archers & stakes

usually I put my archers behind my lines so they are protected from fast cavalry.

seeing the stakes option I thought I would change this and put the archers in front of my lines figuring the stakes would slow anyone down trying to attack them.

but.. to my surpise, they didnt skermisch anymore with the stakes in the ground!! They actually started fightin hand to hand..

how do you guys use this option succesfully?

(and.. do the stakes stay? can you for instance places stakes quickly outside your city and hamper an attack?)

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Originally Posted by Cras

usually I put my archers behind my lines so they are protected from fast cavalry.

seeing the stakes option I thought I would change this and put the archers in front of my lines figuring the stakes would slow anyone down trying to attack them.

but.. to my surpise, they didnt skermisch anymore with the stakes in the ground!! They actually started fightin hand to hand..

how do you guys use this option succesfully?

(and.. do the stakes stay? can you for instance places stakes quickly outside your city and hamper an attack?)

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I've heard alot of people saying they set them up at the gates in sieges, but I personally prefer to set them up at the end of a bridge and enjoy the carnage.

I think you misunderstand how they are used, they are placed IN the ground at the beginning of a battle, the enemy is then seriously hampered when he tries to charge your archers.

at the beginning?

when deploying the units? or after you start the fight?

when you deploy the stakes do you then change your position with your archers? like further away or is that not possible?

are the stakes always in closely front of the archers?

As I understand it, the unit special ability button for English longbowmen is "Deploy stakes" during the deployment phase of the battle, but "use fire arrows" during the battle itself. So, you can only plant stakes during the setup.

That's correct. Also, the stakes stay where they are even if you move the archers around after the battle has started. So you can deploy stakes in front of your lines, then retreat the archers behind your main battle line when the battle begins.

A word of caution with stakes, try not to run through with your cavalry :D , i was in battle full of forrests so i could nto see that well and after moving my king to the back i saw that the unit started to drop in numbers so i zoom in and see the unit die at the stakes heh.

In my last English Campaign I was always low on cavalry and catching or killing enemy generals was often a problem, but getting enemies to rout was no trouble. I'm wondering now if I deployed stakes in front of my armies, but had them facing toward me, would that cause any enemy cavalry fleeing into them to take casualties?

I am worried that the stakes are exploited by the players. I think that stakes shouldn't be allowed in siege assaults.

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Originally Posted by Ignoramus

I am worried that the stakes are exploited by the players. I think that stakes shouldn't be allowed in siege assaults.

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I was thinking that but from a historical realism point of view, if there was a battering ram hammering down on a city gates, I suspect the city folk may indeed stick some more obstacles in the enemy's way.

Ditto bridge battles, for that matter. Although I am rather queasy about them altogether (I've never heard of one in pre-WW2 history).

The stakes are only hurt cavalry, infantry just get slowed down.

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Originally Posted by econ21

I was thinking that but from a historical realism point of view, if there was a battering ram hammering down on a city gates, I suspect the city folk may indeed stick some more obstacles in the enemy's way.

Ditto bridge battles, for that matter. Although I am rather queasy about them altogether (I've never heard of one in pre-WW2 history).

The stakes are only hurt cavalry, infantry just get slowed down.

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Trouble is, in a bridge battle (and slightly less so in a siege, cos there is often more than one door) stakes can effectively disallow the attacker from using cav in any way at all. Seems a bit too uber to me.

In a normal open fight they can have advantages and disadvantages for the person placing them (i.e. they stop your own cav charging the enemy in the back once theyre engaged) but in battles with no way around them... hmmmm....


Interesting note: the first time i ever used stakes i was fighting near a small village, and there was a road nearby. My initial deployment was smack across this road. The units located on the road itself couldnt deploy stakes while those on normal ground could (they had to be 100% off of the road to be able to do it). This makes sense since hammering stakes into a paved road would be tricky at best. I had to relocate the entire army sideways off of the road in order to get a complete stake wall in front of my archers.

So the mechanism clearly exists in the game to prohibit stakes from being placed in some locations.

It strikes me that, since the land inside a city wall is all roads, you should similarly be blocked from placing stakes there. Also, logically, there should probably be roads leading from a castles gates and to and from a bridge. If this was the case then stakes would be prohibited from being placed just outide city games and too close to a bridge as well.