Sieges to easy ?

[Alpha666]

I think sieges especially large citadells and fortresses are too easy. In reality the besieging army needed more siege engines. In the game often one is enough. Or even none at all. I don´t think that some men could open castle gates with swords/spears etc... also trenches (sometimes filled with water) are completly missing in the game.

Thoughts ?

Also i wonder how the stockpiles for castles are calculated ? Any rule or just coincidence ? Thanks.

[SauveQuiPeut]

I agree. Even the two gates of a castle can be forced by two units of vanilla spears without too much trouble.

[Innocentius]

Yes, sieges in of the flaws of MTW, especially how they're handled if you choose to sit them out; a castle holding for 8 years just because its garrison is so small is just ridiculous. Although I guess there isn't much once could do, adding moats other than in the shape of rivers would be tough.
If you want good siege battles, try Stronghold instead. Now that's a good castle engine (and a nice editor).

[caravel]

Sieges are just rubbish overall. Yes they're probably much too easy for the player, and there is no way that infantry should be able to hack the gate of a keep down. The only fortification open to infantry attack should be the fort, fort and motte and fort motte and bailey. Anything above should be impervious. Also, as you've probably noticed, the AI is useless when assaulting. It does everything that it shouldn't, and doesn't attack properly with siege equipment if it has it. Personally I autocalc sieges as I find them a bit cheesey either when defending or otherwise. I've been playing this game for years, playing every single battle, and I've never yet played an assault or defense that made me think, wow that was amazing, except one. That was a defense sometime last year involving only a few of my units that held out against the odds. That was moreso "wow aren't they amazingly stupid" though. Sieges are where RTW beats MTW hands down. I hate sitting there with my 40 UM and 30 archers watching the AI behave stupidly with it's 500 strong force, before losing a lot of men and retreating.

Another great "feature" is watching your own ballista towers shooting your own gatehouse to bits. Great stuff.

-Edit: this is a good point:

a castle holding for 8 years just because its garrison is so small is just ridiculous.

That has to be the most ridiculous thing ever. I think time and number of men in castle should have come into it, but number of men shouldn't have been the primary variable for deciding how long they last out. Income of the province could have been taken into account and also the quality of the fortification itself. A citadel is a bigger castle than a fort, it is likely to hold much more supplies and much more arms, medical supplies and other equipment. Thus it is likely to hold out longer. The system should have worked backwards. i.e. Fortress would automatically give a 12 year siege (taking foraging into account), any penalties would be taken from this, such as for a every extra 100 troops above 100 a year is deducted. The income of the province at the time when the castle was sieged could also be taken into account somehow. So without going into pointless details about something that we can't mod, it could have been done a lot better. Sometimes I feel that MTW was a rushed conversion from STW.

[Alpha666]

Well the "eye candy" is quite good, walls breaking, stones flying through the air, the sound is also good i think. A more realistic detail i discovered while a unit of mine stood directly near a wall which was just shot down by some cannon balls. 20 or so men died from the breaking wall - nice :)

Also funny is the boiling oil or water which the defenders pour on my troops. Interestingly everytime only 1 men dies... Sieges maybe a reason to get MTW2 for more eye candy....

[caravel]

Well the "eye candy" is quite good, walls breaking, stones flying through the air, the sound is also good i think. A more realistic detail i discovered while a unit of mine stood directly near a wall which was just shot down by some cannon balls. 20 or so men died from the breaking wall - nice :)

Also funny is the boiling oil or water which the defenders pour on my troops. Interestingly everytime only 1 men dies... Sieges maybe a reason to get MTW2 for more eye candy....

It was obviously going to be something great. You can see the gantries along the insides of the walls where your archers would have been deployed, but that was never finished. With the incapable AI and botched siege weapons it was never going to happen. All of the spin at the time of it's release was about amazing sieges etc etc.

[Kavhan Isbul]

I agree with most of the above, but I have to note that there might be cases in which autocalculating may lead to less casualties, such for example in storming keeps or better with armies that do not have siege engines. Anyway, the siege aspect of the game feels extremely unrealistic - several years for a siege is something unheard of. After all, a year long siege in the Middle Ages was quite a siege. I do not see any way this can be fixed, though.

