Defending the BRIDGE at E OSG

[airborne guy]

Wow, I keep winning bridge battles at the bridge at OAG. PLaying as Gondor. When I win the battle I will lose half my men. I keep hearing about these slaughters where it will be 4000 orcs vs 1000 gondor soldiers and Gondor comes out as the victor with like 10% casualties. I dont see it like that, or how thats even possible. So I would like to here about your tactics early, mid and late game as Gondor on the E OSG bridge. Feel free to include some pics. Thanks, and sorry if this is already posted some where else.

[Maca]

Bridge battles are easy, practically designed for Gondor. Just remember to bring plenty of archers.

Addmiteadly, they were even easier back in RTW due to the OP phalanx formation. I miss those days...

[ashenhigh]

Ill just copy and paste what I wrote to you in the other thread.

Yih trolls do suck. Im still waiting for a video how people defend the bridge against thousands and thousands of orcs, turn after turn.

Defendind a bridge is the easiest possible thing to defend, and the easiest way to win a battle. How you loose them I dont know, maybe you should hone your Medieval 2 Skills before playing as Gondor, because after what you described, sounds like you should completely own Mordor.

"I just lost a battle at the bridge, I had 8 archers, 2 militia, 2 fountain guard, 2 citadel spearmen, 2 gondor spearmen, 2 axemen, and a general. This game is so bugged"

Sounds like a nice little stack to defend a bridge, don't know how you lost that one...

I like to stick my Melee right at the front the bridge. I place my archers or horse archers behind them, and just pummel them orcs crossing the bridge like so:



There were 3856 Orcs in that battle alone, so eventually all my infantry died. My King and two other Rohan Rider units rushed the remaing Orcs straight on, and routed what was left of them.

End Result:



A Couple of tips... NEVER GET SCARED of the Orcs sheer numbers. Just because they may have 3x your units, they are easily broken. Playing as Rohan on VH/VH I have lost only ONE battle vs Mordor thus far (currently sieging Barad-Dur). Remember one thing when fighting Orcs, they ROUT very easily.

1) Use your cavalry wisely. They make or break the battle.
2) Attack their general's bodygaurd unit, if the enemy general is slain the Orcs will panic at any Cavalry charge and the whole army can rout like a domino affect.
3) Pause your battles and constantly re-engage your troops. Use all your units.
4) When fighting trolls dedicate 80-85% of arches on the trolls to weaken them before they get to the infantry.
5) And so important- EXECUTE all orc prisoners.

[Black_ice_Spain]

Ill just copy and paste what I wrote to you in the other thread.





Defendind a bridge is the easiest possible thing to defend, and the easiest way to win a battle. How you loose them I dont know, maybe you should hone your Medieval 2 Skills before playing as Gondor, because after what you described, sounds like you should completely own Mordor.

"I just lost a battle at the bridge, I had 8 archers, 2 militia, 2 fountain guard, 2 citadel spearmen, 2 gondor spearmen, 2 axemen, and a general. This game is so bugged"

Sounds like a nice little stack to defend a bridge, don't know how you lost that one...

I like to stick my Melee right at the front the bridge. I place my archers or horse archers behind them, and just pummel them orcs crossing the bridge like so:



There were 3856 Orcs in that battle alone, so eventually all my infantry died. My King and two other Rohan Rider units rushed the remaing Orcs straight on, and routed what was left of them.

End Result:



A Couple of tips... NEVER GET SCARED of the Orcs sheer numbers. Just because they may have 3x your units, they are easily broken. Playing as Rohan on VH/VH I have lost only ONE battle vs Mordor thus far (currently sieging Barad-Dur). Remember one thing when fighting Orcs, they ROUT very easily.

1) Use your cavalry wisely. They make or break the battle.
2) Attack their general's bodygaurd unit, if the enemy general is slain the Orcs will panic at any Cavalry charge and the whole army can rout like a domino affect.
3) Pause your battles and constantly re-engage your troops. Use all your units.
4) When fighting trolls dedicate 80-85% of arches on the trolls to weaken them before they get to the infantry.
5) And so important- EXECUTE all orc prisoners.

fighting in cities gives you less loses

[2-D Ron]

Ill just copy and paste what I wrote to you in the other thread.





Defendind a bridge is the easiest possible thing to defend, and the easiest way to win a battle. How you loose them I dont know, maybe you should hone your Medieval 2 Skills before playing as Gondor, because after what you described, sounds like you should completely own Mordor.

