Was it really so much easier to defend than to attack?

Since the beginig of my career as a TW player, i've always prefered to defend and conquer with a defensive agression. I just marched into enemy territory, and waited for them to attack me, defeated them, and the conquered. In TW games for it's just so much easier to defend than to attack.
When i want more chalange, i'm the one that attacks, but i've actually lost a few battles when i was outnumberd and i was the one attacking.

So the question on my mind is.... Was it really so much easier to defend than attack in those times? It should be easier but no so easy:sweatdrop:

And what do you guys like? Attack? Defense? Ambush?

share your thoughts men:beam:

Ambush: The easiest way of eliminating enemies, especially if you got lots of cavalry. Then, if you got lots of cavalry, everything is easy. I mean, a long thin line of enemy soldiers to be attacked from all sides...piece a cake.

Attack: Depending on units in your army. As getai, I prefer to go on the offensive with my falxmen as they cut through any lines. Take that you stinking romans...

Defense: Spearmen, hoplites or phalanxes in your army and defense is the best choice to combat. The AI ain't that clever to flank you and while your main line keeps the enemy occupied, you move around your cavalry and charge them in their backs.

Personally I only ever assault a city if time is against me: if, for whatever reason, a quick attack is (in roleplay terms) more expedient than besieging the town till they sally or surrender. For an open battlefield, I usually attack if I can, though when I'm playing Hayasdan I usually hold a position and wait to be attacked. As for ambushing, I prefer factions that utilise light infantry so I do like to ambush if I can (though usually it doesn't work).

I think that in RTW, defense is easier then attack because the enemy moves toward you which gives them more time for their formation to loose all sense of cohesion. I can't remember if this is actually the case, but it seems to make sense.

Foot

at the beginning i preferred to defence, it was easier expecially with spear units, but after a while it became very funny to attack too, expecially with sword or gladio armed units. You have more caualties in your armies, but you have a lot more satisfaction.

Regarding sieging, in the beginning i liked to try to bypass AI units on the wall, so i used my ladder and towers far away from the enemy units on the wall.
But now i dont like it anymore, i usually siege a town only if i have some experienced units, and i send them on the wall just where there are enemy units. So the battle is more fair, and you can see your experienced units to show their skill.

With Archers/HA faction it's quite difficult to choose. I think sometime is better to attack, so you can retreat in your own turn if you cant destroy the enemy army.
Other time is better to put all your archer/Ha on an hill and wait for the enemy approach...

Historically, the defender has certain advantages, if he is prepared for the attack. This is especially true in the case of fortresses/cities, which IMO are to easy to storm in RTW. However, even in the field a strong defensive position was an oft-decisive advantage. You'll note that, throughout history, a good way of 'attacking' an army has been to occupy a strong position commanding its lines of supply, thus forcing them to attack you on a terrain of your chosing. As Foot pointed out, in RTW it can be hard to keep your formation while advancing, especially if the terrain is uneven, although often it's due to the game's pathing fuck-ups :juggle2:, and the AI is simply unable to keep a proper formation at all. Well, historically armiss actually had similar problems maintaining formation while attacking, especially if a clever defender tried to disrupt it (and that's where Hannibal's staggered deployment of his centre at Cannae was pure brilliance).

Personally, I usually let the enemy come to me, unless I've got a very cavalry-heavy army. I usually only move if I need to grab some high ground or consolidate my position against a numerically superior enemy--the exception is when the I'm vastly outnumbered by several armies coming from different directions, in which case I move to eliminate them separately before they can join up, or die trying.

When I am confident of battle result I attack.
On the other hand if I am not sure of result of the battle I tend to defend, unless of course there is a chance to isolate enemy forces and destroy them one by one.

Ambush is great when your strategic situation forces you to fight battle that you know you cant win in normal battle.
Other then that I prefer to go straight for enemy throat.

with phalanx heavy armies, its always bettter to defend. let those fools come to your long spikes- they get tired, and you start the battle w/ full strength.
and ambushes are a favorite, but if you have phalanxes in your army its screwed b/c they are slow but if you want to risk them in H2H, go ahead. if i ever wanted to ambush their army, dacian skirms are the best, along w/ thracians.....
my formula for a good ambushing army-
large+fast+powerful= PWND!

On the field:
-Its generaly easier to defend, and I used this tactic a lot when playing Vh/Vh. But with Fatige Off the "defensive" strategy looses some effectivness.

-Personally I prefer to attack, its more challenging, its faster, and fun.

