Noob Question: Assault Posture Vs. Sieges

[jasobass]

Hey all

New player here and I've been wondering what the actual advantage of sieges are in the game because it seems like anytime I'll use assault posture I'll immediately take the region instead of having to wait several rounds for a siege in order to take the region. My question is what advantages am I missing out on by not sieging and just assaulting the region and taking control of it immediately?

[FightingBuckeye]

Assaulting won't always be beneficial to you, so while useful it shouldn't be used all the time. If you don't have a large enough force advantage, you could take heavy casualties and/or lose an assault attempt. Also, you risk an enemy force coming in to relieve a siege and you won't have the advantage of being the defender or whatever defensive works your stack has erected. And if the structure is still intact, then you'll have take additional casualties that you wouldn't if you waited a turn or two. Being in an assault or offensive posture also slows down cohesion recovery and you could take hits to cohesion during the actual battle. Depending on what your cohesion is already at, you might want to wait a turn or two in order to recover your cohesion. With a successful siege, you will gain VP and potentially NM when the enemy surrenders.

Not that there aren't times to assault. You could capture guns, ships, and supply units with a successful assault that would otherwise disappear and/or escape if you waited until until they surrendered. You might not have the time and/or supply to stay for a long(er) siege. Or your opponent could bring in additional forces and/or drive you off. There are times and places when sieging and assaulting work best.

[DrPostman]

Always stay in defensive posture until you have worn down the fort
to where it no longer gives a defensive bonus, and have at least a
3:1 ratio against the defenders. If they are big enough they will still
probably survive the assault though. When it comes to big forces I
keep them besieged for as long as I can. At least you have a big force
bottled up that way.

[Captain_Orso]

Siege occurs if the enemy is located completely inside the structure[SUP]1)[/SUP] of a region with no units outside the structure in the field, and your faction has =>1 stack not in PP (Passive Posture) in the same region.

Enemy units inside a structure will only be attacked if the attacking force in in AP (Assault Posture), and:
- your force starts the turn in the region and does not move,
- your force ends its move that turn in the region with an enemy force inside a structure[SUP]2)[/SUP].

How you handle the situation depends on the status of your force and the enemy force.

Generally, if the besieged force is a single militia garrison and your force is a division or larger you can assault the garrison without much thought, although if the structure is a depot, stockade, fort or larger city (I'm not sure how large at the moment) there is about a 25-50% chance that upon assault a garrison reinforcement unit (or even two) will be called-up (generated) before the assault takes place, and these reinforcements are often first line infantry, especially by strategic/objective locations.

If the besieged force is more formidable, it is often adventitious to prosecute the siege instead of assaulting. Hereby the most important factors are, a. blocking all enemy supply, b. besieging with an offensive artillery power much stronger that the defender's defensive artillery power: Manual:Siege combat.

If after the first turn of siege you gain a breach, your force has a good artillery advantage and there is a fair to good chance that the siege will succeed if you have managed to block all enemy supply from reaching the besieged enemy force. As long as all besieged enemy elements receive supply at the start of that turn, there is a 90% chance that a Siege Roll, which would otherwise result in surrender, will be negated.

Beyond that, whether you besiege or assault will depend on the situation in general:
- is expedience on your side necessary?,
- is your force in danger of being flanked?,
- is there an unopposed enemy force threatening to come to the assistance of the besieged force to lift the siege?

You will have to evaluate the situation to decide what you do.


[SUP]1)[/SUP] A besiegable structure is a depot, stockade, settlement, town/city or fort or any combination thereof.

[SUP]2)[/SUP] If the enemy has a force in the field outside of the region's structure in addition to the 'garrison' inside the structure, and your force is in AP it will attack both forces one after the other with the battle in the field taking place first.

[FightingBuckeye]

Captain Orso, informative and comprehensive post as always. The one thing I would clarify is that 90% negation of surrender is only possible if a supply wagon is present with the defending force.

[Captain_Orso]

No, that's not true. Here is an excerpt from Manual:Siege combat:

SRV > defending units' average discipline

Defender surrenders and all defending units are eliminated. Exception: if ALL defending units have received supplies during the supply distribution phase of that turn there is a 90% chance of the defending force not surrendering. The defending force having a supply wagon may help with this, but it is not necessary. A dr100 (die roll on a 100 sided die) is made. If the dr is <= the "sieWagonDepotProtectChance" ""Sieges and breaches"" value found in GameLogic.opt, (90 as of patch level 1.04) the surrender results is ignored. Source: ""Current (1.05 RC4) Siege Rules"".

AFAIK this was actually always the case, only the description was previously no literal.

[Gray Fox]

Welcome Jasobass!

Not all garrisons are the same. I have successfully assaulted structures (Richmond for one) at one to one odds. You just need good artillery and an elite force.


And be really audacious.