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Thread: When the city gate breaks

  1. #1

    Default When the city gate breaks

    On defense I'm not sure what the best plan is when my city gate gets busted open. Do I rush the gate and meet them 1/2 way inside it or keep all my troops just outside the opening and wait for them to come in and swarm them? I don't like to see the "you lost the building" message when I let them press me, but I don't think there's usually anybody left in tower range anyway at that point.

    Kind of a follow up, but do I want high attack or high defense troops holding the line? Defense makes sense, what with being on defense, but with my archers up on the walls I don't think I get much benefit holding them to get flaming arrows rained on them if they can't hit them, or attack, where as ideally the faster I kill them the faster they hopefully cause a chain rout.

  2. #2
    Member Member General Zhukov's Avatar
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    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    I prefer to leave a "pocket" for the invaders to fill just inside the gate, so spearmen can surround and poke that pocket. Also, archers on unthreatened walls near the gate can turn and pepper the pocket from above. The preferred unit for containing the pocket is a heavy armor unit with a shield, like Saracen Militia (which are also spearmen).

    Of course, when enemy arty starts making its own gates in your walls, its time for another set of tactics.


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  3. #3

    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    I always have a unit of crack infantry, usually two, waiting RIGHT inside the gate. I place them so there's no room to actually come out of the gate into the city without having to punch through my infantry. Preferably, this unit of infantry is something with long weapons like pikes or halberds (Janissary Heavies *wink wink*) that can push the attackers back and hold them in the gatehouse.

    Usually, you can defeat an entire attacking army with only a couple units of infantry this way. A better way to do it is have the infantry hold the attackers in the gateway while you circle around with cavalry to throw them into the attacker's rear. They'll be cornered in the gatehouse, and all of them will instantly turn to 'fighting to the death' and get killed fast.

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    Maximizer of Marginal Utility Member Snoil The Mighty's Avatar
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    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    Depends a bit on both where and when. Early to mid-game, and even late game if they catch me "behind the lines", a bunch of the free upkeep militia and at least two units of missiles meets most needs. I meet em directly at the gate with a blob cheap units but which nonetheless do a-ok in confined quarters like that, and while that's going on rain death from above in the form of missiles from towers and archers on walls. If they catch me with a ballista in-house, it's a great door-prize BTW There are of course circumstances which this basic design doesn't hold, say like frontline cities starting midgame, but it works under most circumstances I encounter, and those frontline cities always have the heavier hitters which do basically as above but even more effectively. On the odd accaision I do get hit behind the lines by a large and competent army late in the game, the cheap militia units, and missiles from towers and archers almost always wreak way more damage than the enemy is able to sustain long term and thus weakened make it easy to retake.

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    Masticator of Oreos Member Foz's Avatar
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    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    I've had good success lining up a few good units about even with the spot where the building of the settlement begin so that they completely block the road through town. If necessary to make them fit, park them just on the wall side of the buildings. This leaves the fairly wide road along the wall as a clear lane for 2 cav units that I arrange one on each side. As the enemy infantry pours in they should engage the heavies directly in front of them. Once they are committed, I charge my heavy cavalry in from the the flanks. Being charged on two fronts at once while already engaged on a third tends to shred whatever unit(s) it is that came in the gate in an awful hurry. If need be, reset the cav units and repeat.


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    Man-at-Arms Member Dave1984's Avatar
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    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    Yeah I always block all possible entry with spear units of guard mode, with cavalry parked up nearby to smash into anyone who breaks in if the going gets tough for the first line of defence.

  7. #7
    Supreme Ruler of the Universe Member FrauGloer's Avatar
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    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    I usually leave a pocket in U-form, with a high-defence-unit (like Armoured Swordsmen or Dism. Imperial Knights) in the center and a heavy-hitting unit (preferably Dism. Gothic Knights or equivalent) on either side to charge the engaged enemy in the flanks. Due to abysmal pathfinding inside town, those "charges" won't work right most of the time, but when they do, they almost certainly cause a rout.

    In MTW, I loved having one unit of Swiss Armoured Pikemen holding a gate and butchering everyone. When I tried this in M2TW, I was appalled: My unit of Scots Noble Pikemen right in front of the gate was imediately breached and destroyed to the last man. I don't think they killed more than 10 enemies!
    I'm actually quite confused why so many people on these boards like pikemen so much. I ran a few test battles, and once, a comlpletely braced Noble Pikemen unit (112 men) was wiped out by one General's bodyguard (31 men) charging them head-on in a street!!! The surviving bodyguards even went ahead and brought another unit of pikes down to half strength before they finally broke. I was like WTF?!?!
    Last edited by FrauGloer; 01-12-2007 at 13:24.
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    Member Member darklite's Avatar
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    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    Really depends on numbers attacking versus my own defending.