Now... I don't know about you fellas... but I've been known to disrupt defending enemy formations. Especially in MP. :smash:

I attack very defensively: I take my time to deploy, I take my time to march, I take my time to readjust. Half the fun is to see my units at work etc.; and since I often deploy lots of missiles due to a combination of a mostly land-locked empire with limitted economy; plenty of wars and most notably good archers... (yes I mean the AS) ...

For what its worth, in antiquity there really wasn't an attacker or defender per se (except in sieged obviously). Often if one side wanted to fight but the other stayed in camp, there would be no battle. So a battle only occurred when both sides had a good reason for wanting to fight (confidence in victory, morale or supply issues, time constraints, etc).

Therefore, for a truly accurate battle, both fighters should advance and meet in the middle of the field, as forces did in antiquity. The way RTW battles are fought, with one side waiting patiently on one side while the enemy threw themselves at their line, was rather uncommon. Probably a product of modern conceptions of ancient warfare with rows of steely-eyed Romans standing motionless while wild hordes of barbarians toss themselves feebly against the Roman shields.

^^

Τhis didn't always happen, sometimes one army had the upper ground or defended a pass, so obviously the opponent would either march and engage tem or just watch the enemy watching them until the soldiers are bored and hungry.

Shame that it isn't very well done in RTW. Defending, okay, but even on the attack it's perfectly easy to taunt out the enemy with ranged units and get them to break formation while they should be defending. Takes some discipline as a player not to allow such things to ruin the gameplay.

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Originally Posted by anubis88

Since the beginig of my career as a TW player, i've always prefered to defend and conquer with a defensive agression. I just marched into enemy territory, and waited for them to attack me, defeated them, and the conquered. In TW games for it's just so much easier to defend than to attack.
When i want more chalange, i'm the one that attacks, but i've actually lost a few battles when i was outnumberd and i was the one attacking.

So the question on my mind is.... Was it really so much easier to defend than attack in those times? It should be easier but no so easy:sweatdrop:

And what do you guys like? Attack? Defense? Ambush?

share your thoughts men:beam:

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If you attack, the AI gives away all initiative to you, and you can easily outmanouver them and force them to split up etc. Typically, on the defensive you have to face a more aggressive and coordinated enemy. The RTW AI with EB style balancing (slower battle speed) actually appears sufficiently coordinated to at time be dangerous, unlike in vanilla where units rout so quickly that the incredibly long time the enemy needs to flank you (still a bit too rare of an occurence) means they arrive much too late. So the answer is that attacking is easier unless you're heavily outnumbered and don't have a manouver advantage. If outnumbered heavily and without manouver advantage, defense is usually easier IMO. :2cents:

On open plain:

When I have infantry I put them on defense because I am too lazy to press the pause button and tell each of them to go after a different enemy unit...
stupid command-order-making engine thing:furious3:

With cavalry there's not really attack or defense as you're always moving.

But If I get height advantage then of course I wait.
If the enemy gets height advantage then I try to maneuver them off it (stupid AI:whip:)

I think Imperator is right in most instances though. The game fail to take into consideration that the men would be eager to fight and urging their officers forward (instead of the other way around:sweatdrop:)

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Originally Posted by Foot

I think that in RTW, defense is easier then attack because the enemy moves toward you which gives them more time for their formation to loose all sense of cohesion. I can't remember if this is actually the case, but it seems to make sense.

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Nah, the AI loses all sense of cohesion regardless. :clown:

I used to think defensive agression but I changed that ever since I switched to sinuhet's formations where the enemy agressivley pulls maneuvers left right and centre forcing you take care of three or four lines at any one time without having set them up yourself. I can't seem to pull it off with phalnaxes neither. I'm much better having the enemy hold tight in their formation and let me maneuver around them till I think I've pinned them down. This is especially true if you use a horse archer/spearman army which I huess is my only choice with Hayasdan.

As Qarthardatism I preferred attacking too, despite the lack of a cavalry heavy army. I felt that the spearman had very good maneuverability so I used them to pull off all sorts of front line pulls to wings, back line charges then cavalry surround back type formations. Also there is nothing more satisfying than going custom battle and using a Camillian Romani army to attack poor defending but huge in number celtic nations.

