The Seleucid Empire

[nameless]

Elephants have skirmish mode? How come I never noticed that?

When I right click on the enemies the icon changes to sword, which I assume is melee, when I tried to do the alternate click it changed to arrows which I did not want.

[xemitg]

its really more of making them run over people then as that crazy balloon guy said. I don't believe there is a button.

[pezhetairoi]

interesting... it seems to me that all this doesn't seem to occur for me? I mean, I tried out a custom 15 armoureds against 20 spartans battle the other day, and the attacks worked pretty well except for the elephants' tendency not to go straight for the spartans but at an oblique angle... I even won it handsdown...

[Franconicus]

Has anyone ever tried to be defensive against Egypt in the beginning? Going first for Asia Minor should boost your economy and fighting Egypt in the midgame could be more fun.
This is my master plan:
Fortify Damascus and Antioch. Take Susa and built fortresses along the northern frontier. Attack Pontus. Take Helicarnasus and Rhodes. Take Pergamun and Byzantium and Salamis.
Then make money, raise a fleet and two invasion armies. Make a feint attack on Sidon and Jerusalem with your 1st army. Then make a landing at Alexandria. Block the bridges and go for Memphis. Once Memphis is yours take Thebes and Alexandria and start to attack Jerusalem with your first army.

If this plan works the Egyptians will have a lot of troops but I could take their hoe towns without fighting them and then fight on the battle field of my choice.

[Viking]

I try to get them to do melee attacks in a fight but they just SIT there and shoot arrows. I try to move them towards the enemy, right click past the enemy but they don't even try meleeing anyone in their range. How do I fix this?

Don`t click behind the enemy, click at directly at it!

Their melee attack is secondary, not primary. So you have to secondary-attack for the elephants to banzai the enemy's ranks.

Actually it`s the oher way round

Elephants have skirmish mode? How come I never noticed that?

They don`t, that`s why

[nameless]

Has anyone ever tried to be defensive against Egypt in the beginning? Going first for Asia Minor should boost your economy and fighting Egypt in the midgame could be more fun.
This is my master plan:
Fortify Damascus and Antioch. Take Susa and built fortresses along the northern frontier. Attack Pontus. Take Helicarnasus and Rhodes. Take Pergamun and Byzantium and Salamis.
Then make money, raise a fleet and two invasion armies. Make a feint attack on Sidon and Jerusalem with your 1st army. Then make a landing at Alexandria. Block the bridges and go for Memphis. Once Memphis is yours take Thebes and Alexandria and start to attack Jerusalem with your first army.

If this plan works the Egyptians will have a lot of troops but I could take their hoe towns without fighting them and then fight on the battle field of my choice.

Or you could bull doze your way into taking Crete and Salamis, both are islands and have very light garrisons. Usually when I attack Salamis they have 1 or 2 troops there, if you do it fast enough you can take the city before the Egyptians send in a relief army. Islands make alot of money once the ports are in

Though taking Egypt does generate alot of money but I guess Asia Minor is just as good, I'll have to try it out.

Don`t click behind the enemy, click at directly at it!

Yeah, found that out to. In battles I use Armoured Elephants to guard my Phalanx's flanks.


------------------------------- PhalnxPhalnxPhalnxPhalnx
------------------------------- ArcherArcherArcherArcher
------------------------------------OnagerOnager


-----------------------Elephant---------------------------Elephant

CataphractCataphract
LightCalvaryLightCalvary
CompanionCompanion
ScytheScythe
General

I have my Onagers just dish out some long range damage as well as taking out any enemy artillery. It was fun because there were a couple times in the first heat of the battle my Onager actually got a direct hit on a general and killed him

Archers give support fire for the Phalnx which are basically invincible against anything at the front.

Whenever a flanking unit closes in on my main battle group I right click my elephants to bull doze into the attacker. This usually works and they start trampling and starting whacking that trunk of theirs into the enemy. This is where the problem starts, sometimes the elephants will stop attacking and just let the archers shoot. Elephants are deadly because even when their not moving, their trunks and tusks can take out several guys at once. In this case, the elephants just SIT there and do NOTHING. It's annoying because when their not attacking then that's when they start falling like flies.

