Cfant
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Siege calculations

Wed Oct 10, 2012 1:19 pm

Hi!

As we all know, in AJE NM has a very important impact on the performance of your troops on the battlefield. We too know, that garrisons will most probably surrender, if their moral is lower then the moral of the siege-force. That leads to a strategic problem: The weaker side will avoid battles and use fortress 2+ cities as strongholds or to buy time. In RL, strongholds played an important part, often to withstand a siege for long time. In AJE, if you are on a way to defeat (or simply start with low moral), you have bad chances on the battlefield AND your cities fall quite quick.
I'm thinking on the Sertorius-scenario. Sertorius starts with 120 NM, Rome with 80 I think (dropping a few points in the first turns). The result: Carthago Nova falls within 1-2 turns, Gades too (or you send in legions, whome you will loose).
Of course I can see the sense: Soldiers with low moral will not fight so hard and are more likely to surrender. On the other hand: If the garrison-surrender would not (or less) be linked to NM as to discipline (for example), it would be more likely for stonghold to withstand a longer time.

In other words: For my feeling, fortresses fall too quickly due to NM. There are many examples of desperate defenses in history, and it would give fortresses more strategic value. :)

By the way: I reported a bug, that fleets cannot evacuate troops from sieged cities, but got no answer. Is it a known issue? ;)

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lodilefty
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Wed Oct 10, 2012 1:31 pm

To escape with loaded transports, you need to have the ships set the "evasive move" Special Order.
Otherwise, Any enemy [even stealthy] in a region will force the ships to unload before departure.
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Narwhal
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Wed Oct 10, 2012 1:59 pm

NM has no impact on siege. Discipline has, and it is per element.

Cfant
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Wed Oct 10, 2012 2:24 pm

Hm, I'll check the german manual, when I come home from work. Maybe I remember wrong. However, still I think, fortresses surrender too quick (without being assaulted). :) Neither Gades nor Carthago Nova hold out for long. (On the other hand, Masillia holds quite long in the Caesar scenario. Does the KI-Caesar ever use his attacker-trait?)

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caranorn
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Wed Oct 10, 2012 4:20 pm

Cfant wrote:Hm, I'll check the german manual, when I come home from work. Maybe I remember wrong. However, still I think, fortresses surrender too quick (without being assaulted). :) Neither Gades nor Carthago Nova hold out for long. (On the other hand, Masillia holds quite long in the Caesar scenario. Does the KI-Caesar ever use his attacker-trait?)


Do your garrisons of Gades and Carthago Nova have supply wagons (with at least some supply)? That's a big factor for armies to withstand a siege. Iirc an army will not have to take a surrender check as long as it has a stocked supply wagon (Massilia has a static supply depot in most scenarios I believe, certainly in the Caesar scenario, which explains how it can hold out longer than most other fortresses)...
Marc aka Caran...

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caranorn
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Wed Oct 10, 2012 4:21 pm

Cfant wrote:Hm, I'll check the german manual, when I come home from work. Maybe I remember wrong. However, still I think, fortresses surrender too quick (without being assaulted). :) Neither Gades nor Carthago Nova hold out for long. (On the other hand, Masillia holds quite long in the Caesar scenario. Does the KI-Caesar ever use his attacker-trait?)


Do your garrisons of Gades and Carthago Nova have supply wagons (with at least some supply)? That's a big factor for armies to withstand a siege. Iirc an army will not have to take a surrender check as long as it has a stocked supply wagon (Massilia has a static supply depot in most scenarios I believe, certainly in the Caesar scenario, which explains how it can hold out longer than most other fortresses)...
Marc aka Caran...

lycortas2
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Wed Oct 10, 2012 4:58 pm

I am unsure in the Sertorius scenario why Rome has 80 morale and Sertorius 120. I would reverse that as an historian.

Cfant
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Wed Oct 10, 2012 5:34 pm

I have to admit, that the manual says nothing about NM in sieges. Sorry... although I could bet I've read about higher surrender-chances if moral is weaker then moral of siege-force? Maybe I'm just wrong...
However: It's just my opinion. If anyone else has not the feeling of fortresses surrendering too fast, then it's ok for me :)

@caranorn: No, in this scenario you cannot build supply units, iirc. So you get a strange thing: The fewer garrison-units are created, the stronger the fortress is (the supply lasts longer) :) The more defender you have, the sooner you loose...

