Archers need a nerf.

[hruza]

I'm not going to write out "lance-and-sword armed cavalry of the Frankish pattern, employed as the shock-arm of a late medieval feudal army with a preferred modus operandi of gallop charging and close pursuit" over and over. I trust people have the general idea of the tactics involved with their use when I say they should counter archers. In the context of Bannerlord, it isn't that complicated.

When I wrote "tactic" I did not mean mere manner/stile of fighting. What I mean is how a unit is deployed and used in the battle. You can have Frankish type cavalry charge archers frontally through stakes that archers deployed or through muddy banks of a river after the rain and fail miserably. You can also send it around the flanks been protected by a hill and smash archers to bits.

Archers are good at ranged combat. Therefore if you can force ranged combat on enemy that have Frankish stile cavalry, your archers will dominate. Cavalry is good at moving fast and hitting hard. Therefore if you can use it's fast speed to hit from unexpected direction, it will dominate. Forcing enemy to fight on your conditions is what I mean by tactics here.

 

[Alescor]

There is no such thing as a "counter unit" in real life. Archers were not counter to cavalry and cavalry was not counter to archers. That's a computer game stuff.

In real life there is only tactic and counter tactic. Archers may deploy stakes or behind an obstacle to counter cavalry and cavalry can flank archer position to counter them. It's about playing to advantages of your equipment and a fighting stile while against that of the opponent. Archers are at advantage when fighting at range while on disadvantage when fighting hand in hand. Therefore goal of archers when facing cavalry is to prevent cavalry from closing in easily. And vice versa: goal of cavalry is to get close and personal with archers as soon as possible, ideally while denying them the line of sight/shoot.

Archers are not counter to cavalry and cavalry is not counter to archers on their own. It's how they are used that matters. And Bannerlord does this rather well, although in simplified form

in that you are wrong,
Each unit is designed and perfected to do a different task, and that has been done in the past, is done now and will be done in the future.
I don't mean that they can't do anything else but they are not made for that A basic example would be the submarines, which were specifically to ship ships and then rang the sonar to counter it. and it has always been that way one makes a unit and then the other makes one to defeat that unit. in the case of the archers, their primary objective would be the cheap and poorly equipped infantry that the lord would have collected in a nearby town and would only have given him a nicked and rusty sword and if they have any luck a shield with the blood of its previous owner , a large part of the armies of that period were largely made up of peasants, so armored units were expensive and infrequent

the problem of armored units is also that they are rediculously weak to projectiles and if they have a shield it is out of fashion since they do not know how to use it, I suppose that the shield suits them with the armor that they do not use apart they are too easy to get and too much cheap to keep in the current game but that's a different topic

 

[hruza]

in that you are wrong,
Each unit is designed and perfected to do a different task, and that has been done in the past, is done now and will be done in the future.
I don't mean that they can't do anything else but they are not made for that A basic example would be the submarines, which were specifically to ship ships and then rang the sonar to counter it.

I don't understand what you mean by that. What is "ship ships" and why would submarine "ring sonar" to counter it?

and it has always been that way one makes a unit and then the other makes one to defeat that unit.

You don't make unit to defeat unit, you make tactics defeat tactic and equipment to defeat equipment.

in the case of the archers, their primary objective would be the cheap and poorly equipped infantry

Primary objective of archers would be whatever was on the battlefield and whatever made most sense at that time and situation.

that the lord would have collected in a nearby town and would only have given him a nicked and rusty sword and if they have any luck a shield with the blood of its previous owner

Lords didn't give anything to anybody and they did not collect anybody anywhere. Lords levied feudals that were bound to serve them by the oath of fealty under terms of feudal contract. And they had to provide their own equipment. Save some exceptions.

a large part of the armies of that period were largely made up of peasants, so armored units were expensive and infrequent

Only thing made of armies of peasants are Hollywood movies. Armies of the period were made of feudal levies and peasants did not serve in them in anything but supporting roles. Peasant armies are nothing but popular myth created by uneducated film makers and game creators.

the problem of armored units is also that they are rediculously weak to projectiles and if they have a shield it is out of fashion since they do not know how to use it, I suppose that the shield suits them with the armor that they do not use apart they are too easy to get and too much cheap to keep in the current game but that's a different topic

They are as weak/strong to projectiles as they are to any other weapon in the game. Game engine does not differ damage of an arrow from that of a spear or sword.

