Defending Choke Points

[Alden]

I'm a little frustrated that, so often, what is supposed to be an easily-defendable position isn't proving so easy to defend. I mean, mostly, gates of settlements and bridges. Maybe I'm just doing it wrong but it seems like despite my being in a position like this, I need as big a defense force as I would in a regular open field battle.

Just lost a city to Mongols. Mongols had maybe 50% more troops than me but they were mostly horse archers, and the lightweight variety at that. What little infantry they had rammed the gate then all those horse archers rushed in and just demolished the 7 silver-sheild Italian Spear Militia I had schiltronned around at the gate. It wasn't even slightly close. I don't think that this same army, charging me on the open field, would have so overwhelmed me. But who knows - mongols are tough.

However, similar things have happened when defending against crummy militia from Catholic Factions. The attackers pack into the gate at black-hole like densities - so tight it looks like fur or a head of broccoli spray-painted black and tan and there's just nothing you can do about it.

Or is there? I considered defending the town square itself but I reckoned they'd rock me with arrows. Couldn't have gone worse, though.

Any suggestions?

[Sarmatian]

Pray that their general gets killed. Or that you destroy their ram

[pevergreen]

One word: Cavalry Charge.
At the gates, at the bridge, unless you have multiple good pikes, Cav will just smash straight through.

For Defence, just burn their rams, and fight their infantry off at the walls, attacker gets penalty on the walls, you dont. Mongols dont have good infantry, you can.

[Whacker]

This doesn't work as well in the close confines of a city area, but you can force something like it in a pinch. This requires very precise unit micromanagement but it can be done, all I can say is USE PAUSE OFTEN!! Basically, you treat the bridgehead like a faucet. Position your strongest melee units in a fashion so that you have a long, narrow open space at the end of the bridge. Say maybe 15-20 meters beyond the end of the bridge. Now stick two more on either side of the bridge entrance, maybe 5 meters back on either side. What you want to do is lure the enemy units coming across the bridge to attack your melee unit (pikes works great here, anything with very strong def) directly in front of the bridge entrance, and then flank it with your two killers on either side. With some skill and a lot of luck, you can effectively engage and squash each unit piecemeal as it comes off the bridge, just periodically open and close that faucet to let some out, squash em like a bug, rinse and repeat. It's worked well for me in the past. The main thing that can ruin your day here is a missile/artillery heavy enemy. Sometimes if you pull back far enough, you can goad the (dumb) AI to sending everything it's go across the bridge, including the missile units instead of leaving them there to guard the passage like they should. Good luck!

[Alden]

Sound advice, certainly. But similar has happened with no cavalry involved at all.

What I do is I take my spears and schiltron them and make a sort of box around the choke point. The attackers come pouring in and if there arn't all that many, I kill a bunch, the rest rout and I'm in clover. But if there are a lot of them, they'll just keep packing into the box, denser and denser and then my formations will collapse. Then its all over.

They can't do this to you in the open field. But there's something that happens at these choke points - like there's a compressor behind them, pushing them in.

I mean, I've sorta answered my own question - make the box big enough that they can't acheive these crazy-high densities in it. But then you need a really big garrison.

It just seems like, even when successful, I take way more casualties defending a bridge or city than I would if the exact same armies were fighting in the open field. Seems sorta wrong.

[Whacker]

There does seem to be that interesting trash compactor-type action when all of our new violent friends try to squeeze through our gate at the same time. The best thing I can offer is just use your best defense troops directly across from the choke point, and put your best killers on either side to flank, and hope they mulch fast enough.

[sapi]

I think the reason that the AI acts as it does it that it orders its troops to move through the gate, not to attack yours. They'll only attack in self defense so the momentum of the charge is maintained and you're stuffed :P

[Alden]

I think the reason that the AI acts as it does it that it orders its troops to move through the gate, not to attack yours. They'll only attack in self defense so the momentum of the charge is maintained and you're stuffed :P

I guess that's it. Well, you can't win 'em all.

