have a companion in charge they could handle that...

I dunno... I think they're working OK as is having to see what they're shooting at minus command decision making.

That said, perks, skill points and/or direction could used quite well to introduce "auto volley" behavior to an angle or point of players choosing to blanket a section of field with wooden rain.

"Wood" it be effective..? Or would you just get the shaft for wasting arrows..?

Cheers..!

If someone is standing in front of you it's not like he covers the entire field of view of you. You can always look over his shoulder, how the hell do you think archers back in the day did it? They were not blind when standing behind allied forces.

The point is that your archers need to be able to fire at the enemy, ALL of your archers and not the first and second line and not 50% of them by using loose formation either. They're not working as intended right now so I'm glad they picked up on this and are working on it hopefully. I can't stand it when you want to have a great arrow barrage but you can't because apparently your soldiers are too damn stupid to look left or right and line up their shots with the archers in the first and second line.

It makes no sense, no matter how you put it.

[Feudal]

Originally posted by Lera:

If someone is standing in front of you it's not like he covers the entire field of view of you. You can always look over his shoulder, how the hell do you think archers back in the day did it? They were not blind when standing behind allied forces.

There is no historical account of this happening so you're entirely going off the basis of "Total War said so" but just like it isn't shown in these games, one handed swords weren't really used in pitched battles. Not even Samurai used Katana's as a main armament, simply said this is fantasy. Not to say sword weren't used at all, obviously Legions had one handed swords as a main armament, but you get my point that these things are heavily romanticized.

My point being, archers in real life didn't just shoot into the air and magically understand where it'll land, and even if they did it would be HIGHLY inaccurate. Shooting straight is hard enough. Archers would either take a position of advantage so they could always shoot or they would act as skirmishers. Some notable places of advantage would be on a hill, or you could construct something akin to what was used in Agincourt where your archers would be behind a defendable construct while still shooting and foot soldiers could hold the open parts.

To my knowledge archers shooting with high arcs like they're a mortar is complete fantasy, and if it happened you'll be sure that it was inaccurate as sin and nearly pointless.