What should be changed about Sieges?

[Richard the Slayer]

What is everyones personally view on how CA should change sieges? Right now as I read from other posts castles are pretty much "deathtraps" (quote from papa bear I believe) and theres really no purpose to retreating to a castle becuase you know you'll pretty much lose anyway. Also hitting auto resolve for sieges seems better - who in their right mind spends all that expensive money on sige weapons only to find that they lose far more in an assult than a siege. Suggestions?

[solypsist]

has the AI ever tried to assault your castle in SP campaign mode? I've tried to have the AI do this, but they always seem to wait things out.

[chilliwilli]

AI only assaults if they outnumber the garrison by a staggering amount and if the fortifications are not that advanced.

[sbreden]

Quote Originally posted by Richard the Slayer:
What is everyones personally view on how CA should change sieges? Right now as I read from other posts castles are pretty much "deathtraps" (quote from papa bear I believe) and theres really no purpose to retreating to a castle becuase you know you'll pretty much lose anyway. Also hitting auto resolve for sieges seems better - who in their right mind spends all that expensive money on sige weapons only to find that they lose far more in an assult than a siege. Suggestions?[/QUOTE]

I find that retreating to the castle simply buys time. I like having the option to hole up until my main army can rush in to save the day. Plus, I hate making it easy for the ai to take a province from me.

[Peabody]

The thing that irks me the most about sieges is the length they last is based on the number of troops inside. If there's a lot inside, the siege will only last a year or two. But if there's only 2 peasants - well, sit down, because you'll be hanging around for a decade.

I would think a better game mechanism would be if the lenght of the siege is based on the size of the castle only. And that length should be much, much longer that it currently is. (Which is apparently one of the changes in the patch.)

Oh yeah, that and a siege shouldn't wreck so many buildings. I can understand my guys tromping all over the farm fields, sure. But accidentally burning the port? Please.

[Hakonarson]

Who saysi it's accidental??

Your guys want LOOT!

Bring in disease for beseigers - that'll force a few assaults - hopefully......
Also better AI when it's beseiging - castles are trivially easy to defend with even a small number of troops and you can cause outrageous casualties because of AI stupidity!!

And then your troops melt awy of course http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/frown.gif

[Papa Bear!]

If castles were turned into the defensive fortifications that they were historically, then sieges could also afford to be short, (which would fit historically).

In short, sieges need not be longer, thats just crazy, (should a single King really only be able to oversee the siege of 3 casltes in his entire life before he dies? especially if those sieges are back to back?)

No, sieges should include punishments for the attackers. Sieges should be the difficult endeavor that they were, (thus making the castle more potent defensively).

The solution, imo, is not in anyway, to increase the amount of time they take. instead, the % chance of loyalist rebellion there should be increased, (increasing the need for a quick capture of the castle), and the attackers should take casualties while besieging castles. Right now their simply a deathtrap for the defenders, and a stalling point for the attackers. If they were realistic, (a structure that allowed few to hold off many, not until reinforcements arrived, but until the siege simply became inpractical logistically), then they could be used as they were in the medieval period.

A faction could choose to focus on castles rather than troops as defenses.

Furthermore, raiding would have to be affected. Buildings should be protected from pillaging in the area of the castle, as should crops/food stores in the area. Thus a raiding army could not just run through a kingdom, forcing the defending armies into their castles, and living off the land. This again is where logicstics come in, (raiding had to be exected by small parties, or, if part of a protracted campaign, supply trains, etc. would have to be arranged).

If an army passes through a province, chasing the defenders into their castle, then moves deeper into the factions territory, they now would have an enemy army in their rear. This doesn't matter in MTW, but it should be made to matter. (armies morale should be decreased when seperated from their kingdom, the last stand thing is nice, but too easy to exploit) Also, disease for the attackers, (as so many have stressed, the besiegers greatest enemy was often sickness), and increased disease, starvation, etc. from seperating one self from their source of supply.

Despite being famous raiders, the vikings never had the power to sack fortified cities, and to maintain their power in a province. Thus their raids were short lived, (though frequent), as they could not defend lines of supply, etc.

This should really be modeled.

Imo the problem with sieges isn't just the way their handled directly, its the way the rest of the game fails to work around them.

[Forward Observer]

In four and a half campaigns, I have been the recipient of a assault on my besieged forces only once. I think I was playing as the English, but I do not remember the attacker.