I order run-through when assaulting a lot but its a high-risk operation: run-through-ers usually take a lot of casualties. But then I never really thought to order everybody to run through. ^_^

I'd sorta forgotten how annoying horse archer factions are to fight. The worst part is when you have nearly their entire army routing and that one cav or general will go find some defenseless archers to slaughter, just out of spite. Bleh.

[Musashi]

Italian spear militia are somewhat lightly armored... Horse archers can shoot while charging...

[sapi]

Hey, that's what i'd do :P

[Koval]

Personally i find it ridiculous how closely compacted units can get. Next time you are deploying your units try this: put every single one of your units in the same place. Your entire army will be concentrated into one little block of metal and flesh! Thats hundreds and hundreds of men in a little Soylent Green cube.
Its frustrating and unrealistic, and i dont think the poor soldiers appreciate being crammed together like sardines. This is especially evident in sieges, when what appeared to be a huge army of hundreds of men is squeezed into a 4m x 4m gateway.
The only counter appears to be layering your own units together in the same fashion.
As mentioned before, it looks like the weight of massed troops is just about to rip open a black hole.

[Whacker]

Personally i find it ridiculous how closely compacted units can get. Next time you are deploying your units try this: put every single one of your units in the same place. Your entire army will be concentrated into one little block of metal and flesh! Thats hundreds and hundreds of men in a little Soylent Green cube.
Its frustrating and unrealistic, and i dont think the poor soldiers appreciate being crammed together like sardines. This is especially evident in sieges, when what appeared to be a huge army of hundreds of men is squeezed into a 4m x 4m gateway.
The only counter appears to be layering your own units together in the same fashion.
As mentioned before, it looks like the weight of massed troops is just about to rip open a black hole.

You want to talk about fun, remember doing this same thing in a city square with 20 units of peasants in RTW on huge unit size?

[Cheetah]

Sound advice, certainly. But similar has happened with no cavalry involved at all.

What I do is I take my spears and schiltron them and make a sort of box around the choke point. The attackers come pouring in and if there arn't all that many, I kill a bunch, the rest rout and I'm in clover. But if there are a lot of them, they'll just keep packing into the box, denser and denser and then my formations will collapse. Then its all over.

First of all dont put your troops into schiltron. The enemy comes from one direction, you want all of your troops facing them.

Second, dont just stand around. If the enemy pushing you should be counter pushing. Of course you can say that it easier to push one point than defend the whole perimeter of a circle. That is why: (a) your box (or rather U shape formation facing the gate) should be small and densly packed. (b) You should countercharge them as soon as the first unit enters the gate. Of course if you have cavs then use your cavs to support your spears charging/pushing.

So what I do is to deploy my spears in a U shape so that they should overlap. Deploy my cavs behind them leaving some room for the charge. Select all spears, when enemy breaks through the gate and the first unit enters doubleclick on the first unit with all spears. Then send in your cavs as the situation demands. If all goes well you kill the general leading the charge and after routing a few units they will chainrout. If not it is a though fight
Of course you need at least 7-8 spears (or perhaps more for a full stack). Once I routed this way 3 or 4 boyar sons, general, dzurinha, some archer and some woodsmen with 6 town militia and one half strength militia spearmen.

[Alden]

Italian spear militia are somewhat lightly armored... Horse archers can shoot while charging...

Well, to paraphrase a recently retired statesman, you fight with the army you have, not the one you wish you had :)

As I said, these were mongols fresh off the steps and I was out-starred 9 to 4. etc, etc. Things like it have happened in other battles against far less worthy adversaries though. Had nothing like it ever happened before, I would have chalked it up to superior forces and not posted.

But I've had Armored Sargents get furballed (if I may call it that) by town militia before. Obviously, the game mechanics supports this sort of thing but it just rubs me the wrong way that these guys can swing their weapons when they are packed in like fraternity rushes in a phone booth.

