Best Artillery for Fort Garrissn

[bentongrey]

Howdy folks, I tried a search on this topic but couldn't turn anything up, so please forgive me if this has already been discussed. I'm looking for recommendations from the veterans on what type of artillery gives you the most bang for your buck as fort garrisons. I've read that adding extra arty to a fort will help it hold out longer in sieges, and from my own experimentation, that seems to be true. However, I'm curious if the type of cannon you arm them with can help out further. I would assume that range is king here, but is that true? I've been whipping the Yankees left and right, so I've got piles of captured cannons and have plenty to choose from.

[Didz]

No idea I've been puzzling whether its worth adding brigades to forts at all, I notice that the AI tends to just put infantry in their forts with no canon which seems a bit odd.

[We@ponized Virginity]

I always filter 24 lbers to forts as new guns are available. The idea being they have a bonus against earthworks and emergency firepower during an assault. I never take the Parrot project but the 20-30 lbers would be the best option for fort garrisons. Comparable firepower to old howitzers and some of the best ranges available. With infantry in forts, I add a single garrison brigade if the area's going to be heavily contested. It adds just enough frontage so the fort commander doesn't want to surrender. I also noticed single infantry units holding out against my own sieges so delaying for my own defenses is a theory. Nothing in a fort will result in instant surrender if enough enemy troops roll up.

[crono900]

I see it as not mattering the type of gun the garrison units have, for sieges anyways.

If you look at the forts (not the garrison, just the fort itself where it allows you to upgrade the fort) they automatically have a number of high powered fort cannons and mortars. Think of it as this, the more artillerymen you assign to the fort = the more men that are manning those fort cannons, thus more damage to the enemy.

Now, if you send an army to assist a fort that is under siege, and choose to play the field battle with the garrison joining in. This requires that the garrison use lighter guns that are able to be moved easily on the battlefield. Thus, the choice to upgrade the artillery guns now have an effect as you move them as any other artillery unit.

Ever 15 artillerymen in a battery/battalion represents the max required men for 1 gun. So 16 artillerymen allows your unit to control 2 guns. So a battery of 76-90 men will give your unit control of 6 guns, Which we can assume that that is the number of fort guns that the fort garrison is controlling each time you add a battery to the garrison.

The base men at a fort is 50, when the fort is constructed. Thus, not adding any artillerymen will only allow about 3 guns at most to be used in siege battles.

Adding infantrymen will increase the number of men to man the fort, allowing you to take more damage before it fall in a siege though it does not always add more firepower to injure the attackers, and it gives you someone to protect your artillery unit when playing a battle that involves the garrison.

To increase the power of the guns and mortars for a fort to use in a siege, it is advised to upgrade the fort itself, if you can afford to.

I hope this helps clarify it, as I see it.