 

[Alescor]

I don't understand what you mean by that. What is "ship ships" and why would submarine "ring sonar" to counter it?

I don't understand it either, it's the translator's thing

What he meant was that there are specific units to neutralize others, the submarine is that it is designed to sink ships, and then the ships tried to neutralize the advantage of the submarines using sonar, or anti tank units to neutralize the tanks. . The tactics do help but the units are already designed against other

It is like the Roman pillum, it is not really designed to kill, it is to disable shields. Another thing is that if it hits you in the chest it will not kill you but it is not designed for it.

Primary objective of archers would be whatever was on the battlefield and whatever made most sense at that time and situation

In part, for archers to shoot at anything, I agree, but they are not made for them with a 60 or 80 kilos bow. It would be a waste to shoot at units that do not appear to have shot at them.

Only thing made of armies of peasants are Hollywood movies. Armies of the period were made of feudal levies and peasants did not serve in them in anything but supporting roles. Peasant armies are nothing but popular myth created by uneducated film makers and game creators.

In my country it was made and there are a lot of historical books that you can read, maybe being invaded by the Muslims will help a little to have people go through the villages recruiting people or maybe my country is the exception but it was quite common

They are as weak/strong to projectiles as they are to any other weapon in the game. Game engine does not differ damage of an arrow from that of a spear or sword

and that's the biggest problem there is that doesn't differentiate the type of damage or type of armor

 

[rektasaurus]

I mean arguing that there were no real “counters” to “units” irl only “counters” to “tactics” and “equipment” is a distinction that really misses the forest for the trees and is irrelevant to the topic of this thread.

Pointy sticks go into things that can’t stop them. Simple as that. This is a discussion to come to a consensus on what things pointy stick missiles can pass through in the game. Thinking it’s wrong to say one unit “counters” another, especially in the context of game design and balance, is at best facetious.

 

[rektasaurus]

I don't understand it either, it's the translator's thing

What he meant was that there are specific units to neutralize others, the submarine is that it is designed to unite ships, and then the ships tried to neutralize the advantage of the submarines using sonar, or anti tank units to neutralize the tanks. . The tactics do help but the units are already designed against other

It is like the Roman pillum, it is not really designed to kill, it is to disable shields. Another thing is that if it hits you in the chest it will not kill you but it is not designed for it.



In part, for archers to shoot at anything, I agree, but they are not made for them with a 60 or 80 kilos bow. It would be a waste to shoot at units that do not appear to have shot at them.



In my country it was made and there are a lot of historical books that you can read, maybe being invaded by the Muslims will help a little to have people go through the villages recruiting people or maybe my country is the exception but it was quite common



and that's the biggest problem there is that doesn't differentiate the type of damage or type of armor

Or you know some noble douchebag’s cousin’s friend looked at his wife wrong so he decided to take a couple of villages from him and decided to get the poor saps from his village to go cut down some poor saps from another village. I mean not like that didn’t happen constantly or anything right....?

 

[Alescor]

Or you know some noble douchebag’s cousin’s friend looked at his wife wrong so he decided to take a couple of villages from him and decided to get the poor saps from his village to go cut down some poor saps from another village. I mean not like that didn’t happen constantly or anything right....?

