Combat Strategy!

[Tilemacho]

I never really tried to fight clever until yesterday in my first multiplayer game. There I saw that some small changes in your stack of unit can have a great impact in the result of the combat.
e.g. I attacked 1 ship of line with a stack of 7 units (3 cannons,3 musketers and 1 pikemen) and I lost the 3 musketeers !!!(of course I thought I wouldn't lose anything. I think that was due to the fact that the cannons seem not to be able to attack the ship of line from range.

Several times I wasn't sure whether it was better to attack or bombared (I am talking about ship of lines)

Well I am waiting for your ideas...

[Big Dave]

Always bombard if you have a choice. Your target doesn't get a counterstrike if you bombard.

Big Dave

[Tilemacho]

Well I don't think you are right.
Sometimes it might be more important to make the greatest casualties to the opponent than to heve minimun casualties for yourself.
Also let say you have a stack of 9 ship of line and the opponent a stack of 6. By bombaring you wont kill more than 2-3 whereas it is quit sure that you will win the battle even if you lose 2-3 ships. But the opponents ships may hide if you let then live or maybe they carry other units and manage to unload them if you let them live one more turn...

[Big Dave]

Ok, I'll agree with you there. You didn't give any specifics so I gave an off-the-cuff answer. :P

If you're after your own survival but want to cause casualties bombard. Or if you have 3 stacks sitting doing nothing else, bombard with the 1st two, then attack with the 3rd.

[TrainWreck20]

I have not tried the attack you described in your original post, but wonder if you could clarify. Did the cannons not bombard from the rear row before the Musketeers/Pikeman assaulted?

I take it this was an assault on a city held by a ship of the line?

I guess, if the above is true, it would be better to separate out the cannons to bombard and then assualt with the remaining units, although I do not know why the cannons would not be able to attack the ship.....

Train

[Tilemacho]

Yes thats the case. In the front line I had the 3 musketters and the pikeman and in the second the 3 cannons. And although my cannons fired first nothing happend...

[Genghis Al]

Cannons can miss.

[pchang]

I noticed something similar when attacking cities held only by ships. None of the ranged units ever hit. I think this might be a bug.

[Flyercraft]

Yesterday, in my game, when I decided to attack an enemy city hold by several units, I used 5 plasma ships and 4 helicopters. When the plasma ships started to attack from range, nothing happenned, they fired but did'nt hit anything. I thought they just missed or something but after that attack, I attack about 3 more citys like that and the plasma ships would never attack from range. I also noticed another thing, if I attack a city only with ships, the enemys land units won't be able to attack from distance! So maybe it's a bug or maybe it's a balancing feature?

[jlc9539]

Re: Combat Strategy!

Originally posted by Tilemacho
I attacked 1 ship of line with a stack of 7 units (3 cannons,3 musketeers and 1 pikemen) and I lost the 3 musketeers.

Being realistic, won't a ship that is docked in a city not be able to defend itself very well. Ships are made to move around and attack from a distance. Being tied up in a harbor would make the ship pretty much defenseless (look at what happened in Yemen with the Cole).

It seems hardly right that 3 musketeers should be lost in the assault. Any thoughts?

[J Bytheway]

This could well be related to the so-called 'water bug' which makes aircraft useless at defending over water squares.

[jlc9539]

Originally posted by J Bytheway
This could well be related to the so-called 'water bug' which makes aircraft useless at defending over water squares.

Do you mean interceptors don't "intercept" over water or that any aircraft can't attack/bombard targets while over water? Or even that aircraft over water have zero defense?

[J Bytheway]

I'm not sure of the details, but I think it's when an aircraft which has stopped in midair over water is attacked by some unit which can attack aircraft (like a fighter) it defends very badly.

[Nimrod]

Re: Re: Combat Strategy!

Originally posted by jlc9539


Being realistic, won't a ship that is docked in a city not be able to defend itself very well. Ships are made to move around and attack from a distance. Being tied up in a harbor would make the ship pretty much defenseless (look at what happened in Yemen with the Cole).

It seems hardly right that 3 musketeers should be lost in the assault. Any thoughts?

SoL would still have enough room to move to its broadside to fire its cannons. While the troops, musketmen/pikemen, are charging it could bomb them. But this leaves a problem, what about the cannons? Maybe too many city buildings to fire cannons?