[Musashi]

Another defense is to keep a ballista, ribault, serpentine, or other unit that fires projectiles that go through enemies and continue killing... Firing one of those through a mass of troops like that is guaranteed to pull off hojillions of kills per shot.

[Whacker]

Another defense is to keep a ballista, ribault, serpentine, or other unit that fires projectiles that go through enemies and continue killing... Firing one of those through a mass of troops like that is guaranteed to pull off hojillions of kills per shot.

hojillion? Now you're getting all technical on us. I tried that, flanking with ribaults, and it ended.... poorly. The AI promptly realized what I was doing and moved over to meet 'n greet with the unfortunate ribault crews. I guess there are other ways of doing this but you risk significant friendly fire casualties....

[Alden]

First of all dont put your troops into schiltron...

I used to not. Then I tried it once and it worked better than not-schiltron did and i've done it ever since. It *seems* to be more resistant to getting guys pushed inside the formation. And its this that, I think, causes a lot of the problems under these conditions.

I'll try it not-schiltroned next time. In this particular case, it may well be that I simply didn't have the juice to hold the city.

[sapi]

Schiltroms are great against infantry, but i think their tightly packed formation causes a huge increase in losses against cavalry charges.

[Whacker]

In this particular case, it may well be that I simply didn't have the juice to hold the city.

'Cause I get loose and I got troops
And crazy juice!

Name the song. If it's that hopeless of a situation, you can try and load a save prior to the battle and do what you can to alleviate the situation, or at least make em pay dearly for it.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Eric B and Rakin - Juice (Know the Ledge)

[Alden]

'Cause I get loose and I got troops
And crazy juice!

Name the song. If it's that hopeless of a situation, you can try and load a save prior to the battle and do what you can to alleviate the situation, or at least make em pay dearly for it.

Sorry - I'm drawing a blank on the song :(

I chewed them up ok, actually. I had a real army just outside the city but it had been one movement point shy of being able to attack the beseigers. Vicissitudes of Fortune.

So the next turn I beseiged them in turn, got attacked by another stack, won that battle and retook Antioch. And with that, the first four Mongol stacks were reduced to a rag-tag remnant. Now there are another four stacks crossing the desert towards Jerusalem. Things are a little better-developed down there. Should have at least a few Pikes ready in time.

[nameless]

You have to do it carefuly, if your not English it's difficult. As the English I always have some longbowmen around to plant some stakes next to the gates. Does wonders I tell you

This is what I usually do.

I have one infantry guarding the gate with two units supporting each flank.
I'll also have another infantry behind the first one.

Once the enemy breaks in, I wait a little bit and then counter charge with each of these guys slowly. In MTW2 morale and fatigue are major factors so you have to know how to work around it. Timing is everything. If you feel your about to be overwhelmened, send in another unit. I always keep at least 9-15 units as a garrison since in 1.1 there's no such thing as a safe place In this case, you should have a ratio of 3:7 for every unit engaging.

If you have cavalry or archers, have them go around to the enemy's back. In most cases their still trying to get through the door so your archers can get into the back and pepper them. Unfortunately, the AI is smart enough to counter this and sometimes they'll have a unit counter you but it's not significant from what I've seen. If you have cavalry, have them run in when things seem dire or when the enemy is about to break (Shaken morale) and attack the back, the cavalry will slaughter them and of course, send them in one by one slowly.

A fresh unit has a bigger chance of defeating a unit that is both tired and shakened. Since the AI throws everything, it's all about the timing.

If your defending a castle, let the enemy come in the first wall, that way it allows you to focus your attacks more on them.

[Alden]

I'm grateful for your suggestions, nameless, but my question wasn't so much about How Do I Defend A Gate. It was "what's up with this super-dense blob of attackers and is there anything I can do about that in particular". I could have asked it more explicitly, I suppose. The answer seems to be "no" ^_^

These Mongols didn't just manifest out of thin air outside my gates. I sure would have *liked* to have more/better troops in the garrison but there are only so many build slots and I was fighting a lot of battles in the turns before. When beseiged, I had what I had.

