Siege Battle

Hey there,

I was wondering how you handle siege battles. As a defender, I find my fortress rather useless.
When I position my archers behind the walls, they will fire 2,3 maybe 4 volleys of arrowsbefore they have to retreat from the walls. By this time the enemy is climbing (wtf?) my walls, and I have to position my melee troops at the walls.

Maybe i am doing something wrong but i dont see much advantage from being inside a castle with walls that will slow the enemy down by a meager 5 seconds.

I broke some huge Hattori armies in a current campaign on one of my level one castles. Archers hiding behind the walls do well in the attrition battle with sieging archers, and units climbing the walls tend to take casualties (first from my archers, and then falling off the walls). I've been keeping the archers in place to repel climbers and accepting they'll suffer heavy casualties. Hand to hand infantry also fare much better defending than the climbers do, and anything better than Yari Ashigaru will slaughter assaulting troops. They still tend to be rather bloody, and since enemy ashigaru route rather early in an assault, I often have to have cavalry on hand to chase them if I want anything better than a pyrrhic victory.

Siege defenses aren't as lopsided as previous titles but I've still held off much larger armies.

Siege defences tend to give me a lot fewer casualties than field battles, despite the siege assault AI being quite decent (it usually splits up its forces and keeps up a steady missile barrage). You have two big advantages. First, the walls give you a massive edge in a missile duel - I try to position my defenders so they are all cowering behind a wall or out of range. Second, the units climbing the walls go through a sausage grinder, coming on piecemeal against your defenders - in an even fight, the wall climbers will lose heavily to an equivalent unit.

I've been wondering whether to retreat my archers or stay in place. In principle, replacing them with more competent melee troops sounds sensible but - at least with forts and strongholds[1] - in practice there are problems. The melee troops have to be quite close by, thereby being vulnerable to fire without being protected by walls. And the changeover can give the enemy climbing the walls a bit of time to get up unmolested.

Now I leave ashigaru bowmen on the walls if only yari ashigaru are scaling them. I reckon they are a match, given the large disadvantage faced by units climbing the walls. If it is samurai climbing, I would switch them out and put in melee infantry.

I've been giving serious thought to using samurai bowmen in at least my main army because they should be able to stay in place if samurai are climbing.

Matchlock ashigaru are another possibility. It seems the enemy won't even get in to melee if they are on the walls.

[1]With multi-section castles, I think you might be able to organise some kind of "fighting retreat" - pulling the archers back to higher walls and leaving your infantry in place to pin.

I've had good success with the following:

(1) Initially, fill the walls with archers (usually 8 or so units, a mix of ashis & samurai)
(2) Place first line melee defences (4-6 yari ashigaru) near the walls around the inside of the castle
(3) Place emergency troops (2-3 katana + cav/general units) in the middle, ideally safe from incoming arrows
(4) Keep the archers at the walls as long as possible, but where an enemy melee unit starts to climb, pull back from the wall and replace with a yari. Move the displaced archers somewhere where they'll boost your odds in the ongoing archery duel.
(5) As and when yari defences need boosting, charge a unit of katanas in, or as a last resort, cav.
(6) At some point you will rout all units on one side of the castle or another - cav units should exit the castle on this side and chase down routers (but beware of enemy cav)

Unless the enemy has massive archer spam and can sit outside your walls and whittle you down to almost nothing (never actually seen this from the AI, but it's my favourite way to win sieges when i'm the attacker) or has more than twice your troops, you will win comfortably.

Strangely, i find small castles much easier to defend than large ones. You can rush defenders to counter local hotspots quickly in a small castle, but in a large one you can be too spread out.


Caveat for all of the above: i've noticed in some defences that the AI splits its troops unevenly, with, groups of 3 yaris coming in from 2 directions, and a huge stack of archers + cav coming in from one side. In this situation i move the majority of my archers to face the AIs archer stack - you *have* to win that duel. All of the yari defences then go to taking out the smaller stacks as they climb the walls, with katanas ready to help the archers if any enemy melee troops make it through the death zone to the walls.

In essence, if the AI splits its troop composition, meet archers with archers, and melee with melee. The massive advantage the walls give you in a like vs like battle should carry the day.

I tend to be outnumbered in seiges due to the fact that I keep my armies in the field. However, I still win most seiges. For large or small castles/fortresses etc I only defend the innermost walls. Anything else spreads you out too much. The AI smartly attacks from multiple directions so it is too easy to guess the direction of attack wrong forcing you to scramble units into place. Instead I let the castle towers defend the lower levels with my archers punishing those who climb to those levels. Always have a minimum of 4 archers one to cover each direction but try for more. Use fire arrows immediately if you have the tech. It can help rout a unit or two right away and if the battle drags on you wil get a second chance to use them just before your archers run out of ammo. With more than 4 archers I will leave them on the walls, even ashi archers slow down attackers getting in some kills leaving them more vulnerable to a yari ashi counter attack than if I had the yari on the wall in the first place.

In larger castles once one side is routed or close to routing I sometimes sally a free unit to retake the lower tower. This usually finishes that side off, but is risky depending on how depleted your melee forces are. Be sure you can hold off the rest of the enemy if you lose this unit.

How do I approach a siege?

As offense I have three phases I push at the AI.

1.) Skirmish. The skirmish phase is an archer war between myself and those on the walls. This is going to cause a lot of casualties on my end, but its purpose is to eat up the enemy ammo reserves before the main assault. I also take this time to turn the enemy walls into kindling with fire arrows, if i've researched them!

2.) Moving in. I very rarely will assault from one direction. While my archers occupy the enemy ranged units, my melee troops move into position and surround the castle. Ensuring the AI will be forced to fight on multiple fronts once the final stage is reached.

3.) Battle. The order to charge is given and my men storm the walls!

As a defender:

I try to concentrate my arrows to where the enemy are the thickest. They will almost certainly spread out and assault fom different areas, but I want my bows to cause as much damage as possible before the main battle is joined. Elite troops are the prime targets, but once the enemy has reached the walls, any target will do. Once the AI has closed in I'll replace the archers with solid melee troops on the battlements and hold on for dear life.

Every siege i've fought has been incredibly bloody :sweatdrop:

On siege assaults, I've tended to be incredibly cautious. I deploy 2/3 or more of my army in hiding, leaving the daimyo leading the rest to make a demonstration out of range to try to get the AI to focus on them. Then I approach with previously hidden units from two opposing directions. Archers cover the advance, but if possible I avoid walls where defending archers are present. However, with a 3:1 superiority, you can defeat defending archers quite quickly and without too much loss. With small settlements, I try to expend all my ammunition on defenders not on the walls before resorting to melee. If the AI lacks archers, it can be relatively bloodless to assault. With large settlements, I don't bother too much with prep fire but make a dash for the topmost flag to claim the city.