I'm sorry but I don't understand what you mean, the google translator leaves a lot to be desired

Although I think that the Trojan war started with something similar, but what I said I do not understand very well or if you mean that

 

[Alescor]

Pointy sticks go into things that can’t stop them. Simple as that. This is a discussion to come to a consensus on what things pointy stick missiles can pass through in the game. Thinking it’s wrong to say one unit “counters” another, especially in the context of game design and balance, is at best facetious

it's not funny, life is like that if you have a problem you are looking for a solution to that problem. Another more basic example is the current type of ammunition that you have several specific types for a specific function, hollow charge, fractionation, high explosive, apds, explosive perforator, saphei, ... I may not have expressed myself well by the translator but I don't think I said anything out of context

 

[rektasaurus]

it's not funny, life is like that if you have a problem you are looking for a solution to that problem. Another more basic example is the current type of ammunition that you have several specific types for a specific function, hollow charge, fractionation, high explosive, apds, explosive perforator, saphei, ... I may not have expressed myself well by the translator but I don't think I said anything out of context

It must be the translator.

 

[hruza]

What he meant was that there are specific units to neutralize others, the submarine is that it is designed to sink ships, and then the ships tried to neutralize the advantage of the submarines using sonar,

What else can submarine sink at sea except ships? And sonar is an equipment, not a unit. It can be equipped on anything, even submarine itself.

or anti tank units to neutralize the tanks.

Or APCs, bunkers, armored trains.

The tactics do help but the units are already designed against other

Units are designed against units, that's true, but they are not designed to counter one unit and one unit only. Anti tank gun is designed to punch through armor. It does not matter if that armor is in the tank unit, mechanized infantry, SPG artillery, or on a bunker of a Maginot line. And it does not matter if anti tank gun is in artillery unit, infantry unit, in a fortification or on a tank.

It is like the Roman pillum, it is not really designed to kill, it is to disable shields. Another thing is that if it hits you in the chest it will not kill you but it is not designed for it.

Pillum was certainly designed to kill all right. That it was designed to bend when struck in to the shield or gorund to prevent it from been thrown back is another matter.

In part, for archers to shoot at anything, I agree, but they are not made for them with a 60 or 80 kilos bow. It would be a waste to shoot at units that do not appear to have shot at them.

Must be another thing lost in the translation.

In my country it was made and there are a lot of historical books that you can read, maybe being invaded by the Muslims will help a little to have people go through the villages recruiting people or maybe my country is the exception but it was quite common

It was not done in any country in Medieval Europe. Medieval European armies were not made of peasants. Which is not to say that peasants newer fought.

and that's the biggest problem there is that doesn't differentiate the type of damage or type of armor

Game does differentiate between damage type and type of armor. It does not differentiate between arrow and a spear.

I mean arguing that there were no real “counters” to “units” irl only “counters” to “tactics” and “equipment” is a distinction that really misses the forest for the trees and is irrelevant to the topic of this thread.

On contrary, arguing that unit A should be counter to unit B because it was counter in rl is a distraction. Because it's not true. There are plenty of examples when archers defeated cavalry and vice versa. Some of them have already been listed here.

Pointy sticks go into things that can’t stop them. Simple as that. This is a discussion to come to a consensus on what things pointy stick missiles can pass through in the game. Thinking it’s wrong to say one unit “counters” another, especially in the context of game design and balance, is at best facetious.

Pointy stick missiles can pass through the same things as pointy stick swords, spears or axes. If you want to argue that missile can't go through mail or scale then 1, so shouldn't spear or a sword and 2, it's not true.

 

[Sheepify]

Only thing made of armies of peasants are Hollywood movies. Armies of the period were made of feudal levies and peasants did not serve in them in anything but supporting roles. Peasant armies are nothing but popular myth created by uneducated film makers and game creators.

Uh... from Flemish uprisings through Hussite conflict to even such late-era events like Polish insurrections you can find plenty of "peasants" (to clarify, low-class non-military formations, because not all participants were strictly "peasants") doing actually prettty darn well against regular armies.

Why would medieval England (and it was hardly an English phenomenon) have laws dictating every freeman to own specific types of weapons and armor? Certainly not so they could get uppity against their betters, and we have plenty of levy laws recorded all over Europe prior to establishment of professional armies (and even long into that period - mass conscription of WW2 being just one most recent example).

A conteporary levy recruit was certainly not some highly skilled professional (even if those did exist), and while they may have had some specialist training (English longbowmen being the most extreme example of it), and we know at least in some places they were supposed to participate in regular training (no matter what its quality), it's hard to discount the potential reality of a lot of the most numerable participants of various armed conflicts to be there with limited, if any, combat experience and training.

