How do you garrison your forts?

[Saibot42]

Do you give them enough troops to hold out, or do you just drop in a skeleton crew to act as early warning and waste an enemy turn?

[Duck of Death]

It depends on how much income I have every turn.
At the begining, when money is usually tight, ill just put 1-2 units in forts, like you say, as early warning at key choke points on the map.

Later in the game when i can afford to put 15+ full armies in the feild, then ill garrison the most dangerous forts with those armies.

I played a Byzantine campaign where i had 75% of the old empire recreated... had 26-28 legions (full armies) stationed at forts around my frontier... then 3 main armies to take new areas with.

[Melooo182]

When I share a frontier with an enemy I'm not actively waging war, I like to construct a series of forts not too distant from each other making sure they can block bridges and other passages, almost all of these forts have a skeleton crew, usually consisting of a cheap militia or peasants unit others i leave empty with an agent (diseased spies are good for a trap) preventing the fort from being abandoned, then I have a small army for "making rounds" around the area, serving both for dealing with brigands and providing support in case an attack comes...this is in case the bulk of my army is busy somewhere else of course.

Ive also used skeleton crewed forts for delaying enemy reinforcements to a city im laying siege on.

I guess i almost never leave a full stack army in a fort unless is defending the single pass from where my enemies could come or im invading and then use forts to create some sort of secure beach head for my next waves. This was particularly useful in a spanish campaign were I controlled most of western europe and was invading by sea the holy lands which was filled with several mongol full stacks.

[Harakan]

i usually play like Ducky, with the small and cheap army as a warning.
later in the game i tend to have forts with a full army at a frontier with an enemy i am not at war with. so if a war should arise, i will already have an army out there and i dont need to have a general out there the whole time until then. having the full stack in a fort makes them not turn to rebels, which might happen if i just leave the army out there without a fort.
this way i can keep my generals in the castles (fortesses, citadels) and just put them out in the field when a war takes place