[UPDATED] NTW Tactics - Fighting the Battle AI

[xHerzoGx De Bodemloze]

FIGHTING THE BATTLE AI
Tactics Guide

Hello and welcome everybody to my Napoleon Total War Battle AI Tactics Guide.
Here You can find different useful tips and tactics that will help you to ensure
that the next time you are going to face the AI´s armies you won´t just defeat
but completely destroy them.

Before we start with the actual Tactics Guide let me explain a few basics that everybody, beginner or experienced player should keep in mind when fighting the AI.

· First of all the AI is no human player...so tactics that might work against other players don´t necessarily work against the AI and also the opposite,
tactics that lead you to victory in a battle with the AI won´t always help you if you are fighting human players.

· Another thing you should know is the fact that when you are setting the AI on expert he won´t just fight "better" but your units will also have worse moral...that is a fact that i found out in my carrier as passionate TW player.
So when you are playing the AI on expert you need to have a good plan to keep up the moral of your men otherwise it could easily happen that your whole army is routing and you don´t even know from what.
But thats why i wrote this thread to help you improving your tactics so that no AI in the world can ever defeat you again.

· Here a short summary of things that make the AI as unique as it is: Every single AI from Rome to Napoleon has the Habit to rush without ever thinking about losses...In this Thread you will learn how to use this for your advantage.
The AI of NTW does not really care about the range of his units most of the time he simply walks "10" meters in front of you and then starts shooting so just a little tip,
don´t recruit too much rifle units because they wont help you against the AI...better have a strong line-infantry thats much more important).
That might be stupid but on the other hand he can easily go into melee-fight with you, which is another of his habits.
As soon as the Battle turns bad for the AI he sends all or at least most of his troops into melee-fight and you should do everything to avoid that because from the point on that your men are fighting his in a "man Vs man",
its not in your hands anymore what happens. You should only go into the melee-modus if you know that your men have better stats or if the opponents unit is already weakened.
The last thing you should know about the AI is that he is programmed to keep one strong line...
don´t expect him to split his army, all he does is to send his cavalry to hunt you which gives you the opportunity to make traps.

· The last thing i want to mention before we start with the tactics guide is that it´s our human intelligence that differentiates us from the AI. What i want to say is that no matter how good your tactic is...
being able to react and think of something new when the situation requires it is the decisive advantage that we all have!

Surrounding The Enemy

~SURROUNDING THE ENEMY~ One of the most popular tactics against the AI but also against human players is the surrounding- or flanking-tactic. In this guide i´ll try to explain all the things you need to know to successfully use this tactic. Like every good tactic this one starts with the right preparation. Before you start the Battle make sure that you have done everything you can to prepare your self for the flanking attack. Therefor you place the main part of you army in the middle (if your army contains elite units place them in the middle and not on the flanks because it´s the center where the AI strokes the hardest and your whole tactic is depending on the men in the center who fight the opponents forces long enough so that the wings can flank and surround them). On the wings you should place a mix of line-infantry, light-infantry and cavalry. If you have a full army with not slots empty it´s best to have about 10 units in the middle and 5 on each wing. After you have placed your men on the Battlefield start the game and you will notice the AI has built one big line and is now coming towards your center. Place your men in the middle of the Battlefield and try to get into an favorably position... Spoiler Alert, click show to read:  Note: If you are playing on a Map with many hills and forests...always try to get an advantage out of these conditions. For example place some men in a forest so that they hide and use them when you think the right moment has come. You can also take position on hills because it will take your enemy allot of time to rush up these hills and his men will get exhausted. On the other hand you can also place your men behind a hill so that the enemy can´t shoot you and has to cross the hill to get to you... if you´re doing that place some artillery behind the hill so that you can defeat the opponents units with canister shots. While you are bringing your men into position you should focus on not getting to close to the opponent with you flanking units...otherwise it could happen that he suddenly attacks them with his whole army. Even if you keep a good distance of about 300 meters he will probably send his cavalry to attack you...be prepared to act fast on such a charge and place your men into squares and maybe also use the trap i was speaking about before and catch his cavalry with yours that was hidden in a forest before. Now that your men are in position and the enemy is close enough...FLANK. Send the units on your flanks to attack the wings of the AI´s Battle-line and defeat one unit after the other by surrounding and outnumbering it in the gun power. Meanwhile take care of your center and support your line with your general. With his special abilities he can keep up the moral of your men for quite some time (the time you will need to completely surround the opponent with the flanking units). You should also focus on killing the Enemies artillery...this way you avoid big losses from canon explosions. Send the flanking cavalry to kill the artillery units and after the job is done send them in the opponents back. This has a nice side-effect because when you charge into the opponents units with your cavalry he will be busy with melee-fighting so you can take the advantage and shoot his men and weaken them even more this way. A Tip when you are charging in the opponents back...expand the cavalry line as much as you can this way you can charge into 2 or 3 of the AI´s units and diverse them for a short time. You will notice that the Battle is slowly turning to its ending. Depending on how equal the two armies have been (in my example the AI got better and more units), parts of your center army will still remain and your flanks should have taken only a few damage. Everything left to do is to give the AI the final hit and encircle his last remaining units to completely defeat them (this tactic has the nice side-effect that if it is a campaign battle that you are playing you can defeat almost the whole army of the opponent so that he can´t reform it). The decisive strategy you have to follow during the whole battle is to constantly outnumber the opponents units in the gun-fight by moving your units smartly. This is actually the most important lesson you have to learn for the whole game no matter if MP or SP...if your army is acting all the time, if its moving, if its pursuing... then your opponent will have no chance AI or human player it won´t matter anymore! HOPE YOU ENJOYED THIS GUIDE AND THAT IT HELPS YOU TO ****ING KILL THE AI NEXT TIME

