Your Longest Battle in Stainless Steel 5.1?

[Allu X]

Morning all,

Last night in my campaign (playing Scotland on VH/VH) - I assaulted Bergan Castle, with 4000 units (2000 in each army) against around the same number of Norwegians (with Re-inforcements).

I started the battle at 12:00 am, when I'd finished, it was 5:00 am! 5 hours!

Talk about realistic! >_>

I kept having to withdraw my units and wait for their fatigue to replenish, then launch several more assaults.

Very Fun Battle!

What is your longest?

[burninglegionx]

i have battle time limit on so i must finish even largest battles within 20~30 minutes. It kinda sucks when assaulting a dobule-walled settlement though.
btw, as sicily, i managed to get pope (my ally) to fight a battle alongside me, and got him killed. When i 'ordered' the pope army to be 'offensive' and double clicked on enemy, he headon charged against HRE's spearmen...

[Allu X]

i have battle time limit on so i tend to finish even largest battles within 20~30 minutes.

Hmm, I've never thought about using time limits before - does this affect how you win though?

For example if you take more losses than the enemy, but the time runs out - who is classed as the winner? Or is it a draw. :S

[Willor]

The attacker will always lose if the time is out.

[Allu X]

i have battle time limit on so i must finish even largest battles within 20~30 minutes. It kinda sucks when assaulting a dobule-walled settlement though.
btw, as sicily, i managed to get pope (my ally) to fight a battle alongside me, and got him killed. When i 'ordered' the pope army to be 'offensive' and double clicked on enemy, he headon charged against HRE's spearmen...

Lmao xD - Newbie Pope

[Aldwen]

My longest battle lasted somewhere between 2-3 hours. I was playing as Ireland and Spanish had decided to invade my island citadel of Loryn. Loryn was re-named such in honor of the Prince who had taken it, despite the odds against him. He fell in battle trying to take the city. The actual city name started with an A and it's the small island south of Genoa.

Anyways the attack was unprovoked so I was caught off guard and the citadel was only garrisoned with a few good men, I believe less than a thousand. The Spaniards on the other hand had a full invasion force with nearly two thousand men! The "balance bar" was almost completely red.

I was super tedious when it came to placing my few men and the group of catapults and ballistas. Half of my men were placed inside the inner curtain while most of my best soldiers were placed both on the streets and at the point the Spanish ladders were likely to deploy. My three groups of archers were placed where their siege tower was aimed to deploy. My catapults were placed on main street along with my ballistas, who would have a perfect shot should the gates be breached.

As soon as the battle began I focused all of my archers on one of the two battering rams heading towards my gate. Thankfully I got lucky and the thing ignited. By this time the ladders had already been placed and my troops were busy defending the archers flanks while they began to fire at the siege tower. They however were unable to set it ablaze and when it landed I ordered them to retreat back to the second wall.

After the archers were well away I pulled back my Muire who had amazingly, managed to make the units assaulting via the ladders retreat, and I ordered them to take position in the streets below the wall they had just defended. Meanwhile I ordered a unit of Ostmen and Ulster Swordsmen to hold the doors as the second battering ram had just arrived. The siege tower had just began to spew Spaniards on my wall as well, so I ordered my catapults to fire at the siege tower.

Soon enough my gate was shattered and instantly I ordered my ballistas to start firing into the bottle necked Spanish. My Ostmen and Ulster Swordsmen held out well enough but it wasn't enough to hold back the surge and I was forced to send them retreating into the streets. Almost at the exact moment I ordered a retreat my ballistas incinerated the Spanish general!! Now the fun street battles began taking place! My Muire were engaging a equal force of Sword and Buckler Men in the eastern streets while my Ulster Swordsmen held the line before my siege equipment. My Ostmen were busy in the western streets fighting off another group of Sword and Buckler Men. Meanwhile my archers had taken up position on the inner curtain walls allowing them to pepper the Spanish with arrows. I also got very lucky with my catapults as they managed to set the Spanish siege tower on fire!! Even more so, the tower was packed full of troops!!

It was only a matter of time though before both of my Ulster Swordsmen and Ostmen broke and thus my siege equipment all had to retreat back into the inner curtain. My Muire however had held out marvelously and actually routed the Sword and Buckler Men. However because both the Ulster Swordsmen had broke another group of Sword and Buckler Men were making there way towards the battle weary men. They defended themselves pretty well until they became surrounded by yet another group of swordsmen, it was then that those men fell.