My small besieged army had dwindled to 50 or 60 troops and the enemy's army was in the neighborhood of 300 to 400.

I just couldn't spare another army at the time to rescue them, and when I had last checked their status, they had maybe a year or two before the castle would fall. At the end of the next turn, I was surprised to see that the enemy was assulting. On a lark I decided to fight.

I had a level 2 castle with a curtain wall, and in the castle were 2 or 3 Royal knights, 30 archers, and maybe 20 to 25 spearmen. The attacker had 2 catapults, but one of them only had minimum man power. They managed to knock down my outer wall, but one catapult lost two many men, and I was able to take out the other by sending out and sacrificing my knights.

From then on the ememy just marched all around my castle walls while my arrow towers and few archers continued to decimate their ranks. Their army was about half peasents and half light cavalry, and appeared to be leaderless.

They came into the outer courtyard at least once, but were never able to get to the inner yard. They finally retreated off the field. I got a victory, but after the battle turn was through, I got a message that my castle had fallen to the enemy just like there had been no battle at all. Also the remnants of the army I had defeated now held the province.

It didn't make a lot of sense to me at the time, but I also had a lot of other stuff going on in my campaign, never gave it much more thought. Nothing like it ever happened again.


Cheers


------------------
Artillery adds dignity to what would otherwise be a vulgar brawl.



[This message has been edited by Forward Observer (edited 10-31-2002).]

[PugPenguin]

Talking of logistics though, it's perfectly a valid strategy to employ the "satelite" fortification where you have one big castle at the central province with large garrison, with smaller castles surrounding it with small forces. If AI invades one of your outer provinces, retreat into castle. Then send in the big force from the centre province to break the siege. You can have a long time doing that. Handy when you are out of cash.

[This message has been edited by PugPenguin (edited 10-30-2002).]

[Jo_Beare]

I think it would be helpful if you could pick the men to stay in the castle and which units could retreat to a friendly province. That way could hold out for 6-10 years.

Most of the time I won't retreat directly to the castle, but will intstead fight until my units rout back to the castle. That way I have a small enough force that the AI will assault it.

Like it was said before, the AI for assaulting castles is moronic. Once the human player has a castle with catapult towers it is pretty hard to for the AI to take it. A citadel or fortress are pretty much unassailable by the computer. I held a fortress with 90 peasants against over 1200 Sicilians. I forgot to build a cannon foundary so my gun towers were unarmed. The Sicilians brought enough siege equipment to breach the outer two walls, but the stupid AI insisted on breaking through the gates even though the wall next to the gate was breached already. Needless to say, I watched the enept AI get its troops butchered for about 45 minutes.

JoBeare

[Richard the Slayer]

If a CA programmer is seeing these posts, I thinks its important as papa bear mentioned that castle sieges need not be longer but simply TOUGHER. After all historically sieges lasted only a few months (maybe 2 years was max time) so perhaps the sieges simply have to be more challenging and more stratgey has to be involved. I would like to see a CA programmer input for sieges, for I dont think longer sieges is the best alternative in producing tougher sieges, more penalties should be imposed on the guy sieging a castle - disease, much higher upkeep cost (lets say X3 or X5 normal cost) so that in fact the sieger has much more at stake than simply greater time for a siege.

[Papa Bear!]

Quote Originally posted by PugPenguin:
Talking of logistics though, it's perfectly a valid strategy to employ the "satelite" fortification where you have one big castle at the central province with large garrison, with smaller castles surrounding it with small forces. If AI invades one of your outer provinces, retreat into castle. Then send in the big force from the centre province to break the siege. You can have a long time doing that. Handy when you are out of cash.

[This message has been edited by PugPenguin (edited 10-30-2002).][/QUOTE]


except that 1, the province with the "smaller castle" will get plundered all development there will suffer. and secondly, they can, the turn after, move into a 2nd "little castle province" leaving your first little castle garrison behind, and continuing to pillage. with no thought to the logistics of moving an army through enemy territory, especially with enemy armies in their rear. I hate to repeat myself, but I guess I didn't make that clear the first time.

Furthermore, retreating into the castle is tantamount to signing your troops death warrants. Of course, you can go relieve them, but in the meantime your troops have suffered casualties. Your province has suffered degradation, and the invading army suffers nothing....

That isn't even remotely realistic.

[edit: as richard says a cost increase should perhaps be factored in. Again an issue of logistics, it is much more difficult to maintain an standing army in foreign land, (unless there is a wealth of crops to pillage, or something), which, we'll assume, isn't always the case.

