The Rainbow Attack Formation

Rainbow Formation~
We get plagued w/ this question in the H&Q boards. A rainbow formation is sendin' anywhere between 1~1k of each unit that moves faster than your main attack force. The reason for this is that enemy troops will halt their advance to tackle the units in the rainbow formation before continuin' on to hit your main force.
This gives you at least a full extra round to achieve your task. If your main attack force is archers, (keepin' in mind that archers stand and shoot, allowin' all non-seige units to run ahead of them) you get a full extra round w/ no one attackin' you and in which your full force can fire a wash of arrows at the enemy. If you're usin' ponies, then you get a full extra round to advance forward w/o havin' to stop/be killed.
To make a rainbow formation, send 50~1k troops of each unit (the higher numbers for the large/massive scale battles) as layers in w/ the wave of your achers. A typical example of a full rainbow formation w/ archers would be:
50 warriors
50 scouts
50 pikes
50 swordsmen
50 ponies
50 'phracts
99,700 archers
Workers are usually not sent for the sole reason that they move so much slower that they slow down the entire attack force from reachin' the destination quickly. Usin' seige units as rainbow is also a problem for this, but they also have the issue that they move so much slower that they might not be able to keep sufficiently far ahead of the archers to successfuly rainbow them and potentially waste archer slots in your march.



Clicky on this link to view an example of a successful rainbow formation against an NPC10. Heavy pikes and swords w/ light scouts, warriors, ponies and 'phracts rushed forward in front of the archers, slowin' down the enemy warrior horde enough for the archers to wipe out a massive amount of them. By the time the warriors reached the archers there was only enough left to kill a few before they all died. Note that this example could potentially reduce losses of archers by up to 10k, by havin' an extra 10k archers to attack and a much higher attack hero and/or buffs.

This is jus' about the most overpowered tactic in the game at this time because it allows waves of archers to get in several rounds of damage from the safety at the back at the mere cost of only a few fodder units. Expect this to be used in almost every attack against you and expect to require usin' it in nigh every attack you send short of valley warfare.