Archery or no?

U

ungy

Deity
Joined
Jan 1, 2006
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2,908
I used to normally skip archery but now I've tried going that way and I'm liking it.
I normally play BTS immortal, and my strategy used to be to fogbust with a bunch of warriors and get a second city up with horse or bronze to build some better units. There was normally just time before the barbs would cross culture. Once in a while I'd belatedly research archery and claim another spot or make do with just warriors for longer. After reading Snaaty's deity thread(where there is not time to get a second city up) I tried going the archery route as routine--after the worker techs necessary.
Advantage: can delay hooking up resource and can place second city to block AI or claim better territory.
Disadvantage: archery is dead end tech, archers not too useful other than vs. barbs, and only really good there on defense in terrain or against the warriors.

Opinions?
 
Archers upgrade to riflemen and infantry later, and are a good way to get drill promotions on those units by using them early in the game. I always promote all of my archers and longbowman with drill. It's also a big risk if you wait for both horses and metals and nothing shows up, and warriors don't really cut it when you run into a bear or when barb archers show up. I just get the archers unless I get bronze in the capital; it's just too much of a risk.
 
Sure, Archery... sometimes.
 
Archery is dead-end but it's cheap. And archers and later lbs are themselves cheap, can be built even if your resources are pillaged, and make the best hill and city defenders. I certainly think it's worth an early game detour even if it's not strictly necessary on lower difficulties. (and I've been trying deity lately, and believe me it's necessary).
 
Ive never researched Archery.....for that matter, I wont even trade for it as it increases your WFYBTA. Maybe on lower difficulties, someone might do it...but the extra turns researching it can be used for AH or BW.
 
Depends on starting techs, leader horse/bronze (which itself depends on starting techs) and scape of the land (sometimes fogbusting is difficult)
In general, I try to avoid archery but sometimes it is necessary.
 
I think archery only starts to become useful on the high end levels. On emperor and below, you can easily tech AH + BW if you start with one of mining, agriculture, or hunting. I don't think you'll have that luxury with immortal/deity so archery first may have merit there. I will have to start doing more archery as well.
 
sometimes I go back and get it so I can build archers for garrison instead of axemen, as there is that growth phase for some cities where you can be stuck building units non-stop to keep up with happiness. In the end saves production, which could also mean added research.
 
Cabledawg said:
Ive never researched Archery.....for that matter, I wont even trade for it as it increases your WFYBTA. Maybe on lower difficulties, someone might do it...but the extra turns researching it can be used for AH or BW.
Click to expand...
Seems like the opposite to me--on lower difficulty you have more time before the barbs come for you--so less need for it.
 
of course, on higher difficulties, you have to be more streamlined in your research and taking time out to research archery (and hunting if you dont need it) can cause you to lose your goal to teh AIs
 
I have been founding archery early as per Snaaty's thread and I am pleased. Playing at Monarch/Emperor. No complaints, the tech and units are cheap enough to be worthwhile.
 
I never use archery. But then again im playing Monarch.

It seems its better to focus in getting that bronze.
 
there isnt a need for archery on emperor and below IMHO. you have ample time to find bronze or horses, and if neither are available, iron. but if you have neither and a very close neighbor does, there is still time to research archery and rush him or defend your expanding
 
MrFelony said:
there isnt a need for archery on emperor and below IMHO. you have ample time to find bronze or horses, and if neither are available, iron. but if you have neither and a very close neighbor does, there is still time to research archery and rush him or defend your expanding
Click to expand...

In emperor there is time to go iron working only if you build the great wall and/or there are no aggressive neighbours around. Otherwise you will be taken out by either barbarians or AI.
 
The most noteable factor to figure in is how safe is bronze working? How safe is animal husbandry? Very good if, and that's a big if, you have military resource(s) in your starting capital which can be readily hooked up.

Why risk it? Just tech archery, and use the whip when needed to settle those border cities that can seal your empire from other forces.

Mind you, I dislike archery completely as the units themselves are weak, but being safer is much better than being annihilated in the BCs.
 
I would at the very least take a shot at bronze working before settling for archers. I wouldn't go for AH unless I had animal resources though - chariots aren't that great.
 
On Raging Barbs, you absolutely need archery as the highest priority or you're dead. Maybe you'll be lucky enough to have copper in the starting radius, but that's way too big a risk to take.
The other nice thing about archery is that your archers are cheap, multipurpose units that can garrison your city decently against anything while your heavy-hitters (axes, swords etc) can all go and bash skulls. And you don't really have to worry about sudden chariots like you do with an axeman defender.
But I like it anyway, it just generally lets you expand more safely, which is a nice boon. And archery units make good cheap garrison units for Hereditary Rule as well.
 
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