Strategy Map - Marching Unitited or Concentration at a Point?

[RLucid]

There's that saying about "marching divided & fighting united", yet OTOH there's some advice about splitting up your forces being a bad idea from the advisor. Indeed moving multiple smaller armies around, risks the odd unpleasant surprise.

Yet, if you want to trap or lure an opponent on the strategy map, then it's bit tough to do with just 1 mega-army, marching directly to Go.

So any views on this? Do you amuse yourself with sneeky misdirection moves and offer 'bait', or just find smashing the front door down with overwhelming force working fine?

[Quirinus]

I'm generally a fan of the doctrine of taking enemy cities as fast as possible, on the principle that the loss of settlements hurts an opponent more than the loss of armies. After that, if armies come my way, I sally forth and crush them (Doesn't have to be 'sallying forth' in the strictest sense, could be that I see the army not two grids away from recently-occupied city, so I attack).

[Omanes Alexandrapolites]

I usually use a more united approach to my forces when in enemy lands.

Marching divided never has really appealed to me due to the vulnerability of the scattered forces - the enemy can easily move a force other than the one being baited to attack one of the armies. These then rapidly fall.

Spies can help with this, but this results in movement being a bit tedious/hard to manage on occasions.

I'm also a bit like Quirinus, prefer to use a brute force approach. As said, in most cases, a rapid blitz method seems much more effective and reliable in damaging the enemy than an intelligent yet less reliable tactical manoeuvre or trap.

Having said that, bait can be useful/the only method of victory if you are outnumbered. Especially in sieges if you are able to take the settlement in the turn. Most of the time the AI sends out some troops to deal with the bait, leaving you to sneak in and take the town while they are gone. Sadly, the AI comes back to take back the settlement immediately afterwards which can be a problem - especially if the city taken has a weak defence for an outnumbered level of defenders (lower/higher than stone walls).

Using multiple armies to surround a force to prevent them fleeing can also be useful, but the same risks do apply and it's often possible to catch up with withdrawing forces easily anyhow.

[Bartholemew-Varath]

I always march with a united unit, i dont really like sending small parts of my army ahead, only usually for flankers and the like. I also like the idea of brute force, smashing the enemies frontline with hundreds of soldiers, making them rout, i do it if the advantage is infinately theirs, such as they are on a hill, and have a general or flankers backing them up, nothing feels better than destroying an enemy army in hand to hand combat with brute force

Marching as several groups is usually only useful if the enemy has a small army and rather than charge your lines, they will stay and defend their positions. Also, you might try to lure out an army out of a highly defensive position by dragging them out with bait, but you could use a light cavalry for that so i suppose its not relevant

[RLucid]

Good recce is important. Fighting smaller battles helps, as you avoid the 20 unit threshold, and the AI bodging part of a key battle, by insisting on control of some of your precious forces. It is definitely possible to get "burned". Some of the Diplomacy strategies mentioned in guide feature "misdirection", but it's possible to pull off occasionally without the drag of frustrating Diplo. negotations.

Whilst it's not always applicable, in a campaign where time/space considerations and manuever comes into play it's very satisfying. You can sometimes "take" a whole enemy army out of equation, simply by misdirecting them; if the AI is left with forces in the wrong place, it's worse than not having them, as the upkeep cripple the faction finances preventing them from raising troops in the required spot.

Detachments sent by AI are also cheaper to bribe, adding another strategic possibility.

Maneuver and a dynamic campaign (going in the back door) tends to lead to storming a town with open gates (may be no wall arrows), rather than siege possibly following a battle on ground of enemies choosing, Direct siege battle, where enemy fight to death generally leads to more casualties.

On Quirinus's point, I think you can capture cities faster (perhaps not first one but a whole string on campaign) if you destroy the main opposing army in the open taking very few losses fairly early on. Furthermore you can launch an attack sooner, with re-inforcements following on, if you're prepared to march divided. Sometimes, you can deflect armies long way away from a city (or have them halted by a 3rd faction with hidden stack), which is then attacked from a surprise direction.

Being willing to take the risk and bank on gathering a relief force in time, after a smaller force exploits an opportunity, justifies the recce effort of spies, and can unbalance opposing faction, as they rush to react with the superior forces.

The AI also tends to keep some garrison force, plus a force outside a city, so I've had some success with threatening a city from one direction, then turning to take a more important city; which gets a (weakened) army to chase a stack it shouldn't actually attack. Then have 2nd army moving in, which can wipe out the smaller city protection forces left behind after the main army destroys the attacking AI stack.

Another trick is to have a main force in "ambush" and have a smaller bait army in more open terrain which the AI promptly attacks, only to run into a superior army.

If you prefer to always to campaign with 1 united force, and not use multiple armies, how do you take advantage of interior lines (those roads you like to build and naval transport), shifting thrust of an attack to provoke and exploit weak points?

[El Diablo]

I think that you will find the "march divided fight united" was a military maxim in that having a large force in one place meant that supplying the force was not possible without a good chain of supply. By dispercing your troops you could forage more effectively and thus limit what you needed to ship to the troops.

