Small stone walls are much easier to defend than medium stonewalls

[MiniMe]

Like it says.

terminology
small stone walls - EB 1 level stone walls;
medium stone walls - EB 2 level stone walls;
big stone walls - vanilla epic stone walls that were removed from EB.

My arguments:
From my experience of 13 months of continuous playing EB, AI always attacks
small stone walls with:
1 ram;
2 ladders;
1-2 small towers;
and medium stone walls with:
1 ram;
1 sap;
1-2 medium towers.
(Well that's what my clever computer AI is doing, of course I'm not so sure about Yours)

1. Rams are either burned or not and there's no point discussing it, this is irrelevant;
(BTW, is it better to say "either XXX or YYY" or "either XXX either YYY" or "XXX either YYY"?)
2. A sap is always much more dangerous than ladders. Sap breach causes exactly same AI behavior as broken gates do - attackers form a pushing horde and push. Sometimes they are successful. Unfortunately for defender, attacker in case of pushing through sap breach is not burned. I consider saps to be the most dangerous assault strategy of all possible. As per ladders - its laughable, half of them die even before they get on the wall, the other half dies when they get there one by one, cause they receive multiple blows from multiple enemies simultaneously. Only human player is capable of rational use of ladders if he deploys them there where they are not expected to be deployed so that his assault troops are not met and dealt with immediately;
3. Small towers vs medium towers:
3.1. Of course medium tower ballista shot is devastating! But so is medium stone wall ballista shot. And clever human is not placing his troops in medium tower ballista range, he (me) carefully awaits before medium tower is attached to wall and only then he sends his troops there;
3.2. Now comes a bit more complicated issue: medium tower disembark capability is bigger than her smaller cousin. Therefore medium wall defenders simultaneously fight more attackers than small wall defenders. Which means that it is easier to repel an attack launched from small tower.

Summary
1. Rams are irrelevant cause comp is always using them;
2. Saps are much more dangerous than ladders, actually the most dangerous assault strategy of all;
3. It is easier to repel an attack launched from small tower than from medium

ergo:
Small stone walls are much easier to defend than medium stonewalls and there is no point in building medium walls!

Unfortunately, AI is not aware of my genius assumptions and continues building medium walls.
The problem is: I feel complete idiot after I capture his towns.
In the middle of great war with AS. I was lucky to capture Babylon, Charax and Arbela when they had small stone walls only. I wasn't so lucky with Seleukia. Medium stone walls already was there. Every turn Greys siege one of the mentioned above four towns with full stack. no problem, I like it.
What I don't like is that I spent more efforts defending a city with medium stone walls than the rest of less fortified towns combined together. Babylon, Charax and Arbela have garrisons of six units. It requires ten units to repel AS assault on Seleukia. And casualties rate is bigger.
Cause when AI fortifies a city with medium stone walls, he makes it more vulnerable.

My proposal:
1. either remove medium stone walls from the game at all;
2. either replace medium stone walls with vanilla epic stone walls.

Your opinion?

Best regards
MiniMe

[sanitarium]

In my game, the computer always attacks the larger walls with 2 rams, 2 siege towers, and 2 sap points. I think it's easier to defend those walls than the lesser ones, because the computer will have a siege tower and 2 ladders and it gets very crowded. I can move my defenders around relatively easily on the huge walls, whereas on the smaller ones, there's not much room to move.

With regard to sap points, I always find I suffer fewer casualties fighting at the breaches. Depending on the faction I'm playing as, I'll usually have a couple of levy phalanxes defending the gates and sap points; you can keep an entire army at bay if you stick a phalanx into the breach.

The units I put up on the walls are a combo of missile troops, spearmen, and pretty much anything that doesn't form a phalanx. I notice that I always suffer far more casualties with my units on the walls as opposed to my phalanxes holding the breaches.

