[Daynarr]

Originally posted by Zen:
You must have had more luck with your Wind Riders than I did. They get chopped up very easily by archers/spells.

Though of course maybe you have to build 10+ in order for them to not have a terrible attrition (making an initial charge rout the enemy)

I agree that the movement factor of the Wind Rider is a significant detail; but they are fragile if you are going up against a human opponent. You almost have to take a 9 Fire/9 Air Blessing to counteract it. As Spring Hawks eat them for dinner as well as any missile fire.

Edit: Also it's very easy to make them waste their lances on Harpies or Black Hawks. And target them with missilefire because they are fliers.

I was usually using stacks of 8-15 riders accompanied by 1 commander (filled with items).
You can target archers with them as well. Basically I would usually give them hold and attack enemy archers or hold and attack rearmost units order. That way most of heavy infantry troops would move forward and away from shooters which would get killed or routed as soon as my riders move in. If you can't kill or rout those archers fast they you are probably attacking too large force.

They aren’t a force to single handedly take out enemy main armies, but to harass enemy territories while your main armies push forward. The thing is that enemy must catch them with significant force if he hopes to take them out which is very difficult in both MP and SP games.

Of course there can be other tactics for them as well. You can use Water 9 pretender and boost their already impressive defense (+ give them 2 strikes every other turn) and use them as support troops for main armies that would fight enemy HI.

Or use Cyclopes with earth 9 to give them +4 protection and make flying tanks out of them.