Burning siege equipment

[ammo1369]

I could never do it. Always use flaming arrows with a bunch of archers and still can't even damage any siege equipment. Does anyone have any tips for this?

[Adamat]

Get ballista towers.

[ammo1369]

Right. What about early period?

[Adamat]

Make sure the normal towers are firing and hope you get lucky.

[Duncan III]

Archers can be effective- try to double up, ideally with something better than peasants- with siege towers, keep raining fire when they're at the walls- nothing better than lighting a tower full of DFK and torching the lot.

[totalwar_legend]

The angle with which you fire at is important. If you have archers firing up into the air, you might as well just forget it. Try to get them in a position that they can fire straight at the siege equipment. There is never a guarantee it will work there. There is a tiny percentage for each arrow that hits to ignite it. You could set it on fire with the first hit, or miss 1000 times. Luck plays an important part.

[Highlander of Scotland]

yeah also cannon towers are good because they do huge damage and have huge range

[Vampiresbane]

The other thing I do if I'm in real trouble if the siege makes it to the walls (and I have a spare calvary unit) is have the calvary unit sally out, attack the soldiers manning the tower/ram, they'll drop the siege weapon, giving me more time to torch it.

Unfortunately due to a somewhat buggy siege system, the AI almost never reclaims their tower so I try not to attack siege towers in this manner, mainly rams. Also I have never set ladders on fire (doubt it's even possible).

Want to know the best way to kill siege towers? Mortars.
Granted this doesn't help you early game, but Mortars are better than fire arrows, trebuchets, ballista towers, and cannon towers. Why? They are one of the few things that can effectively attack siege towers that have made it all the way to your walls, they rip towers apart, and typically destroy the tower when the opposing troops have all gathered inside.

[Iapetus]

Is there any way to destroy ladders?

[Avatar]

Is there any way to destroy ladders?

No, but an effective way to deter ladder troops, other than a waiting line of swords at the top of the wall, is a cavalry sortie as described above. If its the early stages of a campaign and you don't have super strong wall defences, sending a cavalry unit out of a side gate and sweeping around can cause havoc with troops trying to carry ladders.

[Iapetus]

That's what I usually do. (In fact, cavalry sorties tend to be my prefered anti-siege tactic. Especially if the enemy has lots of light infantry and is still sieging rather than attacking).

However, Ihad hoped there was a way to actually destroy the ladders, as destroying all siege equipment causes them to abandon the siege itself.

[Sitalkes]

You will find some useful tips here: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...php?p=12220924 the Medieval Total War Settlements and Sieges guide