All about Artillery

HOW TO USE ARTILLERY I was asked to give some more tips about how to use artillery...so here we go! A short article about how to cause the biggest damage you can with your artillery: Well the first question is which kind of artillery should I use ? As you might have already considered every kind of artillery got´s it advantages. So lets start with the most used artillery the foot-artillery. There are allot of variations of foot-artillery. You can choose from 5 to 12 pounders depending on how much damage you want to cause...of course many of you will think why should i use 5 pounders if i can also use 12 pounders ?! its a question of your recourses. In a campaign you should always keep an eye on your money and don´t waste too much of it for your troops if it´s not needed. So it´s up to you to decide if you have to spend more money for larger canons or if the small ones are already good enough. But to get back to the advantages/disadvantages of the foot-artillery: · perfect for besieging Forts · causes heavy damage on houses/walls · the special options like canister shot are very effective · very long range · very slow · causes only a few damage on Infantry Units · quite expensive The next type of artillery is the horse-artillery. It´s biggest advantage is that its very fast and if you want to capture a important point of a map and defend it it´s the perfect unit for you because different to all other kinds of artillery it´s as fast as normal cavalry and after you placed it on a hilltop or at the edge of a forrest or where ever you want it to be it can defend that point like a normal foot-artillery. My advice is to place it at points that the enemy has to cross with his units (bottleneck, hill, ford, forrest) And then you can massacre his men with the deadly canister shots: · Very fast · quite cheap ·*Good range · the special options like canister shot are very effective · causes only a few damage (max 6 pounder) Now comes my favorite kind of artillery...the howitzers! They are the most effective artillery of all if you fight Infantry or cavalry units. One good shot can kill up to 30 men which is simply awesome. The problem is that the howitzers are quite expensive and have only a short range. But still if you face a huge number of infantry or cavalry units i would highly recommend you to use howitzers but if you are besieging a fort they are completely useless...the canon balls detonate when they hit the ground and the metal-pieces which are that effective against soldiers don`t cause any damage to a strong stonewall: · cause allot of damage to infantry ·*cause allot of damage to cavalry · have more special options than other kinds of artillery · compared to other kinds of artillery the are cheap · don´t cause any damage to walls/houses · very slow Last but not least the rockets! Well first thing i want to mention is that they simply look amazing and they have a great range and cause allot of fear to the opponents units but on the other side they are not very effective because of 100 rockets maybe 10 really reach the opponents units and these dont even cause that much damage. Beside that they can´t be replaced which is another disadvantage: · very long range · cause fear · not too expensive · can't be replaced · dont cause much damage Now that you know everything about the different types or artillery lets see how to use them: As already mentioned above artillery is very effective to defend important points of a map like bottlenecks or hills. Therefor you should place the artillery at a point where it can´t be attacked thats fast and where the enemies units have to come close to it so that you can use the special option canister shot to massacre them. Another great opportunity given by the artillery is that you can weaken the lines of you opponent even before he is close enough to shoot you with his muskets. The best artillery for that are the howitzers. Of course you can also use their strength when your enemy makes the mistake to place too many men on one point. Due to pursuing him you can reach this effect and then totally destroy him with a few good shots of your howitzers. The last advantage of artillery is that you don´t have to conquer the walls of a fort with your men anymore but break it with the artillery. Therefor you should use foot-artillery because of the reasons written above. These were some of the important facts about artillery and how to use it i hope you learned something and in the future use your artillery more effectively

More Guides will follow soon

[Toombs]

Hey love the guide . Great use of the arrows to show major movements and such around the map, and great English! Hope to see some more of these from you Herzog! +rep!

