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This article is about the Age of Empires III unit. For other uses of the term, see Chu Ko Nu. |
| “ | Archaic Chinese crossbow that fires at an extremely fast rate. Good against infantry. | ” |
| —In-game description | ||
The Chu Ko Nu is an archer in Age of Empires III: The Asian Dynasties that is unique to the Chinese and trained as a part of the Old Han Army and Standard Army. It is similar to the Crossbowman, but fires in bursts of three shots like its counterparts in previous games.
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Overview[]
Chu Ko Nu is the effective option for the Chinese to counter heavy infantry and light cavalry although they are not a best option against ranged cavalry such as War Wagons, Howdahs, or Yabusame due to their shorter range and low base damage.
The Chu Ko Nu is relatively cheap and are available since Commerce Age. Due to their fast firing speed, the Chu Ko Nu's arrows deal only 5 damage, less than a Crossbowman, but fires three shots simultaneously and has bigger multipliers against heavy infantry and light cavalry. Also, they can be enhanced with the "Old Han Reforms" Home City Card, which allows them to be used in later Ages. They fall quickly to hand cavalry as they are fairly weak, with only 90 hit points.
The Repelling Volley Home City Card increase their multipliers against heavy infantry, ranged shock infantry, and light cavalry into 3.0x, although they have a negative multiplier against cavalry and shock infantry, making them particularly weak against heavy cavalry units such as Spahi and Cuirassier.
Upgrades[]
| Age | Upgrade | Cost | Effect |
|---|---|---|---|
 |
 Disciplined Chu Ko Nu
|
100 wood 50 coin |
Upgrades Chu Ko Nu to Disciplined (+20% hit points and attack) |
 |
 Honored Chu Ko Nu
|
300 wood 300 coin |
Upgrades Chu Ko Nu to Honored (+30% hit points and attack); requires Disciplined Chu Ko Nu |
 |
 Exalted Chu Ko Nu
|
750 wood 750 coin |
Upgrades Chu Ko Nu to Exalted (+50% hit points and attack); requires Honored Chu Ko Nu |
Further statistics[]
As Chu Ko Nu are unique to the Chinese, only technologies that they have access to are shown in the following table:
| Unit strengths and weaknesses | |
|---|---|
| Strong vs. | Heavy infantry, light cavalry, ranged shock infantry |
| Weak vs. | Heavy cavalry, hand shock infantry, counter-skirmishers, artillery |
| Improvements | |
| Hit points |  Cree Tanning (+5%) Navajo Weaving (+5%) Tar Kilns (+5%)
|
| Attack |  Seminole Bowyer (+15%) Carib Kasiri Beer (+10%) Tupi Poison Arrow Frogs (+10%) Armatoloi (+5%) Yoga (+5%) Clenched Fist (+25% melee attack) Somali Jile Daggers (-35% melee attack Rate of Fire) Carib Garifuna Drums (+1.0 multipliers vs. Villagers) Kalthoff Repeaters (+0.1 multiplier vs. light infantry)
|
| Resistance |  Somali Oryx Hide Shields (+10% ranged resistance)
|
| Range |  Sarmatism (+1) Schützenfest (+1)
|
| Line of Sight | Sarmatism (+1) Schützenfest (+1)
|
| Speed |  Quechuan Mountaineering (+10%) Akan Fontomfrom (+5%) Apache Endurance (+5%)
|
| Train time | Akan Fontomfrom (-20% Old Han Army, -10% Standard Army) Cheyenne Horse Trading (-20% Standard Army) Quechuan Diet (-15% Old Han Army and Standard Army)
|
| Other |  Meritocracy (-20% upgrade cost)
|
Home City Cards[]
- Click for a list of Home City Cards related to the Chu Ko Nu
Changelog[]
The Asian Dynasties[]
- With patch 1.01, Chu Ko Nu have a ×2.0 ranged multiplier against light cavalry and Eagle Runner Knights, and ×0.75 against cavalry and Coyote Runners.
Definitive Edition[]
- Chu Ko Nu have a ×2.0 ranged multiplier against light cavalry and ranged shock infantry, and ×0.75 against cavalry and hand shock infantry.
Knights of the Mediterranean[]
- With update 13.9057, the Chu Ko Nu is tagged as Light Infantry.
- With update 13.58326, Chu Ko Nu have a ×2.5 ranged multiplier against light cavalry and ranged shock infantry, ×0.6 vs. cavalry and ×0.5 vs. shock infantry.