One problem with huge walls, the siege towers have the rapidfire bolts that rip through your units like nothing. It forced me to start all the units I want holding the walls to start them away from where the siege tower will land, then when it gets to the wall, I run them in front of the tower to wait. Saves a lot of lives that way.

Overall, I'd say it's much easier to defend huge walls. The computer takes far more casualties just getting their men up to the walls and it makes it a lot easier to fight.

[gurakshun]

I completely agree. I miss those epic stone walls from vanilla, too. I also have noticed a significant pain in the @ss in defending "large walls" over the smaller walls, and I was suckered into upgrading them by the "5% bonus to law" benefit the large walls too. It really is much easier to defend the small walls than the large walls, there is no reason to upgrade save for a piddling bonus to law.

[CaesarAugustus]

I'm pretty sure nothing like the epic stone walls were ever built in the ancient world (barring the Great Wall of China). In fact, even the medium walls look out of place to me in the EB world...

[MiniMe]

I'm pretty sure nothing like the epic stone walls were ever built in the ancient world (barring the Great Wall of China). In fact, even the medium walls look out of place to me in the EB world...

Carthage fortifications were undebatably epic. But that's not important. What's important is that in the depiction of reality we play with, attacker spends pretty much same time on preparation of large walls assault, builds more machinery and due to its amount is more successful. Which makes TW and its modifications depiction of reality distorted. Better fortifications (and small stone walls due to the way AI assaults them are better) do not precede, they succeed.
Can't recall how it was with epics...

[MiniMe]

In my game, the computer always attacks the larger walls with 2 rams, 2 siege towers, and 2 sap points. I think it's easier to defend those walls than the lesser ones, because the computer will have a siege tower and 2 ladders and it gets very crowded.

How defending against 2 rams, 2 siege towers, and 2 sap points could be easier than defending against a siege tower and 2 ladders?

BTW, are you playing with rome.exe or rome-BI.exe or alex.exe?

I completely agree. I miss those epic stone walls from vanilla, too. I also have noticed a significant pain in the @ss in defending "large walls" over the smaller walls...

Can you recall from vanilla days, what was AI strategy on attacking epic stone walls?

[bovi]

Can you recall from vanilla days, what was AI strategy on attacking epic stone walls?

A miserable failure.

[gurakshun]

A miserable failure.

How was it exactly? I must be recalling it different than you are. Thanks.

[bovi]

How was it exactly? I must be recalling it different than you are. Thanks.

The couple of times I had epic walls under assault:
* the enemy rolled up their laser cannon siege towers, blasting away any defenders on the walls (so far so good)
* because there is nothing that can stand against said ridiculous towers, I relinquished the walls to the attackers and retreated to the main square
* The enemy army, numbering five times my men, proceed slowly along all the walls inside, to maximize the effectiveness of my towers by letting all of them fire (fatal flaw)
* The enemy arrives at the main square with the third that is remaining of his army
* I charge at the front unit with my guys, everybody routs and dies

In BI, a Hun army of 6 close-to-full stacks did the same (additionally parading in front of my towers on the outside to reach the opening they created). My garrison was slightly more than a half stack, mostly competent troops. The rout was not instant due to the huge amount of enemies, I lost nearly 3/4 of my men but won, with less than 20 enemy survivors.

[Hooahguy]

Can you recall from vanilla days, what was AI strategy on attacking epic stone walls?

A miserable failure.

How was it exactly? I must be recalling it different than you are. Thanks.

for fun, i assaulted Rome in RTW in custom battle, with a full stack of urban cohort, versus just a couple of legionaries. i had 2 seige towers. one got destroyed after the first load, and that load of urbans cut thru most of the defenders in his section, but was eventrually wiped out. i got 1 and 1/3 units up on the other side- the tower collapsed with 2/3 of the 2nd unit in it. so basically i lost 4/5 of my army when the job was done... at least i killed all the defenders!

[sanitarium]

How defending against 2 rams, 2 siege towers, and 2 sap points could be easier than defending against a siege tower and 2 ladders?

