The ONLY problem with Archers is, that too many of them are fucking scared to go into melee. Many don't even have a melee weapon with them... The class itself is not the problem. The players are to blame, not the bow or the Archer class.
Players will play the game as its designed. Why should they enter melee combat if they can run and shoot? For players that don't want to learn the nuances of melee combat ranged is a very easy way into the game. You can fail repeatedly, for the whole round and still feel like you took part. Fail a single block as melee and you can be dead and no longer playing. The main draw of ranged is that you can play all round and not be put under pressure until the very end, especially if you can get up high where you feel safer
If ranged had similar risk vs reward as melee or cav they would lose some HP each time they missed a shot. People get so much damn ammo they can go to a hill and spam all round..something will hit regardless of skill. Its not even hard by FPS game standards since all targets move so slow. Mostly you're combating RNG in the shot and the target changing direction just as you shoot. Crossbows don't even need to be pure ranged. They have these point & click weapons as well as any melee weapon they want and medium armour, with plenty of ammo to shoot all round. These guys can still kite as well if they want. I wear medium armour as melee guy since to me heavy isn't really worth the extra weight.
There are so many tweaks to the game that could be made to increase the pressure ranged fight under. Roofs seem to have creped back into the game on loads of maps. The ammo could be reduced to encourage people to take care with their ammo or to get closer to the fights. The stagger that can debilitate a melee player and prevent him approaching can be vastly reduced or even removed. The headshot random kills can be removed. Jumpshotting can be removed (I see people landing hits by jumping and shooting over walls). 2 slots for ammo can be removed to 1 slot only, and even then ammo can be reduced. Damage type of ranged could be changed to a new type, and horses and heavy armour could be more resistant to this ammo type
It won't happen though because the tweaks to ranged are never enough. Even last time they couldn't just make them kite less, the devs go and buff the top tier bows and reduce the PD penalty on WPF. Each time they try to nerf ranged they add some extra buff in at the same time. Happened with head shots tweak too. The damage on bodies has creped back up to decent damage, and still the head shot damage is a 1 hit kill most of the time.