The down side of this was your force being spread out meant it was possible for the enemy to counterattack. They may have only had a 1/2 stack but if you split your full stack into four the force attacked would be outnumbered 2:1.

This is the "fight united" part. The trick being to march AS FAR AS POSSIBLE divided without having to fight. A true balancing act.

That was in the "real world" in RTW you have no issues with supply and therefore no reason to disperce your troops UNLESS you have multiple targets that a fraction of your force can TAKE AND HOLD or even just take and destroy (scorthed earth). Otherwise keep them together and take the only thing the enemy can not replace (cities) - rather than armies which they can re-recruit.

Also when you play you often specialise in one type of unit from a city thus if you were sending them to the front like that you run the risk of having a 1/4 stack of hoplies being ambused by a 1/2 stack of missle cavelry. I.e. having a non-mixed unit type of force. Never a good scenario!!

My 2c

[Quirinus]

On Quirinus's point, I think you can capture cities faster (perhaps not first one but a whole string on campaign) if you destroy the main opposing army in the open taking very few losses fairly early on. Furthermore you can launch an attack sooner, with re-inforcements following on, if you're prepared to march divided. Sometimes, you can deflect armies long way away from a city (or have them halted by a 3rd faction with hidden stack), which is then attacked from a surprise direction.

That's working on the assumption that you take very few losses yourself. While the AI may be incompetent in advanced tactics and unrealistically vulnerable to any 'tricks', I find that, generally, when confronted with a similar army, my playing skills are mediocre enough to take significant losses myself. (This is proving to be an especially intractable problem as Bactria in my RTR game, fighting against Seleucids who can churn out stack after stack of advanced units) So while I can usually win, it's sometimes Pyrrhic, and constant attrition without re-training can really bite as a campaign goes on.

Taking the city also provides the additional benefit of being able to reduce the numerical advantage-- wall defenses help a lot.


I do occasionally use the 'many small armies' doctrine as a delaying tactic-- sending out lone units of peasants that the AI stack(s) chase around for a few turns, allowing for reinforcements to be brought up. Kind of an exploit, I guess.

[o_loompah_the_delayer]

Good recce is important.

Yes.

Detachments sent by AI are also cheaper to bribe, adding another strategic possibility.

Not really feasible after patches, bribing seems well nigh impossible and not worht it given the high cost.

On Quirinus's point, I think you can capture cities faster (perhaps not first one but a whole string on campaign) if you destroy the main opposing army in the open taking very few losses fairly early on. Furthermore you can launch an attack sooner, with re-inforcements following on, if you're prepared to march divided. Sometimes, you can deflect armies long way away from a city (or have them halted by a 3rd faction with hidden stack), which is then attacked from a surprise direction.

You dont need to find the enemies main army to destroy it, if you take the city, they will come to you and you can slaughter them there.
As for early attacks, the main army doesnt have to be 20 stacks as long as it is not significantly understength compared to the enemy. so in the early game 6-10 units is fine.

Another trick is to have a main force in "ambush" and have a smaller bait army in more open terrain which the AI promptly attacks, only to run into a superior army.

Agreed, especially if the enemy is positioned on very good defensive territory.

If you prefer to always to campaign with 1 united force, and not use multiple armies, how do you take advantage of interior lines (those roads you like to build and naval transport), shifting thrust of an attack to provoke and exploit weak points?

You keep defensive armies at other points and then once the main army smashes through the defensive armies move up where there is no threat opposing them.

One situation which worked well for me, was against Macedonia. They moved their armies northwards, probably to attack my ally Thrace. I took the opportunity to surprise capture (I think) Larissa, killing their faction leader, with very small forces led by my faction leader. Before the 2 main campaign armies I had prepared (one of which needed to be moved by ship) were in position.

Now the AI turned around and moved it's 2 big stacks back, giving me time to choose ground and set a trap. Meanwhile a 3rd smaller army, mostly mercenaries marched out on Bylazora from North, now denuded of forces.

The effect is, that the faction completely collapses, as soon as you win the first battle. It simply cannot meet the various threats, and you prevent effective withdrawal because retreat is cut off. Furthermore it just moves it's forces to your tune, without significant effect.

I would say this is only possible in Greece where all the the cities are so close together, elsewhere where distances are greater, there can only be one target for any given army.

[Omanes Alexandrapolites]

One tactic of marching, in a way, divided, involves dragging siege weapons behind the main military force. This allows the main force to move ahead without heavy weaponry slowing them down.

The problem with this is the vulnerability of lone seige weapons - even a unit of peasants may be able to bring down a small force of them. This means a guard has to go with them, partially defeating the purpose.

[Quirinus]

Also, since siege weapons are useful for being able to storm a city the turn you attack it, having it trail behind also somewhat defeats the purpose....

[RLucid]

They don't need to be present at every battle or siege, but moving them by ship and landing to rendez-vous with other forces deployed may help.