Archery

[Hammurbabble]

I always research Bronze Working early, but not for axes; I do it because it's required to chop forests. The axes are just a bonus unless I'm doing an early rush, which is rare. My second military tech researched is always Archery.

Archers are ALWAYS my city defenders of choice in the early game, replaced by Longbowmen later. Archery is a very useful defensive tech until you get Rifling, and that's a lot of game time. I will not use axes as passive defenders, although I will include them and/or Chariots/Horse Archers for active defense. Properly promoted, an Archer is simply a better defender.

The business about escorting settlers/workers is secondary in my mind. I agree that fogbusting is the better approach to that problem, but NOT to defending the city after it's built. And what do I use to garrison a city in the early game? That's right, an Archer. Two Archers if the barbarians are really, really heavy.

Final note, a trivial nitpick: I play on Marathon speed, too, and it makes no difference to the calendar year things happen. More turns, but each turn takes up less calendar time on Marathon. The game still ends in 2050.

 

[Polobo]

If you can get all the way to Feudalism without building Archers, your defense forces will be a lot more cost-efficient if you start them out as Longbowmen.

You can upgrade Archers to Longbowmen, but it costs money to do so.

But Archers still have their place, in the right situation.

When I get to feudalism I'll tack on the longbows to the existing archer garrison for border cities. For internal cities I'll normally leave the archers and know that I can upgrade them in an emergency. For those border cities if/when they are threatened I'll upgrade the archers at that point and only for the city needed.

You are only being cost-efficient if you garrison with warriors.

Eventually, if I end up with too many archers/longbows/muskets/rifles I will disband them; but having them around for emergency deployment (offensive or defensive) gives me security and power.

 

[Sjaramei]

Final note, a trivial nitpick: I play on Marathon speed, too, and it makes no difference to the calendar year things happen. More turns, but each turn takes up less calendar time on Marathon. The game still ends in 2050.

3x growth etc, 2x unit costs. (quicker settling because of more moves, faster straight out of the city) It's a big difference.

 

[vicawoo]

I've tried protective archery REXing and I've found it is very strong, though protective doesn't seem to be that much of an advantage.

Archers vs warriors: the problem with warriors isn't animals but barbarian archers. Archers have a decent chance of killing warriors in forests or fully fortified warriors in cities. A stray archer can pop up shortly after your 2nd settler leaves, so that's potentially game over.

Archers vs axes: everyone knows about availability problems. But often you have to build a monument, chop a forest ( takes 5 turns), wait for border pops, which can be a huge window. But I find a big factor is that you have to waste worker turns building roads instead of chopping, and expansion cities often can't build them. Also, it's semi-wasteful to not build a barracks and build axes.

Archers vs chariots: enough mobility to compensate for being restricted to fewer cities, but requires animal husbandry, so it can be hit or miss.

 

[iamnleth]

It's only wasteful to avoid a barracks later in the game. In the early game, I think getting units out (even unpromoted) as fog busters/city defenders is better than using hammers on a barracks.

 

[Kerran]

It's only wasteful to avoid a barracks later in the game. In the early game, I think getting units out (even unpromoted) as fog busters/city defenders is better than using hammers on a barracks.

Also, early in he game there are plenty of barb wariror/archers who are happy to provide your units with the experience they would have gotten from Barracks But if I play an Agressive leader I will usually toss in a barrack in the queue after 3-4 units.

And to the OP: I used to skip archery all the time and trade for it later on, but after a few games with raging barbs/emperor I've come to appreciate them a lot more Still skip it on lower levels, unless I have neither horses or copper near.