Range

The Importance of Range
This article is based on the Evony Forum topic "the importance of range" by Darwin.

Base Range
Each unit has a specific unmodified 'base' range which it can attack from. For quick reference, these ranges are:



Battle Mechanics
Battles start at a base of 200, then you add the maximum attack or firing range of the longest ranged participating unit(s). So for example, if there are catapults in a battle, the first round starts at 1700 range (1500 for catapults +200 base range), with archers in a battle the first round starts at 1400 range (1200 for archers +200 base range), for a warrior-only battle the first round starts at 220 range (20 for warriors +200 base range), and so on. On round one all units with the longest commencing range will attack, and all other units will close up by their movement speed (adjusted for Horse Riding level). All Battles are made up of rounds which repeat until the victor is decided or the Battle defaults to the defender on 100 rounds, with surviving attackers retreat.

Ranged Attacks
Archery technology raises the range of Archers by 5% per level. If archers have a superior range over their enemy, they get 'free' rounds of shots at an opposing army until it reaches it's own attack range. As an extreme, think of the Russian Cannons and the Light Brigade's Sabers at the battle of Balaclava! Likewise, Wall level gives City Defences increased height and thus longer range. This means that archery technology is the most important technology in open battle, with Wall Level equally important in City defence.

Any higher research level Archers are guaranteed to have more range,so they can decimate enemy units before they can respond. For example, with two 10K archer armies faced off, the higher ranged archers can easily wipe out more than half of the opposition on round one, reducing it to less than 5K archers (Research level differences are why the Rally Point 'Exercise' option is so often wrong in Evony).

Note that Archer's Towers have 100 more base range than Archers. Combined with Walls Level over L5 Archer's Towers become deadly as they get one or more free rounds of shots on attacking archers. Although not yet known for certain, it is possible that archery technology does not increase the range of defending archer's towers, only Wall Level (height).

City Attacks By Siege Engines
Compared to Archers, Ballistae and Catapults have more range than Archer's Towers, and that explains why siege weapons are so effective against towers on low level walls, because their higher range gives them free attacks until they reduce the defences.

Miscellaneous Battle Range Implications
  Warriors die easily because every other unit except Workers out-ranges them. Cataphracts lose out to pikemen more than cavalry because they have less range than cavalry - cavalry gets two initial free attacks on them, cataphracts only get one. 

Archery Technology
Archery Technology boosts shooting range 5% per level. It has not been made known what exactly benefits from this extended shooting range, however probably all troops requiring Archery to build (ie: Archers, Archer's Towers,  Ballistae, and  Catapults will benefit from it.

The Archery Research requirement for a unit determines when it becomes available in Barracks for training.

Generally the 'Base' figures for range are a somewhat misleading as the 'Boost' range is what each unit will start with (ie: a Catapult can only ever have 2250 range, no more, no less). The only exception is when the research is not complete (mostly during the initial days of a new server/account) and the player wins a mechanics battalion on the wheel. If a player uses a Mechanics Battalion to get Catapults, the range will be based upon their Archery level.

The research levels are as follows:

If your Archery level is the maximum at L10, and an opponent has the minimum L6 for Ballistae, then your  Archers will have 1800 range, and the opponent's Ballista 1820. So it is impossible for Archers to ever outrange Ballistae, unless the opponent has opened a Mechanics Battalion. It is impossible for anything to out range Catapults as they require L10. Likewise, it is impossible to increase Catapult range by research as it's already maxed out.

Any range that is red can only be obtained via a battalion.

Wall Level
The height of Walls also has an impact on range. Each level a wall is, there is an approximate gain of 6% range.