History[]
| “ | The Chinese chu ko nu repeating crossbow was known for its simple design and incredible rate of fire. It held a magazine of 10 bolts with steel tips, which it shot in succession, and was operated by grasping the stock in the left hand and working the lever with the right. In that swift movement, a bolt would drop into place, the string would be strung, and then the bolt would be fired, with another bolt dropping in to take its place. The weapon was specifically designed to fire rapidly and be turned on groups of enemy troops at a distance of no more than 150-250 feet. It was especially effective against cavalry. Horses provided large targets for the generally inaccurate chu ko nu, and when the animal was wounded it usually lost control and sowed pandemonium in the surrounding ranks. Stories of the chu ko nu date back to 250 BCE, when legend has it that the first Chinese emperor Qin Shi Huang used the weapon to shoot sharks for sport. Most accounts, however, have the creation of the chu ko nu occurring during the Chinese Han Dynasty, around the year 200 CE. | ” |
Gallery[]
8 comments
Clenched Fist (+30% melee attack)
According to the introduction of Clenched Fist, it should be 25% instead of 30%?
"Once researched, it increases the melee attack of ranged infantry by 25%, except Melee Skirmishers (e.g. Sudanese Dervish) and Caroleans, that get +10% melee attack instead."
Should be Zhuge Nu. The repeating crossbow is named after Zhuge Liang, though it's unlikely that he actually invented it.
This is due to the difference on transliteration/Romanization, "Zhuge Nu" is based on Pinyin while "Chu-Ko-Nu" is based on Wade–Giles. The developers may just continue to use the same name from AoE2.
Repeating crossbow - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repeating_crossbow
Cho Ko Nu is the best archer unit in the game in terms of cost efficiency. Cheap as hell, 4.5 speed, fast firing animation, 2x multiplier against Heavy Infantry. The 2 best unit upgrades in the game, Old Han reforms and Repelling Volley.
They do 5*2*3 damage against Heavy Infantry before you send Repelling Volley.
Do the multipliers apply per Volley or per each arrow? How is the attack multipliers calculated for this unit? They were always a confusing unit due to the number of arrows per shot.
The Cho Ko Nu shoots 3 arrows per volley. This means that if the attack of the Cho Ko Nu is 15 then it does 3 times damage PER arrow assuming you have repelling volley. This is a total of 135 damage.
Okay so wait a minute, let me get this straight here. Crossbowmen do 20 damage with 120 hp while my current testing cho ko nu says(With all upgrades possible without natives because they aren't always there)they do 15 damage with a x3 vs Light cav and heavy infantry with a x0.8 vs cavalry. So what this wiki is saying is, these archers do damage three times. Does that make it 15 x 3 = 45 per fire from each cho-ko-nu? and if so would these archers not straight up decimate all other light cav and heavy infantry by dealing 15 x 3 x 3 = 135 per fire to them? They also sit on their highest of 299 HP which makes them decently tank. Also does anyone know if ranged resist affects cannons? I'm not entirely sure but if it does that only makes them more unstoppable with a high chance of getting into range to deal that base 45 per single unit volley.
I guess ranged affects cannons but cannons have multipliers on infantry. However chu ko nu deal 15 x multiplier. So 45 in total with repelling volley. 45 x 3 is impossible, they wpuld be too strong and tbey are strong, but not so unbeatable. Best way to use them againat cannon is using melee combat, 19 melee damage ! And cannons have range defense. Same thing against light infantry if you can, use melee attack. Or use pikes.
This unit pretty much the Chinese equivalent of Crossbowman and became deadly archer if sending Repelling Volley and Old Han Reforms card.
Well, pretty obvious but yes, Old Han Reforms can turn them and Qiang Pikeman into late game "monsters" if you take in account how cheap they are (even with the 50%+ cost).
+50% cost but the best ally on the consulate (after taking russians for fort and factory) are the germans with an incredible -30% in cost of armies ! So you can compensate the increse by 50% in cost emgemdered by old han reforms
these things are designed against cavalry, but actually suck in aoe
1. The full size version is designed agaisnt everything, but it is an artillery piece.
2. They are usually use as home defense weapon as they have short range compare to compound bow used by the Chinese.
3. They don't suck in AoE.
Well agreed, but the game needs some balance, so they choose to make it an "crossbow like unit" out of them.
Similar the Chu Ko Nu in AoE 2
They are way better in AoE 3 after Old Han Reform and Repelling Volley card is played. Not to mention they are consider trash here.