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Simulations works too but are brutal on the attacker.
I am NOT trolling. NOT TROLLING. Seriously asking....
How is it you "find it almost impossible to win sieges"?????
A typical siege for me goes like this.. when I'm lazy.
Me as Party Leader. maybe 4-5 scrub allies. We got say 700 dudes, in a "POWER" 1100 army. We walk up to a TOWN, (pffft castles are for noobs. jk jk) Town has 800 Dudes. Yes, I'm outmanned. I then either.
1- Build 4 Trebuchets FIRST. While camp is setting up. I queue, Treb, treb, treb, treb, Ram, Tower, tower. (why rams and towers???? they;re free and give me engineering points). When first treb finished, Remove it to reserve. Second treb. Move to reserve. Third treb. move to reserve. Fourth treb is HALF done, I put the other 3 trebs Back out.
Now trebs smash their catapults, ballistas, walls etc... I could sit there for months If I wasn't bored, and dwindle defenders to nothing, but instead. when Both walls broken, I attack. I don't care if defenders are 600 or 1200. The odds are, even with my scrub allies helping me, our army is WAY more powerful. we walk through holes in wall, and I kill 50-80 dudes, SOLO, on legit. Using the totally weak, totally lame, but super fun tactic. of walking behind defender meatball, and 2-Hander, or Polearm killing people Like I'm a psychopath... from behind. Easy peasy.
2- I go to a town, or castle... Depending on what I want to take, based on position. I make 1 ram, and 2 Towers. That's it. I then attack, the instant my second tower is done. I could have 400 dudes, they have 350, they have 450.. doesn't matter. We ALWAYS win. and it isn't close.
The only fear, and it is minor... is that while I'm laying siege from outside, they park 5-10 armies near me, waiting for me to attack.... they get 600 dudes OUTSIDE. I fight castle.. My 450 is now 250.. We walk out and are killed by 600. this is rare, since now you don't "walk" into castle, you automatically are there, as you take the fief... Just don't leave until they walk away
Regardless, I'm not trolling, I just don't see how someone with a 300 man army, can't take a 500 man Town, with little to no effort. I do it all the time, and love it because it's fun as heck.
As to "send troops" in option. I do this too, when it's mid game, or I have fought 10 sieges in a row, and am bored. But, my 800 man army, vs 600 man defender. will end up winning (barely) but my whole army will be wounded... after battle I will be at 40 Alive, and 550 wounded (assuming I didn't use trebuchets, If I waited for walls to break, then I have much much less wounded). That gets boring too, waiting to heal up. but it's faster than the siege.
Anyway, If you are doing anything close to those strats, you should easily win every siege, on Legit mode.. with no issues.
~cheers
edit: and dang it, I didn't answer your main issue.. YES, ladders, Siege engines, RAMS, gatehouses, Tower ramps etc.... all are kinda AI broken. I've never seen all my ladders used, ever. If I get 2 guys at top of a siege tower, with 200 running around in circles at base, I consider that a "good siege". Since more often than not, the defenders kill our stragglers so fast, they start to WALK DOWN the siege towers lol. Until they make it to my meatball, and are killed... All in all, what you say happens. but shouldn't affect outcome much, if at all. Though it is quite annoying.
Almost everything about sieges is broken, even the campaign map phase before the actual battle. The AI is apparently completely oblivious to how much food or cohesion it has and instead of assaulting will keep building pointless catapults until it runs out of one or both, even if outnumbers the enemy 8-1. Incredibly frustrating.
The problems still exist.
"This is our life, now..."
IOW - While there are still plenty of complaint threads/posts regarding the quality of sieges and siege equipment being used, as well as the siege scenes themselves sometimes including obstructions that cause problems, the fact is that little improvement has been made.
Optimization efforts have been good for sieges compared to Day 1 EA.
The rest... sucks. While TW has issued patches that are supposed to help with siege issues, it appears they're not true solutions.
Considering that sieges in Bannerlord are the singlemost important activity the player can engage with that progress gameplay, the lack of improvements in overall performance imply TW doesn't know how to fix them, IMO. If they do, they're keeping it secret...
Just build a Ram and go. If you think it's a particularly problematic fief with high Tier walls and lots of high Tier ranged troops with good armor and melee weapons, then try to create a breech. However, take note - Breeches are problematic as well.
Siege equipment performance and even the efficacy of breeches seem to be dependent on certain cultural fief and wall tier combos. At least, certain cultural fiefs seem to present more issues when they have certain wall Tiers.
