Anyone Else Hate Assaulting Settlements?

[econ21]

I dislike assaulting settlements - I tend to starve the cities out to avoid the chore. Often it is either too easy (the garrison is pitiful) or too hard (try storming Caernarvon early on as England in VH/VH - it can be a laugh, with three defending longbows on the walls playing merry hell with your militia's morale).

However, if you force yourself to do it - as I had to in our HRE PBM in the throne room - it can be fun working out some tactics to minimise casualties even when all you have are a ram or two (or none), some militia and a general. Here's what I came up with:

The "he's behind you" tactic:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...46&postcount=3

The "ladder feints" tactic:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...4&postcount=12

The "how to take a settlement with no siege engines" tactic:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...9&postcount=21

Cambyses II said the above were exploiting the AI rather than genuine tactics and he had a point, but still it was interesting discovering them. But an underlying principle is to overload the defence with multiple threats and so be able to work a force into the settlement without having to simply hack through a breach. It's harder to pull off with castles (only one gate).