Need advice in fights on the battlemap

[Pyrebound]

Hello, I have had quite a bit of trouble with fights, mainly in siege battles. As I downloaded Stainless Steel 5.1 for more fun, the fights have became alot harder for me, forcing me from M/M to E/E, so I could practise the art of warfare (Been doing autoresolve for like 95% of battles before). When attacking, if I take command of the army, the fight will be a horrible bloodbath for my troops. Ive only been good commander in city defense fights (As milan, cagliari got attacked several times in a row, and my forces were totally outnumbered, still managed to win them, netting quite a bit of good traits from heroic victories.

So, any tips, simple strategies or anything like that? The problem is mainly in attacking, and especially attacking enemy settlements are such pain. I would like to play M/M instead of E/E as even the autoresolve will net average wins in battles with 1:2 ratio.

pb

[Domnul Ceaşcă]

Well for the battlefield, i suggest using a combination of spear infantry, melee infantry, 2 units of cavalry for flanking purposes and maximum 4 archer units, this is the combination i use, and it has never dissapointed me. When you attack settlements, you should try to enter in force, with all your melee units and most important your general, but don`t put him in front. If you don`t have catapults, trebuchets, etc you should to make as many siege towers or ladders as possible, to climb as many troops to as many points possible, and always try to use heavy infantry for climbing the walls. I can sense that you are new to TW games, i suggest playing custom battles, as you play more and more battles, everything will come naturally and you will suddenly find yourself kicking the **** out of the AI.

[finsternis]

Well, when I am attacking a settlement, what I do is I do not build towers (they are too slow). I just build several ladders and a ram. Then I spread my ladders on the front of the settlement (even around if I have enough) and my ram as near the gate as possible (I do all of this only if I do not have catas or trebus, however). The just send the ladders running to the wall and the ram to the gate. If you do not have a ram or if you lose it, try to take control of the gate as quick as possible so you can get your calvary inside (if the door is under enemy control and it is not destroyed, and you lose all your foot soldiers, and your cavalry is outside, you lose if your are the attacker). And after that:

[Trajan]

Moved to Battle Planning.

[pwijnands]

You can also try using spies to allow your troops free entry to a settlement. But be aware that when you attack stone walled settlements, your troops will still receive boiling oil. Found that one out today and it cost me half a unit of Janissaries.
Also kill as many enemies as possible before they retreat to the main town square. On the square defenders have infinite morale, so you will have to kill every soldier they have (or have a superior force in the square for three minutes). You might try to attempt the last option as the enemy tends to bunch up in the middle of the square in my games, making it very hard for your troops to attack such a dense mass of troops. They do make a good target for catapults/javelins etc, if you have any with you.

[homefry]

Oil in the vanilla game?

I've never seen it in the game nor in the manual.....

[Domnul Ceaşcă]

Oil in the vanilla game?

I've never seen it in the game nor in the manual.....

He was reffering to Kingdoms Total War...

[Pyrebound]

Oil in the vanilla game?

I've never seen it in the game nor in the manual.....

Like i mentioned in my post, i play Stainless Steel 5.1 which has boiling oil included.

Thanks for your tips, i quess i will just need to do it the hard way, clicking the battlemap fight no matter how easy/tough it would be.