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  • When I did the last episode of Archery Popshots covering Shogun 2 Total War, there were requests

  • to cover Rome 2. With even more DLCs and a massive update that added family trees, made

  • the tech and skill trees more visually intuitive, and other user interface changes that actually

  • made the game bearable to me, this was the right time to come back to Rome 2. And what

  • a rich world to explore again.

  • Unfortunately, covering the history and context of archery in the entirety of Rome 2 would

  • be enormous. That would be madness.

  • This DLC campaign for Rome 2 takes us back to the Classical period of Ancient Greece.

  • The Peloponnesian War pits the city-states of Greece against each other: Athens, Corinth,

  • Thebes, and of course, Sparta. And while this period was dominated by hoplite combat, the

  • bow and arrow were just as well known, and well recognised in history and legend.

  • It's almost strange to imagine the Hellenic world and its ubiquitous use of heavy infantry:

  • the hoplites, armed with shield, sword and spear, fighting in the closely packed phalanx

  • formation, yet struggle to picture where archery would fit in. At the same time, Greek heroes

  • and legends were renowned for their archery skills. The deities Apollo and Artemis were

  • associated with bows and the hunt. In the Iliad and the Odyssey, we see renowned bowmen

  • such as Odysseusfamous for the feat of shooting through a dozen axe heads. Paris,

  • prince of Troy, used a bow in combat, and slew the mighty Achilles with an arrow to

  • the heel.

  • In reality, unlike their Persian neighbours, the Greeks did not widely adopt the bow in

  • their normal style of warfare. It could be said that hoplite combat was honourable, and

  • death in melee was more beautiful than being killed by an arrow. Some sources and scholars

  • attribute the low status of the bow and the archer to this idealism of war.

  • This didn't mean that the bow was dismissed. It was a specialised weapon, albeit often

  • relegated to the lower classes who could not afford the equipment to fight as a hoplite,

  • instead fighting as light infantry alongside javelin throwers and slingers. The Athenians

  • were known to have maintained a corps of archers, and archers would see use in siege defence,

  • though had less of a presence in open battle and few battles record significant contributions

  • by archers.

  • The bows used by the Greeks were simple short self-bows. Later, illustrations of archers

  • showed them using a composite recurve bow, widely recognised as being imported from the

  • Scythians, a nomadic people who fought from horseback. Greek bows could shoot over 250m,

  • though they were more likely ranged with some accuracy at around 150m, and could shoot accurately

  • and directly at 50-60m. Notably, records indicate that Greek archers were outranged by Persian

  • archers, as was the case with Xenophon's Ten Thousand, whose archers had to be protected

  • in formation.

  • While most of Greece largely did not adopt the bow in their military, the people of the

  • island of Crete became specialised archers. Their skill with the bow was so renowned,

  • they were hired as mercenaries by Greek city-states, particularly Sparta, and their archers would

  • be sought out centuries later by the Romans, and Cretan archers were present even up to

  • the fall of Constantinople in 1453.

  • The Wrath of Sparta mini-campaign focuses on Greece and the conflict between the major

  • city-states of Sparta, Athenai, Korinthos and the Boiotian League. As with real life,

  • the unit roster is greatly restricted to several different types of hoplites, along with support

  • troops such as cavalry and missile infantry.

  • The balance of power between the missile troops reflects their real-life counterparts. Javelin

  • throwers do a lot of damage, but have very short range and low ammunition. Slingers have

  • the longest range, but don't do as much damage as archers, which are probably the

  • main support unit in your hoplite army.

  • You can rain arrows onto enemy units. However, more so here than in the main campaign, the

  • effect of archers is greatly mitigated by shields. Arrows simply bounce off the heavily

  • armoured hoplites, though the light-armoured hoplites will suffer more attrition damage

  • over time.

  • The real damage is in hitting the flanks and rear. With shields covering the front and

  • left, only the armour value is used in calculating damage when shooting at exposed sides, and

  • from these angles, units of archers can cause devastating damage, taking a unit of hoplites

  • down to the last man in several volleys. This is the key to breaking the deadlock of hoplite

  • combat: while the infantry hold the line, the archers run to the flanks. They are even

  • more effective than cavalry, who are countered easily by armoured spearmen and are better

  • suited to chasing down enemy ranged troops.

  • That's assuming that your archers haven't already dealt with them. Having 3-4 units

  • of archers adds a large amount of flexibility to your army, and I wouldn't dare march

  • out without them.

