What has been your SMALLEST battle?

[macsen rufus]

We've seen lots of accounts of HUGE battles, but I wonder what's the SMALLEST battle you've fought, and the story behind it?

In my case, I'm currently playing a Norwegian (XL) campaign, and had been trying to winkle the Volga Bulgars out of Ryazan. I was about five years march from my nearest artillery, no emissaries or spies nearby, and was besieging a citadel with a garrison of 6 men who had survived the battle. So it seemed the best thing to do was withdraw and re-invade with an army small enough to not make them run straight back into the citadel, yet capable of totally destroying the enemy to ensure the province fell completely.

That's how I came to launch my smallest invasion ever - a mere 4 Mongol Horse Archers to take on 3 bashkorts and 3 urban militia - that's right, a whole 10 men on the field!

As for the fighting, it's pretty obvious. Shoot up the bashkorts whilst staying out of range of their javelins. Shoot up the UMs until the last one runs, then capture him as he flees. Not an epic battle, but fun anyway

[caravel]

I seem to get plenty of those annoying never ending sieges of six men in a citadel. I usually withdraw and invade again next year sending in the smallest unit I've got. I once sent in a single Ghulam bodyguard prince against about 10 UM, and he managed to pull it off.

I must be overzealous hunting every last router down for ransom, because I get alot of them but not enough obviously. It is better to let about 2 or 3 units off the field to ensure a short siege.

On other occasions the enemy routed again, and the process had to be repeated until their was one man left under siege. An assassin sorted that out.

Generally I dislike everything about sieges in MTW. Garrisons under a certain size 50 - 100) should just cause the siege to end like the way a crusade ends when there's not enough men. Also, all sieges should last a minimum of 5 years. There is no incentive to assault when you can wait a year and starve them out. Also you may have carefully planned to defend against an assault against your citadel with all of you JHI and JI, Saracens and Turcoman Foot standing by, but the siege will only last 1 year so the AI decides to sit there... the alternative would have been to use a pathetically small garrison that can last a good few years, but won't stand much of a chance against an assault anyway. If find that I can hold off massive onslaughts some 2 - 3 small units, gaining valour quickly, but once the enemy archers get into range, and really start to wear my men down, the battle is already lost.

[macsen rufus]

Hi Manco - I rather enjoy assaulting castles... I just love my artillery but the casualty rate can be atrocious. But then so's sitting it out. I find the AI rarely assults me if I'm under siege, but then again I rarely give it the opportunity, as I usually counterattack first year. Quite agree though, if the garrison is one man, assassins are the way to go You can't easily get it right - a garrison that can defend an assault will starve too soon.

Sieges are a difficult one to get right in this sort of game, as realistically we should expect one to last weeks or months, but the one-year-per-turn just doesn't accommodate that. At least it's better than in RTW, where the besieging army suffers no losses at all! I think maybe the attrition rate for besiegers should be higher than it is already, as historically sieges were very hard to maintain, due to foraging for a large army, unsanitary conditions etc etc.

[Innocentius]

Speaking on the OT about sieges: Yes, it's a shame sieges don't work all that well in MTW, especially since sieges were far more common than battles.

I've had quite a plenty of small battles, mainly against rebels though so there's really no interesting story behind them (an army of rebels step by step being worn down by the failing AI until they're so pathetically weak that I finish them off). Never think I've been down to as low as ten men in total though
The smallest I can recall was my 6 Horsemen vs. 13 Kerns (VI).

Generally small battles (1-3 units on each side) are among th funniest battles, probably since it's easier to attain victory when you manouvre in small scale. One of the funniest (and easiest) battles I've had was my two units of valour 3 Kerns (trained in that Irish province that gives the morale boost + a 4 star general) vs. 84 rebel peasants with an 6 (yes, six) star general.

[Jxrc]

Playing as the HRE and owing Friesland, my thee ships in the North Sea were sunk by the all-mighty last English ship (sounds familiar does'nt it ?)...