"I just lost a battle at the bridge, I had 8 archers, 2 militia, 2 fountain guard, 2 citadel spearmen, 2 gondor spearmen, 2 axemen, and a general. This game is so bugged"

Sounds like a nice little stack to defend a bridge, don't know how you lost that one...

I like to stick my Melee right at the front the bridge. I place my archers or horse archers behind them, and just pummel them orcs crossing the bridge like so:



There were 3856 Orcs in that battle alone, so eventually all my infantry died. My King and two other Rohan Rider units rushed the remaing Orcs straight on, and routed what was left of them.

End Result:



A Couple of tips... NEVER GET SCARED of the Orcs sheer numbers. Just because they may have 3x your units, they are easily broken. Playing as Rohan on VH/VH I have lost only ONE battle vs Mordor thus far (currently sieging Barad-Dur). Remember one thing when fighting Orcs, they ROUT very easily.

1) Use your cavalry wisely. They make or break the battle.
2) Attack their general's bodygaurd unit, if the enemy general is slain the Orcs will panic at any Cavalry charge and the whole army can rout like a domino affect.
3) Pause your battles and constantly re-engage your troops. Use all your units.
4) When fighting trolls dedicate 80-85% of arches on the trolls to weaken them before they get to the infantry.
5) And so important- EXECUTE all orc prisoners.

To add to those good tips is to put your troops to your side of the Bridge, then place the rest of your Infantry behid those units on the Bridge making it even more tightly guarded.

Then put your archers on the Flanks and hit the Orcs on the Bridge with flaming arrows.

[gluteus maximus aurelius]

Personally i've only ever had to defend the bridge in early and early-midgame coz if you haven't delved into Mordor by that point then it's going to take even longer when they;ve got all those trolls running around. Generally speaking, it's fairly easy to defend the bridge with minimal casualties, it's only if the enemy has trolls that defending the bridge will ever become difficult. Some basic things you should always do:

1. NEVER send any troops across the bridge unless its cavalry to chase the routing enemy.
2. DON'T position your men more than 1/5th into the bridge
3. ALWAYS have your archers and artillery using flaming ammunition, they don't kill so much fewer enemies that it'll make any difference and the enemy will ALWAYS rout faster.
4. Enemy archers are annoying, but DON'T redirect archer fire or send troops over to kill them until the main enemy infantry force is routing.

For your army you can use a wide variety of troops, and in this case it's each man to his own, but you will need:

1. INFANTRY- to hold the bridge, I place my own infantry just a little way into the bridge, where they can soak up the initial charge without being pushed out of the bridge, and thus enabling them to get around my units. I find that Gondor spearmen are very able at doing this, especially in Guard mode, usually two units at a time will keep the enemy at bay while your archers etc will kill the majority of the enemy. I would reccommend having at least 6 units just in case things get out of hand (random routing of your own troops for example, this is the only reason you should EVER lose a bridge battle). However, standard Gondor militia have done just as well in the early game for me.
2. ARCHERS- the most important and usually the most destructive soldiers you'll have. You can have them on the edges of the shore or on the hill behind your troops, but I prefer to have them on the shore as this will cause a few more casualties, especially on the left flank, which is unshielded. Use flaming arrows. Any form of archers are fine, but Gondor archers have a higher missile attack value, though it doesn't really matter. Have at least 4, preferrably more units. NOTE: some people also use Pelargir marines to hurl their javelins into the flanks from the shore. This is fine, and will be particularly useful against armoured units as they are AP, however they aren't essential.
3. ARTILLERY- if you're struggling with high casualties, then this suggests you aren't using enough artillery, in such an enclosed space a single flaming catapult missile will easily kill 20 orcs. So Imagine having 3 or 4 units of them hurling flaming missiles of doom at the orcish scum. Ballista are also useful in the early game, but when you get the cats, use them instead.
4. CAVALRY- not essential, but can be useful to go and hunt down the routing orcs or to sally across and kill off the enemy archers quickly. I find that it's much better to completely annhiliate the enemy so that they have less troops to attack me with later on.

I hope this is helpful in some way, and it's just my own particular tactic, I'm sure there are plenty of people out there that would do things much differently than me. However, using these tactics I have easily slaughtered 4000+ orcs without losing more than 150 men (from my two infantry bridge units).

[illeria]

Also if you do have some fountain guard since they never rout its relatively good to have them defending bridges

[BohemianHussar]

Think this tactic as compatible with a silvan force? just wondering because i'm trying to save Gondor in my Silvan game and so far I'm in the process of taking W Osgiliath from Mordor.

