How to beat vampire counts on open field?

[Kael]

Yep - i dont have artillery yet and the vampire counts with their early flying units and all the stuff beat the ♥♥♥♥ out of me in field battles. I cant kill the Vampire fast enough - so my whole army is struggling in a battle of attricion.

I only beat them on river maps where they cant navigate

[Wh♂♂par]

Compositions, maybe?

Defend your weak ranged with adequate force, shoot everything down. Or shoot the lord quick enough.

[Kael]

Thats the point. i have 5 crossbow and they hard-shooting the Vampire count.
Still - even after 50% of ammunition gone he is still around 60% HP.

Also my Melee units get overwhelmed by zombies while vampire-knights start breaking my flanks AND the flying units starts crushing into my ranged units. Yea i have Halberdiers in Reserve to deal with them. But they cant shoot for a long time because of that.

Regularly i now stopped fighting against vampires cause i am not able to hold the casualties low. I am doing auto-resolve only against THIS Faction because i am not able to do anything against them.

[Trippy Drug]

It would be easier to give an answer if you included the faction you are playing as.

If you don't have artillery as in "haven't recruited any" then you should. Mortars or rockets and so on are going to help against their meatshields and carronades can do important damage to their big monsters.

By early flying units you probably mean bats, which should be also easily beatable with a couple of spears to protect your gunline. If your missiles are getting harassed too much, turn off automatic retreat. Bats don't really do much damage anyways.

In general anti large is what you want to go for against high end vamp armies, otherwise you just get some good missile and artillery units and blow their meatshields up. Armor piercing would also help.

[Wh♂♂par]

Are you using spears as a frontline mainly? You should.

Are you trying to get the bats early by focusing them?

Are you using too many units to fend off weak VC infantry? It doesn't have to be one vs one unit.

[Kael]

My main army composition is Swordsmen with Halberdiers as Main infantry combined with Crossbows (dont have gunpowder yet)

[Wh♂♂par]

Shielded spears defend for longer. Your issues are the cavalry and the bats. Build against them, not the weak VC starting infantry. Zombies overrunning your frontline should not happen.

[Humble]

Don't waste your time attacking on zombie and skeletons because it's low attack power, just forced on get rid of unit that had high power and terrer unit that cause fear if your units are not immure, but it's always wise to taken vampire hero and lord out first then undead fall so easy after that. It's their main weakness, other they don't had lot of range at all if vampire count, unless it's vampire coast. Lot of range with AP is better for this task, well, ok, range with no AP is help for zombie, but little less number, more number range with AP for the lord and hero.

[Koveras]

Even regular spearmen are enough against vampire counts. Not like they have missile infantry. Their bonus vs large will taken down vargheists and any black knights they may field. Regularly archers focusing down on vargheist will work as well. The big bat bois don't have a lot of armour.

[EnemigoDeLaMafia]

What faction and difficulty are you playing? You'll want at least an artillery piece simply because of the morale debuffs it causes, also the damage.

Cavalry, if kept hidden in trees, can also rack some kills if they charge from the back.

You can corner camp so they can't flank you and you focus on doing hammer and anvil.

[Sn3z]

VC are a very aggressive faction EMpire actually struggles playing too defensively and that kind of playstyle is incentivized within the barracks and if you choose to go artillery first goodluck, you should open in ALtdorf always on a stable or get a reikfort. Pistoliers(2-4 units) are handy to draw cav away or shoot at flyers that will take pressure off, empire knights are so-so I think they do well agaisnt T2 black knights(depends on difficulty), rieks are much better but I always skip them for demi's.

[tomasstigjensen]

Kill leader = crumbling army..

[JODEGAFUN]

Escrito originalmente por 91.PzG| Kael:

My main army composition is Swordsmen with Halberdiers as Main infantry combined with Crossbows (dont have gunpowder yet)

Never use swordsmen, go for spears with shield, they also perform much better aiganst black knights. Also if they do not have cav, Free companie is great, they are faster than any undead infantery and can run away while shoting.

[Ardariel]

They dont retreat, but they have major hit in HP if you drop their leadership. I would`ve focus on that

[Namhaid]

Escrito originalmente por 91.PzG| Kael:

Thats the point. i have 5 crossbow and they hard-shooting the Vampire count.
Still - even after 50% of ammunition gone he is still around 60% HP.

Since it's early game and it's unlikely he is very high level, my guess it's that you are trying to shot at him while he is on foot and in melee with one of your units. Don't do that, you are likely causing more friendly fire than hurting him. Instead either use a lord/hero or kite him so that your crossbows can get a clean shot. Alternatively, just forget about their lord, focus on other high value units, like their cavalry, and wait for him to crumble.

[Tricky]

If i have a fast unit or single unit on a horse, I tend to run at army's with that one unit from the offset. After a spell of attack of some kind I run back to my army being chased.

That way the AI tends to come at me unprepared and in poor order. Often the fast units are killed by my army before the slow ones catch up.

Oh and you don't necessarily need to use spears, you can use all ranged as they are just better in WH2.