@lycortas2: I guess it's not a historic decision, but a balancing-thing. Maybe it's a little bit too much...

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Jim-NC
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Wed Oct 10, 2012 6:04 pm

The problem is that your troops run out of supplies too fast. There is a bug in the game, so that a harbor produces no supplies if the city is being besieged. Thus Carthago Nova should be able to supply the standard garrison indefinately with the harbor, but it can't and your troops starve to death. Your troops run out of supplies in 2 turns (if no depot or wagons), slightly longer if they have a depot/wagon. At that point, it's a forgone conclusion that the end is near.

I was able to hold onto Carthago Nova against Sertorius for 5 or 6 months by staging a fleet in the harbor. I would rotate the troops onto the fleet, where they would get resupplied. I was constantly moving units or a supply wagon (I had 1 wagon in the city, and 2 stacks) into and out of the fleet. My opponent had to move a legion to the area to break my walls. As soon as he got enough breaches, he assaulted the city. I didn't know about the "evade combat" order for the fleet, so my troops disembarked and were killed by the Sertorians (I could have used that auxillary unit and supply wagon, not to mention keeping that general alive).

So you can survive a siege for a while if you have ships in the harbor, and can rotate your troops to the ships. You also need to move your fleet out to resupply, and move a new fleet in it's place. Just hope they don't have a legion at that point, or you will fall when they get enough breaches.
Remember - The beatings will continue until morale improves.
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caranorn
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Wed Oct 10, 2012 6:07 pm

Cfant wrote:
@caranorn: No, in this scenario you cannot build supply units, iirc. So you get a strange thing: The fewer garrison-units are created, the stronger the fortress is (the supply lasts longer) :) The more defender you have, the sooner you loose...



Okay, I just took a quick look at the scenario. As the romans at start your force pool of supply wagons (impedimenta) is probably exhausted, so indeed you can't build any at that point. But at least for Carthago Nova you should be able to attach a supply unit to the garrison (the Hispanian Reserve's Impedimenta Id) which should substantially raise the garrison's chance of survival (maybe add that entire force to the garrison as I expect it will have a hard time to survive otherwise considering the large enemy forces at their gates). Gades might receive one of the Proconsular Army's impedimentas and likewise stand much better chance of survival. Unfortunatelly Rome has no navy of any worth west of Brundisium, so no way to help relieve either of those cities once under siege (resp. evacuate valuable units once the cities' fall becomes inevitable)...

Note, Sertorius seems to start that scenario with 105 NM and Rome with 90, so not as bad a difference. Though I expect Sertorius' overunning the Roman legions in Hispania might well lead to a rapid gain of Sertorian morale and loss of Roman...

P.S.: Just saw Jim-NC's post, indeed there is currently a problem with supply production in ports, but the use of wagons to bolster morale of the garrison is the bigger issue I think in early surrenders...
Marc aka Caran...

rezaf
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Wed Oct 10, 2012 6:16 pm

I find sieges to be generally a bit ... odd.
When I go for a city with a small force of only some auxilaries or even a legion or two, sieges tend to be a bit on the short side, but halfway reasonable in length. I once besieged a city with a lone defender with a ~500 Str force four months.
However, I find my own cities are almost always overrun. I had maybe two or three cities besieged by a meaningful enemy force (more than a token cavalry troop or lone auxilary) and hold out longer than a month (usually this would mean two months). Even a lone auxilary managed to force a numerically superior force in a lvl3 fort to surrender after three months (I actually forgot about the siege and was only reminded of it when the city fell). What goes?
I guess year-long sieges mostly happened in later ages, but the current implementation makes militia forces almost useless. It's hardly ever worth it trying to go to rescue a besieged city - even if it has SERIOUS forces in it, with supply wagons and everything.
At times it looks like all (or a lot of) AI generals get a bonus assaulter ability...
_____
rezaf

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