im a shielder and i think there is many other classes better at dealing with archers, i.e. as mentioned cav or xbows and them cloth rondel lamers. in my world a shielder is not suppose to be "anti-" something, but if played right and grouped it can counter almost any class. that's something other classes cannot.
1 shielder counters 1 archers. 2 archers counter 1 shielder.
archers never been OP in my head. there just been times (like now) where the sheer
amount of archers is OP as well as poor balancing archers, cav and infantry. the amount of archeres is too much/OP, not the individual class. some players are very skilled archers, sure nerf them, but they will still be skilled.
i guess only way to get away from the massive amount of archers is to EITHER nerf them (i don't think it should be nerfed) or put some kind of restriction similar to that of other games.
i do think that 13 PD counterstrike archers is OP but that's just a glitchbug-thingy for the exploiters so ill ignore that for now.
edit: sry OP i know this is only for ranged, but i started crpg playing archer and played it for ab out 6 months till i grew tired of it, ive played melee ever since