"Siege equipment performance and even the efficacy of breeches seem to be dependent on certain cultural fief and wall tier combos. At least, certain cultural fiefs seem to present more issues when they have certain wall Tiers."
such as???
I've made a post about my huge dream fight, that finally happened, but was borked by broken wall/ army won't attack bug. It stunk. but this was once. with me at 2k army roughly maybe more, I forget, and them at 1200 or so...
I've never seen any wall "efficacy" issues you mention. Ever, and I've raided every town/castle in the game multiple times, usually over and over. Do dudes get "stuck" loitering outside of the hole in wall? sure. 5 of them? 10? when I got 200 dudes pushing inside, and slaying every man woman and child they see inside. Not sure how 5 dudes with a pathing error, stuck on broken rubble outside a hole in a wall, when I got 200+ inside is that important.
Also," build a ram and go on". Is also not a good idea lol. Makes me wonder if YOU TOO are theory crafting? How many sieges have you done with "build a ram and go on". It works, SOMETIMES, doesn't it???? what happens when they destroy the ram (lot easier to do, when they aren't also attacking the siege towers), or it bugs out (and your dudes leave it at spawn, which happens very rarely, but DOES happen).. you gonna run up those ladders you and all of us complain about????
Good luck.
Summary. DO NOT build a ram and go on. build a real force. Also, sieges need work, as we ALL have said. but none are "broken". ZERO. NONE.. NOT ONE IN THE GAME> None.
Tons of caps, excessive punctuation, miles long posts, and screaming "THEORYCRAFTING!!!" make you look unhinged, not like the font of knowledge you claim to be. If you want people to listen to you, you've really gotta chill out. If you have a good point, that will carry your argument. Being the loudest, however, will not.
The most problematic ones I can think of are Aserai cultural fiefs with Tier 3 walls.
Units can ignore a breech, most typically when some other "trigger" happens, like a ladder group takes their first "goal" which is the Wall they're assigned to, a Ram breaks the outer gates, a group moves to the second Goal, which is the gatehouse, etc... I've seen plenty of instances where a group of breech defenders were the very last group that was attacked after the Courtyard Gate defenders have been cleared.
IOW - Some additional path or part of the progressive "script" of goals that the units follow can sometimes bork up breech mechanics. When the most legitimate, most vulnerable, safest route of attack is ignored by one's entire army... something is wrong. :)
I have lost one siege and that was on purpose. I "yolo'd" a huge garrison to get an idea of relative strength.
Other than that purposeful loss, I have never lost a siege. Not one. Never. And, that's playing since Day 1. Estimate count - umpty-fifty-eleven sieges won...
You appear to have "issues..." I don't know what I have written to set you off, but it wasn't intentional.
I've only had a handful of Rams actually destroyed during a siege. (I haven't played the latest Steam Public Branch patch, yet, though.) But, I don't rely on them or their assigned groups to break through the inner gate. If I have to, I'll plan on doing it myself either from the outside or opening it from the inside.
"Build a Ram and go" is my general tactic. It works well and is quick enough that any relieving forces don't have time to respond. I do gauge the strength of the garrison, but more than that I look at the units in it and estimate their capability paired with their number. Against a typical garrison, "build a ram and go" works. You can find plenty of other posts by other players that attest to that fact. If it's high tier missile units that have good armor, I may add one Siege tower. I don't waste much time with breaches, anymore, since its not worth the effort until they're working appropriately.
That being said, if you have low tier units and you're going up against good units, you may wish to modify that tactic. Siege towers offer "some" protection against missile units and the ramp can not be immediately/easily opposed like the top of a ladder. Even so, that ramp can open up on obstructions that prevent units from leaving it, like placed barrels/debris. Units can not "jump" from one navemesh to another and can not exit the sides of the ramp if those sides are not intersection the navmesh. Unless it was changed in the latest patch, units can only exit the ramp at the leading edge. If there isn't enough room or it's blocked, they can end up just standing there.
I don't think sieges are broken, either. However, the added siege equipment in combination with the scenes can end up just plain not working at all. The more siege towers one adds, the more likely one or both will encounter an issue. I, for instance, never use two siege towers if I elect to use one.
On Rams - Groups assigned to the inner gate will not always be able or elect to attack it. But, at least it can afford the player the opportunity to break the inner gate themselves. (Watch out for dropped rocks, though...)
So I will try to answer, while reading your post above me.