My Calvary wings are usually far away from the battle group and I charge them in attacking enemy artilleries which then charge straight into the enemy's rear, not many troops can withstand my wing. The Cataphracts have a powerful charge with their armor and can rip through anything, light calvary can catch up with anything fast, companions provide a tough backbone, and the Scythe chariots are 10x more deadly against calvary than against infantry since their always moving so they fall like flies.

If I was able to fix my elephant problem then my army would be doing alot better than it is now, it's working for me but it can be better.

[pezhetairoi]

But charging scythes and cav together kinda detracts from the overall effectiveness of both charging separately doesn't it? The problem with chariots is that they are so large they get into the way of practically everything and anything, and those scythes... are there chariot FFs if they charge among enemy cav?

[nameless]

That's why it's set up that way When charging the Calvary usually blows through the enemy and the Scythe chariots mop up anyone left behind in the chaos.

I always strive for total destruction

Though the group formation keeps them in line so the calvary always hits first with the chariots the last ones to arrive. I'll try to get screenshots.

And there aren't any scythe FFs from what I've seen.

[Franconicus]

I tried to be defensive against Egypt in the beginning while taking Asia Minor.
There are the results so far:
Western Front
I hired mercs and took Helicarnassos, Ancyra, Sinope and Mazaka. Now I go for Nicomedia to beat the last Pontus army there. First try is a bad disaster. I had 3 merc hoplites, 2 barb inf, 1 barb cav, 1 falx, two crete archers and one pelteast as well as one FM. The enemy had twice as much men. They had the king with another FM, Samarthian cav, half unit pelteasts. Rest was desert inf.
I formed a square with my cav and archers inside. Phalanx depth was 4-6 rows. I hoped to destroy their cav with my phalanx and then chase them with my cav.
They attack with desert inf first. Then the two FM charges. My phalanx gets shaken. I send falx and FM and lead the barb cav in their rear. Sarmathian attack two. My FM gets panic and runs. Rest of the army follows. Heavy losses.
I will return and then take the town. Pergamum wil be next.

Eastern Front:
I try flexible response. First I take Susa. I built an all infantry army there. I have no FM here, so I cannot hire mercs. I go north to take Arsak. Now I refill and increase the army and then I will try to march to Kotgis. If I succeed the northern front will be secured.

Southern Front:
Egypt has been allied but now it changed his mind. It goes for Antioch and Damascus. I have an army walking round their back. Last turn I attacked their army at Antioch with an all cav army (8 jav, 2 Greek cav, 1 FM, 1 chariot). Their army was twice as big. Some desert cav , some pelteasts and rest Numidian Inf. I had some hard time with their cav but once it was destructed the rest was easy. Total victory. I will soon be able to send troops from the other fronts. Then I will strike back!

Ocean:
My fleet is wiped out and I do not have the money to build a new one.

[Garvanko]

Ocean:
My fleet is wiped out and I do not have the money to build a new one.

Fleets should be confined to ports until the middle game. The AI seems to have the edge in this area in the early stages.

[bubbanator]

Egypt's navy is massive, usually the largest in the world during every part of the game. It is an incredibly difficult task to defeat the egyptian navy (not impossible, but very difficult). I found that the safest and most cost effective way to transport troops by sea as Selucids is to just build one large navy of 10 or so triremes and load up your troops. They usualy won't mess with you.

If you really want to control the high seas though, your best option is to take the fight to the land and take over all of their port cities. This is no easy task, but it is far more effective.

[pezhetairoi]

Sardis is the only major city you can use to build a navy, and even then not always, because you need Sardis to project power into Asia Minor. Antioch should never be touched, I think I don't need to say. Why an all infantry army in Susa, Franc? I thought it should be rather the other way around.

[Franconicus]

You are right. Problem is that Antioch has immidiate access to cav production. Javelins at once, Greek cav and eles soon. So I keep on producing cav here. I have an all cav army with 1200 men. Last night I fought two battles in one turn with two Egyptian armies. Twice my size each. I killed more than 4,000 and lost about 400 in total. This should give them something to think about.
In Susa you have access to pikes. I upgraded it. Now I can produce advanced pikemen and archers. What can I say. They wirk well. I defeated an Parthian army last night and now Phraaspa is almost undefended.

