I know they're coming, how to hold them?

[Lancer]

Just reloaded because my line failed to hold. I've got maybe 16 turns.

I've got a two jungle hex blockage to hold. I'm building forts in both, they will get built in time. In each I've got 2 crossbowmen, three axmen and two spearmen. I know he's got 5 cats, maybe 4 elephants, a horse archer or two and a few melee units.

I'm building spearsmen as fast as I can.

Advise?

[Lancer]

7 elephants, 6 horse archers. They're here now. I've added several spearmen to each stack. Perhaps ten cats. The cats so weaken the defenders that they cannot resist the mounted units.

What is the solution? Can an empire not hold a wooded two space gap with forts?

[Dale]

Where's your cavalry?

[Lancer]

I decided for a defensive option, cav doesn't get def bonuses. For anti mounted unit defense I opted for spearmen, they get the bonus. They dug in for 5 turns...forts...

They were so damaged by the falling rocks of the cats that they didn't last long. Seems odd.

[clarkcd]

Horse Archers with their Flank Attack seem to be the best way to go in a situation such as this. Unfortunately to hold a defensive position it is sometimes necessary to go on a limited offensive.

[Lancer]

Perhaps the best option is to clear fields of fire, remove all defensable wooded terrain at the choke point, and operate out of the cities with cav. It being ancient times I figured defense would have an advantage, that's why they built earthworks back then, yes? Then I could clear the forests prior to the advent of armor and use a mobile offensive defense.

[Lancer]

They had no way through except frontal assault. Suicide.

Hadrians Wall, the Great Wall of China...

The castles and forts all over europe! No point to any of them in Civ IV?

[Dale]

Originally posted by Lancer
I decided for a defensive option, cav doesn't get def bonuses. For anti mounted unit defense I opted for spearmen, they get the bonus. They dug in for 5 turns...forts...

They were so damaged by the falling rocks of the cats that they didn't last long. Seems odd.

Even defensively, horse is best against cats. With some horse to do a sortie versus the cats, you wouldn't have lost so much to collatoral damage.

[Lancer]

The cats are in a pile with lots of other units. I would have to destroy the pile to get to the cats, yes?

On my second wimpy reload I managed to hold. I put almost everything into the one hex they seemed determined to attack. They should have switched and gone after the other hex put didn't. So my army held and I hunted down the survivors of his attacking force.

Grim.

How is flank attack represented in the game?

[Jaybe]

A flexible defense also works. Have enough defense so they use (and lose most of) their siege, but have a backup position they can't take because their siege is used up.

Try using a couple of horse against a siege-containing stack. A horse attack that isn't defeated (killed) damages some of the accompanying siege. More may see more siege damaged, or siege damaged more severely, or even destroyed.

[Lancer]

Jaybe, in your sig...what's 'Bhruic's'?

[Julian Delphiki]

Bhruics unofficial patch for patch 3.13

[The Priest]

I'm not sure the horse archers would have helped much. Unless you were able to attack with sufficient strength to kill many units in the stack (which if you were you wouldn't be asking in the first place), all that the flank attack of the horse archers will do is damage not kill the cats. But, AFAIK damaged cats do the same collateral damage on attacking as full-strength cats. So there would be just as many falling rocks on your spearman's heads.

(OK, it would help, because the cats would do less damage on their normal attack because they were weaker, but its the multiple collateral damage which is the killer).

The only answer I think is what you eventually did. Concentration of force is the most important thing in Civ warfare. When you were trying to hold two plots, he could concentrate all his force onto only one - all of his vs 50% of yours. And if the AI thinks it has a fair chance in a battle you can normally bet on it joining battle rather than stepping past (he doesn't want your army free to pillage his countryside just as much as he doesn't want yours).

After all that though - I agree with the thrust of the post. Forts should be strengthened - +50% and some zoc, at least before gunpowder. Partly realism, but also more interesting gameplay.

[CerberusIV]

Promote your cav units (horse archers at this stage) with Flanking I so they have a better retreat chance. As long as they survive they will damage and even kill the cats - without the cats even a handful of ordinary defenders will stop non-siege units dead.

Flank attack can be lethal. My last game as Byzantines saw Isabella land a stack of 2 maces, 2 x-bows and 8 cats/trebs on a hill. I had 6 cataphracts. I lost 1 cataphract but the other 5 all survived their attacks and killed the maces and x-bows and one treb directly. The other 7 cats/trebs were all destroyed by the flank attacks.

Forts are not the best option for chokepoints. Could you not have put a city there and whipped some walls?

[Lancer]

Could have tried that, didn't.

What a burden that was. I was 4th on the leader board and the first, third and 4th were almost constantly at war with me. I don't do open borders very easily, could that be why? Plus they were all a buddhist or something, I was Judaism. All the dye was just on my side of the border. Anyway they each took turns pounding those 2 hexes. Replacing lost defenders and relieving really weakened troops became my mission, not much else achieved. Finally an army came along that nothing I could patch together could hold.

Gotta try an elastic defense, clearing fields of fire and using the flanking deal.

JD, thanks for the link.