Failing horrifically at siege battles (FoTS)

[Toasty Fresh]

I can't win a siege as attacker, ever. I have a unit of Parrott guns, riflemen, spear levy and katana kachi. My melee units often rout before even getting to the walls or rout soon after reaching the top. Riflemen can't really do much other than sit outside the walls taking potshots until they rout as well. And my cannons are completely useless, and cannot hit anything at all.

I'm surely missing the point here. I can win battles with the odds against me in an open field, but even if I outnumber them in sieges I'll usually lose.

Also, for the sake of argument, naval bombardment is out of the question.

[M2TWRocks]

1) "A unit of parrot guns" Not enough...you need at least 4-6 in a siege to have any impact on the battle.

2) Other option is to wait out siege and starve them out.

The only effective way to win siege battles in FotS is to blow them to pieces with either massed cannon or naval barrage.

[gaunty14]

Having riflemen/sharpshooters (whatever they're called) works wonders as well providing the enemy don't have them as well. Place them just outside enemies musket/arrow range and let them pepper the enemies on the walls to pieces.

Slightly noobish but meh CA seiges have never been "clean" fights.

[O'Hea]

You just need to mass your fire at the point where you want to break through. The one advantage you have over the defenders on the wall is that you can have multiple units firing upwards against only one, thinly-stretched unit firing down- run three or four line infantry and maybe some sharpshooters up against one section of wall and watch how fast you can clear it. Massing artillery to punch holes in the crenelations just speeds things along, sieges are perfect for Killing Zone, shrapnel is super effective- you really shouldn't have any trouble if you have enough guns and know how to concentrate your forces.

[Alpedar]

Do you play with battle time limit?
Without time limit you can use all cannon ammo then all sharpshooters' ammo and then waltz in. (If anything is left)
I don't play with time limit, so I don't know how much it is pressing.

And in general, don't expect to win against odds in siege attack (unless you come extremely well equipped, like armstrongs and tosa riflemen and with general and adviser that increase ammo.

Which remainds me, if you can, get this combo, with more ammo artilery and sharpshooters/Tosa riflman is even more deadly in siege.

[Ceorl84]

Castle Sieges as the attacker are very difficult. The AI pathing is terrible and the defender morale advantages make every fight a bloodbath. If you're going to undertake them take advantage of the AI's poor unit placements (avoid charging garrisoned walls if you can help it) and tendency to garrison the lower castle tiers where the defenders can route and have troops in place to slaughter them before they retreat into the morale perfect keep. Artillery is also very useful as a wall buster in order to get the absurd, but very damaging, rag doll death animations.

Spread your troops out to cover to attack as many gates as possible. I suggest not climbing the walls since I believe most units suffer a melee penalty along with some awful pathfinding issues. Exhaust your arty ammo before doing anthing else. When your units reach the top of the gate the AI will generally attempt to sally. Fall back to the base of the gate and then attack with superior #s. Make sure to capture arrow towers, take your time, and rinse and repeat the gate tactic so long as you're not under severe gunfire. Finally, don't forget you can always try and capture the keep. It's tough to do, but if you've got enough men compared to the defender, particularly ninja, its doable.

[AngryTitusPullo]

If you can't win as attacker then just siege and wait for them to come out.

[6Bagheera9]

Two parrot/armstrong are sufficient, but you can manage with just one if the garrison is not too strong. First thing to do is place your artillery such that it can hit all the walls/gates/towers you intend to destroy. Next I work my way through said targets, I tend to prioritize walls and gates defended by troops as you can kill off an entire unit when they collapse. After that I take out towers and gates along my primary assault path and then if I have any ammo left shell the troops in the courtyards.

Next you should send in skirmishers/bow kachi to clear the walls guarding your approach. Now I would begin my coup de main leading with my riflemen with katana/yari kachi close behind. Once the riflemen start shooting it out with the remaining defenders, I charge in with the kachis and set fire to towers/gates as needed. Traditional units are simply better in melee than modern ones and even having 2-3 Kachi in an otherwise modern army greatly helps in assaults. You can swap them for guards or foreign troops as they become available. You want to keep moving towards the capture point and never linger in lower courtyards where you can easily get shot to pieces. This is one of reasons I shell gates in advance.