At the moment its led by my king and a majority of my army is composed of 7 sentinels. Along with that there is 5 regiments of ents and 4 regiments of spears. Also 2 units of silvan horse archers. But I fear there might not be enough infantry to hold the bridge...

Any advice on how to adjust this tactic with a large elven archer force and ent force?

And will this tactic work with trolls? Because Mordor has already sicked the armored trolls on me.

[illeria]

lol are you kidding me dont sweat it man SE are quite EPIC
and there archers will mow down the enemy like there is no tom
dont worry you'll be fine

[Kawee]

lol are you kidding me dont sweat it man SE are quite EPIC
and there archers will mow down the enemy like there is no tom
dont worry you'll be fine

Just don't use your elite infantry to hold the line. They're harder to replace, so use them as backup. You'll need them much more in field battles when trolls and nazguls run wild. Forest wardens and silvan spearmen are what you should use to hold the line. And any archer will do, they all kick arse.

[Kauppaneuvos]

And here is some tactics.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

First tactic wont even require you to command your troops at the battle. Just place your units like that and watch how they pwn. And this is in VH/VH

Finished my Gondor-campaign some time ago and im not really eager to start a new one just to prove this works.

[Tuatha Mordred]

That's a nice pic right there. What unit size is that?

Just to spice it up a bit for the original-poster...

(1) Of stakes and such.
If you have stake-capable units, have them deploy as close to the bridge as possible without losing any stakes (you'll know what I mean when you mess around with it at troop-deployment). This will utterly neutralize any wargs they might have, provided they come at it at more than just walking pace. Do this even if they don't have wargs; the stakes break up the formations of the charging infantry, once they're over the bridge and about to clash lines with your infantry.

(2) Infantry placement.
Place infantry immaculately. Every bit of positioning can help save lives. I'm unsure as to how anally-retentive are you willing to go with this, so I'll just give the easier ones. Place infantry like so in that picture, like a U-around the mouth of the bridge. I usually give ample room for the enemy to form up in that little space that I allow for them. Why?

You know the whole TW series have always had some issues with pathfinding? Well, I find that the AI employs a different kind of pathing algorithm when a unit is considered to be on the bridge than when it's off. That little space allows for the unit to be considered off the bridge. In this state, morale acts as it should (it's all weird when on the bridge, in my experience). Also, in allowing for the little cul-de-sac, any unit that finds itself fresh off the bridge also finds itself suddenly surrounded on three sides. Huge morale hit. If you're willing to be a little Longshanks yourself, have your fire-archers rain down in that zone. Yes you may hit your own men, but it'll also have the enemy running very quickly.

(3) Cavalry... useless in a bridge fight?
I beg to differ. In fact, I dare say they're the hammerstroke in my bridge-battles. Especially if you've got a high-dread horseback general.

What I do is I kinda modify the U-shape. I pick a side, usually the enemy's right flank (unshielded), and leave that side unmanned by infantry so that it sort of becomes an L-shape. Now, as the enemy pours out from off the bridge, they start to smother your infantry lines. As orcs from behind push against the orcs clashing with your infantry, the latter orcs start to spill around the sides of your infantry line as they become increasingly packed. Now's the time. From a fair distance away, my high-dread general comes hurtling in and smacks into the general mass of bodies. Insta-rout.

So basically, modify your infantry-line, coax the enemy into spilling around your left infantry flank, then when you see the bodies as 'Shaken' due to the casualties and fire-arrows, send in your cavalry.

(4) Where to shoot?
On a regular stack, the enemy usually sends in their infantry first - give or take a few skirmishers/missiles. At the end of that, the general himself comes waltzing across. Up till the general comes, I usually get all my archers to concentrate fire on the very first unit, then the second, then the largest mass of body forming on the bridge. Why?

Routs are contagious. Being in the vicinity of a routed enemy unit is in itself a morale hit. This is what we're gunning for; by whittling the first two units to less-than-half size, you allow for your infantry to spend a shorter time to rout those units which will be the head of the column. It is important to not whittle them down too low with your archers cos then they'll rout too early. Ideally, you want them to rout as the the bodies mash, so all their buddies will be around to see when they break and run.

Since the purpose of these initial volleys is to cause casualties, I fire with non-fire arrows - faster shots, better accuracy = more kills per unit time. When the bodies pack and the aim switches to causing morale hits, switch to fire.

