It's a really wierd thing for me, I play on siege servers all the time but only a tiny percentage of players have any notion about how to properly fight in coordination with their team mates.
We have players who will just blatantly swing 2H weapons through their allies, and others who will simply treat any situation as a 1 vs 1 and use their standard tactics there (these types of players can often be very skilled in 1vs1). Both these things tend to get allies killed as much as enemies, yet fighting with your team mates is actually extremely easy. So it does surprise me that so few people seem to know how to do it.
Coordination over VOIP can help of course but it actually isn't at all necessary for this so I thought I would write a short guide for players who are unaware of the simple techniques and tactics which can be used for effective group fighting. This deals how best to coordinate with other players against single enemy opponents, obviously there are a lot more situations than that but this seems the most common that people go wrong on.
TL;DR Version at bottom of post.
Attitude
This is probably the most important thing, most players follow the mantra of 'I need to get the kill'. This actively hinders fighting in groups as it encourages you to constantly be at the fore of the fighting and pushes you to get the kill in competition with your team mates.
A better attitude is 'We need to get the kill', or put simply to only care about killing the other team and not who in particular is doing the killing. This allows you to assist your fellow players in setting up easy kills, even if you in particular do not get the kill.
Basic Tactics
Surrounds
One of the simplest approaches in a 2 vs 1 situation is to simply surround your opponent, when attacked from two sides no matter how good the single player is, he generally stands no chance.
Actually getting a surround can be tricky at times but as far as I know always possible. The enemy might move away from you or your team mate but as long as they are forced to defend or attack they cannot move faster than a player who is not. So the player nearest to the enemy should attempt to slow them down by simply engaging rather defensively until their ally has got the opponent out flanked.
A surround is the perfect attacking style since not only can you attack with different swings (getting round blocking without shields), you also attack from two entirely different sides. Completely unstoppable.
If a surround is not possible, for instance you do not have time to catch up and overtake the enemy due to some other circumstances, it is still effective to fight side by side. This is much more common as a fighting tactic but one that 95% of players make extremely basic mistakes on. Just alternate your attack directions to get round the enemies block, or against a shield user keep attacking alternately, he should never have a chance to counter. If he does he dies, if he doesn't his shield will break then he dies.
What to Avoid
Firstly, be careful with your attack directions, if you have an ally on your left side then you should NEVER use a left swing. Seems obvious, yet happens all the time. If you are not exactly sure where your allies are around you stick to thrusts and overheads.
Secondly DO NOT ROTATE AROUND THE ENEMY. This is a tactic commonly employed in 1 vs 1 situations. Players will get close to an enemy then spin round them to try and bypass their block. This is a very useful and effective tactic in 1 vs 1. In 2 vs 1, it's extremely stupid.
If you move around the enemy you can very quickly block your allies line of sight, not only making them cancel any attacks they had chambered but also masking the enemies attack. The enemy can very easily use this opportunity to launch an attack at your ally which will often be successful.
The correct way of fighting is to maintain the same orientation to the enemy all the time. You don't have to use crazy spinning techniques or even mad feinting spasms to win simply because the combination of you and your ally can make unstoppable combo attacks and also pressure the enemy to such a degree he can't counter attack anyway.
Thirdly when fighting alongside ranged players, always make sure to stand neither in front nor behind the enemy relative to the ranged players point of view. Stay off to the side and you will make it extremely easy for your ranged ally to get a kill. All you will need to do is make token attacks and play defensively. In ranged/melee combined engagements, the melee fighter should ALWAYS set up the kill for the ranged player. If you fight it like a 1 vs 1 the bowman/xbow player might as well not be there because if they shoot they will be as likely to kill you as the enemy.
Fourthly, if you are a bit further back than your ally, be very careful with holding chambered attacks. A common technique I use when confronted by multiple opponents is to always strike at the one who thinks he is safe to ready an attack. If you significantly outrange the enemy then this isn't so much of a problem but otherwise try to chamber only thrusts. It's easy enough to stick a thrust into someone if they suddenly lunge at you.
