Using mounted bowmen

[tinkthank]

I did a search both under mounted bowmen and T'ien Chi, but have come up with nothing that helps me here. Your tips appreciated.

I like the idea of mounted bowmen, although they are expensive. But for what I am able to do with them with my poor skills so far, I am wondering whether they are worth it.

I love the description: heavily armored troops will meet their lances, others will perish under a hail of arrows. (Paraphrase, dont remember off the bat.) Sounds great. Flexible, quick, deadly. Yum.

But: I havent got them to work yet. What do I set them on? On "Hold and attack" they are kamakazie horsemeat, on "fire" they don't sink their lances into anyone.
I sort of want them to be able to fire a bit, then run around the approaching footies and lance the enemy vanguard.

Any tips?
Merci.

[Wauthan]

New patch solves your problem. Archers fire twice when on "hold and attack" then go into melee.

[Saxon]

Which patch is that which allows two rounds of fire before attacking? 2.08? I have not played with these recently.

I also have a rough time doing anything with these units. SOmetimes in a newly captured province, the cash/resource situation sees me building these as fodder to convince the AI not to attack. Not the best use of this unit...

[PDF]

Well, IMHO the main problem is that those horse archers/lancers are very inefficient as archers due to their cost (you can buy 3 foot archers for the price of 1 horseman), and not that good as lancers dur to relatively weak protection (and they are also costly as "lancers" due to their -useless- bow ...). They don't even have great morale ... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif

[Raz 24]

I have had great use of the tien chi barbarian horsemen . I just let them hold and attack and they first pepper and lower morale then charge and destroy the enemy front. Works great in hordes

[NTJedi]

Originally posted by PDF:
Well, IMHO the main problem is that those horse archers/lancers are very inefficient as archers due to their cost (you can buy 3 foot archers for the price of 1 horseman), and not that good as lancers dur to relatively weak protection (and they are also costly as "lancers" due to their -useless- bow ...). They don't even have great morale ... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif <font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Horsemen archers are one of the WORST deals in the game. First their accuracy is very bad, second they are more expensive, third they seem to die just as easily as regular archers.
From my experiences it's always been better to either buy regular archers or regular heavy cavalry.

The heavy horsebowmen of TC and BK do work, about 10x better than they used to. They may or may not be as efficent as they should be or could be, but it is a step in the right direction. You need 20+ in order to really see the effects. They don't work alone but if you have them on a flank, they do very well in causing alot of damage (because of the bow and lance) before they lose many forces.

[moodgiesanta]

*considers a Mongol Horde mod*

Hmm . . .

[Pirateiam]

I build a small army of 24 horsebowman with Horsebowman leader to use as an unrest patrol group - they have movement of 3 which helps on patrol and they also work very good as a mobile defense when combined with provence defenses. I never use them as front line soldiers.

[Arryn]

Originally posted by Pirateiam:
I build a small army of 24 horsebowman with Horsebowman leader to use as an unrest patrol group - they have movement of 3 which helps on patrol and they also work very good as a mobile defense when combined with provence defenses. I never use them as front line soldiers. <font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">BTW, FYI, it's the tactical movement that's most important on patrol. But the 3-strat move makes them handy for quickly getting them where they can be useful.

[Chazar]

As stated before in an older (unsatisfying) thread, hold and attack does not solve the problem for horsebowmen: They are not using the speed of their horses sufficiently! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif

One would want that they move closer to the enemy, fire at the enemy while keeping some distance, and then retreat orderly (or engage in meele for a few rounds).

Hold and attack means that they will fire from their far away starting position, their cool horses grazing, and then charge stupidly...

---

Aside, I'm quite new to the game, and I do believe that the game is kinda balanced, so there must be another good reason why this expensive unit is worth building?! Why is no one here giving this precious secret of cleverly using horsebowmen away? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

I'd love to build an empire on horses...

[Pirateiam]

Originally posted by Arryn:
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Originally posted by Pirateiam:
I build a small army of 24 horsebowman with Horsebowman leader to use as an unrest patrol group - they have movement of 3 which helps on patrol and they also work very good as a mobile defense when combined with provence defenses. I never use them as front line soldiers. <font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">BTW, FYI, it's the tactical movement that's most important on patrol. But the 3-strat move makes them handy for quickly getting them where they can be useful. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Thanks! This is why I love this game you learn something new all the time even after playing it forever. I assume thier tactical movement is high also, I will have to relook at it while I play some more ! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif