Preparations
Food
Mules, Sumpter Horses - make sure you have as much as possible to carry the food, ignore the Herd penalty on the moving
Buy all kind of foods you can, up to 2000+ food
Grain and fish - the cheapest food, should have a max of it because easy to come by and cheap
All foods: grain, grapes, fish, olives, cheese, butter, meat, dates - each gives additional +1 to troop morale (Food Variety)
Drinks: wine, beer (no morale boost, surprisingly)
Buy hog/sheep/cow and take them with you, does not take inventory space and you can slaughter them later for the meat when food starts to run low
When the army is assembled it is possible to check how long the army survives on the available supplies:
At the top:
This value (31 in the example) shows only the remaining food for my own Party, not the whole army. Based on the values and army size it seems they are not right. My party of 212 has enough food for 31 days, but the whole army of 932 has enough food for 42 days. Anyway - this can give you some indications. Usually ~2000 food for the army 1000-1200 is enough to capture 4-5 towns/castles.
Starving
Sometimes there are such messages:
That means that some party inside your army has no food, so you give it out some.
Real starving starts when you are out of food. When troop morale will go down and they will start to desert. Do not allow that - better to disband the army and go buy some food. This could be a problem when you are on the path of war - all villages/towns usually are empty of food if they are in the war zone.
Troops
- Take strong infantry
- Archers - strong ones which can handle themselves when arrows run out
- Cavalry - high tiers, too expensive to waste on the sieges
Create an Army
- Count 1:2 ration to take a castle/town, defenders vs attackers on realistic. Example 1000 soldiers to take a town with 500 defenders
- Take more parties to leave some parties behind when you capture a city/castle, so they could reinforce it with their troops - harder for an enemy to take it back
- After war declaration other warlords will create armies so hurry up, to be able to select best parties (cheapest, nearest, strongest, etc.)
- Create an army before arriving near your target. So, it will give time for the parties to gather up.
Cohesion
Monitor your armies cohesion:
When this bar runs out, your army will be disbanded automatically.
Increase it when it's low by using your Influence (press on +10):
It goes down at midnight.
When you have only companion parties following it doesn’t cost any influence to +10 the cohesion bar.
Check your target
Select the town/castle you want to capture.
Go near it and check it's status by holding the mouse over it:
Important stuff:
Wall Level:
- 1 - low walls, easy to take
- 2 - higher walls
- 3 - highest walls, hardest to take
- Garrison - higher level troops
- Militia - low-level troops
Based on this we will select how we will approach the siege later.
Start of the Siege
If you are feeling confident, you can start the siege with a lower number of units, until waiting for all parties of your army to arrive.
I find that like in Warband, you can cheese the sieges by strategically bringing a small number of elite troops such that the enemy defenders will sally out and attack you. You can kill them in the open field and then bypass the entire siege system. You still need to create a siege camp to win against an undefended city though. (Tuco)
Click on the town/castle, your army moves in front of the gates (marked on the circle as a pointing arrow) and the siege begins.
You will see a dialog, which gives you several options:
Select Besiege the town and press spacebar for a PAUSE to make arrangements.
Siege Camp
This shows the progress of how long to wait till the Siege Camp will be built. Siege Camp - various barricades in front of the castle, mainly for archers to hide when shooting at the enemies at the walls.
This stage usually takes me less than a day.
Siege Equipment
Here Engineering perks help a lot when building Siege Equipment.
Make sure you have a good engineer at your party.
Also, if your starting culture is Empire it gives 20% construction speed bonus to town projects, wall repairs, and siege engines.
If you will decide not to build siege equipment, your soldiers will use the ladders to get on the walls. This is quite risky because when your soldier is on the ladder, archers can shoot him very easily and when he reaches the top, separate enemy units are able to attack him at once, so your unit will die very easily. Use the ladders only when you outnumber your enemy several times, or you in a hurry and can waste a lot of your soldiers.
