The damage is absolutely incredible, and it is unlike most rogue strategies because it provides an absolutely insane amount of ranged firepower. This strategy basically means you can build nothing but archers and ' bardchers' through early-game, and well into mid-game.

They also boost damage to the whole stack, which is just nasty. You don't want to build them exclusively, but mixing them with regular archers in a 1:1 ratio means they can serve as front line archers and take a hit, while providing just as much damage as regular archers.

Basically, Take an elven archer, add a bunch of hp, defense, & resistance, give it +300 morale, and teach it Charm. So why would I even be talking about them? Well, in exchange for all these weaknesses, elven bards get longbows. They also lack any form of healing, which means they really really suck at typical charm-based bard tactics.

Elven bardspams are highly focused, as elven bards are far more likely to kill than convert most of the time. Typical bardspam strategies are based around creating a chaotic mess of units which look nothing like a rogue army. The thing about elven bards is that they kind of kick ass but, unlike other bards, they don't take names. Unlike Human assassins, Elven bards are a complete change of strategy, as opposed to an improvement of an existing strategy. Yes, I realized I already covered bard spam, but this strategy is both distinct and different enough to merit its own category.

Age of wonders 3 unit spam