    My usual frontline cities will have two-three spear militia solely for the gates, and two heavy cavalry (lance wielding preferably). The spearmen will attack and hold the gatehouse when the gate is broken. Usually cavalry units will make it past the spearmen in the initial rush, so I use one unit of cavalry to mop them up. The last unit is either to rush from the side if my defense is breaking, or to move out of a side gate to hopefully attack from the rear once they're fully committed. (aiming at either the general, or taking the gatehouse troops from the rear)

    Lastly if I can afford it I'll have one heavy swordsmen unit reading to help the spearmen blocking the gate. But honestly I can rarely afford the extra unit. The cavalry already make this expensive enough of a defense, but they've saved so many cities, especially when my gates have been opened by spies.

    Personally I can't stand pikes, unless they're fully upgraded. I find they're slaughtered by any modern infantry unit, and while cavalry are a threat, their charges can be stopped in the gatehouse by the spear militia.

    Lastly I'll have my general unit close to the gatehouse (but not attacking), simply because its these units that need the morale modifier the most. Those on the walls already have enough bonuses as it is. The troops on the ground benefit the most from his/her presence.

    Note (1). The morale banner unit of the Italian states is an excellent gate defender. Park the unit right at the gates, and the actual equipment will block the gate, allowing only small numbers of enemies through. Trebs also work this way, although for some reason, the AI is more likely to destroy the treb if its in the way.

    Note (2) Archer spikes. England and few other archer units (Turks I think) have the ability to plant stakes. I'd recommend trying to plant stakes as close to the gatehouse as possible from the wall. As said before your troops on the wall already have the advantage, so the stakes are best used against the units milling around outside the gatehouse trying to push their way in, & reinforcements waiting to the side. They can do some nifty damage.

    Note (3) Those Eastern units (I know Egypt & Turks get them, not sure about other eastern factions) with the fire grenades are awesome for gate defense. just put one or two units at the top of the gatehouse (I like having two units, one for either side), and fire away. Awesome unit. Just try to give them an armour upgrade.

  9. #9

    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    Depending on the amount I am overnumbered (it is always the case because all my forces are for attack ;)):

    - Not too many enemies: I form a U with the side made of cavalry if possible. I let them attack my central unit and charge the sides.

    - If they are really too many, the first strategy does not work because you are not squeezing 1 unit but each of your unit faces at least 1 enemy unit and they don't feel surrounded this way. In this case it is pretty disperate, but I try to block the entry directly, not allow them to surround me (it is a forced 1vs1). I place some archers on the walls and after a while I charge from the outside with cavalry. The combination of combat+arrows+charges accumulates the malus on their morale and there is a chance that they flee. If they don't flee you lost, but if they flee they are just fresh meat for your cavalry.

    Stéphane

  10. #10
    Member Member General Zhukov's Avatar
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    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    Am I the only one that doesn't usually use castle units (swords, cav) to defend sieges? Certainly not in cities. I assumed discussion of the most effective way to use militia units would have the widest usefullness.


    For every shadow, no matter how deep, is threatened by morning light. - Izzi, The Fountain

  11. #11
    Ranting madman of the .org Senior Member Fly Shoot Champion, Helicopter Champion, Pedestrian Killer Champion, Sharpshooter Champion, NFS Underground Champion Rhyfelwyr's Avatar
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    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    Schiltron spearmen in a U-shape around the gate hold very well. Pikes are great at holding wall breaches.
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  12. #12
    Relentless Bughunter Senior Member FactionHeir's Avatar
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    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    Depends on your attacker's units. I usually in defending against an assault set up a bubble in front of the gate the attacker comes from. This looks kind of like

    XXXXGGXXXX
    ----P---P----
    ------P------
    ----S---S----

    Where P are spears and S are swords. Sometimes the S can be spears too, depending on your force.
    If you got javelin infantry (not cavalry as those friendly fire too often), place em behind the bubble or on the walls (except if the enemy takes your walls using ladders/towers)

    This way the enemy is limited in the number of troops he can send through and a lot of crowding prevents his troops from getting through effectively due to a few laggers holding them back. This also allows you to assault the enemy from both flanks and the front and is fairly airtight (move in second row if your first row dies too quickly) It is detrimental to enemy morale and also stops significant hoardes of cav getting in at all. Just make sure your general is nearby to boost your morale or the enemy by sheer weight of numbers will kill your morale.

