seige equipment and arrow throwers

hi, I'm a bit new to EB but obviously I am wowed by its awesomeness. Anyway, a few things were bugging me about seige equipment:

1) Does anybody find any real use in their strategy for using the stone/arrow throwers? In my experience the arrow throwers are powerful but way too inaccurate, and expensive, to be any use whatosever. Similarly, stone throwers will smash a few guard towers, but why spend tens of thousands to achieve something you could do with a free-of-charge seige tower? Am I missing something? (please note this isn't a complaint, I'm not arguing for the return of vanilla RTW onagers, I'm just curious about how to use these units)

2) Guard towers: the AI seems oblivious to the fact they fire arrows, and will happily march up and down in front of them while half their army gets shot to pieces. Is there any way of weakening/removing the weapons fired by guard towers (thus helping the AI), or is it hardcoded?

3) In vanilla RTW the largest seige towers came with ridiculously powerful rapid-fire ballista weapons. Is it the same in EB? And does that mean that you should avoid building the largest type of stone wall?

4) Is there a formula for approximating starvation death when seiged in a city? I never know how many men I'll lose.

Thankyou for withstanding my barrage of vaguely-related questions.

My own preference if I fight a siege battle is to use assault towers as I like to clear the walls and sieze all gates and towers. As you say it hurts the enemy but mainly to stop me getting hit when inside the walls.
Catapults and saps can annoyingly stop you from transversing the wall! Also, artillery is the slowest unit on the campaign map.
Note I mostly play Romanii so legionairies are very good on walls.

I almost never use arrow throwers myself. But when I do, I always have some Heavy Cavalry behind the crew when the enemy decides to counterattack. Don't bother using them against Light Cavalry or Skirmishers, you'll utterly waste your ammo. Use them against naked dudes, closely-packed Heavy infantry or extra Heavy Cavalry (like Cataphracts). I've also killed a General with a single shot once :tongue:

Maion

Continuing in the fine tradtion of TW, generals are artillery magnets.

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Originally Posted by antisocialmunky

Continuing in the fine tradtion of TW, generals are artillery magnets.

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Well my only success in killing FM with siege engine was in MTW2. The almighty Pope was hit by a huge stone from one of my trebuchets. Byzantine Empire for the win.

How long would real seige weapons have taken to knock down a stone wall in real life? Weeks? Months?

Never use siege engines in EB...

1) Too exspensive

2) Too weak

3) Too lame

:oops:



Better

1) Starve em out

2) Mount with siege towers

3) Use Rhodians to took the defenders

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Originally Posted by Apázlinemjó

Well my only success in killing FM with siege engine was in MTW2. The almighty Pope was hit by a huge stone from one of my trebuchets. Byzantine Empire for the win.

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I've lost numerous generals in MTW as well as managed to snipe those 10 star Immortal Byzantine Brothers because of arty.

Did u hit the pope with rotting cow caracass? :skull: yeukkhhh.... if yes... I won't be surprised if in the next years, all your kingdom will become blight, and god struck your FM's with disasters...:laugh4:

Rotting cows are the best siege engine missiles available... too bad, EB didn't have them...:laugh4:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

But I don't want them to exist in EB as well... Rotting cows --> give me an idea that Saka should end have a catapult that launching them... at least, Herds = many dead cows everyday -> More arsenal

Incendary Pig launcher FTW! WHERE ARE YOU ELEPHANT GODS NOW!?!?

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Originally Posted by antisocialmunky

Incendary Pig launcher FTW! WHERE ARE YOU ELEPHANT GODS NOW!?!?

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Today, the Athenian geeks have invented a new multipurpose siege engine...

ELEPHANTES KATAPELTAI
This siege engine throws dead, rotten elephants, that could easily break enemy wall, as well as their defender's morale in a really large area...

Not only quickly get the rid of the walls, we also easily get the rid of enemy balls...


BTW:

Back to topic...

EB siege engines was too highly priced... what's the reason behind that?