What might be really interesting, though this is moving away from sieges, is the option to choose to plunder or not, (not buildings, as they should be protected by the castle, but cropland, etc.) Thus you either pillage the cropland, and your troops don't have to pay high upkeep for a turn or two, or you leave it alone and suffer the costs. Less pillaging should= higher loyalty, and obviously, more income from the province once you've taken it, but the siege force would be forced to pay upkeep during the siege.]

[edited again for legibility]
[This message has been edited by Papa Bear! (edited 10-31-2002).]

[This message has been edited by Papa Bear! (edited 10-31-2002).]

[RabidMonkey]

I have absolutely no idea why there isnt an option not to plunder a province you take over. How hard could this be to implement? And then it allows you to decide if you need the quick cash from the plunder or you would prefer to leave some structures and not send the province back to the stone age. Same deal with castles getting degraded.

I heard that the beseiging forces were going to get a x3 upkeep cost in the patch. But now in the patch details released i doont see it mentioned. Is this still going ahead?

And why does the beseiging force get the province income? They didnt in STW and it worked great so why change it when castles are even more important in medieval europe?

Anyway thats my little rant on seiges done!

[Papa Bear!]

Quote Originally posted by RabidMonkey:
I have absolutely no idea why there isnt an option not to plunder a province you take over. How hard could this be to implement? And then it allows you to decide if you need the quick cash from the plunder or you would prefer to leave some structures and not send the province back to the stone age. Same deal with castles getting degraded.

I heard that the beseiging forces were going to get a x3 upkeep cost in the patch. But now in the patch details released i doont see it mentioned. Is this still going ahead?

And why does the beseiging force get the province income? They didnt in STW and it worked great so why change it when castles are even more important in medieval europe?

Anyway thats my little rant on seiges done![/QUOTE]

Indeed, but I'd never heard that bit about the increased costs. I'd heard it proposed umpteen times, but never agreed with by the devs. What we really need is a giljaysmith right about now. I wonder if the bossman still thinks they shouldn't be on the net at work...

[Richard the Slayer]

Quote Originally posted by Papa Bear!:
Indeed, but I'd never heard that bit about the increased costs. I'd heard it proposed umpteen times, but never agreed with by the devs. What we really need is a giljaysmith right about now. I wonder if the bossman still thinks they shouldn't be on the net at work...[/QUOTE]

hehe, yea maybe they were using the internet for "inapropraie uses". Whatever their doing they sure come in handy if you can convince them your points. sadly a few modifiers here and there can correct some of the most basic issues.

[MizuKokami]

i would like for upgrades that are dependent on castles to not be destroyed just because the province is lost. this would give purpose to retreating to the castle. personnally, i find it odd that spear maker workshops that are in castles get destroyed when you are on the battlefield, even when there is no battle.

[muffinman14]

i find sieges pointless. You would rather just wait a couple of years than lose 100 men storming a castle that only has 15 defenders. The AI has assaulted me three times in all my campaigns, wow!

[Galestrum]

some actual assaults by the pc would be nice

[Richard the Slayer]

I hope CA doesnt make sieges longer to solve the problem, that would be just silly. Historically no siege lasted more than a few years, in fact the average siege was for a few months. CA has to implement the changes we listed above for sieges to work out. Also, the addition of siege towers (for the attcker) and rams may make the comp assault sieges more agressively. (BTW, the comp. ai can be quite smart sometimes. Considering that the ai doesnt assault sieges, its best to do what the comp. does. It doesnt make any sense like posted above to assault and lose tons of guys or lay siege and lose nothing.)

[PugPenguin]

Quote Originally posted by Richard the Slayer:
I hope CA doesnt make sieges longer to solve the problem, that would be just silly. Historically no siege lasted more than a few years, in fact the average siege was for a few months.[/QUOTE]

Well, Einstein says Time is a variable. So... perhaps the solution to that is to actually make the siege "longer" by making it last more turns, then make each turn very short, like 1 turn = 1 month instead of 1 turn = 1 year... http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif

Sounds fairly simple, doesn't it. But I guess then people would complain that seasons are not realistic...

[Richard the Slayer]

Quote Originally posted by PugPenguin:
Well, Einstein says Time is a variable. So... perhaps the solution to that is to actually make the siege "longer" by making it last more turns, then make each turn very short, like 1 turn = 1 month instead of 1 turn = 1 year... http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif

Sounds fairly simple, doesn't it. But I guess then people would complain that seasons are not realistic...[/QUOTE]

Yea then with the game representing one turn=one month all of us would be playing MTW until were eighty years old to finish ONE campaign.