First, I don't have an Issue with you, which is why I put "you too" with the theory crafting, Usually you are one of the few posters who I can tell plays legit (at least a majority of the time, if not full time) and has intelligent comments in answers to others. So the "just use a ram" Makes zero sense to me. And I believe I answered why. it seemed "out of character" in my opinion, for you personally to state something that is commented about multiple times in Both forums, and seems so common in practice that you had to have experienced it before. i.e. rams bug out.. rams get smashed. So I seriously, thought perhaps you were, in this case, Theory crafting. Because yeah, based on the bugs/ladder/siege tower issues etc.. it sure would SEEM like using a ram only is the way to go.
Second, The OP made a constructive post, voicing some frustrations many of us have or had. And he asked "how" we do it. I too have played since release, and seen the myriad of improvements, they made to AI. TONS! and for anyone to imply they haven't improved a lot, is either salty, incorrect or "has issues". Now, when people (not you, maybe you.. I can't remember) that sieges are "broken", which seems to be a theme in the trolls or salty people lately. "bah bannerlord is a mess, game is broken, go back to warband" etc... how many times have you read that? this week? Multiple, right? And in this thread, we get comments about how Siege is STILL not working (slightly correct), or "broken", etc. So when I replied to your comment about stuff you said, I ALSO (and I shouldn't do this I know) throw in the other "sieges are broken" rebuttal. Since I know some people (hahahahah read above) have issues reading long posts, or multiple things. I try to abbreviate it. I also don't tend to call ANYONE out by name, just by their post. So in my long reply to your issues, I also feel (erroneously probably) ""hey I aint trashing Mork.. just disagreeing with his arguement, lemme also add the broken siege thing" My apologies. Wasn;t directed at YOU, or anyone in particular. But is a thing I feel is incorrect and needs to be replied to.
Ok , now your post above. I would love to test the aserai cultural fiefs with tier 3 walls. i just switched again to 1.5.4 today.. so won't be able to for awhile, but I WILL remember to try it when I get to that point. I know I have conquered every single aserai fief, multiple times in multiple patches, including 1.5.3 and never noticed anything in particular, but will pay more attention in future, to see if I can confirm, and if so..... what is a THEORY of mine, as to what it might be, and how it MIGHT be able to be rectified. hopefully smart people will read it and agree with reasons, or disagree with reasons, and we can come to a solution.
"units can ignore a breech". Yes I too have seen this, and commend your way of putting it in words. you explain it well. For me, this is not "broken", or even of immediate importance for the devs to look at (IMO) based on other issues outstanding. I don't see it happen every time a ladder is used first (example) but certainly enough to agree with you. I will say, that for me personally. I tend to be shooting with archery (if no wall breech) on one side or the other... Or charging in like a maniac with melee if walls breeched. The side I'm on, seems to have the most defenders (of course.. and I'm glad it does. Good AI design IMO). So whether the ladder or tower, or (far more common, ram) bugs out.. and can't break an inner wall, or they can't climb to top of walls etc... It is of little concern to me, and personally I feel it has little to NO effect on my sieges. my numbers of "my army vs their army" are pretty accurate estimates. So them climbing a wall better? may save me 2 dead, and 14 wounded??? I dunno. Not a huge deal to me.
not sure how you "never lost a siege" except the Yolo one, when you "use a ram and go". Since I personally have seen my rams break, at least 5 times, and bug out once or twice. So that's a good 7 I'd have lost if I only took a ram. Perhaps it is luck, perhaps it is our tactics we employ INSIDE castle. I dunno. But your "Umpteen Fifty Eleven" is probably Eleventytwelve more than Me, so I assume you would have seen the issue as well.
Anyway, yeah.. I Thought you were (and am still not 100 convinced you aren't) hopping on the Bannerlord is broken, bannerlord devs aren't working on stuff Bandwagon. "
"IOW - While there are still plenty of complaint threads/posts regarding the quality of sieges and siege equipment being used, as well as the siege scenes themselves sometimes including obstructions that cause problems, the fact is that little improvement has been made"
This seems very very very far from my experience, from game release when I had to f5 save before every siege, waiting for the crash. Then get in, and wait for the crash as I hit "auto deploy", then watch dudes climb ladders (which in my memory they did BETTER back then) but the siege towers NOT reach the walls.... Or troops walk away off to the ocean.. etc. It is much much better to me. And the "make a ram and go". Is seeming more like hyperbole, which it didn't appear at first. Since you now say "I've only had a handful of Rams actually destroyed during a siege. (I haven't played the latest Steam Public Branch patch, yet, though.)" and this statement alone, that you made. THIS ALONE, would counter the "make a ram and go"
At minimum make a ram and 1 tower, since ladders are so terrible currently. Anyway, Nope no issues with you.
And I thought I was clear with why I disagreed with some of your points. My bad. Sorry.
