About the counterpart:
Cav can counter archers as well as archers can counter cav.
Buying a horse without knowing what you are doing will be a birthday present for archers as cav cant strafe that fast and have quite smooth movements, which in turn makes it easier to shoot them. Cav who charge archers straight ahead in the beginning of the round without a shield are rather easy to deal with. If you miss however, even a nub can easily oneshot you as you cant dodge with 30+ kg of equipment.
If cav has a brain however and simply waits till the archer has to shoot incoming enemies and simply enganges from behind it pretty much becomes a hardcounter against archers. Since an archer cant shoot in 2 directions simultaniously, cant stagger/stop cav, cant outrun cav, cant dodge cav and has to remain stationary to shoot, cav timing their attacks with inf is actually archer-autokill since they die in one hit and cant block with a bow.
Also, if archers are by their own, lancers can hardcounter them given they are very manouverable. Given the right build, an arabian can bump me, turn around and bump me again before I are able to release an arrow, which leaves me with my melee weapon. Since 0 or 1 slots are the weapons of choice for archers, outranging me with a 180ish lenght lance is easy game for them. If I dont block i get lanced, if I block I get bumped, which is also enough to kill an archer in a few runs.
Usually the answer to all this would be teamplay but hell, we all know it doesnt happen. Even if the enemy has 4 horseranged and I am the only ranged in my team I dont get any support. Needless to say, melees still complain in end that horse ranged is gay because they cant kill them. Sticking with your team is also not always possible as for every 2 seconds you have to stop to take a shot, your team already has traveled another 10 meters that you can hardly catch up because of the weight nerf.
I can only repeat what I said so far on this matter:
Revert the weight nerf. Unfuck general mobility for archers and come up with a system that punishes kiters for archery-related things such as equipping/drawing/shooting a bow instead of a general slow down so archers can once again dodge and fight against cav/inf.