Meanwhile the Spanish began to reform outside the inner curtain and started to bring their ladders and rams forward. My archers were focused on destroying the battering ram, while I began to position the rest of my troops to defend the doors and I set my siege crews to man the towers.

By this time, because of my units valiant fighting in the streets and my siege equipments devastation, I had managed to wipe out a large portion of the Spanish army, not to mention they lost their general. Thus the constant peppering by both my archers and towers managed to cause many of the units to rout, they of course would always come back though. My archers eventually, once again, got lucky and set the battering ram on fire, the ladders however kept creeping forward.

Sadly, my archers finally ran out of arrows and I pulled them back and positioned them so they would man the towers. I also repositioned my men inside the inner ward for a wall assault. Once the Spanish began to pour off the ladders I was glad to find they routed quickly! As a result I sent my men positioned on the ground to sally forth and attack what remained of the Spaniards. This ALMOST proved to be fatal, as the Spanish still had almost a full group of their bad-ass horsemen, but my general managed to swing the tide of battle in my favor.

The rest, is history as my men managed to rout the remaining Spaniards.

To say this was an easy battle would be crazy. Had it not been for the placement of my units, and the apparent luck that was on my side, I would have surely lost. Again, I had less than a thousand men while the Spanish had nearly two-thousand, some of them being well trained and the top tier Spanish units, yet still my men held out and won. They should make a movie about it.

I only wish I had taken pictures, then again, I was busy fighting for my life.

[The Sundance Kid]

My longest battle without a time limit was when I was the Aragonese against the French, fighting just outside Paris, their penultimate city. I had my Grand Host, which I always call my best or main army, with the most up-to-date troops and such. The French had basically all their troops left in the world on this field outside Paris, ready to defend their capital. The ration was about 1500 on my side, to 3400 on the French. But my troops were better, on the whole.

I had a few trebuchets, so I peppered their armies until they launched an attack. All 3 of their stacks smashed into me, I had dismounted Armats holding them off and taking huge casualties, and my left wing nearly buckled under the enemy knights. My right wing beat back their spearmen, though, and swept round to hit the left wing attackers, routing most of their infantry. I thought I'd won, but I looked at the ratio bar and it showed still about half and half...I checked the map and saw a huge army of mounted cavalry charging across the plains towards me, and I only had 2 units of cavalry and my general.

My trebs managed to take down about a unit or two with flaming ammo, then I sent my general and the nights charging out to meet them, with my infantry lining up in formation behind. The cavalry engaged and held up their charge, meaning my infantry could join the fight and take down the enemy from behind, routing them, even though my general and most of the cavalry sacrificed themselves. In the end, the battle took 2 hours-ish, it was epic. I then besieged Paris with the remnants of my army but got beaten back by a HRE sack allied to the French.

[Allu X]

My longest battle without a time limit was when I was the Aragonese against the French, fighting just outside Paris, their penultimate city. I had my Grand Host, which I always call my best or main army, with the most up-to-date troops and such. The French had basically all their troops left in the world on this field outside Paris, ready to defend their capital. The ration was about 1500 on my side, to 3400 on the French. But my troops were better, on the whole.

I had a few trebuchets, so I peppered their armies until they launched an attack. All 3 of their stacks smashed into me, I had dismounted Armats holding them off and taking huge casualties, and my left wing nearly buckled under the enemy knights. My right wing beat back their spearmen, though, and swept round to hit the left wing attackers, routing most of their infantry. I thought I'd won, but I looked at the ratio bar and it showed still about half and half...I checked the map and saw a huge army of mounted cavalry charging across the plains towards me, and I only had 2 units of cavalry and my general.

My trebs managed to take down about a unit or two with flaming ammo, then I sent my general and the nights charging out to meet them, with my infantry lining up in formation behind. The cavalry engaged and held up their charge, meaning my infantry could join the fight and take down the enemy from behind, routing them, even though my general and most of the cavalry sacrificed themselves. In the end, the battle took 2 hours-ish, it was epic. I then besieged Paris with the remnants of my army but got beaten back by a HRE sack allied to the French.

How long did it last?

[strife1013]

How long did it last?

He said two hours...also good thing your did get CTD at the end, that would blow!!