    If your enemy is mainly having sword or halberd units, you probably don't want to try holding him at the gates but crowd all your units in the townsquare. Why? Because they NEVER rout in the square and your enemy has to take it.
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  13. #13

    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    I use a formation of spears shaped like this \__/. It is a little cup that the enemy will soon fill with their dead. I put the general nearby unless he is the ONLY cavalry unit I have.

    Next I always put any cavalry at a side gate. Once the ram starts ramming, I begin to move the Cav out of the city and towards the outside of the gate. Once the gate is down and the majority of the enemies are battling in the Cup O' Death, I charge the rear with my cav. Even a crappy mounted sgt unit can often cause a chain route.

  14. #14
    Member Member Kraggenmor's Avatar
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    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    Like everyone else, I try to either jam the gate or form the pocket depending on what the attacking army has coming at me.

    The only variant I do to this is:

    If the enemy has siege artillery

    and I am defending a settlement which has a gated inner keep type of area.

    then I will pull all troops back to that gated area.

    It has been my experience that when the AI brings siege artillery, the will use it whether they need to or not.

    The first time I experienced this I had decided to fall back at the start simply because my forces were terribly outnumbered, lacking sufficent force to effectively man the gate and the walls both. Especially against ladders and breeches. I wanted to have more control of the engagement so I immediately ran all my forces back to the gated inner keep area.

    I noticed while doing this that the AI sat out there happily chucking big rocks at my walls and making holes, even though I had, to all intents, abandoned the gates. All they needed to do was put up a ladder, take the gates and let everyone in.

    Instead they sat out there for quite some time and made no fewer than six holes in my walls.

    /shrug.

    At the inner keep, I executed the standard - clog the gate with spears, attack with swords and cav, harrass with missiles etc.

    Works like a charm! (ymmv)

    You don't get the opportunity to hit them from the flanks so much this way but, it's a fantastic choke point. Plus, it's a lot closer to the city square so, if things go badly, routers don't have so far to run ;).


    "No swords for you wannabes! Get back to poking!"
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  15. #15
    Masticator of Oreos Member Foz's Avatar
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    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    Quote Originally Posted by FrauGloer
    In MTW, I loved having one unit of Swiss Armoured Pikemen holding a gate and butchering everyone. When I tried this in M2TW, I was appalled: My unit of Scots Noble Pikemen right in front of the gate was imediately breached and destroyed to the last man. I don't think they killed more than 10 enemies!
    I'm actually quite confused why so many people on these boards like pikemen so much. I ran a few test battles, and once, a comlpletely braced Noble Pikemen unit (112 men) was wiped out by one General's bodyguard (31 men) charging them head-on in a street!!! The surviving bodyguards even went ahead and brought another unit of pikes down to half strength before they finally broke. I was like WTF?!?!
    This is because the pikemen have really weird issues that people have posted about on here before. One of the main ones is that if an enemy unit gets in the pike formation, they put pikes away and become swordsmen... which is not what they're good at. It doesn't appear to be the only thing wrong with the unit though, they also are horrible at attacking into an enemy unit, as they often just walk through the unit without attack, or so I'm told. Truthfully I've been avoiding them after hearing the many comments on how screwed up and useless they are.

    Quote Originally Posted by General Zhukov
    Am I the only one that doesn't usually use castle units (swords, cav) to defend sieges? Certainly not in cities. I assumed discussion of the most effective way to use militia units would have the widest usefullness.
    Militia units are kinda plain, not much really different or interesting you can do with them aside from making sure they get spread thin to activate as many towers as possible, though default placement is often quite good at assuring this. Outside of that, you park them by the gate and wait for enemies to come, nothing really too fancy usually. I guess we all prefer to comment on situations other than when you get caught with only militia defending a settlement, as those are the situations that actually allow you to be more creative and utilize different options. One thing I will say though for cases where militia are your only defense, I find it's nice to have a few cav units rush to the scene of the crime, especially since they'll start the battle already outside of the walls in great flanking position. Since they have such great movement speed on the campaign map, you can usually spread a few cav units pretty thin and still cover your empire sufficiently, which for me at least has been well worth it. They're by far the bast choice for a siege-response unit.

    I do consistently use castle units in castle sieges, as armies are always being built in the few castles I leave around. Of course it makes sense to take full advantage of parking free-upkeep militia in all your cities, but any that are likely to be attacked (bordering other countries directly) deserve more attention than that, at least a couple stout heavy infantry units. The amount you pay to keep the units around is pretty reasonable compared to the significant loss of income you take if you have the city snatched away from you for a few turns due to it being defended too lightly. Additionally, keeping a better garrison seems to help the opportunistic AI not decide to start a random war with you.