I think it depended on the situation whether it is more difficault to attack or the defend. Take a look at massda or alesia. The romans outnumbered their enemies but still werent able to storm the cities(fortresses). And i mean the romans had formidable siege equipment and with the legioners quite heavy infantry. The jews and the gauls had the geographical advantage. The fortresses were built on hills, which made the siege equipment more or less useless.
The battle of hastings is also a nice example, although it took place 1000 years later, the equipment didnt change that much. The saxons had also the geographical advantage, but were fools enough to give it up.
I would say you cant expect a game, with lets say "rules of playing", to show you it could have been in the real past.

i swear by the tactics of the great Wellington: a strategic offensive, combined with a defensive tactic: i move my troops deep into enemy turf and let them come to me afterwards, preferably on a spot i pick. i rarely attack cuz i like them to come at me. it makes it easier cuz otherwise they mostly spawn their army at the other side of the friggin map :wall: and that sucks. the outcome is the same anyway.

in battle i always tend to pin them down with my center, then nail their flanks with mine, and finally crush one flank with a decisive cavalry blow. when you are attacked you can easily deploy your troops. when your attacking, you need to bring your formation to them and do it so they wont screw up your plan. sometimes that goes wrong (some units arrive to early, to late, etc...), but adapting is something i like.

i generally dont like ambushes. i like to take them out on the field, and i mean that literally. i hate fighting in forests cuz i have to little overview that way. and since i rely severely on my cavalry for the finishing touch i need to see the whole picture.


@ Imperial Fist:

as i recall, the romans did storm massada. they build this friggin huuuuuge rampart for their siege equipment (you can still see it today i believe) but the judeans killed themselves before falling victim to the romans. at alesia i dont think they had the possibility to stage an assault since caesar himself was pinned between 2 armies. so he could only wait for someone to make the first move. geographical issues werent such a problem for roman engineers. to build the rampart there they supposedly cut down every tree in the surroundings. really, their construction were mind-blowing, no medieval siege can even come close to what they did.

Siege-ramps were always the purview of major empires that could keep large armies in the field more or less indefinitely; they served the Achamenid Persians quite well too, by what I understand. Of course, throwing one up required the besieging army to have ample time at its disposal, ie. no nasty relief armies on the way and so on. And of course the logistics to be able to remain in the siege camp for the required time.

Medieval armies tended to be remarkably short of both those kinds of full-time troops, and sieges where they didn't have to worry about either other enemy forces or the shortage of victuals. They habitually compensated with a lot of quite sophisticated siege engines though.

Assaulting walls has always been one of my strengths and I enjoy it, so I rarely carry out a lengthy siege unless there logistical or strategic demand for me to do so. I virtually never defend, the AI simply isn't fast enough to keep pace with a human brain. It's also extremely rare, from my experience, for the AI to launch a large-scale invasion. Yes I play on vh/h.

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If you attack, the AI gives away all initiative to you, and you can easily outmanouver them and force them to split up etc. Typically, on the defensive you have to face a more aggressive and coordinated enemy.

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Precisely. Plus it's boring to sit and wait to be attacked. Who knows, maybe the AI will simply yet you devastate their land. If I have a full stack army, I want it always on the march, always attacking, always conquering. I can't afford to sit and wait for the enemy to attack me.

i mostly use a minimum of 2 armies when assaulting enemy territory. one with only heavy inf that lays siege and the other(s) - fully fledged battle armies -to secure the siege and take on relief armies.

the AI never comes when you attack, thats why i rather have them coming to me in defense. otherwise they are always waiting half across the map...

^ Same here Gaius, but I often include an army of millita/levies as garrison when I conquer a city so my main force can move on... :D

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Originally Posted by Foot

Personally I only ever assault a city if time is against me: if, for whatever reason, a quick attack is (in roleplay terms) more expedient than besieging the town till they sally or surrender.
Foot

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I have question on your tactic, Foot. When waiting a city out, do you (1.) "resupply" your army (by retreating general in command to your territory and back again) or (2.) have it led by a captain only or (3.) do you suffer all those belt-tigthened/starving penalties?

I for one, usually have a general "A" who lead the army to the city, sieges it for a few turns, until being relieved by another (well-supplied) one. Is that fair to do?

BTW, for how long does an army have to stand in enemy territory before it get "plundered" (i.e. black spot appears)?

Actually, I think that sieges are a very interesting issues and I would like to invite other member to discuss their preferred conduct.

Personally I believe as long as there is an easy route to one of your cities using a general to resupply is OK.

The traits are supposed to simulate the army's supply status, not the general's. "Resupplying" by bringing in another is somewhat of an exploit. If you however come in with a fresh army to keep up the siege and retreat the previous army along with its general it's fair.

the general could be carrying a caravan of supplies with him :beam: and women, and booze, ...

I think RTW emulates battles rather well, you march into another factions land, destruction takes place (ie broken supply lines?) this would have forced an army to attack just to keep their economy

The only reason it is easier to defend than to attack is that the AI doesn't have the first clue on how to attack decently; they just end up all over the place, come to you exhausted after running half a mile to reach you, charge uphill, don't use ranged units and skirmishers effectively to harass you, etc.