I have a purge base with archers on platforms that can fire either inside or outside of the base. Basically, they can fire wherever the fighting is happening (round house with entrances on each side if you need to visualize it). My problem is that they sometimes jump down from their platform into the fighting and get killed. How can I get my thrall to walk to the edge of the piece its standing on, fire at enemies, and also stay on the platform?
Btw, I have no idea what is causing some of my archers and dancers to jump off of platforms in the first place. I put them on platforms to keep them protected, not so they can jump in front of a level X purge without backup.
You need to set your Combat Tactics for your thralls according to how you have them placed.
For archer thralls (and dancers, depending) - you most likely want to use the HOLD Combat Tactic. I posted about these with a pretty descriptive breakdown of how the work here.
Give Hold a try, and see if that solves your issue.
I tried hold and the archers tend to gas themselves on the platform. Even a small triangle piece and they will gas themselves at times by hitting the platform. They have gas masks. However, I need the arrows to hit the enemy since the gas clouds allow my fighters to see and kill the Thieves.
The archers man. Their aim is definitely bad. I had a moment recently where I was watching an NPC mob try to shoot at me from behind a rock. And he just kept firing at the rock.
So - hold is the tactic you will want for archers on perches, for sure. As far as them striking the perch platform - the best you can do is to build it so that their enemy targets cannot get under them or at their feet. You can try posting them on the very tip of the triangle also to give them less perch platform to shoot at.
What I do - I will sometimes add a couple of extra ceiling platforms next to the triangle perch to give more walkway. Then, place the archer right at the tip of the triangle - with their toes in what would be the air. Once they are placed, remove the extra ceiling platforms so that they are balanced right on the edge. That may improve your setup. Good luck!
Cool, I think I am gonna redesign some and see if that will help so I can use Hold. Btw, in my current design I want the NPCs to walk under my archers and congregate there. It gives my fighters time to finish their current fights and then attack the guys under the archers in the back.
It just occured to me, all of my archer deaths came on level X purges. Specifically when the golems arrived, the archer closest to the golems jumped off of his/her perch and died in the explosion (only way I have lost thralls in a purge since we can revive them now).
My best solution may be to only run high level purges with a second player. That way I can watch for golems and explode them away from my base (and any downed thralls).
Have you made certain that they are not carrying any melee weapons?
This one has found that if an “Archer” has a melee weapon in inventory, and an enemy is close, regardless of instructions or being placed at an Archer post (or cauldron) they will cease what they are doing to jump into the scrum.
So - I tested this fairly comprehensively. Even without melee weapons, the archers chomp at the bit terribly if they are on Chase or Withdraw. Hold is the key. Even with just a bow - the silly bros and bro-ettes hop down from safety and ideal angle to get a “better shot” when they are on Chase.
The platforms are 1 wall piece higher than the ground. Good idea though.
I am about to raise the roof above these archers since some of the gas arrows are getting blocked by the roof above them (even though they are firing down at a target).
My archers don’t have gas masks. I wonder if the Noxious Gas is killing them permanently when they go down and not necessarily the golem explosions. Btw, they do still heal faster than the Noxious Gas and enemy arrows will weaken them.
I can easily test this by dropping a new weak thrall out front and seeing what will happen.
Best tip I’ve ever learned for placing archers is to put them in the middle of a ceiling piece above several columns and then delete the ceiling pieces. The archers land on the columns and are able to hit targets below them much more accurately because they don’t have a ceiling piece in the way.
You can also get rid of their melee weapons to prevent them from swinging forward with it and falling into enemies.
That’s a really good idea. And all I need them to do is fire 360 degrees and draw aggro.
In my case I have a wall there and will need to remove that wall. That way my fighter thralls don’t get pinned between the archer’s post and the wall right behind it. It’s not a load bearing wall or a wall that’s required for defense so its easy enough to remove.
