Elite Skirmisher

"Stronger than Skirmisher. Ranged unit equipped with armor vs. archer attacks."

—Age of Empires II description

The Elite Skirmisher is an anti-archer ranged unit in Age of Empires II that can be trained at the Archery Range once the Castle Age is reached. They have an attack bonus against archers and, as opposed to its predecessor, an extra attack bonus against Cavalry Archers. They also have increased hit points, attack power, and pierce armor. This makes Elite Skirmishers more useful against other ranged units even beyond the Castle Age.

The upgrade to the Imperial Skirmisher is unique to the Vietnamese and their allies.

The * indicates that the civilization can fully upgrade their Elite Skirmishers, i.e. gets Bracer, Ring Archer Armor, and Thumb Ring. Faith and Heresy are not taken into account because they only contribute to their combat strength in a very situational manner.

The ^ indicates that the civilization has at least one civilization or team bonus or a unique technology that benefits the combat strength of the Elite Skirmisher.

Tactics Edit

Most of the time, Skirmishers are very weak to everything except Archers, Hand Cannoneers, and Pikemen (to a degree). With a weak and slow attack, as well as a minimum range, they deal almost no damage to infantry and cavalry. Nevertheless, their attack bonus against archers can make them valuable against any archer-using opponent, especially if the player's civilization bonuses benefit infantry or heavy cavalry. Unless created to retaliate against enemy archers, each individual unit does poor damage and in most games, training Elite Skirmishers is avoided unless opponents are going heavy on archer units. Elite Skirmishers also have a +3 attack bonus against Pikemen, allowing groups of them to quickly take out approaching Pikemen, but their minimum range still makes them vulnerable.

While Elite Skirmishers make poor ranged support in small numbers, they are extremely cheap. As they cost no gold, they are considered trash units and can be easily massed in significant numbers enough to kill units with a single volley. The size of the mob of units should also prevent enemy units from coming close enough to all of the units, allowing them to continue to fire. Therefore the Elite Skirmisher becomes especially important in the late game when gold becomes scarce and players have to rely on a wood and food economy. In the trash wars situation their bonus against the Spearman line also becomes more useful.

The Elite Skirmisher and its predecessor, the Skirmisher, were the only ranged trash units until the release of The African Kingdoms, where the Berber Genitour was introduced.

Further statistics Edit

Unit strengths and weaknesses
Strong vs.	Archers
Weak vs.	Melee units, siege units
Upgrades
Attack	Fletching (+1)  Bodkin Arrow (+1)  Bracer (+1)  Chemistry (+1)  Atlatl (+1, Aztecs only)
Range	Fletching (+1)  Bodkin Arrow (+1)  Bracer (+1)  Atlatl (+1, Aztecs only)  Yeomen (+1, Britons only)  Andean Sling (eliminates the minimum range, Incas only)
Accuracy	Thumb Ring (increases accuracy to 100%)  Ballistics (hit moving targets)
Armor	Padded Archer Armor (+1/+1)  Leather Archer Armor (+1/+1)  Ring Archer Armor (+1/+2)  Pavise (+1/+1, Italians only in patches 4-4.7)  Tower Shields (+2 pierce armor, Lithuanians only)
Conversion defense	Faith  Heresy
Creation speed	Conscription (+33%)
Upgrades	Imperial Skirmisher (Vietnamese and allies only)