[pezhetairoi]

How in the world did you defeat a Parthian army with pikes and archers? Did they send Eastern Infantry at you, or did they have HA? If they had HA I am amazed at your skill.

[Franconicus]

Well in fact it was not a big thing. They usually have lots of eastern infantry, some hillmen and FM's guard. Also some cataphracts. HA were rare.
I took Susa as soon as the defending army was gone to figth rebels. Then I defeated the backcoming army.
After that I sent an army north. My army was only spears and javelins. After the first battle I had a new General. Eastern inf is no problem The catas always rush into my pikes.

My craziest battle was when the Armenian sallied a town. They had only one eastern inf and a FM and I had two pikes and two javelin. I sallied. I managed to kill the inf and made the cav route

[pezhetairoi]

aah I see... if you beat HA I would kowtow to you.

[Emit_Flesti]

After two successful Roman full imperial campaigns (my first was Brutii, second Julii, on M/M), i decided to look for a challenge with the SE. So, this was what happened.
- I tried to hold on to everything i got, building roads/trade/temple of haephestus on my central cities (antioch to seleucia). The army is very small and totally amateurish so i decided to try to divide the empire into central, eastern and - you gessed it - western army regions. At first, each one had only one stack with hoplite militia, mil cav, some peltasts (maybe).
- Where available, i hired cretan archers, better cavalry (bedouin, arabian) ASAP. The eastern army is confined to seleucia. Western goes immediately into action, to take those rebel cities in asia minor. Central army is building up and upgrading as possible. Meanwhile, my diplomat and spy travel south, to the inevitable Egypt.
- 3rd step (they all take more than one turn, of course), my central army begins to push into rebel territory in the south. The idea is to build another, more powerful army (levy pikemen are SO much better than mil hop) in Antioch (Tarsus is set to build ships by now) to attack Tyre and Jerusalem while I cut off those bloody reenforcements coming from Egypt after capturing and enslaving rebels in the south.
- Parthia, Armenia and Pontus were under control at this stage. They were wandering around, but as the money started coming in, i bribed anything in sight. Got a cataphract unit which was nice. The west is already secure, except for a small rebel town in central Asia Minor.
- Tyre and Jerusamlem were no prob. In my efforts to push south, i actually lost and retook tyre. Pretty stupid move on my part, but it was a bit late at night :P Following my strategy, i cut off the counter attacking egyptians at the sinai and win a clear victory. Actually, it was a bit scary because early in the game the seleucids do not have much in terms of cavalry. And those chariots are hell.. 2 militia cav routed before success.
- All quiet in the east. In the west, made a move against the rebel town. Naked fanatics!! My FM died almost immediately after a flank charge. Anyway, got the town, close victory. Some turns afterward, the following FM died in a similar approach. I have to point out that mil hop are not enough to stop NF. My attack was too hesitant, but i learned a good lesson about phalanx battle.
South: bribed an egyptian FM, later used to rule Alexandria, did the bridge thing with one of the armies and cleaned up with some bribing. The second central army took Alexandria, the first one took Memphis and Thebes. A third was ready to an amphibious strike at Salamis (edit: Cyprus), which had gone rebel by now.
(General siege tactics for wood-walled cities: 3 battering rams, for flanking, with peltast fire to soften defenses before barging in :)
- On the next turn, two unprovoked but welcome attacks from the greek cities in the west and from parthia. Time for my eastern army to go into action. I bribed a big captain-led parthian army outside seleucia and took susa, then moved north. Bribed an armenian FM (trying to bring my treasure under 50000) and got three (one 4 star gold chevron general, a good administrator and a common chap) and a spy (!!). The first one was ideal to lead my second east army northeast from antioch into the heart of parthia. Meanwhile, a lesser general whith a lot of eastern infantry and desert mercs attacked the southern parthian town. In the west, had 2 battles with the greeks: 1 in the woods, 4 greek mil hop vs. 3 sel mil hop+2 peasants. Enveloped them and won a crushing victory. The second one was on the bridge. I screwed up and put a single unit at the bridge end, instead of further back. Really stupid, lost a lot of men but won.
- Took the last greek city in asia minor. Then went island-hopping with my cyprus army: Rhodes and Crete fell quickly. Further south, started my campaign against the numidians and got all the way to Lepcis Magna with my two veteran armies from the egyptian campaign. Up north, Parthia was a different story. I spotted a huge FM-led parthian army, but had no more MPs on my westernmost eastern army. The other was besieging the eastern town, which had a full stack garrison. Next thing I know, both armies attacked me. It was something like 3000 men (including cataphracts and HA, but mostly eastern inf, fortunately) versus 1200. Won an heroic (i think) victory and a plague sticken town after successfully holding off a hill against two cataphract units, 6 HA (they got too close and I got to them with my cats and general) and a LOT of infantry. At the end, the hill was pink and half of my men were dead. Lesson: balance your armies properly. The other eastern army was more successful, and took the other town (500 men garrison) by fending off the HA with the sarmatian mercs.
- West again: after capturing Lepcis Magna and sallying to crush a numidian counter attack, I took my new faction leader (the previous died with the plague), by ship, to mainland Greece, where i was waging war on the cities with my two archer-rich western armies. I had already taken Sparta, so I sent the second western army to Thermon and waited for the end of the sieges of Athens and Corinth, which were Macedonian. The Greeks won so I went for both. Corinth was easy. Thermon took a bit of a battle, fending off reinforcements coming from the hills (archers and slingers OWN those phalanxes!). Athens is now rebel, after my landing. My Leader's army attacked a FM Greek full stack. So, 1 general, 3 Mil Cav, 3 Mil Hop, 4 Levy Pikes, 2 Phalanx Pikes, 1 chariot, 1 bedouin archers and some peltasts took out the remnants of the greek army and conquered the city of Athena.
- I am now preparing the push into sicily and Italy in the west, but I am worried: how will my phalanxes and hoplites fare against the romans, esp. in wall sieges?? I seem to be a long way from silver shields, and eles are not much good in cities. Anyway, I'll try make them sally by attacking armies in the same tile as the city.
-In the east, it's time to go for armenia and pontus. In Africa, I'll try to make peace with the numidians, ally with the carthaginians to push the scipii into the med.


