Quote Originally Posted by bovi
I've never been attacked by the AI when marching out of the front gate. In fact, they tend to withdraw and line up far away from the gate. Why do you choose the back gate?
If they don't withdraw far enough and they have slingers, for instance. Secondly, like you said, they withdraw, usually to the left or right, so that to face them properly I either need to make an unwieldy turn close to the walls, or march forward and expose my flanks. This may be due to the fact that I prefer wide battle lines, though.

This don't count for big cities, actually. I was thinking mainly of forts.