Foot Archer Tactics - Bannerlord Battlefield Tactics Guide

in this episode of the bannerlord battlefield tactics guide we're going to do a deep dive into foot archers by the end of the video you will have a complete understanding of which formations and commands work best for different situations sorry for the long intro let's get started since we are still on foot let's continue the same format of testing starting with line and hold position one thing you'll notice with the archer testing is that the results were much more steady and consistent meaning we didn't need to run as many tests in the control after five tests the kdr is nearly one at 1915 versus 1919 kills next up line charge there is a peculiar pattern i noticed while running these tests as the front archer stops to take aim another archer from behind would walk in front and take game blocking the first shot and cancelling it entirely not every archer was blocked but close to half were which we can see in the data the site on hold earned nearly double the kills as the charge command and one 100 of the time advanced is next and i have to add a caveat here if we run this test on a normal map at 200 meters or greater it would lose even worse than it does here normally advance would start to shoot at roughly half of their max range which means the other side would pelt them significantly before they even get into range once they're in firing range they oscillate back and forth trying to maintain the exact distance from the enemy line notice the kdr is slightly different than the charge since as more troops were able to lose their arrows before a fellow soldier blocked their path looking at the recap it's quite obvious that the only way to fight with ranged troops is holding firm and shooting back the other two commands do have a use but once arrows start to fly from the enemy be sure to stop them immediately moving on to shield wall and holding position we made sure both lines were even for this test as shield wall tends to be more dense allowing for more output with the same width of troops it's fairly even most of the way but the shield wall wins by a fair margin in the end we see a .91 kdr for line hold and zero percent win rate within the same space shield ball packs more of a punch than line as soon as we give the charge command the shield wall formation starts to fall apart suffering from the same issues as lying it's a convincing defeat for the shield wall which is confirmed by the data 1.81 kdr for line formation and 100 win rate advance seems to move slower and tries to get closer to the enemy their line disintegrates within a few volleys for a lopsided defeat from the data we see one of the worst results 2.28 kdr and 100 win rate ouch the only time shield wall is recommended for archers is when space is limited and the archers don't need to move neither charge nor advanced is a good idea as the slaughter was significant now the time has come the real archer formation we start with line versus loose on hold position right from the start it's immediately obvious that loose formation has a significant advantage which only gets worse as the duel goes on although it may not be immediately obvious why sure loose formation has three rows of troops shooting but line has more troops firing in the front row let's see what happens when we make line formation with a single row against loose formation of the same lane now there will be no output disadvantage as all units from both sides will be shooting it's still a convincing win at 1.57 kdr for loose formation we run the same test but let loose formation go the full length of the map spreading the troops further damage output remains the same on both sides by the end it's an even more devastating defeat for line at 2.19 kdr for loose formation the more dense a unit is that's taking projectiles the more casualties it sustains making loose formation ideal to both avoid damage and dish it out the numbers don't lie .44 kdr which is nearly identical to shield wall advanced versus line hold loose formation is superior in both offense and defense when it comes to projectile battles once the charge command is issued we start to see the same pattern even loose formation can't make up for the disadvantage while loose does fare much better than line and shield wall it's still a 100 loss and 1.45 kdr in favor of line hold advanced is an interesting one though we see a fairly close back and forth with loose formation holding an edge the whole fight they eke out a small victory in the end but the results overall are similar to a mirror match with 1.02 kdr and 50 win rate in summary loose formation is by far the best formation to use for both offensive and defensive with standing ground as being the preferred method advance can work in a pinch if you don't have time to micro but avoid charge at all costs now i know what some of you are thinking why would you ever use circle formation with archers i see a lot of comments about using this formation with a circle shield wall formation so we test how effective it really is we see a significant gap for line formation which ends in a convincing win circle formation cuts the number of troops able to shoot back by half or more severely limiting their effectiveness i was planning on doing the next test in the bonus section but it belongs here and is taking the place of the column formation meme test we even give the foot troops a three to two numbers advantage it's quite obvious that circle formation misses the mark when it comes to defending against horse archers we managed to get five or six kills with our archers before they are all lost please don't use this as a defense against horse archers there are better alternatives which we will look at later let's have a moment of silence for the massacre that is about to take place don't use square with archers it's very bad 19.65 kdr for line formation once again i wasn't sure what to expect with skein formation it's fairly even most of the way down but skein takes the lead and line