Sorry for the long boring post. I do hope you enjoy the story

[bubbanator]

Nice post.

About the comment about taking walls, try to avoid it. With the Selucids, you can make some sap points, send in your best phalanxes stacked on top of each other with archers behind them to pepper the enemy. After you have a foothold in the city, take your cats and just run over anyone in the streets. Try to avoid using seige towers unless you are sending a few groups of Royal Pikemen up (they have a very good secondary attack) otherwise, your phalanxes will get slaughtered by the Romans on the walls.

[Deus ret.]

Yep. With Seleucids vs. walls, you're screwed if you try to scale them instead of bringing them down.

@bubbanator,
Royal pikemen are a Macedonian unit, and I'm not sure about silver shield pikemen having the same acceptable secondary attack.

anyway, if you've already reached Huge city level, bring in silver shield legionnaires. Those should put up a fair fight against most units, including Romans, on the wall; provided you keep up a stream of units up the siege tower, that is. With a decent commander, the wall is basically yours.

[Emit_Flesti]

Nice post.

About the comment about taking walls, try to avoid it. With the Selucids, you can make some sap points, send in your best phalanxes stacked on top of each other with archers behind them to pepper the enemy. After you have a foothold in the city, take your cats and just run over anyone in the streets. Try to avoid using seige towers unless you are sending a few groups of Royal Pikemen up (they have a very good secondary attack) otherwise, your phalanxes will get slaughtered by the Romans on the walls.

Thanks for the comments! That's right. There is no point in storming the walls with a phalanx faction - by the way, there were no royal pikes in the SE unit roster?! . No way you can slug it out with a legion.