[BigTex]

I've noticed that the AI instead of attacking just uses the push mechanism. It will order it's troops through the gate and wont bother to attack you. So the charge is maintained and you are being continually pushed broken and surounded. The best advice anyone can give you is to not put them right on the gates. Back up about 50 yards from the gate or further. Block all all 3 sides of the wall further back in the streets. This will allow the enemy the freedom to move through without gaining that decimating you. But it still provides you with the surounding morale drop for them. When they finally attack you it will be scattered and easily repulsed. After the enemy has settled down, send them in all at once to attack them. You'll quickly rout them.

[Cheetah]

Actually, have you tried what I suggested? It worked for me ...

[BigTex]

Actually, have you tried what I suggested? It worked for me ...

Havent tryed the counter push at the gates. But I usually have horrible infantry in my cities. Spear militia and the like. Don't think they would hold up to well doing a counter push.

[Musashi]

hojillion? Now you're getting all technical on us. I tried that, flanking with ribaults, and it ended.... poorly. The AI promptly realized what I was doing and moved over to meet 'n greet with the unfortunate ribault crews. I guess there are other ways of doing this but you risk significant friendly fire casualties....

Yeah... I didn't say anything about flanking. I just fire right through my defenders.

My serpentine picked up 145 kills with a single shot once...

[IrishArmenian]

Never use spears! They only work really early and after that, they are just good for absorbing missiles.

[Sheogorath]

PROTIP:
You know those ribault things?
I beleive that most of the Italians get the monster-variety, yes?
One of those behind your gate on volley fire mode. Stick some peasants in as a holder if you have to.
But at close range, a volley from even a standard ribault will produce mass carnage. Maybe even enough to weaken those horsies to the point where you can rout them or mop them up.

If you dont have ribaults yet, ballista work to, but not nearly as well. Basically anything with the 'skewers multiple units' trait.




Also, I find that 'stacking' shiltroned spearmen works quite well. Basically you just line them up on the paths leading to your town center. Sure, you'll lose a few on the way, but by the time the enemy gets to your TC (IF they do) theyre weak enough that you can route/finish them off fairly easily.
Also, good pike units at a gate will work wonders. I had some Aventuros (silver shield, no exp.) save me from a rather large Scottish army once. There were only about 18 guys left in the unit at the end of the battle, but they had ~200 kills, and the Scots were left with lots of dead nobles.

[Alden]

I've noticed that the AI instead of attacking just uses the push mechanism. It will order it's troops through the gate and wont bother to attack you. So the charge is maintained and you are being continually pushed broken and surounded. The best advice anyone can give you is to not put them right on the gates. Back up about 50 yards from the gate or further. Block all all 3 sides of the wall further back in the streets. This will allow the enemy the freedom to move through without gaining that decimating you. But it still provides you with the surounding morale drop for them. When they finally attack you it will be scattered and easily repulsed. After the enemy has settled down, send them in all at once to attack them. You'll quickly rout them.

That makes perfect sense but it raises the meta-issue (I guess you'd call it) that the Gate of a city is, given game mechanics, the least defensible spot in town! The game is what it is and I guess it just doesn't model battle very well in this particular regard.

I'm no adherant of the "realism" fetish but still, in historical seiges just a handful of soldiers could hold a castle against an army for years. If they were that hard to assault in the game, nobody would assault which would also be lame. But it does seem like these massive fortification should provide more benefit to the defenders than they do.

Against anyone other than the Mongols, I probably would have defended farther back. I've had a lot of good results from just abandoning the walls entirely and deploying the garrison in the town square. But all those horse archers - I was worried they'd fill up the streets and shoot me to bits.

[Cheetah]

Havent tryed the counter push at the gates. But I usually have horrible infantry in my cities. Spear militia and the like. Don't think they would hold up to well doing a counter push.

As I said I defeated boyars not with spear militia but with town militia this way!!! I have to admit I was surprised too.