[DonCoyote]

Richard the Slayer said:

"I hope CA doesnt make sieges longer to solve the problem....."

Read No. 15 on the SP improvements list for the patch - it says exactly that!

Don Coyote

[This message has been edited by DonCoyote (edited 11-04-2002).]

[MizuKokami]

what i find most odd about castle seiges in the game, is that it takes at least a year to win, even when there is only one defender in the castle. one guy escapes the battlefield...huh? my cav, hot on the trail of the one lone surviver fleeing the field, is not gonna stop just because he gets across the red zone. so i would like to see that a castle seige only takes place when there are a minimun amount of survivors who escape.say at least 100 men have to escape before they can man a castle that's under seige. if that many men don't escape the battle field, then they run past the castle into a neighboring province.

[Lord Romulous]

i dont have much of a problem with the seige times being increased if it leads to more castle assaults by the ai (and by me http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif ). this may not be historicaly accurate...but then it is not historicaly accurate that it takes a 3 years to march accross 3 provences yet u can take a boat trip accros the medieval world in 1 year.
(i hate how travel time is implemented)
infact i convert years to months in my head. that way i see a month to travel accros a provence, 4 months to succusfuly seige a castle etc)

i would love a more historical game but we make do with what we have....

on the subject of seiges, while it is true that for the ai castles assaults are quite deadly...for a human player i find assaulting a castle is way to easy. im not sure a solution to this problem is doable in a patch or even a add on pack as it would take much recoding effort to make the ai more skillful in attacking castles while at the same time making castles harder to attack.

for the patches i would like to see.

1. city upgrades ie spearmean workshop etc do not get destroyed until the fortification falls. (castle level and above) farms and ports can get destroyed as normal. for fortress level fortifications the port should be protected as well. ie only gets destroyed when castle falls.

2. large attrition to seiging forces. and triple upkeep costs. litttle if any attrition to beseiged.

3. increased seige times. as said above i know it is not historicaly accurate and i wish their was better (and doable in patch) solution but at this point anything that increases the chance of castle battles is a good thing IMHO

3. more arrows fired by castle defence ai.
atleast when a human player is attacking the castle. at the moment I can rush a wall and take 5 casulties out of a hundred. that is not good ! if i take out the gun tower beside the gate (and i always do) i can breach the gate and take less than 20 casulties.

at the moment i find the lack of castle battles the most disapointing aspect of my medieval total war experience.

[Lord Romulous]

posted deleted

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grrr stupid romulous computer

[This message has been edited by Lord Romulous (edited 11-05-2002).]

[Lord Romulous]

post deleted

grrrr stupid romulous computer

[This message has been edited by Lord Romulous (edited 11-05-2002).]

[Lord Romulous]

any one see my posts ???

they are not showing up for me.. but the reply count on this topic is increasing.

weird new board software or Lord Romulous computer going nuts ??

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edit. what do u know my posts finally showed up. i was pressing refresh like crazy and nothing changed. stupid computer http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/mad.gif

[This message has been edited by Lord Romulous (edited 11-05-2002).]

[Maelstrom]

Quote Originally posted by Lord Romulous:
any one see my posts ???

they are not showing up for me.. but the reply count on this topic is increasing.

weird new board software or Lord Romulous computer going nuts ??[/QUOTE]

I have to hit refresh to update the page each time I view a topic I have looked at before - But if this is the case for you, i guess you won't see this either.... http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif


[This message has been edited by Maelstrom (edited 11-05-2002).]

[Turbo]

Castles should offer some protection to structures. The larger the castle the more protection a structure should be given. Farmland should drop by -1 for each year of a siege. This would at least provide some incentive for holding out in a castle as long as possible.

In assaulting the castle manually (instead of autoresolve), fewer structures should be damaged. This would provide some incentive to play out some of the sieges. As the game stands right now, I view the siege as a waste of time and tend to use autoresolve.

[Hulegu]

Unless I've missed something, as the defender in a castle assault battle I cannot actually get my troops out of the castle to mount a sortie. I can do so on the strat.map but during an actual assault I cannot rush my cavalry out to attack a siege engine or something.
If I'm mistaken perhaps someone will enlighten me: otherwise that's one change that I think is important.