I'm not sure where you get your news from, but it's pretty rare to see caps in news outside of titles of articles and locations, or Opinion pieces. Professional journalists and writers tend to use italics, not caps, to emphasize certain words, precisely because the world see using caps to emphasize a point as abrasive. Regardless, there is definitely nothing professional or valid about using "?????????" multiple times in a written work.
Looking through your post history, this seems to be untrue. You don't seem to have people agreeing with you often at all. Most of your posts are you arguing a point against multiple people with no one taking your side, as your posts grow increasingly full of caps and ridiculous punctuation.
You're also the only person on this forum who even uses the term "theorycrafter" (it's practically your signature), as well as the only one who sees "theorycrafter" as a bad word, so much so that you seem to worry about being called one.
You tend to ramble and repeat yourself in your posts. In a discussion forum, it is important to be as concise as possible when getting your point across. A wall of text is the online equivalent of having a "conversation" where person A monologues, and person B never gets a word in.
I generally play with heavy-archers armies. Whether that's Battanian Fian Champs, or Veteran Sturgian Archers, etc. Once you have 50+ top tier archers, and at least 50 other top tier units (I usually keep a 2:1 or 3:1 ratio of archers:shieldmelee), you can pretty much decimate any town in siege while just AFKing until the battle finishes. Here's my siege pattern:
Build a ram and 2 towers, no trebs/cats. Start siege. Auto deply. Start assault. Do not issue any commands to the groups of units on the ram or towers; they path better if you leave them to do their business. Feel free to micromanage the other groups (ie, if RAM=1 and TOWERS=2&4, you can micromanage groups 3,5,6,7,8 but don't change orders for 1,2,4). AFK and win, even if you're outnumbered 6 to 1.
The key is to make sure you have a solid number of veteran level units. Generally, archers are better than crossbows, and shield melee are better than berserkers. If you want tons of Battanian Fian Champs, just capture and recruit all the forest bandits, and level your leadership to promote them. It doesn't take that long to get a party of 200 BFCs, then you can use your companions as party leaders to keep melee, recruits, and trash units in your army of 500+.
I'm sorry we "got off on the wrong foot," there. It's all good, man. :)
It's the sort of "If there's a general vanilla solution that still leaves the player with options, what is it" kind of answer. The assumption there is that a player is going to be able to judge the likelihood of their success, eventually. It's not always the perfect choice, though, and that's why I always try to include a warning about certain troop types. That's a "heads up" to the reader so they'll know they may need to make a judgement call on that, but that it's also a fairly reliable strategy.
I don't always include that disclaimer in posts that aren't deep discussion about "siege tactics." It gets... tiresome. )
Sure - It does reduce the actual number of possible failure points introduced by the buggy siege equipment, connection points, obstructions and some weird behaviors. So, it's kind of a "First Pass" sort of thing -
"How do I reduce the impact of poorly performing sieges before I actually find myself in one?"
Answer: Minimize the use of poorly performing assets. ;)
It's not always ideal, but it's what we have. :)
You're absolutely correct. There are plenty of posts that are obviously just players reacting in frustration. I've made a couple, too, I'm sure. :)
You are, again, correct - Sieges are not "broken." Can they actually sort-of "break?" Yes, when the perfect storm hits and the player has two towers that bork out and an inner gate that isn't registering as being able to be hit by anything... I suppose I'll have to revise my win/loss list to include that experience very, very, early in EA. So, that's two sieges I "lost," one that was "yolo" and then that one. It was against, IIRC, that castle near Quyaz. IIRC, I also reported that in the old, now deleted, "Bug Thread." I couldn't hit the inner gate with my weapon or it wouldn't register damage and no units could move beyond the ramps of the towers. IIRC, the enemy charged and could access the tower ramps. (Might have been collsion-blocked on top of the ramp by other units?)
I haven't done much besieging in 1.5.3, I started a new playthrough and then just... got frustrated with the lack of an interesting field-battle AI. I watched time and time again the enemy units going to the exact same place in the battle scene and doing the exact same stuff...So, I just said "@$%@$% it." Played a bit of Path of Exile and "Dungeonmans" lately, just to clear my head of the experience until I'm ready to return when 1.5.4 hits the Steam Public release.
I agree. Breeches can work, though I have only once ever seen a breech actually be an important part of a siege battle. That is with the Sturgian cultural fiefs that have that sort of winding path leading to their central courtyard. (Can't recall the wall tier, there.) But, it's also worth noting that I've seen them fail to work in the same cultural fief type. In the succesful one, my units actually cleared the breech defenders and quickly moved into the fief. Glorious! In the other, a few batted their weapons against the breech defender's shields then went on a coffee break to the other side of the defenses...