BTW, are you playing with rome.exe or rome-BI.exe or alex.exe?

I play with BI.

The siege tower and 2 ladders means there are at least 3 enemy units on the walls at a time (assuming I can't ignite the tower), as opposed to the large stone walls with 2 siege towers, you only have 2 units at a time to fight on the walls.

The rams account for nothing, as I believe I've only seen the computer actually get a ram up to the gate a handful of times in the few years I've been playing RTW. Sap points are preferable for me because I can chew up any attack the enemy tries with only 1 or 2 phalanxes.

Also, you can set sap points on fire. I usually manage to knock at least one out every battle, meaning I have 1 sap point and the 2 siege towers to deal with.

[MiniMe]

The siege tower and 2 ladders means there are at least 3 enemy units on the walls at a time (assuming I can't ignite the tower), as opposed to the large stone walls with 2 siege towers, you only have 2 units at a time to fight on the walls.

As you can see from my first post, I believe disembark from medium tower to be much more dangerous than ladder climbing or small tower cause the amount of soldiers that land on the wall simultaniously is much bigger

The rams account for nothing, as I believe I've only seen the computer actually get a ram up to the gate a handful of times in the few years I've been playing RTW.

Yep, the rams are not the issue anyway, agreed on that

Sap points are preferable for me because I can chew up any attack the enemy tries with only 1 or 2 phalanxes.

It is obvious that we need 1 or 2 phalanxes to bloke any hole be it breach or broken gate. However sometimes this is not enough (I mean AI horde assault taktic when he simply pushes your pikemen with heavy armoured horsies.

Also, you can set sap points on fire. I usually manage to knock at least one out every battle, meaning I have 1 sap point and the 2 siege towers to deal with.

WOW! thanx, did not knew that =)

[sanitarium]

As you can see from my first post, I believe disembark from medium tower to be much more dangerous than ladder climbing or small tower cause the amount of soldiers that land on the wall simultaniously is much bigger

The balancing factor there is only having to deal with two units at a time instead of three. Yes they drop out of the larger towers quicker, but you have fewer dropping onto the walls at a time. 2 siege towers versus 2 ladders and a siege tower amounts to fewer troops that can drop onto the walls at once. Not to mention the archer towers on the large walls do a lot more damage as the enemy approaches the walls.

It is obvious that we need 1 or 2 phalanxes to bloke any hole be it breach or broken gate. However sometimes this is not enough (I mean AI horde assault taktic when he simply pushes your pikemen with heavy armoured horsies.

I play on VH/M, maybe this is where we differ. The only time I've had a problem with the computer just pushing through my phalanxes is when a spy opens the gate and the entire army charges forward. Then they usually manage to push through, but I layer my defense and they can only push through so many pikes before they're all dead.

[Perturabo]

Absolutely correct MiniMe. Medium stone walls are actually a step back from the small ones.

Has anyone noticed also that the medium stone walls (particularly the eastern ones) never seem to shoot at enemies inside the city? The small ones will bombard enemies on both sides of the wall with missiles - medium - nada. I also notice the same with Eastern small stone walls (lack of missiles), the Greek or Roman ones are much more effective in every way.

I don't actually care much for the medium stone walls to be honest. At this stage of warfare very, very few cities had anything of that nature. The Romans were the first real western proponents of effective siege equipment (yes the Greeks/Carthies had some but was not common). The Assyrians in the east of course were well known for it also. The Pelleponesian War (sp) dragged on for as long as it did basically because nobody could breach walls such as built by Athens to guard the way to its docks. (This statement should cause some argument I expect, but its what I believe the situation was).

Edit: I suspect that the reason why the medium walls fire less missiles is much like why the larger castles in MedII get progressively less usefull as they get taller/larger. The angle of the walls is such that the missiles cannot shoot down at the ground. Stupid but true (for MedII). Could be wrong but that is my guess.