Missle Shield

[UberPenguin]

When playing with any of the races that can easily mass range (IE: Man with Longbows/Pangaea with centaurs) I do. The way I play is just having enough archers to rout whoever somuch as steps towards me, it works against normal AI, and the indies level 7-. I was wondering if anyone thought this to be a stupid idea? (The normal army size I have is 100-200+ archers clumped into four Groups, as not to get massacred by return fire.)

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by UberPenguin:
The way I play is just having enough archers to rout whoever somuch as steps towards me, it works against normal AI, and the indies level 7-.

Consider what would happen if your opponent brings a staff of storms onto the battlefield, or casts mist. The precision of your archers will be severely affected, and with a storm, half of the arrows will not fire. This will severely affect the usefulness of your archers. They will, however, still be quite useful against any opponent that doesn't have a lot of air magic.

[alexti]

Originally posted by UberPenguin:
When playing with any of the races that can easily mass range (IE: Man with Longbows/Pangaea with centaurs) I do. The way I play is just having enough archers to rout whoever somuch as steps towards me, it works against normal AI, and the indies level 7-. I was wondering if anyone thought this to be a stupid idea? (The normal army size I have is 100-200+ archers clumped into four Groups, as not to get massacred by return fire.)

And consider what would happen if you get attacked by Arch-Devil or similar SC. He will fly into the middle of one of your archer Groups and while he will be taking his time killing them one by one, your other archers will insist on helping AD (with good intents, of course ;->)

[Cohen]

This tactic should meet too big problems with HI like Abysyan or Ulmish, with Tower Shield and very high protection.

How does it works against HC?
I suppose you can't arrow them so easily as Indep Infantry.

[Master Shake]

Massed archers work great against indies. It works great against others players as well. Just don't become too reliant on it, as other players have some nice counters they can throw at you. Another, is that they may well do the same thing, only they may have Wind Guide, Arrow Fend, and/or Flame Arrows on their side. If they do, and you don't, you can write off your archers.

[tinkthank]

Im also a big missile fan, but it only works well into middle game. I am also a big support-mage fan, and dont build SCs, but that is my failing; flaming arrows and wind guide are a MUST, which I dont see you having with Pan, and Man only gets you Wind Guide.
Make sure you have some cheapo troops around to draw enemy fire. Even a crack troop of heavily armored is nice too.
Drawbacks: Useless underwater. Severely handicapped by storms and mist -- and no one has yet mentionend my MOST FAVORITE spell of all time (whcih I usually rush to get against human players): Arrow Fend. Poof, your army is 1/5 of its original size with the casting of 1 spell, and will be mowed down quickly to nothing.
So you will need to switch in mid-to late game, and stay dynamic. NEVER rely on 1 strat only, unless you feel your opponents will never be able to counter it.
The computer opponents are stupid; I have never seen them cast Storm or Arrow Fend, or the other counters mentioned in previous Posts. But against a Human Being you will suffer, because humans WILL scout you and WILL find out what you are doing, and they WILL counter it.
So to answer your question: No, it is not stupid, but neither is it a solution for all situations.

[Taqwus]

Massed archers would have trouble with flyers and with heavily armored, fast units.

The former could actually -mostly- be countered with storms; sure, you sacrifice half your missile firepower, but it'll give you much more time to shoot the flyer before he reaches you. This will not, of course, hamper air spirits... forget about trying to ground Thuella, Queen of Elemental Air, armed as an SC (and who probably cast Storm and Wrathful Skies just before launching herself at your army).

The latter presents a problem. Crossbows will help penetrate heavy armor, but can still have problems and will get off very few volleys before that mass of Demon Knights smashes into you. Vans will be a big problem; while not heavy armored, they could be (think Marble Warriors, for instance), they're very fast, they have mirror images innately, and it would be very Vannish to have a mage ready to cast Arrow Fend to grant all his troops Air Shield-80.