Have I misunderstood handgunners?

[e11]

I've always given them a direct line of sight to anything I want them to shoot, and disabled fire at will if I have to have them retreat behind allied lines. then try to manoeuvre them into another shooting position. Because I don't want them to shoot my troops in the back.

But I saw a Youtuber set up a massive gunpowder army, and they had one line of handgunners, with an identical line right behind it.

How does friendly fire work in this game?

[Sawboss]

Friendly fire can happen if your troops are firing past friendlies or at enemies that are right next to friendlies, but they generally won't fire unless they have clear line of sight. I think this goes for individual troops, as in if only the left half of a unit of handgunners can see past your troops to the enemies only the left half will fire. I think...

[Tisiphone Edge]

Did the youtuber have the back line on a hill that would let them shoot over the first line?

[e11]

Originally posted by Tisiphone Edge:

Did the youtuber have the back line on a hill that would let them shoot over the first line?

No. It was a flat plain.

[franz]

It can still fire on large targets over the front .

[e11]

Originally posted by gg:

It can still fire on large targets over the front .

Oh, right. It was a custom battle against giants. That explains it.

[lPaladinl]

Well, they don't shoot if you have friendly units in front of them unless there's gaps in their formation or there's large units towering over them.

It's just a waste to let them sit there, your melee units get chewed up while your DPS line is twiddling their thumbs.

In the case of tall units, I find that it's fine and friendly fire isn't much of an issue for guns.

This goes for every gun unit in the game, they use the same mechanics. Sometimes you can get them to shoot over the heads of your melee line but that requires terrain giving your gunners elevation over your melee line. However then you're dealing with potential friendly fire, and it's still not optimal firing.

So you had it right, you should let them open up shots starting the battle, when you enter the melee phase your gunners should be moving to new positions either to shoot your enemies in the back or to setup new firing lines while you pull back your melee lines to open the enemy up to more gunfire.

Archers bypass this by having firing arcs, but I find they tend to have much higher friendly fire rates. It depends on the unit and your faction, some factions have archers and abilities better at avoiding archer friendly fire than others.

Artillery is the exception where there's not really a distinct difference between "arrows or guns", it all depends on what their firing arcs are, and you have gunpowder cannons of various arcs, as well as Balistae with different arcs. Some artillery can easily fire over the heads of your melee units, others are horrible at it. Terrain is very important for artillery, and can modify their arcs much more considerably than for infantry.

In general, Armor Piercing and Anti-Large artillery tends to be harder to aim into crowds of your own troops, but that's not always the case.

[Lost Latios]

Another set up you can use is a Pike and Shot formation. Checkerboard the front line and fill the gaps with hand gunners.

[Kapika96]

Leave fire at will on. Units will actively try to avoid friendly fire, they'll only shoot if they have a clear shot, there will probably be some enemies to the sides that they can still shoot and big enemies, eg. monsters, horses etc. can be shot over the top of troops anyway, especially if you're playing Dwarfs.

Archers can have friendly fire issues, but it's much less likely with guns.

[Invisible]

Don't belive everything that youtubers do. Just belive in yourself.

[Supermarine]

Originally posted by Invisible:

Don't belive everything that youtubers do. Just belive in yourself.

This is becoming increasingly important in this day and age.

[SarmatII]

Large targets can be shot from multiple ranks of handgunners, as each of them have LoS to the big target.

But the best way to use them is chevron or checkboard formation. Chevron works best as it allows gunners to fire into the sides of enemies, causing even more morale loss & bypassing shield block.

[Tsuyara]

Handgunners still have a solid arc and can shoot at units further away above heads without issues, only once in melee does it become an issue, at which point you either want to be on a hill, flank or shooting large. Or, shooting enemy archers/casters and stuff.
They generally refuse to fire if an ally blocks their sight, so i'd leave fire at will on (they'll on occassion still hit yours, but not too badly). It's only really some explosive artillery that'll blast your line into oblivion if you let them.

Tl;dr: they can still shoot at anything that's not engaged in melee, even on flat ground, the shots arc a fair bit.

[Xaphnir]

Originally posted by gg:

It can still fire on large targets over the front .

Can even do it against large infantry over small infantry, such as dwarfs firing over their infantry line at Big 'Uns.

[peremptor]

Originally posted by Supermarine:

Originally posted by Invisible:

Don't belive everything that youtubers do. Just belive in yourself.

This is becoming increasingly important in this day and age.

Or just believe in what you're told about yourself. We do live in a benevolent society looking out for everyone's best interests after all.

[galhalatine]

Handgunners won't shoot if they are obstructed, so they won't shoot their own troops. archers will shoot over their own troops and end up hitting them. so leave your handgunners on fire at will. best put them behind generals, heroes or steamtanks, single entities don't block line of sight and the guns have lots to shoot at.