Siege Towers VS Ladders

[Ippius]

Is it just me or do siege towers just suck when compared to ladders...I mean whenever I'm sieged the seige tower always burns down (as opposed to the ram) and further more, when the units board in ladders, they have more chance of doing more damage to my men on the walls than the ones on the siege tower...This is totally the opposite of RTW...

[parvus]

guys with ladders get pwnd by missiles

[Mb Perseus]

Yeah, ladder do get destroyed by missle fire as parvus said, but all you have to do to fend off a ladder attack is position any unit except maybe crossbow militia in 3 deep ranks where the ladders are going up and they will kill whatever is coming over the walls because they pretty much come one by one, units using ladders also seem to rout extremely easily. Only problem I have with seige towers is when they start to burn when 3/4's of my unit is climbing up it and boom I'm left with 12 dismounted knights out of 60. When siege towers do get to walls and you get men out your hitting the walls with like 6 men to start, they can usually get a good base and hold thier own for a bit, if your trying to take a well defended wall with seige towers I'd say you use three to cut the enemy forces into peics and destroy them.

[CtrlAltDe1337]

This is what I've found to be the most effective use of ladders/towers.



Send the ladder to the portion of wall farthest from the gate and the tower to the closest section. The ladder will arive first and distract the defenders while you troops in the tower pour into their flank and capture the gatehouse.

[Soulghast]

This is what I've found to be the most effective use of ladders/towers.



Send the ladder to the portion of wall farthest from the gate and the tower to the closest section. The ladder will arive first and distract the defenders while you troops in the tower pour into their flank and capture the gatehouse.

This could work, but the problem of the guy is that his siege towers are getting burnt when nearing the walls.

If it goes to the gatehouse, which has 2 towers, I don't think that there is much chance that the tower won't get burnt down.

And I think that ladders cannot be used in some higher level walls, correct me if I'm wrong.

[parvus]

true, but i kno that ladders can be used against lvl 3 citadel walls.

[Ippius]

ok...maybe I've been positioning the siege towers in the incorrect places...but they still do burn a lot more quickly than i would imagine...

[boerekovic]

Is it just me or do siege towers just suck when compared to ladders...I mean whenever I'm sieged the seige tower always burns down (as opposed to the ram) and further more, when the units board in ladders, they have more chance of doing more damage to my men on the walls than the ones on the siege tower...This is totally the opposite of RTW...

Lies, its just like RTW.
its quite cool that CA didnt change much of the Battle gameplay

[shazam]

i dont get it when my troops see a ladder i want them just to push the ladder off lool make all thos trooop climbing fall of into a horable death

[Strategos83]

Crucifix - Ive usually found that when following for your tactic my siege tower attracts all the missile fire (since its closest to the double towers of the gatehouse) and eventually burns up, thereby acting as a decoy so that most of my ladder guys get up and over unscathed.
Of course the guys stuck with the burning siege tower usually take alot of casualties either retreating or running over to the ladders..

[Saiah]

My tactic is get the ram first, then I send one siege tower between two ladders to get some protection (depens if i'm lucky). Then, bam!! Rest is history.

[CtrlAltDe1337]

Crucifix - Ive usually found that when following for your tactic my siege tower attracts all the missile fire (since its closest to the double towers of the gatehouse) and eventually burns up, thereby acting as a decoy so that most of my ladder guys get up and over unscathed.
Of course the guys stuck with the burning siege tower usually take alot of casualties either retreating or running over to the ladders..

If you do that on both sides they wont be able to burn both towers unless they have balista towers.

[Gorrrrrn]

ladders can't be used against huge city walls.

huge city walls plus cannon / ballista towers and good quality infantry should repel the most determined attackers.

provided you have a bunch of cavalry handy to destroy any artillery that gets within range of the walls.

I found that dismounted crusader knights were very effective at repelling egyptian spear militia. stand them 3 deep where the siege engine / ladders (if applicable) are placed and they see the attackers off with hardly any casualties. Defended jerusalem with a danish force, 1100 attackers and defenders. losses: attackers 1100, defenders 17.

attacking - well use artillery to open up the walls. (protected - i have known the AI to sally forth to attack bombards etc). have ram and siege tower in front of main gate but run infantry and archers with ladders (if you can) round the sides in the hope of finding an unprotected wall.

when attacking: If in doubt - sit it out!

[Garnier]

I dont fight castle battles. If I get besieged, I autoresolve the defence cause I know I will beat the AI in any situation, since they always get stuck somewhere. And when I am attacking, I always wait the siege out, and autoresolve when they sally. I used to play siege battles, but they are stupid. The AI will have a "garrison" of 2 cavalry units or somesuch, so I send my ladder up, take the gate, run 4 units of spears into the townsquare, and the battle is over.

[parvus]

gunpowder units r soooooo useful...

[Ippius]

I think ladders can be used against citadel walls BUT can't be used against Huge City walls. Doesn't matter though, basilisks pwn any wall.

[Long John Silver]

I don't use siege towers or battering rams at all.

I use spies to open the gates, ladders and catapults (later cannons).

First, the catapults will drive all archers off the walls (or shoot them off).

Then, my infantry goes through the gate and wall breaches, while my archers use the ladders to get on the walls and fire their arrows from above at the enemys fighting my infantry.

[Commander_Vimes]

i agree with long john just blow the wall apart from the distance with catapults or something or justuse a spy by the way how come when you do a sally battle the enemy bother coming in ever at all??

[Snipafist]

With the tougher defenses, it really pays to bring along some siege engines, thank god. In RTW, siege engines were pretty darn pointless. Anyways, I see ladders as the thing to bring along to overwhelm a tiny garrison. Siege towers are for when you're willing to build for 2-3 turns to ensure you completely overwhelm a tougher defense. Building 1-2 towers and a handful of ladders doesn't work well, as the towers get burned up by arrows and the ladders get there before the towers, so your attack is disjointed. One or the other, says I.

[parvus]

its also quite necessary to get a couple of gunpowder seige units