Just finished the campaign as the seleucids; here are the latest news:
- I left Macedon alone and, like I said, tried to do some alliances with Rome's neighbours. Ended up allied with Macedon, Carthage, Gauls and Germans, gave them all my excess money (about 100k to each). At home, bribed some rebels that kept popping up. My bribing schemes in Armenia, Pontus an Numidia gave me a LOT of FM, so I ended up with 30+ FMs and babies, weddings and new suitors for the girls every single turn. Got a few decent general, which I used to replace my dead leaders and generals.
- Sued for peace with Parthia. They were confined to the Northeasternmost region in the map, and no menace to my power. On the sea, I had several huge fleets on the east, and began to send them to the central med,where the fate of the known world was to be decided.
- Rome finally declared war on me. The Scipii sent an army from Thapsus into my domains, but i soon bribed them and conquered Thapsus and Carthage. I did not attack in any of the instances. In Thapsus there was a huge battle, which my FL won heroically almost exclusively by a massive right flank maneuver by cavalry. The desperate AI even charged my phalanxes a few times, head on. In Carthage the same thing happened while i was laying siege, but this time it was a reinforced sally. They came from behind me with cavalry, but i got there on time and routed them with a trident attack (1 cav in front and one on each side). So, I managed to avoid the dreaded sieges. My cities were a bit underdeveloped, because I exterminated to speed things up. Revolt control was a real issue in the west. Peasants are no real solution, because you really need to pump out new units in the new cities, usually more developed (Carthage was my first city with silver shield leggionaires recruiting ability). Numidia would not make peace, so I invaded them to avoid getting those pesky petty invasions and sieges. One does get bored of bribing.
- On the other side of the med, things went well. After capturing Athens, the drive into Brutii territory was no walk in the park. The AI armies had a lot of skirmishers and missile infantry (up to 75% of at least 4 of the 5 stacks I faced in Appolonia and the other Adriatic city, so one has to move forward to avoid just standing there getting shot to hell (archer auxilia have a lot of ammo and get their kicks off targeting silver shield pikes! I lost half of my very first unit because of that, and there was nothing I could do before my flanking greek cavalry was in place). I also use 4-5 archer units, so their leggionaires are cut to half before even getting near; my learning of mil cav use also served me well, as one can use them first to skirmish and to charge afterwards :)
- Had 3 armies in greece. Two were supposed to conquer the adriatic and one to hop into Italy. They did. The first city I took from the Brutii only had wooden walls,so did my regular 3 rams assault. After the brunt of the Brutii had bitten the dust in the western Balkans, I got jammed with low public order and had to leave one army there. Another army was being built in the pelloponesus and Athens, rallied in thermon to help in the Italy invasion. I can't stress the importance of slaughtering everyone at this stage. Other than that, and you cannot keep going at all. Even doing that, i found myself too worried about low order to push forward, esp in the big ex-roman cities.
- In the east, some uneventful battles in the pontic/armenian campaign gave me complete control of that side of the black sea. Up north, bribed a scithyan city, just for kicks, and somehow managed to control it after a second bribe, because by then i had built some pikemen to calm the populace :)
- By now, I had cataphracts available, so I built a new army with a fresh leader and shipped it all the way to italy. The hop into sicily was very simple. I just approached and besieged, and then I would be attacked by a relieving force. Of course, I had to do some mop-up inside the walls, but the story ended with rebels in Lilibaeum.