Now, the moment the enemy general comes into range, I immediately set all my archers on him and him only. The idea is to kill him, so use non-fire arrows. This is much more achievable with High Elves or Silvan Elves because their archers are so damned accomplished; if you're stuck with barely-making-it archers, just stick to fire-arrows-on-the-mass. If you do manage to kill him, him and all his +morale modifiers goes with him. This on top of the morale hit of losing the general usually means the entire mass breaks and runs.

(5) Strategy map preparations.
This one is not so well-known. I only discovered it myself when I played the High Elves. Imladris is located on an island of land surrounded by rivers. Which means bridges. Which means crazy bridge-battle fun.

Now, Imladris starts with no roads. Early in the game, an OotMM stack comes to greet the new neighbours. My measly 1 elven-infantry, 2 light-archers, 1 elven archer thought their bacons are cooked. But it's cool, let's give it a shot. What else is there, right?

Turns out, I won that fight with less than 50 casualties. It helped of course that the HE archers are, well, excellent. It also helped that even the entry-level infantry for the HE have awesome staying power. But what helped the most... is the lack of an actual bridge.

See, I haven't gotten around to building the roads for Imladris. Turns out that this was a brilliant move. No roads means no bridge. In battle, the enemy has to wade across rather than march across - and they do so at a snail's pace. Which is perfect for your killer archers.

In short, on the strategy map, if you're set on holding your frontier lines on a good bridge spot, think about the option of not building roads for that region.

(6) "Fear" troops.
Just a minor point... As the Elves, you get to recruit Ents in the Fangorn region. They've got this "Frightens nearby infantry" modifier. Just park them behind your infantry line. They don't actually have to do anything throughout the entire battle. Just stand there and look imposing.

I'm not sure if it actually makes any difference. That mod might kick in when they actually get to engage the enemy, maybe? Can anyone confirm this?

END

That's all I have for now. Hope people find it useful.

[Myshkin]

It will be easier for you to defend W.Osglieth than the bridge, but if you are really keen on defending the bridge, use cats.

[Gezoes]

Maybe less casualties defending the city, but should they get through at the bridge... you can still fall back onto the city and bring on reinforcements from Minas Tirith while they are sieging West-O. Loose West-O and they can break out.

[confused german]

Tuatha Mordred, you got some nice observations there!

Never really trixxed around with bridge formations, standard block-and-slaughter-with-ranged worked too well for me.

Of course, defending settlements it's usually possible to reach lower casualties than defending bridges, but i prefer bridges, cause it's pleases me evil side to see the enemy so tightly-packed while my fire rain!
dumdideldum dideldiddeldidium....

[k/t]

Some very reputable members have repeatedly said THERE ARE NO UNSHIELDED SIDES IN M2! Someone should post that in the FAQ so people will stop spreading misinformation.

[Hermes Trismegistos]

They are not totally unshielded but shield armour counts only 50% when attacked from the side (no matter which). Take a look at the Palantir unit guide.

EDIT: OK, I reread it to see which part you were talking about and you are right of course, left or right side makes no diference any more.

[Muffer Nl]

It will be easier for you to defend W.Osglieth than the bridge, but if you are really keen on defending the bridge, use cats.

You clearly do not know how to best exploit the M2TW AI.

[Myshkin]

You clearly do not know how to best exploit the M2TW AI.

It's called sally out baby. I clearly know exactly what I say.

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...40#post6357640 (55:782 kills, including two troll teams)

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...81#post6368181 (83:1829 kills, including a troll team and a nazghul general)

These are two random ordinary examples, nothing amazing. The best I had was 0:2000+ kills... all on VH/VH.

If you ever do 0:2000 on a bridge, let me know. Also no reason to be so emphatic.

As for the cats, a good placed cat just behind the line can even get over 500 kills on a bridge (on huge size).

HTH,
Mysh

[airborne guy]

It's called sally out baby. I clearly know exactly what I say.

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...40#post6357640 (55:782 kills, including two troll teams)

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...81#post6368181 (83:1829 kills, including a troll team and a nazghul general)

These are two random ordinary examples, nothing amazing. The best I had was 0:2000+ kills... all on VH/VH.

If you ever do 0:2000 on a bridge, let me know. Also no reason to be so emphatic.

As for the cats, a good placed cat just behind the line can even get over 500 kills on a bridge (on huge size).

HTH,
Mysh

What does sally out mean?