Illyric Slingers

Summary
Slingers are cheap missile infantry available to the Illyric faction group. They are a basic missile unit available from the start of the game, having a relatively long-ranged attack but being utterly incapable of melee combat.

"The sling is one of the earliest ranged weapons developed. Slingers are cheap and easy to train, but lack the range or damage of more advanced ranged units. Without armour or melee weapons, slingers are highly susceptible to charges and direct combat."

- In-game Description

History
Though details are lacking, the Illyrians were sometimes noted for deploying large amounts of slingers that operated in tandem with their javelin-armed peltasts, such as at the Siege of Pelium.

Ancient authors frequently describe slingers as being able to outrange archers, at least in European warfare where the stronger composite bow was uncommon. In-game, though, slingers are outranged by archers, likely because archers were designed as a more advanced elite missile unit with better stats as a reward for the extra investment required to unlock them, whereas slingers are a basic missile fodder unit.

Tactics
Slingers are a basic missile brigade of the Illyric faction group available from the start of the game. They are of a much lower quality than the Illyric Peltasts which are also available from the start of the game, but are significantly cheaper in terms of both gold and recruits and have a slightly longer range. Nonetheless, the Peltasts' much, much higher missile damage, improved defenses and capacity for melee combat make them a preferable choice to slingers in most situations.

Slingers are, however, very useful as city garrisons thanks to their low gold cost and requiring less recruits per unit than the similarly cheap spearmen and skirmishers.

Compared to other early-game missile brigades, Slingers outrange Leves and Axemen and require less recruits, but have a lower damage output, worse defenses and no capacity for melee combat. The same holds true when compared to Gallic Javelineers and Peltasts, which are stronger but more expensive than Leves. Greek Psiloi are similar to slingers but have a higher damage output and lower gold cost in exchange for worse defenses and requiring more recruits. Gallic Slingers are identical to their Illyric counterparts in terms of performance.