- The siege of Rome was a very fun and eventful battle. With some 1000 men, I faced one full stack of SPQR forces and an attacking small Jullii cavalry force. The Julii were easy, but those SPQR archers and skirmishers took their toll. I ended up with some 5 or 6 flank cavalry charges by 2 Cataphracts and 3 militia/greek cavalry, as my last resource after my own archers and skirmishers had run out of ammo. My infantry lines were somewhat disorganized after the brunt of the roman infantry and cavalry attacked (that's where all the ammo went...). They just kept going until there were only 5-10 men left in a cohort! o_O Pulled myself together, got the skirmishers into the sap points, sent the remaining cavalry directly to the city center, destroying the remains of some 10 roman units, and then successfully held the plaza with the cav against some stray cavalry. Rome was MINE! Mwaahahah! Note: do not attack sallying armies until they are out the towers' range. Even if you are outnumbered,as I was, it's easier to take them out with a solid line, ranged infantry (as many as possible) and strong glorious death-defying scary flank and rear cavalry charges.
- By now, this was getting boring. To wrap things up, i'll just tell you about my final battle, against the Jullii. AGAIN, while I was sieging Arretium, I was attacked by a ridiculous relieving force. I guess the AI intended to make to full-stack army in the city count. I guess you all noticed this, but it really is incredibly strange how the AI spams the armies with light auxiliae and archer auxiliae. So, this time I got a VERY nice spot between two woods. Streched my silver shield and phalanx pikemen from one to other. Hid my 2 silver chevroned 2 mil cav in the woods on the right, 3 Greek cav in the left woods. 3 units of peltasts in front of the lines, 2 cretan archer behind, together with the general and 2 onagers. Trashed the arrow-fodder relieving force (auxilia and light auxilia) with missiles and an all out charge from my left flank cavalry (AH! No one expects the Greek cavalry. Our chief weapon is surprise. Surprise and Fear! LOL) THEN the main force attacked through the right -hand woods. Again, most of my losses were archer-related, because somehow thoses guys can jus park in the woods and shoot through all the branches and leaves (ridiculous, really). Anyway, I used my mil cav hidden there to ambush the 4 or 5 early legionary cohorts (they were early in the attack ;) When they got to the open space, they were all in a bundle on top of each other, so I opened missile fire again. I could see that more or less all the onager boulders would smash right into the middle of the *ahem* formation, and they would just stand there. Ordered the phalnxes forward a little, to lock them. My right consisted now in a sucessful cav charge that instantly disrupted those annoying archer. Suddenly, all those leggionaires (cut down to some 30 men each) turn left, facing that part of the battle, so i just charged my 3 greeks cav and depleted skirmishers into them from behind, instarouting them with barely any losses when they turned, THEN got hit again from behind by my glorious mil cav.
-My overall conclusion: i used to my best abilities some tactics from the ancient greeks and macedonians that have been discussed in the relevant threads. Kept an intact reinforced wall of spears as long as i could. I always had one unit in reserve to use in tight situations. Hired a lot of mercs to make up for unbalances and to adapt to the region i was invading. I used skirmishers in front of the hoplites, to help softening the enemy, retreating to a more or less safe side position to form a kind of \____/ (they would be the \ / and the phalanxes the _ _ ) and charging the enemy from behind when they make contact with the spears. Cav is all important. The hammer to solve most battles with. Archers are essential for extra range. Elephants are great against Roman legions and basically any heavy infantry, provided you use more than one unit so that they will divide enemy arrow fire. Chariots... good for cleaning up, but I'm still NOT convinced of its worth. Too small units, too quick to rout, and not as effective as, say, 2 units of greek or mil cav, for that matter. Reminds me of Egyptian chariots in Civ3 - while being OK as early cav unit, they are just not effective enough to make a difference against good defence. Running amok makes them a plain liability in decisive battles. Cataphracts are simply fabulous, the tanks of ancient times, great to explore those flanks and cracks in the enemy lines. Unfortunately, I did not get around to use my silver shield leggionaires or companion cavalry in campaign. Tried them in a custom battle and they seemed at least as good as roman legionnaires and heavy cavalry
This was by far my favourite campaign yet. Thanks for your comments

