Archer
ArcherBase values, before Blacksmith upgrades. The Blacksmith raises attack and armour for infantry, cavalry and archers — Blast Furnace, for instance, gives "+2 Attack for infantry & cavalry". Late in a game, the real numbers are higher.
Evolution
Archer
Feudal Age
Crossbowman
Castle Age
Arbalester
Imperial AgeThe coach's briefing
The Archer is your Feudal Age ranged powerhouse. With 4 range and solid damage, you can harass villagers and pick off Spearmen before they ever get close. Your weakness is simple: you have zero armor and you're slow. Skirmishers counter you hard, Hussars run you down, and Mangonels delete you in one shot. Stay mobile, stay grouped, and always have an escape route. Upgrade to Crossbowman the moment you hit Castle Age.
STRONG AGAINST
You win these trades cost-effectively.
WEAK AGAINST
Avoid these fights or bring support.
Prepare your next matchup
Choose both civilizations for a game plan, key threats and an army composition.
Strategic Analysis
Tactical Identity
The Archer is the **Feudal Age aggression king**. Cheap, ranged, and deadly in numbers, they let you pressure opponents while safely staying out of melee range. A mass of Archers can snowball into an unstoppable Crossbow timing push.
Tactical Playbook
Flush Build
The classic 22-pop Archer rush puts 6-8 Archers in enemy base by minute 10. Target woodlines and gold piles - kill villagers, cripple economy.
Spearman Counter
Your +3 bonus vs Spearman class means you delete anti-cavalry units. This protects your Scout Cavalry partners in team games.
Tower Support
Build a forward tower near enemy resources, then use Archers to zone villagers away. The tower tanks damage while you deal it.
Critical Point
Skirmishers are your **hard counter**. They cost no gold, have +3 bonus vs you, and have Pierce Armor. Never fight Skirmishers - run and find another target.
Understanding The Stats
The Archer trades durability for range. Low HP and zero armor make positioning critical - you must kill before being touched.
Range Advantage
4 tiles of range lets you shoot most units before they can respond. Kite melee units by moving between shots.
Glass Cannon
No armor means everything hurts. A single Mangonel shot or a few Scout hits will kill you. Always have escape routes.
Spearman Bonus
Your +3 vs Spearman class makes you deadly against the entire Spear line. Spearmen, Pikemen - all melt to your arrows.
Gold Cost
45 gold per archer adds up. Balance Archer production with villager production - don't go broke!
Coach's Tip
30 HP with 0 armor is fragile. Research Fletching immediately for +1 attack and range. That extra tile of range is the difference between killing a Scout or dying to it.
Mechanics & Bonuses
Attack Bonuses
| Target | Bonus Dmg |
|---|---|
| Spearman | +3 |
Armor Classes
Archer
Vulnerable to Skirmishers and Huskarls.
Key Upgrades
Castle Age
Civilizations
* 50 civilizations have access to this unit.
Other Units
AoE Coach analysis
Context & meta
The Archer is the ranged backbone of the Castle Age, bought for what surrounds it rather than for itself: 30 HP, 4 attack and range 4 for 25 wood and 45 gold. Fletching, Bodkin Arrow, Ballistics and Thumb Ring all apply to every archer at once, and the Crossbowman upgrade (35 HP, 5 attack, range 5) is usually the point where the composition becomes real. Its official card states the trade plainly: strong against units at long range, weak against Skirmishers, the Mangonel-line and anything that reaches close range. Massing archers therefore means committing to research first and to numbers second.
History & balance
What makes the Archer line unusual is where its power is stored. Almost nothing sits in the unit; almost everything sits in the research that improves all of them at once, and in the two upgrades that rewrite the whole army the moment they finish. A design like that turns a military decision into an economic one — the player is not choosing a unit, they are choosing to fund a branch of the technology tree and to keep funding it. It also explains the line's reputation for being unforgiving: committing halfway buys a gold-priced body that cannot fight, and when it meets its counter there is nothing about the composition that can be salvaged quickly.
In pro play
Decide early whether you are an archer player, then act like one: the research is the army, so buy it on schedule instead of adding bodies you cannot upgrade. Fight where the opponent has to walk toward you, keep a spear screen for anything mounted, and pull back the moment siege appears rather than trading into it. Against Skirmishers, do not grind — bring something that beats them and let the archers shoot what they are good at. And never let the line clump: the single shot that punishes an archer army is the one that finds ten of them standing together.
How to counter it
Skirmishers are the cleanest hard counter — they have +3 armor vs pierce and +3 attack vs Archer-line. Elite Skirmishers in Imperial Age trade 1-for-1 against Arbalests cost-effectively. Mangudai (Mongols) and Heavy Cav Archer bypass armor with rate-of-fire and HP advantages. Knights or any cavalry chase down Archers easily — the Archer player must always have Pikes or terrain on standby. Onagers/Mangonels are the late-Castle annihilator: a single shot can wipe 8-10 clumped Archers. The pro-level counter is Skirms+Mangonel+Light Cav: Skirms tank, Mangonel kills, Light Cav protects from raids.