At which point it becomes merely a linguistic argument.

 

[hruza]

Uh... from Flemish uprisings through Hussite conflict to even such late-era events like Polish insurrections you can find plenty of "peasants" (to clarify, low-class non-military formations, because not all participants were strictly "peasants") doing actually prettty darn well against regular armies.

Flemish uprisings and Hussite wars were not fought by peasants. That I know for sure. Flemish armies were made of Flemish nobility and free citizens of towns and the same goes for Hussites.

As for actual peasant uprisings, as few as they were, yes, they included peasants in the armies. Which is why most of them ended up as they did. In complete failure.

Why would medieval England has laws dictating every freeman to own a weapon?

Majority of peasants in medieval England were serfs and were forbidden to own weapons by law.

Certainly not so they could get uppity against their betters, and we have plenty of levy laws recorded all over Europe prior to establishment of professional armies (and even long into that period - mass conscription of WW2 being just one most recent example).

Except peasant serfs were not levied in to English armies.

The persistent old belief that peasants and small farmers gathered to form a national army or fyrd is a strange delusion dreamt up by antiquarians in the late eighteenth or early nineteenth centuries to justify universal military conscription.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription#Medieval_levies

Infantry, basically, could be raised in one of three ways: they could be members of a lord's household (retinue troops), hired for a campaign (mercenaries), or levied from town or countryside. As early as the 11th century, we have attestations of professional infantry serving as castleguards and the like in Normandy. Some of these men were mere mercenaries, but others very clearly were attached in a more long-term sense. At the same time, the Assize of Arms of Henry III makes it very clear that unarmed serfs were not expected to leave the fields and fall into ranks. The men being levied were armed, had some training, and came from the upper peasantry: sokemen (later yeomen), tenants farmers, and the like.
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/227qb2/how_often_were_peasant_levies_used_in_medieval/

A sokeman belonged to a class of tenants, found chiefly in the eastern counties, especially the Danelaw, occupying an intermediate position between the free tenants and the bond tenants, in that they owned and paid taxes on their land themselves.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soke_(legal)

Yeomen were often constables of their parish, and sometimes chief constables of the district, shire or hundred. Many yeomen held the positions of bailiffs for the High Sheriff or for the shire or hundred. Other civic duties would include churchwarden, bridge warden, and other warden duties. It was also common for a yeoman to be an overseer for his parish. Yeomen, whether working for a lord, king, shire, knight, district or parish, served in localised or municipal police forces raised by or led by the landed gentry. Some of these roles, in particular those of constable and bailiff, were carried down through families. Yeomen often filled ranging, roaming, surveying, and policing roles.[9] In districts remoter from landed gentry and burgesses, yeomen held more official power: this is attested in statutes of the reign of Henry VIII (reigned 1509–1547), indicating yeomen along with knights and squires as leaders for certain purposes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yeoman#United_Kingdom

A conteporary levy recruit was certainly not some highly skilled professional (even if those did exist), and while they may have some specific training (English longbowmen being the most extreme example of it), and we know at least in some places they were supposed to participate in regular training (no matter what its quality), it's hard to discount the potential reality of a lot of the most numerable participants of various armed conflicts to be there with limited, if any, combat experience and training.

At which point it becomes merely a linguistic argument.

Feudal "levy" is not equivalent to peasants. That's just modern misconception created by ignorant popular culture.

 

[rektasaurus]

Pointy stick missiles can pass through the same things as pointy stick swords, spears or axes. If you want to argue that missile can't go through mail or scale then 1, so shouldn't spear or a sword and 2, it's not true.

I didn’t argue that a missile shouldn’t go through mail. It shouldn’t go through scale anyways. Basically there should be armor in the game which stops javelins and arrows. That’s all I’m trying to get across.

 

[Sheepify]

Flemish uprisings and Hussite wars were not fought by peasants. That I know for sure. Flemish armies were made of Flemish nobility and free citizens of towns and the same goes for Hussites.

