Archer Bug

[Khayyin]

Hello,

I'm playing the singlepayer Normandy campaign und there is a problem with the Archer. I don't know if anybody else has this problem. But it seems that the Tank moves backwards(if you move forward) and the canon is allways orientied backwards. When it shoots it turns right. So the problem for me ist that I don't know what the real orientation is. Is it like its seen on the monitor or is it just a graphical glitch.

I just hope you can understand what I want to say, english is not my native language.

Thanks.

[Amaz_Ed]

The Archer had a rear facing gun. Taken from Wikipedia;

Instead the gun was mounted in a simple low open-topped armoured box with gun barrel to the rear, very much like the early Panzerjäger German self-propelled guns in general appearance. This kept the overall length of the Archer short. However, this meant that on firing the gun breech recoiled into the driver's space. The driver stayed in position though in case the vehicle needed to move quickly.

The rear mounting at first seemed like a liability, but it was soon made into an advantage. Combined with its low silhouette, the Archer made an excellent ambush weapon, allowing its crew to fire off a few shots, then drive away without wasting time turning around.

[Merr]

It also moves on the left side of the tile when it's on a road tile ...

[Khayyin]

Ah sorry I did not now that. I just thought that it did seem strange

[junk2drive]

Portee (trucks with guns mounted) are the same way.

[acarhj]

AFAICT, the archer IS still bugged. Consider, a tank will rarely react if approached from the rear. It has a much higher chance of reacting if approached from the front. Since the archer has a rear facing gun, the computer still thinks it is facing backward and it won't react, even if it did not shoot in its previous turn. The way to test this is to roll the archer up with the gun facing away from the enemy. Do not shoot. If an enemy approaches and the archer spins about, there will be your answer.

[dickesKind]

AFAICT, the archer IS still bugged. Consider, a tank will rarely react if approached from the rear. It has a much higher chance of reacting if approached from the front. Since the archer has a rear facing gun, the computer still thinks it is facing backward and it won't react, even if it did not shoot in its previous turn. The way to test this is to roll the archer up with the gun facing away from the enemy. Do not shoot. If an enemy approaches and the archer spins about, there will be your answer.

This dude is right!
The archer is very powerful, but I never know in which direction I should face him.
I am also not sure, which side of the model - front or backside - the game considers as the front in terms of armour.

[Merr]

This dude is right!
The archer is very powerful, but I never know in which direction I should face him.
I am also not sure, which side of the model - front or backside - the game considers as the front in terms of armour.

The Archer is quite an unusual monster in BA ...

During my testing in the TrackHit! mod, it was impossible to immobilize the vehicle because the code considers it "Two-Faced" ... meaning it has the same reaction chance for attacks from the front as well as to the rear! The best way to approach the Archer is from the side.

No worries about armor facing ... I checked the squads file, the value is 40 all around.

IMO ... I don't consider any of that a bug because you can achieve the same reaction chance with a vehicle with a turret, e.g. tank facing one direction, turret facing rear.
Perhaps they assumed the same with the Archer ... Driver facing forward, gun crew facing backwards, nobody looking to their side(very often).
Frankly, I don't know another game that simulates the Archer, so I can't compare the behavior nor would I know what would be appropriate behavior.

I think it's cool to have a unique vehicle like the Arhcher even though it's a bit off-the-wall.