The next year the English invaded with one units of archers. I had two units of peasants and thought they would do the trick (one to charge head on, one to do the same from the rear). The archers did not run away when I attacked but charged my first units of peasants. Before the other an gone round, the first unit was already running away.... Second charge head on thus and same result ... They loss about 15 guys, I lost about 100 ...

[Alexios]

I once sent in a single Ghulam bodyguard prince against about 10 UM, and he managed to pull it off.

My God! What was his name, Bruce Lee??? It must have looked like "Matrix Reloaded" with him dodging all those arrrows, then beating the heck out of 10 guys once he got into the castle!

On other occasions the enemy routed again, and the process had to be repeated until their was one man left under siege. An assassin sorted that out.

I'm wondering, did you experience a downgrade in the structure, or lose any of its upgrades after the assassination was complete? That's one thing that has always annoyed me about leading an assault: the structure almost always gets downgraded after it's over. And it's really a bloody shame when it's something like a fortress or citadel that's involved.

[Kavhan Isbul]

My God! What was his name, Bruce Lee??? It must have looked like "Matrix Reloaded" with him dodging all those arrrows, then beating the heck out of 10 guys once he got into the castle!

My understanding was that the UMs were in the open outside of the fort/castle.

[Martok]

My smallest battle was in a French campaign. In the very first turn, I scraped together a few troops and invaded Anjou. The English had only 1-2 units, while I had 3 (spearmen, archers, and ballista crew). In the end, my ballista crew won the day, flanking and killing the English general. It was quite amusing.

I'm wondering, did you experience a downgrade in the structure, or lose any of its upgrades after the assassination was complete? That's one thing that has always annoyed me about leading an assault: the structure almost always gets downgraded after it's over. And it's really a bloody shame when it's something like a fortress or citadel that's involved.

A castle is downgraded one level if you siege out the enemy (as opposed to directly assaulting it). That's why, if I'm besieging a Citadel or Fortress, I often choose to assault. The loss of men is offset by not having to rebuild the bloody castle.

[caravel]

My God! What was his name, Bruce Lee??? It must have looked like "Matrix Reloaded" with him dodging all those arrrows, then beating the heck out of 10 guys once he got into the castle!

Not a castle assault, but an open battle. If he'd been assaulting a castle he probably would have dropped on his way up the hill to it.

I'm wondering, did you experience a downgrade in the structure, or lose any of its upgrades after the assassination was complete? That's one thing that has always annoyed me about leading an assault: the structure almost always gets downgraded after it's over. And it's really a bloody shame when it's something like a fortress or citadel that's involved.

Yea. It's effectively the same as invading an empty province, and just taking control of it. There is still a downgrading. This is because my assassin was a clumsy devil, managing to knock the port down, and lean against a castle wall causing it to collapse on the way in.

[macsen rufus]

my assassin was a clumsy devil

[Loucipher]

My smallest battle so far was the battle from my first Polish campaign (no VI installed then, only bare 1.0), where 40 Polish Retainers wiped out a single unit of Rebel Archers without losing anyone
Basically it was nothing to do, just position the riders on the hill, disperse the formation to avoid arrow fire, and then charge them, closing the formation. Then it looked like:
- Impact: 6 archers dead (including General)
- One round of combat: another 6 archers dead (thanks to pushback). Unit routed at this point.
- Pursuit: 48 archers captured.
I was so amused with this battle that I let all the captured rebels go, thereby raising Happiness in the province

[naut]

Yea. It's effectively the same as invading an empty province, and just taking control of it. There is still a downgrading. This is because my assassin was a clumsy devil, managing to knock the port down, and lean against a castle wall causing it to collapse on the way in.

[caravel]

Reminds me of this thread: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=71517

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

Yea. It's effectively the same as invading an empty province, and just taking control of it. There is still a downgrading. This is because my assassin was a clumsy devil, managing to knock the port down, and lean against a castle wall causing it to collapse on the way in.

Sir, congratulations. That was the funniest thing I've read all day.

[Motep]

I can beat all of that! 1 on 1. Sent 1 archer to kill 1 fuedal knight. Just thought it wold be funny to do that. Second smallest was assaulting 3 men with 2 of my own! Getting rid of surplus. Both were victories! The latter got me a provence!