[Dustin]

Hey guys posting my first reply just signed up seems like a cool place, have rome and medieval2 total war and both are awsome. I also find most sieges too easy. I would like it if city towers would kill more like in rome. Also the fact you cant take a tower under your control that blows. Overall its force size that wins the day for me atleast.

[caravel]

I agree with most of the above, but I have to note that there might be cases in which autocalculating may lead to less casualties, such for example in storming keeps or better with armies that do not have siege engines. Anyway, the siege aspect of the game feels extremely unrealistic - several years for a siege is something unheard of. After all, a year long siege in the Middle Ages was quite a siege. I do not see any way this can be fixed, though.

The problem is that the game is in years and not seasons. While a year seems a long time for a siege in gameplay terms it's simply not enough. You click end turn and it's practically over. Even if you do assualt, it's over anyway so what's the point? The problem with MTW is the time units. That's at the root of the problem. You have a piece of wood that throws rocks that takes 2 years to build and train the crew, an artillery piece that takes 3 years, ships that take 3 to 4 years to build, and an elite fighting force of 120 men that only takes a year to train?! A huge army can travel to from Wessex to Egypt in 1 year and another takes 1 year to cross the channel! Seasons would have solved alot of this. Having four seasons would have been far more realistic. Units would have taken e.g. two to eight seasons to train, and all ships would only take about two to three to build. Siege equipment would only take one season. Travel then would be based on province/sea zone per season movement. A unit placed in transit would move via the sea zones containing your ships instead of just jumping straight to the target. This, IMHO, is how they sohuld have done it.

[Alpha666]

>>>>The problem is that the game is in years and not seasons...........>>>>



Hearts Of Iron (WW2 grand strategy) solves this problem with continued but pausable time. So a Panzer Div takes 120 days to train, or a simple inf div 80 days, Paras even more etc. I guess all these games need to make compromises to reality in some way. MTW isn´t very realistic regarding the move on the strategy map, as well as you noted correctly the times to train units are off.

Interestingly i can shift my forces from Southern Italy in 1 turn to Finnland. Even if i have an army of 1200 men but only 1 (!!) small ship in each sea province. But i need also 1 turn to move from Denmark to Northern Germany (which would took in reality 2-5 days i guess in this time period - means it depends if it is an army with much foot soldiers and arty or only a cav army which would move much faster also the size of the unit would have effect on the travel time....all these facts aren´t in the game)....this is solved also in HOI that each unit has a speed (panzers+mech faster than foot inf etc.)

[Grande Orso]

I agree with most of the above, but I have to note that there might be cases in which autocalculating may lead to less casualties, such for example in storming keeps or better with armies that do not have siege engines. Anyway, the siege aspect of the game feels extremely unrealistic - several years for a siege is something unheard of. After all, a year long siege in the Middle Ages was quite a siege. I do not see any way this can be fixed, though.

In regards to autocalculations, I fully agree that they are unfortunately "botched". The fact that cavalry is taken into account into these calculations, even without siege engines, makes things that much worse. Since my armies are usually fairly cavalry heavy, which quickly shifts the "strength" of forces in my favour, I could easily "cheat" most of my sieges by autocalcing.

[naut]

You may be right, but there is an undeniable satisfaction of blowing some insolent scumbag's castle to smithereens (especially if it is in an extremely rebellious province).

[caravel]

You may be right, but there is an undeniable satisfaction of blowing some insolent scumbag's castle to smithereens (especially if it is in an extremely rebellious province).

I know what you mean, I do occasionally get a few culverins or cats and trebuchets together and have a go at a citadel.

[Martok]

Hee! I really enjoy assaulting big castles. Sometimes my entire first wave will consist of artillery (except the general), and I then proceed to level almost the entire front wall(s). Yes, sieges are rather broken in MTW, but I do love watching artillery pieces in action.

Hey guys posting my first reply just signed up seems like a cool place, have rome and medieval2 total war and both are awsome. I also find most sieges too easy. I would like it if city towers would kill more like in rome. Also the fact you cant take a tower under your control that blows. Overall its force size that wins the day for me atleast.

Welcome to the Org, Dustin! I think you've stumbled into the wrong forum, though -- the Main Hall is for discussing the original Medieval Total War. If you're interested talking about Medieval 2 Total War, then I recommend you visit the Citadel. Have fun!