formation routes this time we see a 0.96 kdr and zero percent win rate for line formation giving skein a slight edge overall charge seems to be the biggest loser in this video and we don't see it changing with skein the lines actually meet and engage in melee but line formation has close to 50 more units an insurmountable deficit we see a 1.77 kdr and 100 win rate for line formation over skiing charge this must be one of the strangest cases of tail world's math i've seen thus far skein advance doesn't seem to like smaller spaces testing again on a full-size map we see horrendous results while in advance the skein walks through volley after volley only to gyrate back and forth loosing an arrow at roughly one-fifth the volume of the line don't use this command skein formation didn't perform very well for archers only achieving parity with line formation but losing badly in charge and advance looking at the data as a whole we can see a very clear winner loose formation and holding ground should be used at all times when loosing arrows not only does it allow more arrows to be shot per volley but it also minimizes casualties sustained by enemy incoming arrows in a pinch shield wall can perform better than line formation across the board moving our archers while trying to shoot is a bad idea charge in advance have their uses but not for head-to-head combat before we move on to the next section let's take a look at how effective archers are from three different distances to test we have one side hold fire and the other side let loose with 10 volleys we start with the max distance for this small map or about 80 meters away by the end we inflict 76 casualties over 10 volleys moving up to the halfway point of the map or about 40 meters away our casualties inflicted rise to 229 or a threefold increase finally we moved to just outside of melee aggro range and casualties increased to 330 or 30 percent more than mid range and four and a half times more than at long range as we can see damage inflicted is massive from close range and drops off slowly until mid range then exponentially drops off at long range now we test the infamous height advantage dirt i have the high ground both sides are in line formation at approximately 70 meters apart it's surprisingly close given the height of the hill however the lead sticks until the end and results in a sound wind for the hill having the height will nearly guarantee a win and have on average a 10 increase in kdr over the opponent using the same formation now we move the lines a bit closer together and see if the advantage holds right away we can see it's a very close race to the end having the hill does still give an advantage but it's miniscule at close distances looking at the data we see an increase of 1.19 kdr but much more volatile results with only 67 win rate for the hill having the high ground loses its effectiveness at shorter distances before we get into the bonus segment i wanted to fiddle around with a few different ranged units to see how they performed i'm working on a unit versus unit comparison video as well going tear by tier for each faction so this is not a thorough testing just fyi we start by substituting crossbows for one side and run a few tests at the max distance for this map we see a slight lead for crossbows with the first volley dropping a few archers but the lead is given up with time and the results were very close we see a 1.02 kdr for the archers and a 50 win rate which is basically a mirror match when we move the crossbows to the middle of the map we see a different story play out again the first volley is devastating from the crossbows but the bose rate of fire eventually makes up for it and consistently beats the crossbow the data shows a 1.09 kdr and 100 win rate for bow let's see if the trend continues for close range ouch that first volley looks painful however the gap still remains resulting in a victory for bose the kdr ends up at 1.05 and 100 win rate making bow the winner at close range and both evenly matched at long distances okay for real this time last section before the bonus let's find out the max distance for a few units and see if that range changes with elevation differences we start on a roughly flat map and slowly inch towards the enemy with our palatine archers the crossbows fire some bolts our way around the 240 meter mark further than i expected we put the crossbows on hold fire and move closer to check the bow range they start to let loose around 190 meters which is quite surprising i always thought most bows shot around 150 meters or closer now let's move the crossbows to the top of the large hill and see if there's a difference they are at roughly 250 meters away when they start to open up on us which is about a four percent increase once again crossbows hold fire and we move the bows up into shooting distance at roughly 170 meters the shooting begins this is a much bigger difference than the crossbows about 10 and a half percent decrease in range remember we get to add both results to get the true difference since the hill will have the advantage and the same time the flat ground will have the disadvantage crossbows go from 240 to 250 and bows go from 190 to 170 or from 50 meters to 80 meters which is an increase of nearly 60 percent for the engagement gap that's 80 meters of running through a hail of bolts just to get in range let's see the max range for the best crossbow and the best bow units in the game fellaini and sharpshooter versus betanian fian champion the sharpshooters seem to open up around 250 meters which is fairly close to the imperial crossbows looking at the fiance they open up at just shy of 200 meters i ran into the same issue in a world conquest series fighting against blandia those crossbows are nasty at range and because i was curious i let them duke it out up close for science of course the fiends smash them easily finally it's time for the bonuses we begin by exploring different crossbow tactics in the earlier testing it was difficult to beat the bow over time so