The Peasant Rebellion was not fought by peasants? The Bohemian conflict that popularized the use of trashing flail (a very much improvised agricultural tool turned a weapon) was not fought by peasants (along with a large contingent of professionals)? What?

Majority of peasants in medieval England were serfs and were forbidden to own weapons by law.

You mean like the villeins, who constituted majority of longbowmen levy? The same "serfs" (because that wasn't a term used in England) that are literally mentioned in Henry III's Assize of Arms of 1252 as required to be armed, by law?

Except peasant serfs were not levied in to English armies.

Except you weren't talking about serfs exclusively, but peasants. Which includes freemen, who very much were the backbone of medieval levies until the armies turned professional.

The persistent old belief that peasants and small farmers gathered to form a national army or fyrd is a strange delusion dreamt up by antiquarians in the late eighteenth or early nineteenth centuries to justify universal military conscription.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription#Medieval_levies

I'll see your wikipedia claim of one author and raise you collected cited examples of contemporary laws requiring specific military equipment (if not training) from various segments of the society. Aside from all the battle accounts confirming the presence of lightly armed-and-armored levies on battlefields all through Europe.

Infantry, basically, could be raised in one of three ways: they could be members of a lord's household (retinue troops), hired for a campaign (mercenaries), or levied from town or countryside. As early as the 11th century, we have attestations of professional infantry serving as castleguards and the like in Normandy. Some of these men were mere mercenaries, but others very clearly were attached in a more long-term sense. At the same time, the Assize of Arms of Henry III makes it very clear that unarmed serfs were not expected to leave the fields and fall into ranks. The men being levied were armed, had some training, and came from the upper peasantry: sokemen (later yeomen), tenants farmers, and the like.

Do you realize this is validation of the statement that armed peasants were part of the levy and participated in combat?

Feudal "levy" is not equivalent to peasants. That's just modern misconception created by ignorant popular culture.

No, it could very well consist of burghers (Italian city-states certainly used those), but does not discount "peasants" at all - quite the contrary, you yourself provided validation to it.

 

[hruza]

I didn’t argue that a missile shouldn’t go through mail. It shouldn’t go through scale anyways. Basically there should be armor in the game which stops javelins and arrows. That’s all I’m trying to get across.

And why then such armor shouldn't stop spears and swords? Why should it stop only missiles? Can sword go through scale?

No, it can't. And now tell me how do you want to play a game where NPC or player in a scale armor is untouchable?

I don't know why are you so fixated on missiles. Missiles, swords or spears can't go through scale, but they can go in between the scales, in to armpits and other unprotected parts of the torso. However game does not simulate damage mechanic all the way down to single scale or single ring. Instead it assumes certain average damage that "goes through" and spreads it out on every hit. And so instead of say 9 hits that would do no damage and 1 hit that would do 100% damage, every hit in the game does 10% damage. It's called abstraction.

 

[rektasaurus]

And why then such armor shouldn't stop spears and swords? Why should it stop only missiles? Can sword go through scale?

No, it can't. And now tell me how do you want to play a game where NPC or player in a scale armor is untouchable?

I don't know why are you so fixated on missiles. Missiles, swords or spears can't go through scale, but they can go in between the scales, in to armpits and other unprotected parts of the torso. However game does not simulate damage mechanic all the way down to single scale or single ring. Instead it assumes certain average damage that "goes through" and spreads it out on every hit. And so instead of say 9 hits that would do no damage and 1 hit that would do 100% damage, every hit in the game does 10% damage. It's called abstraction.

The topic of the thread is “nerf archers”, that’s why I keep trying to bring it back to missiles... What’s wrong with putting my opinion on the internet that if my attack hits a surface of a hitbox which is armored I’d like it to do little to no damage. If it hits a surface on a hitbox which is unarmored, it should do full damage. That’s literally how it is now. What are you arguing with me about I don’t get it?

Did you vote on the poll?

 

[Sheepify]

I don't know why are you so fixated on missiles.

