Siege battles a bloody mess?

[jahjeremy]

How costly are typical siege battles supposed to be in this mod?

I am okay with losing some troops, maybe even a lot of them. But it seems like any of my troops in a siege that go over the walls with ladders or siege towers and hit decent infantry on the walls just run into a buzz saw and get shredded to pieces. They are liable to lose half or more of their strength. All other things being equal, what is the recommended number of men to have in a siege battle in order to outnumber the enemy? 2:1? 3:1? I just hate it when my elite infantry gets turned into a bloody mess, and there's not much to do about it. I think it may have something to do with the very high defense scores of many of the heavy infantry units, in the 18-20 range, which, considering that most infantry units have an attack of 2-3 and generally not more than about 6 or 7 at the most, seems to be quite a high value (can't say for sure as I don't know all the details of the dmg formula). And in any castle settlement past the little fort, the towers hurt quite a lot, too.

I prefer open field battles for this very reason. I can use maneuver, missile troops, or cavalry in different ways. It is fun, and if I lose, I know at least I was able to use some different tactics. But it isn't always possibly to arrange to "greet" most of your enemy's forces in this way. Straight up siege battles are just plain frustrating to me.

Thoughts?

[Ichon]

Search on siege battles... there have been many past threads about this. Siege battles aren't always the most fun but after awhile as you understand AI weaknesses siege battles become easier and shouldn't cost more than a field battle except in middle game before you get many cannons but the cities are upgraded and its hard to reach the inner courtyard without fighting through the entire city and breaking several gates.

Do remember that fewer cities fell to assault than treachery or surrender. There was a reason to build castles- so even if the defender could probably win he will likely take many more casualties than the defenders. I don't think this plays out very well in the game actually but ohwell, use spies, assault from many directions, exploit AI pathfinding and defense scripted issues and sieges become quite predictable and more boring than field battles.

[Dahoota]

A few things that might help.

Remember troops coming up ladders to mass melee-oriented infantry are ALWAYS vulnerable and will often lose 50%+ of the unit before establishing a foothold. Siege towers are usually a better option, although they are slower and vulnerable to missile fire.

Use spies. Get some cavalry and come through an alternate (unguarded) gate while the main assault is taking place, preferably after your units have started engaging the enemy on the walls. The AI will often try to abandon the walls once you get in, breaking up their defense of the walls and letting you target and isolate their retreating units. Sometimes you may even be able to take the city centre if you are lucky.

As Ichon said, this has come up a lot in most M2TW forums. Perhaps also try searching the vanilla M2TW general discussion forum as well.

[Jean=A=Luc]

Siege battles a bloody mess?

As they should be.

[Hadrian I]

As they should be.

Ah, the Fallout 1 & 2 perk, It brings up the nostalgi in me,
they are alot better then the lousy "RPG" shoot'em Fallout 3 from Bethesda.
They really disappointed me, compaired to their eailer games, Morrowind & Oblivion.

[merocaine]

A little advice.

Make sure you outnumber the enemy at least 2 to 1, faint attacks to draw troops off a wall, then attack the undefended wall. Use your sword and shield infantry to gain the wall, then get them off it as quick as you can and on to the city street, the arrows from the towers will quickly wear you down.

Send up missile troops as reinforcements, Leave them on the wall to provide fire support to your infantry within the walls. Your attack will draw in more AI units, as soon as another wall is left undefended attack it in the same method, sword and shield first, as soon as there off the wall send up your missile troops to consolidate your position. At this point the gate should have fallen to your battering ram, but don't rush your men in yet (that hot oil), once you get enough men onto the walls the AI will retreat to the town square, as they do send in your troops at the gate. Once your in the city things get easier, use your missile troops to wear down the defenders, when your out of arrows send in your elite infantry to finish the AI off. Expect high loses among your initial assaulters, but loses should tail off quickly once you get you missile troops on the walls.

[webba84]

Another simple tactic is to have a couple of skirmish units with ladders deploy near a wall section as far away as possible from your main force (usually the top inside corners of the u shaped deployment zone) as a diversion. The AI will always deploy troops on the walls there to guard against you even when your peasants just stand there out of range doing nothing which means your main assault has a much easier time facing only part of the enemy force. When you main assault gets a foothold on the wall (for the main assault I usually go for siege towers in the center with ladders on the edges) the troops that were left to hold the walls will run over to support the defenders at your main assault which means your skirmishers are then free to climb the walls unmolested, open gates for cavalry, perform flanking attacks and so on. Concentrate your forces while forcing the defender to spread his out. Works wonderfully.