In other cases, you need to build Siege Equipment.
There are 2 lines of options to build siege equipment:
At the bottom let's build 2 Siege Towers and a Battering Ram.
If an enemy has 1st level Walls, then 2 Siege Towers are enough. No need to waste time on building Battering Ram.
Siege Towers for 1st level Walls are without ladders and very convenient. A lot of troops can attack fast and en-mass.
At the top line, there are 4 places to build Ballista, Fire Ballista, Onager, Fire Onager, Trebuchet.
Destruction of the walls
If you have time just build 4 trebuchets/onagers and hold them in reserve, and then when you have 4x deploy them at once (still in the world map stage), kill the enemy siege weapons and then destroy the walls. In this case, you can win with a 2:1 ratio against you. (vadimuha/Tuco)
That makes doing this possible:
After wall destruction, it will take some time to repair them.
Siege without the destruction of the walls
If you decide not to break the walls, select equipment accordingly.
From my experience Ballistas are useless as attacking equipment.
Better to build Onager which can be used to attack the gates (manually).
Trebuchet is too slow.
Zoom into the city and check what kind of equipment an enemy has/is building.
If he has Ballistas - that's good, because they are harmless. Can't really hurt your Battering Ram which will knock down the gates.
Attack through the gates is the easiest one with the least number of casualties, so that's our priority.
If an enemy has Onagers then there is a risk it will destroy our Battering Ram and Siege Towers.
In this case, what works for me - is to build 4 Ballistas as a decoy. They are fast to build (Build Cost 8 vs 20 for Onagers and 24 for Trebuchet). That way you save time in the siege and provide some targets for the enemy with the hope your Battering Ram reaches the gates (which basically means the battle is won).
What to build and when:
| Attackers vs defenders ratio | Enemies Equipment | Wall Level | Build |
| 1:2 | anything | any | 4 Onagers/Trebuchets, deploy at once, destroy enemy equipment and walls |
| 3+:1 | anything | 1 | nothing - will use the ladders |
| 2:1 | Ballistas | 1 | 2 Siege Towers |
| 2:1 | Onagers | 1 | 2 Siege Towers, 2 Ballistas (as a decoy) |
| 2:1 | Ballistas | 2-3 | 2 Siege Towers, Battering Ram |
| 2:1 | Onagers | 2-3 | 2 Siege Towers, Battering Ram, 3-4 Ballistas (1 Onager if you want to fire manually to the gates) |
Wait till the Siege Towers and Battering Ram is built.
After that additional equipment is started.
Move to Reserve
Now take notice and do not miss a crucial moment. When equipment is built in the top line, the enemy will destroy it with its equipment. To avoid this, we need to pause the game at the moment when our Ballista, Fire Ballista, Onager, Fire Onager, Trebuchet is built, press on it and select Move to Reserve. Equipment will disappear, the enemy will shoot on the empty space and you will be able to deploy this equipment on the battlefield.
I usually wait with the fastest time setting (3 on the keyboard) and when the equipment is built, I press pause (1) and put it into the Reserve.
Enemy misses all the shots. The trick is to pause just at the right moment when the equipment is built.
Practice with 3-2-1 at first to avoid enemy damaging your equipment.
Enemy actions during the siege preparations
It is possible that the enemy will come with a large army (which matches or exceeds ours) and will attack you. The battle will take place on the field. (Garrison/Militia will join??)
If you have a weaker army, you can retreat.
If you have a more powerful army, the enemy could gather around like to a party to watch:
In this case, just ignore them. They are harmless.
Time of day of the attack
You can select when you want to attack, the morning, day, evening or at night.
I prefer to attack at night, because nights are not dark at all and there are fires around the castle/town, and it looks very beautiful. Also, the lights/fires in the buildings allow seeing instantly what is in the room.
I do not like the realistic effect when in the daytime when I come into the room from the outside, it is completely dark and only after some time it becomes clearer and I can start to see. These are the moments when I usually get hit by the enemy, I am unable to see. That is why I choose attacks at nights mostly.