Beyond this general set of tactics, there are also a few special tricks that can see you through. First is taking manually controlling artillery, you can hit targets much more accurately and and greater than the stated maximum range when manually controlling them. You could call this an exploit, but it does take some skill and you don't get nearly as great volume of fire. Next is naval bombardment, the biggest problem that you normally encounter when using it in field battles is that if they enemy isn't pinned down then they can scatter to avoid it. In a siege battle they'll have nowhere to run and you can devastate entire sections of their fortress with one barrage. Make sure to use it before opening up with your field guns to avoid wasting the barrages on lone or already bloodied targets. The final tip is to attack from two directions if your forces are about twice as numerous as his. You can use identical forces for each avenue of attack, ranged units in one and melee in the other, or simply try to sneak in some ninja. Your opponent will either have to split his forces to cover both directions, in which case you can press the most promising one and simply threaten the other, or he can focus on one of them and allow you to work towards the central courtyard unopposed from one direction.

[nonja121]

Some great advice here. Before I give my two cents, just remember that modern military knowledge states that you'll need three times as many troops as the defenders have to take a fortified and defended position. Now, I'm not in the military, nor is this a hard-and-fast military sim. But my point is that you're going to take massive casualties as the attacker no matter what if the enemy force isn't horribly outnumbered.

That being said, you should probably avoid fighting an undiminished enemy in a siege. Continuing the siege usually coaxes the enemy into sallying forth. This is the best case scenario. If you do have to assault a castle, however, I suggest bringing in specialized troops. Like others said, bring in multiple cannons and traditional melee units and bow units to fire over the walls at idle troops or commanders. Usually, I'll have a separate half stack of units that I'll swap in during a siege scenario. Sucks to pay the extra upkeep and seldom use them, but it's better than breaking your field army on the walls of some diamyo's castle.

When you deploy, try to deploy your troops and artillery on multiple sides of the castle so you can get as many men on the walls as possible while reducing the amount of safe areas the defenders have from your cannons. Exhaust your artillery and rifle ammo before committing your troops to the walls.

Also, screen your melee troops with line infantry. You want as few casualties as possible in the units who are trying to take the walls. When your melee units are taking the walls, have your bows firing at any idle defenders to thin their numbers. Don't forget to bring your general up to give a morale boost if it's not too dangerous.

Lastly, use naval bombardments when possible.

Unfortunately, however, sieges are meat-grinders. If you're going up against a similar number of troops, you're going to take massive casualties in the best-case scenario. Avoid them unless you have numerical superiority or have no other choice.

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[6Bagheera9]

Its possible to take a citadel with a large garrison if you have naval bombardments, multiple cannons, and sufficient skirmishers/melee troops. It will take about an hour in real time, but it can be done. Trick is to be patient and through, the naval bombardments can even make it a cakewalk if they are big enough. I have not tried assaulting a star fortress in the campaign, so I don't know how bad that might be.

[Junaidi83 de Bodemloze]

direct confrontation is no no , remeber siege castle in fots is bloody things since they dont rout easy like in open battle , also your unit get slayed before even reach the enemy ,since most of them is line infantry unit, go siege if you have a lot of cannon like parrot or armstrong 3-4 is enough to massacre, or you have full stack army vs less garrsion unit (number dont tell lie), or go trying trap enemy by using ambush i always do like that , first i send 1 unit cavaly for mobility near their city , in front of it i put my real army in full stack hidden near forest waiting to intercept , enemy ai think i only bring 1 cavalry meh "easy battle" and move their entire army from city right to bait and get slayed in ambush , win that and i can easy rolling into their city only fough less garrison and its easy win

ps : be sure use ambush mod for making ambush is real ambush ,very-very deadly , vanilla ambush is pathetic , ai always have time to prepare and go hide in top of hill very very frustating

[Alpedar]

Another thing, geisha can distract garrison so (unless there is enough regular units) you will face smaller army.

[Tephros]

Collapse walls and gates that are guarded with cannon. Sharpshooters kill survivors. bows kill those in courtyard. Burn unguarded gates and rush in with kachi. Avoid climbing when possible. Very few casualties.