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Originally Posted by Cute Wolf

Did u hit the pope with rotting cow caracass? :skull: yeukkhhh.... if yes... I won't be surprised if in the next years, all your kingdom will become blight, and god struck your FM's with disasters...:laugh4:

Rotting cows are the best siege engine missiles available... too bad, EB didn't have them...:laugh4:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

But I don't want them to exist in EB as well... Rotting cows --> give me an idea that Saka should end have a catapult that launching them... at least, Herds = many dead cows everyday -> More arsenal

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Nah...but now as you say....damn...

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Originally Posted by Cute Wolf

Today, the Athenian geeks have invented a new multipurpose siege engine...

ELEPHANTES KATAPELTAI
This siege engine throws dead, rotten elephants, that could easily break enemy wall, as well as their defender's morale in a really large area...

Not only quickly get the rid of the walls, we also easily get the rid of enemy balls...

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Holy crap :laugh4::laugh4::laugh4:! That has got to be the most amusing, preposterous, and farcical thing I have ever heard on these forums. You deserve a balloon IMO: :balloon: (I always give red balloons :yes:)

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Originally Posted by Cute Wolf

Today, the Athenian geeks have invented a new multipurpose siege engine...

ELEPHANTES KATAPELTAI
This siege engine throws dead, rotten elephants, that could easily break enemy wall, as well as their defender's morale in a really large area...

Not only quickly get the rid of the walls, we also easily get the rid of enemy balls...

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HA HA HA HA ---- WOW, now thats what I call a great Joke! I can't remmeber when I last saw such a good one on the EB fora:2thumbsup:

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Originally Posted by gja102

1) Does anybody find any real use in their strategy for using the stone/arrow throwers? In my experience the arrow throwers are powerful but way too inaccurate, and expensive, to be any use whatosever. Similarly, stone throwers will smash a few guard towers, but why spend tens of thousands to achieve something you could do with a free-of-charge seige tower? Am I missing something? (please note this isn't a complaint, I'm not arguing for the return of vanilla RTW onagers, I'm just curious about how to use these units)

4) Is there a formula for approximating starvation death when seiged in a city? I never know how many men I'll lose.

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1. Yes, I use them in my Rome campaign. Bobbin's unit card mod is helpful, telling you how many artillery pieces you get. The big stone thrower is utterly useless - one artillery piece, so it barely breaks through a stone wall's gate with its last ammo. The smaller stone thrower unit works well though, easily gets you through a stone wall with ammo to spare for suppressing nearby wall towers if need be (2 artillery pieces makes all the difference). Similarly I favor the lighter bolt throwers since you get 8 artillery instead of 4 for the heavy bolt throwers. Not every legion has artillery, but many do. Usually a light stone thrower in a city near a potential enemy, and a bolt thrower with legions on or near a frontier (standing on the bridge next to Tarsus, for example). Note that stone throwers won't get you past a heavy stone wall, so artillery can be mostly useless in Hellenic and Eastern territories. The Celts/Lusos/Germans can't build beyond basic stone walls, so stone throwers are useful in the west. For some reason the AI rarely fortifies the eastern Mediterranean coastal cities (Halikarnassus through Sidon), so that's a good use for them too. Raiding Antioch and burning it to the ground in a single turn was fun! That would be the main answer to your "why use them" question - take the city instantly, before any nearby armies can interfere. Particularly when raiding enemy homelands from the sea, as in the Antioch example. I haven't tried it yet, but they may also be useful to force those massive central European rebel armies to besiege you in the city they were supposed to defend, rather than fighting you in the open field.

As Rome, the enormous cost of artillery is a virtue, not a flaw. Factions like Baktria will obviously disagree on that point. ~:)

4. I think it's random. A few percent per turn seems typical.

Thanks, I didn't realise the larger versions of the catapults only had half the ammo. And I never thought of the potential for general-killing. I guess I could look at the arrow-throwers as a sort of elaborate, ancient-era sniper rifle.

(I like this talk of elephants, escpecially considering what just happened in my current campaign as Carthage. While assaulting Rome, the Roman faction leader was killed amongst the elephants, and in the cutscene it looked exactly like he'd been crushed to death by a toppling, dying elephant. brilliant death scene. do collapsing elephants squash the units beneath? or was it just coincidence they died at the same time?)

