For the similarly named unit in Empire: Total War, see Windbüchse Jaegers.
Windbüchse Jägers are a type of skirmisher infantry in Napoleon: Total War.
Description[]
These skirmishers are experts in fieldcraft, and armed with an unusual rifled airgun instead of a flintlock.
Recruited from woodsmen, hunters and poachers, these men are used to moving across broken ground and staying unobserved by their prey. Their cleverly designed airguns can be reloaded very quickly by screwing in a new air reservoir and slotting home a new magazine of shot. The airgun is also rifled, making it a deadly weapon at long range. However, like all skirmishers the Windbüchse Jägers are vulnerable to being ridden down by cavalry and cannot be expected to last long against the massed fire of line infantry.
Historically, the windbüchse (“wind rifle”) was a fascinating “what if” of military history. It had a 20-round magazine, and could fire as quickly as the user could pull the trigger. The gun could drive a ball through a plank (or a man) at 100 paces, but it was a delicate weapon. Quiet, and without a tell-tale cloud of gunpowder smoke, the windbüchse did not work after rough treatment, something that was inevitable in battle. Napoleon Bonaparte hated them and decreed that any captured “assassin” with an airgun was to be executed, not treated as a soldier.
General Information[]
Windbüchse Jägers have smaller than average regiment sizes when compared to other skirmishers in Napoleon: Total War, but more than make up for this with their extremely fast fire rate thanks to their special rifles, making them the best skirmishers in the game despite their inferior numbers. They are also some of the only units in the Austrian army to be immune to the effects of cold Attrition. However, they are only limited to one regiment under normal circumstances and are also the most expensive skirmishers (and infantry) in the game.
Windbüchse Jägers have marginally better melee statistics than Jägers, but they are still very poor. Together with their unusually low number of men in a regiment, the poor melee stats of Windbüchse Jägers leave them very vulnerable to being charged, particularly by cavalry.
Windbüchse Jägers are Austria's only standout among its mediocre roster, but they are often impractical to use online due to their extremely high unit cost, being nearly double that of a standard line infantry regiment.