[bubbanator]

@bubbanator,
Royal pikemen are a Macedonian unit, and I'm not sure about silver shield pikemen having the same acceptable secondary attack.

ya, sorry about that

[pezhetairoi]

my gods ermit, very verbose... o_O But very informative nevertheless. As Macedon I didn't really care, I just sent my phalanxes up anyway... a lot of wall battles were actually militia hoplites and phalanx pikemen against hastati/principes/the like. Losses were heavy, but they can be taken down. You just need enough to gain control of the gate. But that's only if you're an impatient commander like me :/

[Gorsnak]

Re: Taking walls with Seleucid troops

1) Just don't do it. Starve them out. Use sap points. Pikemen are extremely good on the ground in street fighting, so keep them on the ground.

However, there may be occasions where leaving the walls to the enemy is extremely undesirable. Perhaps you can't afford to leave the towers in the enemy's hands because the city layout forces you to walk around the perimeter for some distance? Onagers can take out towers fairly easily to solve this, but perhaps that's not an option. So, let's assume that for whatever reason you have to take the walls with pikemen. We'll further assume that you don't have Silver Shield Legions, as they can go toe to toe with pretty much anyone.

2) Have lots of troops. Use mercs. Most mercs suck fighting on walls too, but you won't care as much when they die.

3) Don't use levy pikemen. On top of having crap stats, they have poor morale and will break/fight to the death before they accomplish anything. The phalanx pikemen at least have enough armor that they don't die immediately.

4) Roll your tower up to the walls far away from the defenses around the gate. This lets you get multiple units up without being harrassed.

5) Get a unit of archers up there. Have them shoot over your pikemen's heads. You'll likely take a bit of friendly fire, but it works quite well, and the enemy troops break much more quickly. Cretan mercs are the way to go because they can hang back further allowing you to have multiple units of pikemen between the archers and the enemy.

6) Don't let your troops break. Even if you have reinforcements right behind them, pull the front line unit back once they're wavering. If they break and the second unit is right in their midst, the second unit takes a morale hit too. Have the first unit run around and take the towers in the other direction or something, but don't let them rout.

[Emit_Flesti]

my gods ermit, very verbose... o_O But very informative nevertheless. As Macedon I didn't really care, I just sent my phalanxes up anyway... a lot of wall battles were actually militia hoplites and phalanx pikemen against hastati/principes/the like. Losses were heavy, but they can be taken down. You just need enough to gain control of the gate. But that's only if you're an impatient commander like me :/

Sorry about that, everyone. Actually, I had a lot more to say, but tried to be as acceptably prolix as possible

I ended up fighting very few siege battles, like I wrote, because the enemy kept attacking me while I was sieging and I got the cities without the trouble. I'm only impatient in sieges during the early game, when I really need the money.

@Gorsnak: Thanks for the tips. I think sap points are the way to go, provided you study the street plan carefully enough to go quickly fron the entry points to the town center. The starve-them-out plan is also good. I used it to good effect, see above.
Archers are almost as essential to your success with the SE as cavalry. I agree - cretan archers are the best.

[pezhetairoi]

It helps in assaults (because I'm not the kind to sit and wait) to study the city plan then move your entire operation to the sector where the plan most suits you, like Alexander did at Halikarnassos, because the AI doesn't always give your army the best assault point. E.g. I was given a segment of wall at Patavium where there was a tower along every unit of wall, and I had to move my operations to the opposite side where there was mysteriously 3 units of wall withou towers. That was where I made my breach. For Seleucids this is even more important since you have to contend with much more powerful towers...

[Emit_Flesti]

I was given a segment of wall at Patavium where there was a tower along every unit of wall, and I had to move my operations to the opposite side where there was mysteriously 3 units of wall withou towers. That was where I made my breach. For Seleucids this is even more important since you have to contend with much more powerful towers...

Yes, it does happen a lot. I have the same problem in some sieges, but solve it by re-positioning the army and siege weapons during deployment. Usually there are some sections of the walls with barely any defenses, which anyone using phalanx should take advantage of. Makes life a little simpler.

[Deus ret.]

how the hell do you manage to study the city map? When I assault a town, all I get is brief overview before the perspective zooms down to your troops (and henceforth is more or less restricted to your deployment area), allowing maybe guesses about the best deployment spot ....

is there a way to access the city map of an enemy settlement?

[pezhetairoi]

Well, I'm sorta...cheating. I don't play with restricted camera, so I get the full overview. :-\ The way I see it is that if you restrict camera, the only way to try to get a clearer view is through multiple rams and units being dispersed around the walls to scout them out during deployment phase. Otherwise you'll have to use cavalry once the battle starts.

[Franconicus]

Well, I'm sorta...cheating. I don't play with restricted camera, so I get the full overview.

[bubbanator]

I never really thought of it as cheating...

...well that is probably 'cause I use it too.

I wouldn't use it but I send my troops out to flank the enemy and I send my cavalry behind. With restricted camera, I can't "get" to my cavalry unless I double click on the unit card and all...

That coupled with the fact that I am a lazy slob (and that clicking wastes time that I could be charging into the rear of the enemy