[aion2006]

Time limit on mine,
though when I was attacker. It was a draw in the end.
Even my attacker during siege. I outlast them at the gate.

Anyway it never takes my more then an hour to fight a battle.
I don't pause, and playing medieval since launch... U tend to know exactly what to do. I expect nothing less from others veteran, and also nothing but heroic victory most of the time.

[spanish_emperor]

i used to pause and it became a bad habit...now every time i play i see my finger stretching for the pause button in times of trouble, and i smash it down, annoyed.

i've always played battle limit since the time something wrong happened and it would never end, even though i had destroyed the whole enemy army....made sure there weren't any hiding as well.
because it was a heroic battle and one of the best i had ever done i wanted to save the replay and so i spent hours in the same battle trying to win even though the enemy was dead.

if you count that as a battle then it was 12 hours since i went to sleep hoping next day it would say "Heroic Victory"....it never happened though and i had to quit

[Antiochos VII Sidetes]

Well, mine isn't as epic as others, but it was pretty cool for me.


I was the Great and Mighty Byzantine Empire, and I set myself on a Grand Quest to restore the lost glory of Rome. I had taken most of the Middle East, but left the Templars alive as allies, since they are, well, really too cool to kill. However, I was having difficulty tackling Egypt; we were at something of a draw. My Empire was from Italy through Hungary all the way to the end of the map Eastwards (not including the Egyptian territories) So, most of my generals were doing other things, such as beating up the almighty and ridiculously full-stacked Holy Roman Empire. The best I had in Constantinople was an adopted captain named Kalauskos or something with like 2 command stars..

I'm rambling..

Oh well, and essentially Egypt called a Jihad on Constantinople and sent 3 full stacks after it, with some help from those bastard Moors. (My navy was super weak, so they had no trouble landing) I had one stack defending Constantinople against hugely superior numbers, but my men were a lot better. (fully upgraded Varangians, Alamanoi, and Dismounted Byzantine Lancers) I had no cavalry, and no archers. Only the units that I could build there. So they got on the walls with ladders; the Egyptian infantry cracked in the beginning, but eventually sheer weight of numbers from all sides was causing casualties to mount. Most of my Lancers were down to 11 or 12 troops to a unit, with my better units faring only slightly better. They had broken down the gate and were being held off by 2 Varangians and 1 Alamanoi. All seemed lost, but then, for some reason, a Saracen Militia Unit routed at the front, and then the boiling oil poured..and the nerve of the Infidels broke, and my victorious swarms of heavy infantry helped the hard-pressed troops on the wall, defeating the two-bit militia attackers easily. The Moorish army was routed with considerably less trouble; I just got the out on a plain and cut them to pieces with Byzantine Cavalry from Corinth. All in all, the battle lasted like 3 hours.

[TzuDevil]

My longest field battle was around an hour and a half, playing as the Moors and fighting the Mongols.

I had gathered my best Generals and troops after a long war with Egypt, and made a piece agreement with the Turks which included military access so I could hunt down the Golden Horde in all their glory through Turkish territory.

My fist few battles had all gone okay, but I had reached a point where all I had left was one great general, and a mixed stack with Mercs and a number of half strength units. My reinforcements were a few turns away, and my General was 58 years old, so I decided to let him die with honor facing the horde in battle one last time, rather then on the campaign trail escorting troops to be reinforced.

So I attacked; two Mongol stacks (one of which was depleted to about 3/4 strength), against my mish mosh of merged, under-strength units, and odd ball mercs (about 3/4 of a stack). All I was hoping to do was reduce their numbers as much as possible, and sweep in a few turns later with my reinforcements to clean up what was left.

When the battlemap loaded up, I was not pleased. I had one of those really bad maps, where it is all uphill, and I was on the bad side of up. Facing all those HA's, I thought it would be a quick death. I picked what looked like the flattest uphill spot on my side, and deployed as best I could, knowing I would be badly out ranged and out numbered, by troops I could not catch (I had no cavalry left but for my General, and a half strength unit of HA mercs). Fortunatly I still had a solid core of Dismounted Christan Guard, so there was still hope that I could hurt them a little if I kept my general alive...

