Frustrating siege battle

[Ozymandias Maximus]

First off, I'm loving Attila. I really don't want to be another guy complaining as I'm overall having a lot of fun, but this really irritated me!

Playing as Saxons. At war with the Franks. I'm attacking a settlement, I don't remember exactly the name, but somewhere in Gaul. It's a walled settlement. I'm attacking with 2 full stack armies against their 1 stack that took heavy casualties in a previous battle and the town garrison.

In deployment, I split my first stack army and attack from 2 fronts while waiting for my 2nd stack to reinforce and attack from a 3rd front. In my first stack, I had several onagers and archers and I had hoped to inflict as much settlement damage with them as possible and have my melee and cav hold back to protect the ranged units until my reinforcements arrived. Then when the 2nd stack consisting of more powerful melee and cav shows up, move in both armies and attack from 3 fronts. That was the plan anyway.

Battle starts, the enemy immediately sallies forth 100% of their troops to attack my first stack in the field. I probably had a poorly balanced army with too many archers and onagers and not enough melee and cav, but I didn't expect that move from them. My split first stack was overwhelmed and routs. I did manage to do a fair amount of settlement damage and inflict some casualties, but my first stack was pretty much obliterated. Possibly a great strategic move by the ai to take advantage of my infantry weak forces and overwhelm my archers and onagers. I was actually sort of impressed that I got my butt kicked in such a manner.

Anyways, here's where it gets ridiculous. My 2nd army continues to march in on the opposite side of the city. What does the enemy do? Forms up lines in the middle of the field where they smashed my first army. My 2nd stack smashed through the gate easily and marched into the city unopposed. The enemy sat there in the field, outside their own walls and waited for me to meet them. That counts as a victory to me as I hold the settlement and they are picking grass in the field outside. But they aren't moving and unless I go meet them in the field, I have to wait for the hour battle timer to expire as it appears in Attila, there is no auto victory for holding the town square. Even on 3x speed, it takes a million years to get the battle timer to expire.

What the heck is that? They abandon the settlement and I have an entire army standing in their town square. How is that not a victory?
Well I got tired of waiting so I marched my army out to meet them and eventually beat them, but took heavy casualties in the process. Dumbest battle I've ever personally played in a total war game.

[Aeratus]

Actually, TW Attila does have a countdown system upon capture of the city during battle.

But, did you take all the victory points or just the town square? Taking the town square alone does not start the countdown. You need to take all victory points. Large cities will have multiple victory points besides the center town square.

[Ozymandias Maximus]

Destroyed every tower and captured every point I saw. How long is the countdown? I never saw one initiated. Maybe I missed a point? I sat there with the game on 3x speed for a few minutes and got bored and just marched out to finish the battle.


Even if that's the case though, it was still stupid for them to march their entire army out of a walled settlement and just form up lines in the field while I march an army into their city.

[Butan]

Sounds like a BAI flaw: if AI sally out from camp/settlement it switches to open battle schemes.

Maybe bait him with some ranged so that he tries to march inside the settlement perimeter toward you.

[Aeratus]

Countdown is 150 seconds. Maybe you missed a capture point. Towers are not capture point and are not required to be destroyed to start a countdown.

[Riekopo]

The capture points are the things that look like Pokeballs. In my opinion the AI should never run its troops out of the city during a siege battle. If they want to fight a field battle then they should use the "sally forth" option and fight a field battle.

[Butan]

The capture points are the things that look like Pokeballs. In my opinion the AI should never run its troops out of the city during a siege battle. If they want to fight a field battle then they should use the "sally forth" option and fight a field battle.

I agree with you absolutely. While its easier for an army to be assured it is "superior" and sally out when it is around the settlement, I believe the army superiority detection should be restricted to "sally forth" or not battles, and if not stick in defense.

The problem that way is that if the sally forth detector isnt up to par, its possible that a standing siege defense AI would lose a battle that it wouldnt have on an open field battles, especially if it has a ranged/artillery inferiority.

[Emperor Arcturus Mengsk]

Oh also I think they are 100% running out of the city to greet you if you have 1 army reinforcing, it doesn't matter what the setup is... so I don't think the AI saw it could take your onager heavy army

It happens to me too even when my first army is like 12 germanic spearmen-4 archers-2 cav-1 onager, they just run out and suicide onto my spear wall. . . .

In general siege ai is still tragic, you can win EVERY battle if you have the timer on when defending by running outside of the settlement and hiding your troops in the woods in the edge of the map...

I tested it and the ai just sits around the settlement waiting.

It's not any fun though and pointless as it's abusing the very weak BAI. But hey that's what the game has to offer right now.

Unfortunately, the BAI can't handle line of sight like a player can.

[Emperor Arcturus Mengsk]

I think there's a countdown only for the province capitals, the unwalled settlements don't have a timer just morale boosting capture points, even if you upgrade them with walls they probably still don't have it?