Archers in battles?

[indianer]

I've played several large battles in sieges and in the field with a couple dozen archers, but they don't seem to do any damage or at least not as much as in warband. The shields and armor seem to really negate the arrows completely in VC.

Does anyone know if archers are worth buying, recruiting, and having on the battlefield? It seems that having more infantry and spearmen instead of the archers makes a more powerful force? Even when defending in sieges, archers don't seem to have much of an effect on the enemy? Maybe I just haven't noticed their effectiveness, but I don't want to recruit more archers if they aren't worth it? I could see how having 50-70 archers would start to have a much greater effect, but I don't want to waste the money and time on that many if it just isn't a good strategy?

 

[florinteal]

Yes, they are. Bows are undersold in this mod, they still work well for the player if you go for headshots or for your units if you mass them. My strategy for taking Dun Taruo is to put about 20-30 warrior archers in a line a ways from the ladders and lead my foot soldiers into a charge. The screen just becomes a constant scroll of "blah killed by Warrior Archer (Heimthegi)" until they run out of arrows. In general they're far deadlier if you can flank the enemy with your foot soldiers and distract them into exposing their side or back to your archers.

 

[Reiksmarshal]

Archers are at a disadvantage with all the shields out there, but the Norse warrior archers are a well rounded unit for a raiding party. I try to have at least a dozen of them for my 90 man busse and they are good at killing routing units.

 

[Sir_Dara]

Yes, they are. Bows are undersold in this mod, they still work well for the player if you go for headshots or for your units if you mass them. My strategy for taking Dun Taruo is to put about 20-30 warrior archers in a line a ways from the ladders and lead my foot soldiers into a charge. The screen just becomes a constant scroll of "blah killed by Warrior Archer (Heimthegi)" until they run out of arrows. In general they're far deadlier if you can flank the enemy with your foot soldiers and distract them into exposing their side or back to your archers.

That's because the Heimthegi are the best archers in game. In fact, I think they have a different type of bow from the common Longbow, for their weapons is longer and thicker. Also they are good in melee, so even if they run out of arrows or they are not effective you can still use them as footmen, unlike the other archers that are basically peasants with bow (which makes sense).
So this pretty much answers to the OP question, as they are right now, archers are not worth to be used.

 

[florinteal]

Compared to standard bowmen, they have elite or featured long bows rather than regular long bows, and can have barbed and bodkin arrows in addition to piercing and regular arrows. They have 160 archery rather than 120, and 5 power draw rather than 4. I wouldn't say the answer is that archers aren't worth using, I would say the answer is that if you want to use archers, train a bunch of bowmen into warrior archers using your retreat, because they're definitely worth using.

 

[kraggrim]

Could try to position them on your left so they're firing into the enemy's right hand side as they come at you, less chance of hitting the shield. 

 

[sirgzu]

Could try to position them on your left so they're firing into the enemy's right hand side as they come at you, less chance of hitting the shield.

That's what I usually do with spearmen

 

[kalarhan]

VC is more about spears, shields and javelins. Less about cavalry and bows/crossbows.

Not saying you cant use archers. You can. But if you try to play like native you will die... and they will steal your purse of gold 

You need to learn the flavour of the DLC and how units balance works here. Then you can adapt and use out-the-box strategies like flanking with archers.

 

[Andrix]

Archers are good if you use them properly - position them on a hill and make a shieldwall in front of them.

Have in mind that archers are a support unit - they are not supposed to destroy the entire enemy army on their own.

 

[indianer]

Pretty mixed reviews on the archers then? I gathered as much. They dont seem as efective as in Warband, and i kind of gathered that the strategy of VC is having massive amounts of infantry and spearmen. I'm avoiding cavalry because with all the spears they don't seem like they would last long in a charge anyway. But that's ok, it's kind of refreshing having a focus on infantry for a change.

I have a max army size of about 350 at the moment, and I have 20-30 peasent archers with 4 or 5 of the warrior archers mixed into that group. I hadn't noticed them doing much damage at all to the enemy, and was just wondering how effective they become in the later game with bigger battles? In defense of a siege they could be useful at taking out the enemies unarmored units, though? But sieges seem to be more about hand to hand combat as well. I can understand why they would design the game that way, and it does make the game and tactics entirely different than Warband.

I guess I won't worry about using many archers, except to train them for defending towns and the little motte and bailey forts. And I probably won't use cavalry at all, they get cut down very easily and aren't worth much on foot.

 

[FelipeII]

I've played several large battles in sieges and in the field with a couple dozen archers, but they don't seem to do any damage or at least not as much as in warband. The shields and armor seem to really negate the arrows completely in VC.