Personal Equipment
Make sure your character is equipped for the siege.
I usually fight on the walls and in the open - don't like closed spaces. So, I take 2h Voulge, which is very satisfying. Also, a bow and 2 quivers of arrows to kill time waiting for the Ram or Towers to reach the gates/walls.
If you prefer to fight on the Towers in the rooms - this is close-quarters fight, take a shield and a short axe/sword/mace.
At this point, AI is quite stupid, so it is easy to use your preferred weapon.
The Siege
Press on the Lead an Assault
to start the siege when you are ready.
Equipment placement
in this stage, you can select where to place your Ballista, Fire Ballista, Onager, Fire Onager, Trebuchet. Battering Ram and Siege Towers cannot be placed - they are already at their positions.
To change the place of the equipment, at the first press on the already placed one and select X to remove it. Then select the new place and put it there.
I see no point changing the place unless you want to manually attack the gates with the Onager. Then place it in front of the gates so it could be easier to aim. Example:
Army placement
You can place army units before the battle (does it require Tactics perk or is available from the start?). I see little point doing this because they can run fast where they need, so it seems a waste of time.
If you want to do this, select them by pressing 1...0 keys to select them and place where you see appropriate.
Also, in this stage you can check the walls and towers, how they connect, to get the idea where you could go for chopping and plan your route in advance.
Currently, at the start of a siege assault, the game rearranges all your formations and forms many small groups of mixed units to attack the fortifications from all sides. This makes it very hard to apply any kind of tactic other than an all-out assault.
Mod Fixed Siege Formations makes sure this formation rearrangement does not happen, so the player can devise proper tactics.
(Sometimes quickly ordering F1-F1 disables the AI control over your formations before it splits and mixes them.)
Press on Begin Assault button to start the action.
When the camera is teleported to your character, you can give orders to the troops.
Not commanding your Troops
In my experience is better to avoid commanding your troops because it will mess their pathing. They will be stuck near the walls, around the obstacles, will run somewhere or there will be any other mess.
So better is to relax and do your own stuff. AI will tell Infantry to use the Siege Equipment and Ranged units will use barricades to shoot at the enemy on the walls. Do not interfere.
Commanding your Troops
- You can tell everybody to stay at the safe distance with F1 F1.
- Some of the units will still run to operate the Siege Equipment.
- You can order your archers to take cover with the Scatter formation if the formation position is close enough to the covers.
- Infantry won't climb the ladders in the shield wall formation.
An alternative strategy - everybody through the gates
What usually works sufficiently well for me with minimal casualties is holding everyone back, let the Battering Ram do its job, make a group with 15 or so melees and set them on f6 so they attack the inner gate since destroying it alone takes a while and after it's down let everyone move in. The majority will attack through the gate and not try using ladders or siege towers where they will get killed easily by the defenders. Plus the defending force behind the gate just stands there doing nothing, or at least only the frontline attacking here and there, mostly not though because they are so tightly packed that they cant swing. (VanHoven)
Shooting the defenders
If you want, you can spend time till the Battering Ram reaches the gates by shooting the defenders from your bow/crossbow. Use barricades. They can be destroyed, so be ready to relocate.
Sometimes there are arrow barrels next to attacking siege barricades - use them to replenish your arrows. (Haven't seen this myself, reported in the comments)
Don’t forget to keep an eye on the arrow slits in walls for the enemy archers.
Firing Ballistas
From my experience Ballistas are useless - they are slow, I can't hit anybody with them, and they are only for the troops - can't damage the gates.
Ballistas pierce through enemies. You may kill 2 or more with one hit if you shoot a formation of enemies at the right angle. This becomes very useful in defense. I like to have at least 1 on defense for my personal use in certain castle setups. On offense, this may be situationally useful too, but probably less as you usually do not get a clear shot on more than a single enemy at a time. (AndrewBones)
Firing Trebuchet
Trebuchet is slow, can damage gates, but too slow. Better to use Onager.