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Originally Posted by gja102

(I like this talk of elephants, escpecially considering what just happened in my current campaign as Carthage. While assaulting Rome, the Roman faction leader was killed amongst the elephants, and in the cutscene it looked exactly like he'd been crushed to death by a toppling, dying elephant. brilliant death scene. do collapsing elephants squash the units beneath? or was it just coincidence they died at the same time?)

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Coincidence.

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Originally Posted by Cute Wolf

Today, the Athenian geeks have invented a new multipurpose siege engine...

ELEPHANTES KATAPELTAI
This siege engine throws dead, rotten elephants, that could easily break enemy wall, as well as their defender's morale in a really large area...

Not only quickly get the rid of the walls, we also easily get the rid of enemy balls...

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Wow, thanks AP... :beam:


Slammed by dead elephants will guarantee almost death in everything...

I honestly think if you have your elephants head spiked while they're on a city street, it should be all but impassable. They'd be the ancient equivalent to a road-block, yes debris and such would be easier and less expensive, but personally I'd prefer the elephant corpses.

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Originally Posted by gja102

3) In vanilla RTW the largest seige towers came with ridiculously powerful rapid-fire ballista weapons. Is it the same in EB? And does that mean that you should avoid building the largest type of stone wall?

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Yes, it's the same in EB.

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Originally Posted by gja102

(While assaulting Rome, the Roman faction leader was killed amongst the elephants, and in the cutscene it looked exactly like he'd been crushed to death by a toppling, dying elephant. brilliant death scene. do collapsing elephants squash the units beneath? or was it just coincidence they died at the same time?)

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No, I've lost generals to dying elephants as well. When an elephant dies, cavalry standing next to it often dies as well. Not sure whether the engine realizes they should be crushed, or it simply the effect of amok elephants.

I lowered the upkeep cost of siege equipment so that I (or the a.i.) would use them. I really don't mind spending 10,000 on a toy, but with a crew of six, it shouldn't cost 4000 a turn to maintain... I've heard that the ballista is useful for hunting elephants, although Siege artillery slows down an army so much that I would rather just use skirmishers for that task.

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Originally Posted by Labrat

No, I've lost generals to dying elephants as well. When an elephant dies, cavalry standing next to it often dies as well. Not sure whether the engine realizes they should be crushed, or it simply the effect of amok elephants.

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I've seen friendly and AI units get killed immediately next to dying elephants plenty of times. Elephants still fighting, not running amok.
So I would have to say that they do crush nearby units upon death.

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Originally Posted by Labrat

No, I've lost generals to dying elephants as well. When an elephant dies, cavalry standing next to it often dies as well. Not sure whether the engine realizes they should be crushed, or it simply the effect of amok elephants.

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I guess it works like at sieges. WHen you break the walls (even if it's made from wood) and the enemy units are standing too close to it, then some of them will be crushed.

Elephants definitly kill people and cavalry standing next to them when they die, as they already did in vanilla. Killing generals by having your elephants being brought down is besides enjoyable also quite costly.

About artillery: I don't use it. I'd rather have a second army supporting my humanitarian missions than a single unit that is remarkably bad at killing people (cost-wise).

This brings up the interesting possibility of dominoing a continuous line of elephants by killing the ones at the end of a long line of them.

http://www.macedonium.org/userfiles/...s-Demetrij.jpg

Your besieging army is only complete when you have one of these ;)

I haven't had the chance to use them so far, but I quess thoose 8 artilery / units arrow throwers can be used like balisate. Back with Rome Vaniila and RTR I used balistats to force defending enemy armies to charge at you (very useful if you have a long line of Phalanxes:laugh4:) , but the "guns" must be protected - the AI seems to be smart enough to charge strait at them first (I ususally put the Artillery on the Flanks so they can cross-fire if possible:skull:)

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Originally Posted by Dutchhoplite

http://www.macedonium.org/userfiles/...s-Demetrij.jpg

Your besieging army is only complete when you have one of these ;)

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Nice but where can I get any of these?:laugh4:

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Originally Posted by antisocialmunky

This brings up the interesting possibility of dominoing a continuous line of elephants by killing the ones at the end of a long line of them.

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Now that would be funny.

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Originally Posted by Andy1984

Elephants definitly kill people

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Wrong. Elephants don't kill people, people kill people. Or people with elephants kill people. Or people firing elephants from catapults kill people. Or something like that...