I really like the idea of Cavalry archers for raiding the economy (in particular with cards) of other players. Yet, despite being cavalry I can’t get them to escape infantry. As soon as they start fighting against infantry they slow down.
How can I skirmish with Cavalry archers? It is rather upsetting that it seems difficult to accomplish since one of Cavalry archers’ very purposes is to skirmish.
Cavalry Archers are generally bad at kiting and raiding, infantry counters them.
Their main purpose is to counter Heavy Cavalry.
Thank you for the clarification. I do find it odd that kiting and raiding isn’t the role of cavalry archers since that’s what seems the most natural.
I’ve been pretty disappointed by Cav. Archers so far. Though I’m new at AOE III.
I tried with the Irregulars card which gives them a pretty great multiplier for raiding (1.5x instead of 0.5) arguably making them a bit more similar to Bow Riders (with almost half base damage, a bit more health and the same speed).
Still, I find it rather odd that they are so badly affected by snare that they’re unable to avoid battles. Almost in all games mounted archery is certainly not something that does a lot of damage, but is very strategically useful since you can retreat or raid very easily.
Here it doesn’t seem to be so much the case. Countering heavy cavalry would be one of the last tthings I’d expect horse archers to do. x)
Anyway, thank you for your help.
With the introduction of gunpowder cav archers lost their dominance on the battlefields, i think the gamemechanics want to resemble this. I agree, that ranged cav doesnt feel like a intuitiv counter to heavy cav and think lance riders (like Uhlans) would be more historical accurate … but giving lance riders a multiplayer against inf and cav doesnt feel balanced ^^ so i think they made a compromise
From a historical standpoint, indeed horse archers were ineffective against musketeers since they could be shot rather easily so they lost their purpose on a battlefield.
Nonetheless they were used in raiding supply lines and towns by Ottomans up until the disbandment of the Akinjis in 1683 (and probably minor units were used even longer).
So I actually expected a weak unit, able to dodge fights and raid decently!
Don’t expect to get good results raiding with cav archers - the delay in attack is really painful, and you can’t kite as well as they just feel “slow” and agonizing.
The best use is to stick them behind a bunch of units and pick off goons or heavy cav with them.
Surprisingly, they have great DPS against cavalry. If you do the math, I think it’s more than dragoons. Portugese dragoons can make 156 damage on a cav in 3 seconds (52 base damage x 3 cav multiplier). Russian cav archers can make 180 damage on cav in 3 seconds (30 base damage x 3 cav multiplier x 2 shots within three seconds).
They can go head to head against goons, but if the enemy kites your cav archers with his goons, it’ll end up with them just picking you off one-by-one as they take advantage of your attack delay.
So you just force the fight - make a bunch of cannons to draw them in, stick some infantry in front. Put your cav archers in a mass near your cannons. If he has a mass of goons, he will probably be tempted to push his goons up close, where he will have to micro his goons to target your cannons as infantry and cav archers fire upon them.
Or you could force him to mass heavy cav for a flank, which is also advantageous for you because cav archers have melee resist and higher DPS against cav than goons.
Maybe if the opponent is smart, he will stall it out and produce culverins in time, but if you keep your cav archers protected behind some units, they will literally sit there and take care of any cav issues for you.