Trebuchets are good at destroying the walls and equipment before a siege, but in battle, they are too slow to reset and take much longer to build, so you're more likely to be intercepted by a large army(they do look waaay cooler though). If you're planning to take down the walls, I say go trebuchet. (King of Limes)
In the meantime, you can use an Onager to help bring down the gates.
Firing Onager
Onager has 13 shots (12 on the ground + 1 loaded).
Go near it from the front and press F to take control.
Adjust the positioning with A and D and height with W and S. Height has a visible marker on the Onager:
Make a shot with are LMB (Left Mouse Button) and mark where the shot landed.
Adjust the Onager's position and height and shoot again you will be able to target the gates.
Destroying crenelations usually results in the archers on the walls repositioning, reducing the time they have to fire at you as well as reducing the number of archers that can fire. If they don't reposition, at least your archers have bigger targets now. As far as using the onagers effectively, you have to keep in mind that there is some randomness to the flight path of the projectile and try not to do too many small adjustments. A near miss may be a direct hit the next time you lose a stone(or firepot.) On that point, use fire onagers, as there doesn't seem to be any disadvantage and they can kill multiple troops with one shot. My personal best is 57 kills(total) concentrating on infantry while my AI used the other onagers on the walls and enemy siege equipment. With 1 good shot, I've gotten up to 8 or more. Keep in mind that any good shot you get in forces the AI to reposition new archers to the front of the wall, reducing the total amount of arrows your poor pawns will take to the face.
A good trick with the onager is to let the AI take the first shot, that way you have an idea of where it is already aimed and can make small adjustments from there. (King of Limes)
This is more like a time killer because you have nothing to do until Siege Equipment reaches the walls.
Also, you can go near the gates and shoot some defenders with arrows if that's what you like.
After the shot, the troop neat the Onager will load another ammo and you will be able to shoot again.
Sometimes AI got confused and the troop will run around the Onager with the ammo, sometimes it drops the ammo on your feet, sometimes he can't go around you, sometimes he just runs to the walls and leaves you alone.
In this case, you can load ammo yourself, take it and put it in place with F.
When you manage to hit the Gates, it will show:
Gates has like 10.000 hit points (?check).
When gates are breached, Onager troops will abandon the Onager and will run towards the castle/town. You should do that also.
All Siege Equipment can be destroyed by the enemy artillery. Also, troops and you can be killed by the lucky shot.
The Gates
It takes ~3 minutes for the Battering Ram to reach the gates.
If your troops breach the gates - you almost won.
With Battering Ram breach the first gates. Without Battering Ram, it is possible to breach these gates also, but it will take a LOOOONG time. When all attacking Siege Equipment is destroyed, _sometimes_ your troops will gather near the main gates and will try to breach it with their swords. After half an hour they will succeed. In this case, it is better to retreat and repeat the siege with the undamaged Siege Equipment you build before (which was destroyed in the first siege, go figure).
When the main gates are destroyed, there will be second gates that are weak. They can be destroyed with swords/axes/etc. and takes just under a minute for several troops.
As you are destroying the secondary gate holes appear before it’s destroyed, you can shoot through these holes.
Be aware of the defenders who can shoot you from above with arrows. In some castles, the defenders will drop stones on your head which is instant death on Realistic. You can let your troops breach these second gates if you see stones falling from above.
Most of the troops will run away when only some of them stay to breach the second gate. They will return when the second gate will be breached, do not waste time with your commands. Better chop at the gates.
In case your Battering Ram is destroyed - you are in trouble. The Siege Towers are your only hope if you not managed to breach the main gates with your Onagers/Trebuchet. Do not waste time trying to breach the main gates with your sword.
Ninja way to open the gates
In many castles/towns it is possible to open the gates from inside. (In some castles/towns not possible - why?).
