Is Building Siege Equipment A Waste Of Time?

[Good Night Owl]

For so long I thought I needed Siege Equipment, but I have found that if you outnumber the enemy, it is so much more efficient to just use ladders. In the time You can take one town or by building equipment, you can take two of them if you don't bother with siege stuff, so what's the point?

Literally just issue a command for you troops to follow you to the walls, and you've destroyed the enemy castle siege equipment without actually destroying it.

[kristianjakob]

Originally posted by Good Night Owl:

For so long I thought I needed Siege Equipment, but I have found that if you outnumber the enemy, it is so much more efficient to just use ladders. In the time You can take one town or by building equipment, you can take two of them if you don't bother with siege stuff, so what's the point?

Literally just issue a command for you troops to follow you to the walls, and you've destroyed the enemy castle siege equipment without actually destroying it.

There is no point;)

You are infinitely better off just taking fiefs by storm, rather than using lengthy sieges.

There is simply no contest between those strategies.

Rapid conquest is all about numbers. The more men you can bring, the faster you can set up your siegecamp and the less time the AI has to build defensive equipment.

Storm them, move on to the next, repeat.

[Clovis Sangrail]

I used to build a ram and a couple of siege towers. But I am often outnumbered, and when
that happens, the seige towers don't get manned. I quit building those.

And the ram is so slow, you take a lot of casualties before it gets to the gate.

So most of the time -- no seige engines. Just hit the ladders and establish a beach head, then start pouring in your troops.

This usually works, and when it doesn't, it's so close that it merits a reload. There is usually more than one pair of ladders. Time to try another one.

[Good Night Owl]

Originally posted by Clovis Sangrail:

I used to build a ram and a couple of siege towers. But I am often outnumbered, and when
that happens, the seige towers don't get manned. I quit building those.

And the ram is so slow, you take a lot of casualties before it gets to the gate.

So most of the time -- no seige engines. Just hit the ladders and establish a beach head, then start ppoiuring in your troops.

This usually works, and when it doesn't, it's so close that it merits a reload. There is usually more than one pair of ladders. Time to try another one.

I totally agree, and to add to that, even if once you get to the gates, you take further casualties while trying to break the second door down as enemy drop rocks on your head, killing like 5 troops at a time, it's insane.

You would think the AI would also do this while you climb ladders. I myself have dropped the fire bombs down on enemies trying to climb ladders. Using siege equipment would be a lot more appealing if the enemy would do more than just sit there, and wait for you to climb all the way up the ladder.

[Clovis Sangrail]

I carry a big ol' two-handed axe just for chopping on that inner door on those occasisons when I do use a ram. I can get north of 30 damage a whack while my soldiers absorb the rock damage.

That part's kind of fun, and sometimes I'll build the ram just so I can channel my inner fireman and chop down that door.

[Good Night Owl]

For the record, I *like* the siege equipment. It bothers me that it's better to use ladders. I wish there was a mod to make the AI drop stuff on you while at the bottom of the ladders. Rocks, bombs, oil, grandmas, anything to slow you down other than just standing there.

[kristianjakob]

Originally posted by Clovis Sangrail:

That part's kind of fun, and sometimes I'll build the ram just so I can channel my inner fireman and chop down that door.

Well then, I stand corrected, there is a point:)

[Action Man]

Originally posted by Good Night Owl:

For the record, I *like* the siege equipment. It bothers me that it's better to use ladders. I wish there was a mod to make the AI drop stuff on you while at the bottom of the ladders. Rocks, bombs, oil, grandmas, anything to slow you down other than just standing there.

This happens on some maps, though I don't think all.

If you're going for the long siege though, you're better off smashing the walls with trebuchets/catapults over the siege towers. You can funnel a lot more troops through the breach than waiting for them to climb the tower/ladder.

[EfBee]

I just build a ram and take part in taking down the gate. Easy-peasy.

[Beornegar]

I thought if the town or castle walls are build up to level 3 ladders are not available as the walls are too tall. So I check the level of the town if only level 2 I use the ladders. If level 3 build the siege towers and ram. If there are ladders I use them, to quickly take the wall.

[Grizzly]

if i want a super easy siege i just destroy the enemy walls... am i the only one?

[Good Night Owl]

Originally posted by Grizzly:

if i want a super easy siege i just destroy the enemy walls... am i the only one?

No. I do that if I am outnumbered, or even. In that situation, meeting their forces head on is important. Those initial kills that the defending team gets from my troops going up the ladder make a huge difference in that circumstance.

It's not that it is never useful, and in the early game, when you might find yourself low on numbers, it's necessary, but late game, most of the time it's more efficient to just charge up the ladders.

[Philippe_at_bay]

The problem with destroying the walls is that after the siege you'll end up owning a castle with breached walls that you may or may not have time to repair before the enemy counter-attacks.

Having said that, building and using siege equipment is the main source of engineering skill, so if you aren't in a hurry you may want to make a prospective governor your party engineer so that he builds things faster when you send him off on his own.

Sometimes you storm a castle by escalade, sometimes you go for a formal siege. You don't have to wait for the walls to be demolished to start the assault, you just need to wait for his catapults to be out of action.

If his catapults aren't up and running yet and I've finished the siege camp, if I'm not heavily outnumbered I usually go for escalade.

In other words, like all things in life, it depends.

[Action Man]

Originally posted by Philippe_at_bay:

The problem with destroying the walls is that after the siege you'll end up owning a castle with breached walls that you may or may not have time to repair before the enemy counter-attacks.

If I'm doing this, I'm keeping my army nearby for defense. In the time I've spent in this game, the AI has broken the walls less than a dozen times.

The AI has a big problem in defending what they've taken. It's more obsessed with taking as many fiefs as it can.

[Fendelphi]

If you are about 50/50 with the enemy in strength, siege equipment is not a bad use of time(depending on how well fortified the enemy is).
Some sieges only have a single area that allows for ladders(so 2 ladders in total), surrounded by battlements where arrows, bolts and all manner of throwing weapons pour into your poor soldiers as they are climbing the ladders.
Not only will you lose a lot of people during the climb, but because there is only 1 area to attack, all the defenders siege weapons will be focused on the soldiers trying to reach that point, and so you will often be losing 5-10 soldiers in one go.

If you have about a 70/30 advantage, or the city has a low level of defenders and defenses, storming with ladders is fine.

If you are at a 30/70 disadvantage, the defenses either needs to be very weak or you have to be extremely OP with what you have. Otherwise you are going to be losing a lot of your troops, and might not even be able to get a foot on the wall. Not to mention, spending several days afterwards healing up, with only a small force to repel any form of counter offensive.

[Grizzly]

well the most important part in a siege is to make sure the defending side doesnt has a ranged option left when you start imo, or your teams death numbers might go up by 100 per ranged siege engine that they managed to have