Something is going on there with how the battle progresses and how the AI moving units for the player chooses the next "goal" or viable path. Dunno what it is, but it happens.
I agree that it's not a strict issue of a game element failing that then causes the player to fail. Like you, I've seen enough of these happen and have overcome them when they do to know it's not really of huge import on the overall success of a siege. Unless, of course, everything "breaks." /reload
But, it can certainly increase one's costs in units lost. That's the annoying thing that can effect one's overall success. For me? I don't fight battles I can't win.
I'm one of the fortunate/unfortunate few that don't have a "real life." I'm basically retired and the only reason I have to get up in the morning is to drink coffee. So, my gameplay habits across the board are "slow but sure wins the race." I don't get impatient if whatever it is I'm going to do will take an additional thirty minutes or an hour of... whatever. That means - I don't fight battles I can lose.
I've only lost a field battle once, maybe three times? (Once on Day 1 when I realized "Looters" were tougher than their name implied. The others were in my last playthrough, one against Looters, the other against Sea Raiders that I wanted to try out... That's playing on standard normal settings, though, and never any mods. And, I have to play on low unit counts due to playing on a potato. Those "could" have an effect, but it's hard to pin down what it is until we see some unit rebalancing later in development.
IOW - My win/loss ratio probably has a lot to do with my free time spent in preparation for progressing my gameplay.
I dont' count myself as any uber-player, btw. I, also, pick off units at the connection points, hammer/raise the inner door if needed, etc. I do, however, raise the ladders myself as soon as my character has the stats/armor to survive a few missile hits. Because the defenders units are still moving around inside to get to their positions, you can raise ladders before a large number of them can defend that spot. It's a judgement call, though - Either pick off dangerous missile units/halberd unit at that connection point or rush to raise the ladder. (Aserai Tier 3 walls have "wtf" Tier 3 crenelations that make picking off units much more difficult. I sometimes add one siege tower because of that.)
I try to be specific so that an experienced player will know exactly what I'm talking about and can hopefully see it is a comment derived from "personal experience." My computer is far too crappy for making/rendering vids. Even if it wasn't, I doubt I'd feel the need to unless some developer jumped me and screamed that I was lying about something... (Note: I've always promoted the game positively, where logically called for, and criticize two things consistently: Sieges, as we're talking about them, and field-battle AI, which is... lackluster. That's it, aside from acknowledging common things like Perks, lack of a robust/working Diplomacy and economic system for King players, etc..)
IIRC, I did include specific mention of the optimization efforts they have made which have been substantial improvements compared to Day 1. That can't be ignored and they've done a good job there in terms of optimizing performance.
Let's just forget all that. I made a mistake there, too, assuming you were unloading a cannon at me. :) We do have to admit that a lot of arguments are started here because there are a ton of players that really do want to see a great, near perfect, "Bannerlord Experience." And... Early Access ain't exactly the place to find that for any game. :)
It's all good, man. When 1.5.4 hits Steam Public, I'll restart yet another playthrough and do my best to look for improvements. :) (I am very disappointed in the lack of the Tactics Perk "One Step Ahead," though. Making it a line of "Combat-related" Perks that imply "Don't actually fight battles yourself in a game about fighting battles" is... uninspiring. :))
This can be done for Siege battles at any time the player has a good, strong, party/army. (Provided all the equipment in the battle doesn't bork up.) Siege battles are a coffee-break for the player.
And, that's a major gripe of mine when it comes down towards criticizing gameplay or design, outside of "bugs/glitches" with any siege equipment.
The player should never, ever, be meaningless in a game that involves... the player. But, TW has designed Siege Battles to be "player-input free."
No player interaction is ever necessary. Nor orders are necessary. The player does not have to order their units to "Assault the Walls" or "Attack the Gates." There's no "All units to the Courtyard" or any sense of the player actually "commanding" the battle.
And, when the player does try to issue "go to" commands or basically anything other than "Charge?" Meh... Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't, maybe they obey for that moment and then go off on their pre-programmed orders later?
All indications are, so far, they have no plans on involving the player in this Phase of the Siege Battle. However, they have promised that there will be another Phase where the player will lead an assault against an interior Keep/throneroom. I'm hoping they take the opportunity to then involve the player a bit more in the First Phase as well as NOT forcing the player to "lose due to a lack of armor" in the Second... I'm sure we'll see cries of outrage when/if that second Phase of the siege is added.