Finally, numerical overkill. Quite often I will see a single enemy be mobbed by 4 - 7 of my team mates. In almost all cases the single enemy will die quite quickly, unfortunately this will often be accompanied by 1 or 2 deaths of my allies, either from accidental tk's or simply by the enemy getting a sneaky attack in. At most 3 players is the maximum you can really use to attack a single other player in melee. Any more than that and it quickly becomes an unworkable mess.
Blind Siding
This is where you see an ally approaching to help, but your enemy doesn't. All you have to do in these situations is keep fighting but play defensively and keep the enemy looking directly away from your ally. All too often I will be approaching an enemy from behind to 'ninja' him when my ally who is fighting will close and spin around the enemy, revealing me and removing any hope of surprise.
Weapon Choice/Roles
By far the best weapons for group fighting are the pikes, no side attacks cut down on any risk of hitting your allies and they have great range. I always try and take a pike or spear where I can to use in these situations. It really is quite horrible trying to fight two pike users who work together, you have no opportunity to even get into range let alone attack. Sure you can hold down block but the moment you try to attack one of them the other one will skewer you.
If you don't have a pike or spear though, there are a few other specialised methods to use beyond what has already been discussed.
Archers, kite the enemy, you can maintain a distance of about 3 - 4X the enemies maximum range. If the single enemy comes at you and looks like he will get in range, switch to melee but keep backing off. Ideally let infantry do all the fighting, you are there to get the easy kill when the opportunity comes. If there are no infantry but multiple archers vs a single infantryman, just keep backing off and let the others shoot him (oddly THIS I see in game quite a lot).
Xbow's, the same as archers but maintain a greater distance to give yourself more opportunity to reload.
Shield+1H users, best way to fight like this is to close to point blank on the enemy I find and get in their face. If you keep your shield up most of the time you can play defensive very easily.
Generally though, just keep at the maximum range of your weapon. There is no point really closing in when fighting in a group.
Main Points
I would be interested to hear if anyone has anything to add to this (or disagree!), good tactics to counter it when outnumbered (besides run away) or the best way to use cavalry in a supporting role/the best setup for holding choke points etc...
We have players who will just blatantly swing 2H weapons through their allies, and others who will simply treat any situation as a 1 vs 1 and use their standard tactics there (these types of players can often be very skilled in 1vs1). Both these things tend to get allies killed as much as enemies, yet fighting with your team mates is actually extremely easy. So it does surprise me that so few people seem to know how to do it.
Coordination over VOIP can help of course but it actually isn't at all necessary for this so I thought I would write a short guide for players who are unaware of the simple techniques and tactics which can be used for effective group fighting. This deals how best to coordinate with other players against single enemy opponents, obviously there are a lot more situations than that but this seems the most common that people go wrong on.
TL;DR Version at bottom of post.
Attitude
This is probably the most important thing, most players follow the mantra of 'I need to get the kill'. This actively hinders fighting in groups as it encourages you to constantly be at the fore of the fighting and pushes you to get the kill in competition with your team mates.
A better attitude is 'We need to get the kill', or put simply to only care about killing the other team and not who in particular is doing the killing. This allows you to assist your fellow players in setting up easy kills, even if you in particular do not get the kill.
Basic Tactics
Surrounds
One of the simplest approaches in a 2 vs 1 situation is to simply surround your opponent, when attacked from two sides no matter how good the single player is, he generally stands no chance.
Actually getting a surround can be tricky at times but as far as I know always possible. The enemy might move away from you or your team mate but as long as they are forced to defend or attack they cannot move faster than a player who is not. So the player nearest to the enemy should attempt to slow them down by simply engaging rather defensively until their ally has got the opponent out flanked.
A surround is the perfect attacking style since not only can you attack with different swings (getting round blocking without shields), you also attack from two entirely different sides. Completely unstoppable.
If a surround is not possible, for instance you do not have time to catch up and overtake the enemy due to some other circumstances, it is still effective to fight side by side. This is much more common as a fighting tactic but one that 95% of players make extremely basic mistakes on. Just alternate your attack directions to get round the enemies block, or against a shield user keep attacking alternately, he should never have a chance to counter. If he does he dies, if he doesn't his shield will break then he dies.