  • It should go without saying that this is probably not how archers were used historically. In

  • Greek warfare, if archers were used at all, it was typically behind the infantry, or sometimes

  • embedded with the formations and engaging in short-distance sniping. As light troops,

  • archers have the historical advantage of being able to out-run the heavy infantry, but alone

  • they cannot defeat them. Running forward to flank was unlikely to be feasible, as that

  • would require an overview of the battlefield and instantaneous commands that would be available

  • to the player, but not a real life commander.

  • It should also be noted that historically, the Greeks did not deploy archers in massed

  • formations. This style of warfare would be more commonly seen in the medieval times,

  • especially with the English archers. As devastating as a volley of arrows would be, Greek armies

  • were more devoted to infantry combat rather than investing resources into the highly specialised

  • archers. The fate of the battle was determined by which phalanx broke first.

  • Of course, this is Total War, and we have the liberty of playing with historical units

  • in ahistorical ways, and that's what makes the game fun.

  • Unlike the original Rome, Rome 2 makes more of an effort to depict battles in realistic

  • ways, and you might be surprised to learn that some of the smaller details are well

  • researched.

  • Taking a look at the archer's unit model, we see that the archer uses the simple wooden

  • self-bow with size and proportion close to what we see in the source material. The archer

  • wears an arrow quiver on the left side, and this might pique your curiosity. Most archers

  • are more familiar with bags and quivers worn on the right, but pulling arrows from a cross-body

  • position would have been plausible. In fact, historians have identified that light Greek

  • archers may have carried up to 200 arrows and shot at a rapid speedup to 10 aimed

  • shots per minute. Some depictions also show archers carrying light shields.

  • The Cretan archers appear as mercenaries. On paper, their bows have more range and do

  • more damage than their regular counterparts. Their unit model features the linothorax armour,

  • though this doesn't really help them in melee. They also seem to use composite bows,

  • likely derived from the Scythian bows that appeared from northern tribes. Cretan archers

  • are able to make use of whistling arrows to damage morale, and heavy shot to inflict more

  • damage but at the cost of range and accuracy. This is particularly devastating against the

  • heavily armoured hoplites, almost ignoring all armour. This isn't far from history

  • sources make reference to long arrows with heavy arrowheads that could pierce through

  • shields and armour, but only at very short distance.

  • The animations are not very specific, but we can see that the game roughly shows a conventional

  • Mediterranean grip, with the first two or three fingers pulling the string back. The

  • source material is rather ambiguous, depicting a “Greekpinch draw or a Mediterranean

  • draw of some variant. What is known from historical sources is that Greek archers drew the string

  • to the chest, which is exactly what we see here. Drawing towards the ear or cheek, as

  • many of us would know today, was more of a medieval development.

  • Speaking of animations, Rome 2 has improved the fluidity of the shooting. For the most

  • part, archers no longer hold onto the bow for extended lengths and instead execute the

  • shot more cleanly. In general, missile units are more responsive, beginning their shooting

  • cycles quicker on command and not being stuck on reload while one archer is out of position.

  • Considering that archer units are just one out of many in Rome 2, the game does a reasonably

  • good job of illustrating them in a battle environment, and they are fairly well balanced

  • for gameplay purposes. If there's anything really missing from the Hellenic campaign,

  • it's that Greek archers were also known to be mobile combatants, shooting from kneeling

  • positions and being more versatile instead of being static massed archers.

  • It's interesting how a campaign that focuses on hoplite combat brings out the importance

  • of archers and other missile troops. Without them, battles are long and drawn outmuch

  • like how ancient Greek battles actually were. By bringing in mobile missile troops, the

  • player gets to out-play their opponents, risking their potent but vulnerable archers or slingers

  • to cause havoc in enemy lines, thinning out enemy infantry and breaking morale. In fact,

  • it wouldn't be unusual to see archers accumulate the most kills in campaign battles. They are

  • the tilt factor in armies and can make all the difference in close matches.

  • Of course, we should be wary that Greek armies did not shoot volley upon volley of arrows

  • into the backs of enemy hoplite formations. That was simply not the Greek way.

  • That brings us to the end of our first foray into the Rome 2 franchise. Should we look

  • further? Post your thoughts in the comments below. This is NUSensei. As usual, shoot straight,

  • and aim for your best.

When I did the last episode of Archery Popshots covering Shogun 2 Total War, there were requests

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