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    Praeparet bellum Member Quillan's Avatar
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    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    Quote Originally Posted by General Zhukov
    Am I the only one that doesn't usually use castle units (swords, cav) to defend sieges? Certainly not in cities. I assumed discussion of the most effective way to use militia units would have the widest usefullness.
    In cities near a hostile border, I've usually got a few castle units there (I put a couple archers to burn towers and the odd ram, and a unit or two of tough infantry so I have a little punch inside, plus always one unit of cavalry even if the city can't recruit any), but the rest is militia units or at least city recruitable units.
    Age and treachery will defeat youth and skill every time.

  17. #17
    Senior Member Senior Member Carl's Avatar
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    Default Re: When the city gate breaks

    In MTW, I loved having one unit of Swiss Armoured Pikemen holding a gate and butchering everyone. When I tried this in M2TW, I was appalled: My unit of Scots Noble Pikemen right in front of the gate was imediately breached and destroyed to the last man. I don't think they killed more than 10 enemies!
    I'm actually quite confused why so many people on these boards like pikemen so much. I ran a few test battles, and once, a comlpletely braced Noble Pikemen unit (112 men) was wiped out by one General's bodyguard (31 men) charging them head-on in a street!!! The surviving bodyguards even went ahead and brought another unit of pikes down to half strength before they finally broke. I was like WTF?!?!
    The_Foz_4 is quite right in his reply regarding Pikes being bugged.

    Their are the following issues with them, (some are my observations, others are second hand observations, primarily from Dopp):

    1. If you do anything other than order them into a specific position, (e.g. order them to attack), they do a starburst and don't maintain Phalanx Formation. This makes them easy meat even with working Pikes.

    2. If you don't take their Sword away in the unit file the entire unit will switch to swords as soon as more than one or two enemy models get in amongst the unit.

    3. Pikes only effect enemy models when the enemy is charging or when the pike wieldier directs an attack animation at an enemy model. Otherwise the enemy can freely walk right through them without injury. This makes it relatively easy for the enemy to walk up to you and force their way close enough to make you switch to swords.

    4. Pike units will only attack properly, (except when the enemy counts as charging), if you disable guard mode. However they will only brace for a charge when in guard mode. The problem in guard mode is that if anyone does make it to your first rank, the fourth and fifth ranks, (who are now in range to thrust with their pikes), won't attack and if you lose anyone, the spare from the fourth rank back won't simply step forward and attack, but actually step forward and try to take the place of the fallen before attacking. As a result the spares often get slaughtered without getting an attack off in Guard mode. Lastly, the unit as a whole won't advance whilst thrusting with their pikes and an enemy unit one to two ranks deep won't try to push into your pikes and because it sits at the very limit of Pike range, it takes forever to kill them. Take of Guard Mode with fixed pikes however and the fourth ranks back will attack if they are in range, and the formation closes up meaning more pike points over a given area. the combination means few enemies will close with your Pikemen from the front, and those that do will probably die before they get to swing. Lastly they step forward and can thus efficiently clean up those last few men and push the enemy out of breaches.


    On the flip side, even Town Militia can massacre engaged pikes, (including Noble Pikemen), if they hit them from the Flank/Rear. This applies to both fixed and un-fixed Pikemen.

    To illustrate how deadly Pikemen can be, I ran a Bridge battle with Noble Pikemen, (only the Papal States has better Pikes), against massive numbers of French Dismounted Chivalric Knights, (DCK).

    It was Huge Unit Sizes and 2 Units of Noble Pikemen, each with 1 Bronze Chevron, 1 Armour Upgrade and 1 Weapon Upgrade. They where fighting 10 units of un-upgraded DCK.

    I gave 2 commands during the whole battle. The first, in the deployment phase deployed both units side by side facing the bridge with the gap between the middle being lined up with the centre of the bridge and the units both being if equal width. The Second Command was to disable Guard Mode once enough enemy where in CC.

    Here are the Post Battle Results

    Bear in mind that this WAS a perfect situation for Pikemen to prevail in, (hard to get at their flanks), and that the AI is too stupid t try to get to them if you don’t make it very easy, (i.e. actually expose a flank to it). Thus, on an open battlefield the results would be rather more against the Pikemen.

    In case no ones quite realised it, the kill ratio for the pikemen was 40-1 in their favour.
    Last edited by Carl; 01-12-2007 at 23:04.
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