If you are fast/strong/agile/brave (or play on reduced damage) you can go up with the Siege Tower, run to the gates and open them from inside. Stupid AI in front of the gates in the Shield Wall is too slow to stop you.
Another more extreme (but super fun way) is to run to the room above the gates and jump into the hole through which the defenders are dropping stones and open the main gates. You will get a lot of damage doing this, I usually get barely alive, so before that take a shield and be very quick and smart to avoid the attacks till you reach the opening where you could make a jump.
Gates are breached
When then main gates and second gates are breached, the way to the castle/town is open and your troops will use it to get inside (without your commands - do not confuse poor fellas).
The enemy will stand in a square (shield wall) in front of the second gates and will not move. This is quite sad, so your troops will chop them to pieces. They will never protect their back, so can go around and get free kills on sides and rear, although for large battles defending troops can spawn there.
Enemy reinforcements will come so look around when killing standing troops to avoid attacks from behind.
Their morale is usually low so after some time they will start to desert.
Killing these poor fellas’ kind of feels wrong to me, so instead I run up the stairs and do my harvesting on the walls.
Greek Fire
You can use the oil-containers from the defender's fire onagers against their troops waiting at the gates. If you manage to drop one on them (like dropping a stone), you will kill ~30 soldiers at once (Bannerlord's greek fire
). (Liwi)Routing defenders
They will run towards the keep, usually some gates and disappear near them. They will not defend when running away, so they will be easy kills.
Reinforcements
There are predefined spawn points for enemy reinforcements. Be wary about them and do not stand inside them. You could find yourself surrounded by automagically appearing enemies.
Ladders
If you decided not to build Siege Equipment, you will have to use Ladders to climb on the walls.
Go at the end of the Ladders, press F to raise them to the wall. Or wait till your troops will raise the ladders.
Then you can climb them.
The enemy can push ladders off the walls so be careful.
Siege Towers
Siege Towers differs depending on the Wall Level. 1st Wall Level will have Siege tower without the ladders, very convenient to use. Many troops will be able to run at the same time and fight with the defenders.
3rd level wall Siege Tower has 3 ladders which at this moment it seems that only the middle one is used by the troops. (you can use all of them). This means that troops are slow, and they get killed fast at the top.
If Siege Tower is not destroyed before reaching the walls, you can climb by one of the ladders, press F to drop the front and hold the attackers till your troops will come and help you.
Or you could jump to the side of the wall, avoiding the attackers and run along the wall, to the towers to kill their peasants. Usually, nobody will chase you. The troops have their designated place and will not leave it even if you are standing just a few meters away and killing them with arrows (:sad_face).
Take note on the status of the Siege Tower:
If it will be destroyed when you are on it - this means you are instantly dead. Same for all the troops. So when you see a lot of action at once in your kill feed - you can guess that one of your Siege Towers is destroyed.
Enemies’ Siege equipment
When you are inside the castle you can destroy enemies’ Siege Equipment. But it takes time and usually is not worth it. Better to kill its operators.
Arrow barrel
Inside the castle you can replenish your arrows by using the Arrow Barrels:
As the enemy will not leave their places, you can kill almost everybody in the castle if you are inside and you are careful (and have a lot of time).
End of the battle
Press TAB to see the status of the battle.
Sometimes (very often actually) there is 1 unit left, and nobody can find it. It is very annoying. Usually, this poor fella is stuck somewhere. I was lucky to find him a few times between the barrels or similar and kill him. Most of the time they are inside the walls and nobody can reach him. My solution is to retreat and repeat the battle (or auto-resolve and lose 40-50 soldiers).
TODO:
- How long does it take to starve the city/castle?
Let me know what I missed and where I am wrong. Would be happy to learn and update this guide.
Happy slaughtering!
Special thanks for corrections and new insights to: AJAJP_Juan, Heratik, Lovec1990, vadimuha, Tuco, King of Limes, Liwi, VanHoven, AndrewBones, Hawaiian555
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