When I started the battle, the Mongols had deployed kind of "cockeyed", and the reinforcements were going to be coming in from my right flank. They had left a nice hill, and choke point, on my left side wide open (which is where I had assumed they would deploy). As fast as my fingers could click, I got my entire force running for that hill, which was well inside that Mongol deployment zone. About 1/5 of the way there, their HA's engaged and started peppering my army. I saw no point in trying to counter, I just kept moving. By the time my men were almost in place, the Mongol Heavy Cavalry had reached me, along with their General. Literally, as I was deploying in my defensive position, I was facing charges. I had taken some losses, but after repelling the first few charges, I managed to get a bit of a breather, as the mongols redeployed with their reinforcements, which allowed my men to rest up a bit.

What happened next, was utter carnage and chaos. While my new position was excellent, I was still badly outnumbered. As the Mongols came in, charge after charge, horse archers mock charging, foot archers unloading on my heavy infantry, I was frantically moving my General around to support the lines, along with my second line infantry. My Desert Archers were doing a beautiful job, as they now outranged the Mongols significantly, but soon enough, they were out of ammo, and I began to use them as my second infantry line.

Then, unfortunately, the last Mongol General was killed under the swords of my infantry, and many of his troops started to periodically route. I surely would have been destroy otherwise. But, I perked up, as the battle could now be won, and started focussing on routing units, and killing what I could.

After a long stretch of disorganized battle, I was left with about 150 men (and only my General - all bodyguards dead), and the Mongols had about 80 HA's left, all out of ammo.

I resorted my men, and slowly (and I mean slowly) cornered and routed the rest.

Long battle, and lots of fun!

RC rules!

Cheers!

[Jingles]

My Longest Battle on SS so far lasted about 2 hours or so. I was playing as Templars on Very Hard/Hard and I attacked Acre with an army of peasants near enough, with a smattering of sergeant spearmen. After an hour of fighting on the walls with my general riding backwards and forwards blowing his rally trumpet thing, most of my army routed.... As it turned out I won the battle and captured Acre with only my Generals bodyguard! They were reduced to 3 men by the end and despite the fact that my general had scurvy, his unit racked up 160 kills as a result, most of which were in the town square. (I have to play with unit sizes set to small btw). So despite having a totally crap army, my terminator general carried the day.

[Enavic]

With time limit-> The longest has to be when the Mongols attacked Antioch. It was 4 full stacks against the 9 units I had there as the English, 4 spearmen militia 4 longbows and a general. Luckily for me only one of the armies had siege equipment, ram 1 set of ladders and a tower. The tower was set ablaze by the longbowmen. and I had a squad ready for the ladders. The only thing that saved me was planting stakes right at the gate that pretty much destroyed all their cavalry which had to funnel through the one gate that was broken. They still had a sizable infantry force though, but the bottleneck around the gate served as a useful choke point limiting their numbers and making the burning oil and gate defenses cause heavy casualties. In the end though they broke through and I won purely from holding the center from them before they ran out of arrows. It was I think about 30 guys against about 60, all archers.

After the battle however the Egyptians decided that the garrison of under 150 men would be easy picking as took the city.
All in all the crusade against Egypt actually helped the Egyptians quite a bit by eliminating most of the Mongol horde.

The stakes though are really overpowered. you shouldn't be able to just plant them in front of the gate like that.

[Poqzt]

The stakes though are really overpowered. you shouldn't be able to just plant them in front of the gate like that.

Agreed. But if you play singleplayer, you could just choose not too.

[muffinhead]

Sundance Kid,
That sounds like an amazing battle, and really fun. But the thing that i am stuck on is how did the HRE come to France's aid? I never get that realism in my games. Im playing with Lusted battle AI (most recent), but their allies never come to their aid. They usually just mind their own business, even if they are at war with me already, they still dont send aid.

All in all, though, sounded like a really fun battle.

[The Sundance Kid]

It was intense, but I'm not sure why the HRE came to France's aid. It was amazing they were allied at all, because usually one can't survive if the other is still standing, sort of thing. But as I besieged the city a stack of knights and sergeants just marched out of the eastern forests, attacked my force, knocked me back and besieged one of my own cities. I managed to stop them taking it, but it was cool enough just to see an AI faction stick up for their ally. Needless to say, I destroyed France and purged into HRE lands, but beforehand, I was never planning on going that far, attacking England instead...amazing how fate takes it's course

My general was my prince as well...they paid for that sacrifice....haha.

[Allu X]

No-one can beat 5 hours then?

[The Sundance Kid]

It was a competition?