[Preatorians100]

Hey love the guide . Great use of the arrows to show major movements and such around the map, and great English! Hope to see some more of these from you Herzog!

I agree. The arrows are really good.
The guide is great m8!!

Keep it up

[xHerzoGx De Bodemloze]

thx guys

[Shiloh]

Nice work Herzog, +rep.

[removeduser_86732453]

Awesome guide Herzog!

[almg]

Good evening everybody

You are doing a very good tactics guide xHerzoGx !



Alban

[xHerzoGx De Bodemloze]

thx guys next guide should be done this weekend

[almg]

Good evening everybody !

I have two questions for you xHerzogx

- the first dealing with mobility.

How to use it as we have few units to use at the center?


- the second front-frontal attack from the computer when we are outnumbered.

What type of organization tactics should be used to counter the computer and its artillery:
Two, three or four lines of infantry, square and what about cavalry and artillery ?
Should we put everything in the center when we are understaffed then either divided into smaller units ?






My favourite unit: the Hunters from the French light infantry.

Alban

[xHerzoGx De Bodemloze]

@ almg...if i understand u right u want to know how to act when ure extremely outnumbered ? well then to answer ure questions one after the other:

first of all always expand ure units so that they have only 2 lines u do that coz u simply have more gunpower then and its not like in etw where all lines shoot so its best to expand the line as much as u can this way u need less units to control bigger areas

and second...as in my tactics guide shown u ll always be outnumbered in the center when ure using that flanking tactic...the point is (as i already explained in the guide) to hold the line long enough to get the flank attacks rolling...a few tips to strengthen ure center are:

- place ure men on favorably positions such as hills forests or even behind hills...that forces ure opponent to climb the hill and when he is on top of it u can destroy his units with the canister shots of the artillery that u have to place directly behind the hill (the trick is that because u place ure units behind the hill he has no chance to attack them so he got to keep moving closer this way he comes in range of ure canister shots...i guess u can think of the rest then )

- beside that u should support ure men with ure gen...as shown in the guide.

and i guess i ll be able to answer all the detailed thing in my next guide that should come out the next days...in this guide i ll show how to act if ure outnumbered 2 in 1 or even more

but my advice would be to play more online battles...there u learn how to act fast and also how to react fast...the whole game is much faster and variable than games against the AI...if ure a good online player u wont have a problem with AI anymore


PS: i think the best way to demonstrate tactics is through videos...so check out my youtube channel i got a few pretty old tactic videos they are pretty bad commentated but still u ll learn what i mean by fast moving and reorganizing armies

http://www.youtube.com/user/xHerzoGx

[almg]

Thank you for all your answers

I must say that I begin the game so I have a lot of things to learn and your help for strategy is precious !

So what about your next tactics guide

Alban

[PVT-Kanaka]

This was extremely well done! Concise script with good diagrams to illustrate the point! I look forward to your future commentary, especially as I have been experimenting with the "reverse slope defense" in my own, admittedly limited, allotted TW time each week!

Right on, and Write on!

[xHerzoGx De Bodemloze]

thx guys and next guide will probably follow this weekend...not sure though coz i got allot more things to do

[almg]

Good afternoon everybody !

xHerzoGx, will you be able to give us more advices about artillery in your guide ?

Alban

[xHerzoGx De Bodemloze]

sure i can make a lil sub/guide/paragraph/article/whatever just for artillery can do that today actually...

[xHerzoGx De Bodemloze]

UPDATE artillery guide is published now

[almg]

Alban

[almg]

Good afternoon everybody !

About horse-artillery, must we put all the units together or dispatch them on the battle field: my question is about power of fire ?

Alban

[xHerzoGx De Bodemloze]

just place them where they are needed... the horse artillery shouldnt be seen as a independent force but more as a supporting force for other units...it needs to be covered by a few line units and support them with its canister shots so to answer ure question yeah u can spread it over the field and it doesnt have to be all on one point

[almg]