What to Avoid
Firstly, be careful with your attack directions, if you have an ally on your left side then you should NEVER use a left swing. Seems obvious, yet happens all the time. If you are not exactly sure where your allies are around you stick to thrusts and overheads.
Secondly DO NOT ROTATE AROUND THE ENEMY. This is a tactic commonly employed in 1 vs 1 situations. Players will get close to an enemy then spin round them to try and bypass their block. This is a very useful and effective tactic in 1 vs 1. In 2 vs 1, it's extremely stupid.
If you move around the enemy you can very quickly block your allies line of sight, not only making them cancel any attacks they had chambered but also masking the enemies attack. The enemy can very easily use this opportunity to launch an attack at your ally which will often be successful.
The correct way of fighting is to maintain the same orientation to the enemy all the time. You don't have to use crazy spinning techniques or even mad feinting spasms to win simply because the combination of you and your ally can make unstoppable combo attacks and also pressure the enemy to such a degree he can't counter attack anyway.
Thirdly when fighting alongside ranged players, always make sure to stand neither in front nor behind the enemy relative to the ranged players point of view. Stay off to the side and you will make it extremely easy for your ranged ally to get a kill. All you will need to do is make token attacks and play defensively. In ranged/melee combined engagements, the melee fighter should ALWAYS set up the kill for the ranged player. If you fight it like a 1 vs 1 the bowman/xbow player might as well not be there because if they shoot they will be as likely to kill you as the enemy.
Fourthly, if you are a bit further back than your ally, be very careful with holding chambered attacks. A common technique I use when confronted by multiple opponents is to always strike at the one who thinks he is safe to ready an attack. If you significantly outrange the enemy then this isn't so much of a problem but otherwise try to chamber only thrusts. It's easy enough to stick a thrust into someone if they suddenly lunge at you.
Finally, numerical overkill. Quite often I will see a single enemy be mobbed by 4 - 7 of my team mates. In almost all cases the single enemy will die quite quickly, unfortunately this will often be accompanied by 1 or 2 deaths of my allies, either from accidental tk's or simply by the enemy getting a sneaky attack in. At most 3 players is the maximum you can really use to attack a single other player in melee. Any more than that and it quickly becomes an unworkable mess.
Blind Siding
This is where you see an ally approaching to help, but your enemy doesn't. All you have to do in these situations is keep fighting but play defensively and keep the enemy looking directly away from your ally. All too often I will be approaching an enemy from behind to 'ninja' him when my ally who is fighting will close and spin around the enemy, revealing me and removing any hope of surprise.
Weapon Choice/Roles
By far the best weapons for group fighting are the pikes, no side attacks cut down on any risk of hitting your allies and they have great range. I always try and take a pike or spear where I can to use in these situations. It really is quite horrible trying to fight two pike users who work together, you have no opportunity to even get into range let alone attack. Sure you can hold down block but the moment you try to attack one of them the other one will skewer you.
If you don't have a pike or spear though, there are a few other specialised methods to use beyond what has already been discussed.
Archers, kite the enemy, you can maintain a distance of about 3 - 4X the enemies maximum range. If the single enemy comes at you and looks like he will get in range, switch to melee but keep backing off. Ideally let infantry do all the fighting, you are there to get the easy kill when the opportunity comes. If there are no infantry but multiple archers vs a single infantryman, just keep backing off and let the others shoot him (oddly THIS I see in game quite a lot).
Xbow's, the same as archers but maintain a greater distance to give yourself more opportunity to reload.
Shield+1H users, best way to fight like this is to close to point blank on the enemy I find and get in their face. If you keep your shield up most of the time you can play defensive very easily.
Generally though, just keep at the maximum range of your weapon. There is no point really closing in when fighting in a group.
Main Points
- Keep line of sight open for allies at all times
- Fight at the maximum range of your weapon
- Fight to kill the enemy, don't fight to get the kill for yourself
- Use pikes/long weapons whenever you assist another player
- Use simple coordination to avoid unnecessary pyrrhic victories
I would be interested to hear if anyone has anything to add to this (or disagree!), good tactics to counter it when outnumbered (besides run away) or the best way to use cavalry in a supporting role/the best setup for holding choke points etc...