Missile Penteres - Archers
Archers can shoot down upon many enemies from the deck, doing terrible work in the process.Archers are ideal for goading the enemy into foolish action.
The 'five', called a quinquereme in Latin and a penteres in Greek, was a ship first used by the Syracusans against the Carthaginians sometime around 398BC. Like other polyremes, a term meaning many-oared, the chances were that it did not have five banks of oars but that the word 'oar' was used to mean 'rower'. In such a case, the arrangement of rowers would be two-two-one going up from the waterline. It makes sense to keep as much weight as possible low in the vessel to help its stability; a high centre of gravity makes any ship liable to capsize if struck from the side. The quinquereme, then, would be a formidable vessel both in terms of appearance and combat value. With a large fighting contingent aboard and plenty of deck space, this heavy vessel could cope with most enemies and threats.
(Archers)
Although archery was not highly thought of as a military skill in Greece, Crete produced truly excellent archers who were able to sell their services to the highest bidder as mercenaries. Firing bronze-tipped arrows from their heavy self bows, Cretan archers tended to carry shields, indicative of some additional prowess in melee, which must’ve made them an even more enticing proposition for a general hiring mercenaries for campaign. Their finest hours came when Alexander the Great hired Cretans directly into his army to support its unbeatable phalanx. Commanded by Clearchus, 500 Cretans accompanied the Macedonian phalanx into battle at Granicus, off-setting the Persians' numerical superiority on the day and enabling Alexander’s subsequent victory. Whereas the Romans didn’t traditionally use archers in their forces, once they conquered Greece Cretan archers began to appear as auxiliary troops in their armies. Notably, they fought in Caesar’s campaign in Gaul against Vercingetorix, causing him to rally the best archers the tribes could provide to range against them.
Unit Name Missile Penteres - Archers |
Main Unit Key Gre_Archers_Five |
Land Unit Key Gre_Archers |
Naval Unit Key greek_five |
Soldiers 140 |
Category Medium Ship |
Class Missile Ship |
Custom Battle Cost 750 |
Recruitment Cost 750 |
Upkeep Cost 150 |
35 |
├ Missile Weapon rome_bow |
├ Projectile arrow_normal |
├ Missile Damage 31 |
├ Missile Ap Damage 4 |
└ Base Reload Time 12 |
Accuracy 5 |
Range 125 |
Reload 13 |
Shots Per Minute 6 |
Ammunition 15 |
1020 |
└ Ship greek_five |
Ship Speed 5 |
Melee Attack 8 |
24 |
├ Melee Weapon rome_shortsword |
├ Melee Damage Base 20 |
├ Melee Damage Ap 4 |
├ Armour Piercing No |
├ Bonus vs. Large 0 |
├ Bonus vs Elephants 0 |
└ Bonus vs Infantry 0 |
Charge Bonus 3 |
12 |
├ Base Defence 12 |
├ Shield none |
└ Shield Defence 0 |
10 |
├ Armour cloth |
├ Armour Defence 10 |
└ Shield Armour 0 |
45 |
├ Man Entity rome_infantry_very_light |
├ Man Health 40 |
└ Bonus Hit Points 5 |
Base Morale 25 |
Abilities
Missile Penteres- Row Hard 20
Increases speed for 20 strokes.
Ship speed
Attributes
- Resistant to Fatigue
Fatigue has less of an effect on this unit. - Hide (scrub & forest)
This unit can hide in scrub and forest until enemy units get too close.
Strengths & Weaknesses
Missile Penteres- Good hull strength
- Medium crew
- Average speed
- Average ramming
- Poor boarding
- Good missile combat
- Long range
- Average rate of fire
- Good damage but low armour penetration
- Very weak in melee
- Very poor morale
Requires Buildings | |
---|---|
Lv. 0 |
Military Wharf
(greek_port_military_2) Level 1
Drydock
(greek_port_military_3) Level 2
Military Port
(greek_port_military_4) Level 3 |
Faction Availability | |
---|---|
Grand Campaign | |
Samnite Wars | |
Hannibal at the Gates | |
Imperator Augustus |