Because current Bannerlord implementation makes archers more effective of an unit type than anything comparable.

Your melee infantry will still take damage and potentially die to enemies they fight - even the lowliest looter. Your cavalry, more often than not, won't even hit anything charging, and will take damage and die when properly countered (and there are multiple ways of doing it).

Archers, by their definition, sit there and, currently, kill significant portion of enemy force even before being threatened themselves in any meaningful way. Basically, they overperform.

So while "simulation-wise" armor type should be far more resillient to all weapons compared to how Bannerlord currently works (and whether or not that would benefit the game is, frankly, another discussion), archers are the major offender.

 

[rektasaurus]

Because current Bannerlord implementation makes archers more effective of an unit type than anything comparable.

Your melee infantry will still take damage and potentially die to enemies they fight - even the lowliest looter. Your cavalry, more often than not, won't even hit anything charging, and will take damage and die when properly countered (and there are multiple ways of doing it).

Archers, by their definition, sit there and, currently, kill significant portion of enemy force even before being threatened themselves in any meaningful way. Basically, they overperform.

So while "simulation-wise" armor type should be far more resillient to all weapons compared to how Bannerlord currently works (and whether or not that would benefit the game is, frankly, another discussion), archers are the major offender.

Right. I’m just saying like a sword thrust or any pointy thing to the face should do full damage 1 hit kill if the head armor is open. Or arrow. But if it hits armor somewhere it should do no damage unless it can pierce it. Or if they have shoulder armor reduced damage on a down stroke to the shoulder instead of 1 or 2 hit kill.

I think better ai would have a much better impact than changing anything about weapons and equipment. It’s so hard to tell archers to shoot at the right thing and they’re not very good at aiming. They’re very situational. They’re not great in melee and will die to infantry rushing them. Cav ai isn’t too great at melee so it’s actually hard to use cav against archers. They just sit and take arrows barely doing any damage.

 

[Sheepify]

Right. I’m just saying like a sword thrust or any pointy thing to the face should do full damage 1 hit kill if the head armor is open. Or arrow. But if it hits armor somewhere it should do no damage unless it can pierce it. Or if they have shoulder armor reduced damage on a down stroke to the shoulder instead of 1 or 2 hit kill

They'd need to overhaul too much of core code for that.

Dwarf Fortress (among others) can do that, so it's not that it's not possible, but it's "simulated" rather than direct effect of a particular strike. The way damage calculations and equipment values are implemented in Bannerlord, you don't have the basis for partial coverage, much less calculating the direct area of impact for multiple combatants with such fidelity that it would differentiate between "covered" and "uncovered" part of a model's armor.

It’s so hard to tell archers to shoot at the right thing and they’re not very good at aiming.

They will generally shoot at closest formation. I agree that there should be a way of designating intended formation as a target, though, even if perhaps tied to some leadership or tactics skill level.

Troop level of your archers (and their equipment) directly affects their range and accuracy - an Imperial Archer is nothing comparable to a Battanian Fian (though Vlandian Levy Crossbowmen and higher are still hilariously effective)

They’re very situational.

Neh. You just need some horse archers (or javelin throwers) as a distraction, and most enemy armies will get creamed as long as you have enough ammunition.

They’re not great in melee and will die to infantry rushing them.

I consider that a feature, not an issue. Though, again, troop tier goes against making such a general statement - general T3 infantry and below won't even phase Palatine Guards or similar high-tier archers much, as an example.

Cav ai isn’t too great at melee so it’s actually hard to use cav against archers.

Yeah, that's another, if very much annoying, problem itself.

 

[rektasaurus]

They'd need to overhaul too much of core code for that.

Dwarf Fortress can do that, so it's not that it's not possible, but it's "simulated" rather than direct effect of a particular strike. The way damage calculations and equipment values are implemented in Bannerlord, you don't have the basis for partial coverage, much less calculating the direct area of impact for multiple combatants with such fidelity that it would differentiate between "covered" and "uncovered" part of a model's armor.

It’s a box with six sides. They don’t have to overhaul anything.