Against heavy armored enemies the archers doesn't do any damage, only in blank point shoot(almost impossible, because the AI changes to melee when the enemy get to much close) and this damage is very low(about 5 in a bodyshot), you can test it against armored vikings by yourself. In other hand against unarmored enemies, light armored enemies or enemies without a helmet(in case of headshot) the bows do a support role(when the slings starts to work, I would recommend sling unities, because they have greater speed rating, ammo and armor penetration when compared to cutting damage of the bow).

I could see how having 50-70 archers would start to have a much greater effect, but I don't want to waste the money and time on that many if it just isn't a good strategy?

Don't do that. Only do if you are in war against picts or other faction focused in skirmish/light armored unities. I would recommend 70 archers in VC only if you party have 200+ infantry and spearmen.

The screen just becomes a constant scroll of "blah killed by Warrior Archer" until they run out of arrows. In general they're far deadlier if you can flank the enemy with your foot soldiers and distract them into exposing their side or back to your archers.

I'm pretty sure that you are playing the Warband Native. o_o
I would recommend you to change the module before start the game.

I hadn't noticed them doing much damage at all to the enemy, and was just wondering how effective they become in the later game with bigger battles? In defense of a siege they could be useful at taking out the enemies unarmored units, though?

They won't that effective in sieges as well, the better for the sieges combats are the heavy armored unities equiped with one handed weapon+shield. In large combats you could try to use the feature of indicate by holding the "hold this position" button and releasing in desired enemies that you wish to your troop attack, then you could make the archers to shoot against light armored troops.

If you have any another curiosity about how lame the bows are working for now, I recommend you to test in custom battles and see with your own eyes
Cheers

 

[florinteal]

The screen just becomes a constant scroll of "blah killed by Warrior Archer" until they run out of arrows. In general they're far deadlier if you can flank the enemy with your foot soldiers and distract them into exposing their side or back to your archers.

I'm pretty sure that you are playing the Warband Native. o_o

Pretty sure I'm not. 

 

[JuJu70]

If you have any another curiosity about how lame the bows

I don't about lame, but they work exactly like they supposed to - to annoy and disturb. They are not designed to win you battles, just like it was historically.

 

[Reiksmarshal]

What about a morale penalty for troops that are under fire?

 

[FelipeII]

What about a morale penalty for troops that are under fire?

I guess this is hard to transform into a script, but this is a amazing idea pal.
By now, I don't think the bows are "disturbing" or "annoying", I had wonderful times charging alone against 25 archers using a heavy armor and killing all by myself.

 

[florinteal]

Yeah, you can do that with any low tier unit. On the other hand I've had the experience of getting my character knocked out and then having to watch my hapless troops engage a larger enemy force head on, whilst ignoring the archers firing constantly into their flank and picking them off quite effectively. (And my men were all heavy infantry.)

 

[FelipeII]

Impossible, the AI has the same formation for archers as the skirmishers, send they in front line. The AI doesn't flank with archers and the damage of the bow from a average range(I mean average about: 15 meters) against a enemy with heavy armor(around 50-60 armor) is 0-2.

 

[indianer]

I agree that archers are only there to support the army, and perhaps they are a bit overpowered in Warband? I guess the question is, if your army is stronger with the same numbers of spears and infantry instead of archers, why bother with the archers? If your force is more powerful by replacing them with spears and infantry, that makes them pretty useless? Especially because most of the spears, infantry and skirmishers carry thrown weapons anyway? But as I said, it makes a nice change of strategy/ tactics from Warband (set at a later time period), and is probably more historically accurate this way. I don't mind having large scale almost all infantry battles for a change.

And where are the crossbows? The crossbow sharpshooters in Warband are lethal when used in large numbers in castle defense. I haven't noticed any crossbows in VC yet, although it seems to be involved with the skills, etc? Historically crossbows were not very widespread until much later, so I don't mind not having them available in VC. I haven't seen one crossbow unit or a crossbow for sail anywhere? One of my favorite weapons in Warband!

 

[florinteal]

Impossible, the AI has the same formation for archers as the skirmishers, send they in front line. The AI doesn't flank with archers and the damage of the bow from a average range(I mean average about: 15 meters) against a enemy with heavy armor(around 50-60 armor) is 0-2.

They didn't flank deliberately. They ended up shooting into my group's flank as a result of my own efforts to flank and their archers backing off from the melee. Maybe you should try actually using archers intelligently before dismissing them?

 

[Ivan Khan]

I agree with the developers. It would be several hundred years before Northern Europeans learned to use massed archery. The  bows in VC are very much like they would have been during this time period. Same with cavalry.