Crossbowmen are light infantryunits that use crossbows in battle. They are counter infantry units that are useful for attacking heavy infantry such as Musketeers, but are easily defeated by melee cavalry and Artillery. They are similar in many ways to Skirmishers. Although the Crossbowmen might be out-ranged by their Skirmisher counterparts, they are cheaper and are trainable earlier in the game. The exceptions to this rule reside in the Dutch who can train Skirmishers in the Colonial Age and the French through the use of TEAM Early Skirmishers which allows them and their allies to train Skirmishers in the Colonial Age.
Spanish players have the option of being able to almost instantly train (2.7 seconds) Crossbowmen and Pikemen in the Colonial Age, due to the TEAM Archaic Soldier Training and Fencing School cards, and can train instantly if the cards are also used with the Standing Army improvement.
The Portuguese has the Besteiros technology, which "upgrades" their Crossbowmen to the "Guard" level by granting the Veteran upgrade (if not already) and giving them +30% hit points and attack.
“Handheld crossbows began to appear in the tenth and eleventh centuries. Crossbowmen were attractive to military leaders because they took much less time to train than archers using bows. Firearms eclipsed Crossbows by the end of the sixteenth century.
Europeans, chiefly the Spanish, included crossbows amongst the muskets and cannon they brought to the New World. Cortes arrived with more than two dozen crossbows and less than ten muskets. Columbus' crew had crossbows when they landed in the West Indies. When the original stockpile of munitions ran out it was difficult or impossible to make or trade for more. Explorers had to be very careful with their limited supply.”
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Veteran Crossbowmen
Infantry Breastplate (+10%)
Besteiros (+30%, Portuguese only)
Cree Tanning (+5%)
Navajo Weaving (+5%)
Carib Kasiri Beer (+10%)
Carib Garifuna Drums (+1.0x multiplier vs. villagers)
Iroquois Lacrosse (+10%, vanilla Age of Empires III only)
Seminole Bowyer (+25%)
Tupi Poison Arrow Frogs (+10%)
Yoga (+5%)
Clenched Fist (+30% melee attack)
Military Drummers (+10%)
Tilly's Discipline (+20%, Germans only)
Incan Road-building (+20%)
Apache Endurance (+5%)
Town Watch (+2)
Standing Army (-25%)
Incan Chasquis Messengers (-25%)
Meritocracy (-20% upgrade cost)
High Crusade (-5% hit points, Knights of St. John only)
TEAM Infantry Hitpoints
8 Crossbowmen
10 Crossbowmen
24 Crossbowmen
Long-range Infantry Hitpoints
Fencing School
TEAM Ranged Infantry Attack
Tirailleurs
TEAM Shivaji's Tactics
TEAM Scout Infantry
TEAM Cheaper Unit Upgrades
TEAM Dueling School
TEAM Archaic Soldier Training
TEAM Inquisition