we need to switch things up a bit crossbows are unique in that they have shields we use this to our advantage and put them in shield wall formation get close to the enemy and unleash a nasty volley from point blank then give the charge command one thing to notice here once the first volley goes off the second row overtakes the lead and loose their volley then the third row and so on this is musket warfare in a nutshell we easily dispatch the bows in this testing thanks to our staggered volley however we need to test it against a legit bowman this time we face the fiance once again we start in shield wall formation and move into close range our shields hold up surprisingly well although as we get closer we do take some casualties i accidentally gave the charge command without releasing hold fire and our troops plunged headfirst into certain death except for some reason our crossbows come out on top i'm not sure what happened here to be honest and i tried it again giving theons the charge command but they still lost badly secret counter next let's look at some mixed infantry and archer tactics of course we have to start with the patented circle flank combo with only 200 archers 100 on each flank we test to see who will break first the enemy connects with our circle and fully commits to the envelopment allowing our archers to unfold on their flanks and pour devastating volleys into their back our circle is taking significant casualties but they still hold long enough to route the enemy for the next setup we split into three groups and spread out the goal is to get the enemy to commit to one formation and give chase allowing the other three to envelop the n flank they seem to commit to the center so we pull the flanks back to ensure they don't split into groups as well as they approach we move our center back slowly and complete the flank giving exact move commands would be nearly impossible without the rts mod so instead we give the advance command to both flanks allowing them to maintain an exact distance no matter which direction the enemy approaches i promised you i would find a use for that command eventually the enemy routes and we suffer zero casualties for the last bonus we will look at several tests between foot archers and horse archers it's widely accepted that horse archers are superior and an equal numbers match up but we need to run some tests to find out exactly why we start in a controlled environment in loose formation with our archers against imperial buccalaria interestingly enough more than three rows loose arrows possibly because the extended hitbox with the horse however not all foot archers are shooting and we can see that all horse archers are definitely shooting regardless of their position it's a sound defeat at nearly 2 1 kdr for the horse archers now let's see if the advantage is caused by being on horseback or from their equipment we dismount the horse archers and set them up in the same formation as our foot archers several groups are stuck behind horses so we are forced to piss off peta once again go on get giddy up with both sides being even now we begin the duel it's neck and neck the whole way through which makes me think the buccalari eye are just mounted palatine archers foot archers win but the margin is so thin it's pretty much a draw now let's test what happens if the entire foot archer line is shooting to match the horse archers since they can ignore the laws of physics and friendly fire we line both sides up evenly and let them duke it out once again horse archers come out on top although not the 2-1 kdr like before it seems the horses are soaking up much of the damage allowing them to live longer and lose more arrows now let's let the ai take control on both sides to see what happens and get a baseline both lines rush together with foot archers bunching up and a horse archer circling around remember horse archers can shoot no matter who is in their way so this bunching does not affect their output but severely diminishes the output of our foot archers we see a resounding defeat at more than 7 kdr now let's try to spread out our archers and split them into two groups so that one group can intercept when the horses begin to circle off the plan sort of works although now only half of our archers are shooting while 100 of the horse archers are shooting it results in a defeat in the end at 2.25 kdr in favor of the horse archers let's see what happens when we take a hill and cover both sides allowing for more of our troops to get in on the action it seems the mountain is blocking the line of sight for our troops on the other end of the horse archer mob resulting in a humiliating defeat of more than four kdr okay final attempt let's put these crossbows to good use we start by splitting them into three groups with the vanguard going into shield square formation and the two rear groups into loose formation and spreading out the idea is to have the vanguard soak up the arrows while the back rows unleash a hail of bolts our shield square is performing poorly losing 70 troops within the first few seconds of the battle once the horse archers switch their focus to the rear group we open up the square to allow for maximum firepower it's still not enough i tried many other formations but these were the best i could come up with we had much better success with skirmisher troops which is quite unexpected if you have a good idea for countering horse archers without using cavalry let me know in the comments so i can try it out be sure to hit that like button if you enjoyed this video or learned anything up next we will be testing melee cavalry extensively as always i thank you for your time and i'll see you on the next one

Channel: Strat Gaming Guides

Views: 117,490

Keywords: Mount and Blade 2 Bannerlord, Strat Gaming, Battlefield Tactics, Line Formation, Shield Wall, Square, Circle, Skein, Column, Loose, Charge, Advance, Hold Ground, Stop, Move

Id: YxPFSb23orc

Length: 16min 37sec (997 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 01 2022