Reversing the Ladder

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I don't know about the rest of you guys, but I love it when the enemy sallies out to fight since I'm more adept to tackling them without a ladder to bottleneck my troops and me. However, due to some silly bugs, some castles have entrances wide enough that defenders feel like getting some air. This is great if you're the one besieging, but seems like your drawbridge is open if you're defending.

You can fiddle with the F-commands as much as you'd like--maybe having them alternate between following you and charging, or making them stand ground on that narrow strip of wall. It might work out for you, maybe, maybe not. I have an easier solution for defense: reverse the ladder.

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Much like you don't like your troops inadvertently sallying out, you can change the defending scenario such that the enemy sallies in to you. So they will be coming downward to meet you in the bailey, rather than meeting you at the top of the walls.

Commands
Archers, Stand Ground on the far side of the courtyard facing the ladder, spread out
Infantry/Cavalry, Stand Ground at the foot of the stairs, stand closer

For archery, you typically think of shooting upwards as much harder, but that's because we're used to doing it from outside a wall where defender heads are the only thing showing--no body. When you're in the courtyard like that picture, your arrows can hit anywhere on the enemies' bodies.

The bottleneck is still there--the ladder is just as narrow as it was before. Also a new 'top of the ladder area' is formed on the right side of the picture at the bottom of the stairs where you see my infantry standing ground. It's the staircase of death  :twisted:

The main tactic here is to not worry about ranged enemy attackers as your archers can handle them. Instead you need to assist your infantry in clearing out the front line of enemies at the foot of the stairs. You can do this meele or ranged--and it's much more spacious than that deadbeat ladder area.

Enemy reinforcement waves take a while to reach you so that gives you time to sweep whatever's currently in the castle. You can also refill your quivers in that time :smile:

This works with any faction. It works better with fast projectiles, so archers will fare better than crossbowmen, but that doesn't mean bolts won't work well.

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Had a rough start here since I comfortably positioned myself on the archer tower then wondered why only archers spawned--turns out everyone else already ran out x_X
 
All the castles I've held have been fairly boring. But I was examining some of the Rhodok ones earlier today when I was playing and thinking of how much I'd love to fight inside of them instead of just taking out top tier troops from the side while my army holds the ladder. So I might try this once I get a hold on a couple of the cool castles.
 
usually i try to pick a fight with besiegers before they steal my 0 garrisoned conquests, but ive found it pretty fun to just rest in the castle until the battle starts :smile:
 
Makes sense!  :mrgreen:

One thing I dislike in the native settings is the tiny battlefields: no time to actually set up your troops and makes it feel like one of those godforsaken RTS hectic-click-fests. I reset battlefieds to max size and that helps a lot.

I wish there was a way to sort of do the same thing with sieges, have some additional time to set up your dudes before the arrows start flying and the infantry start charging.
 
bigtoebubby said:
mb143.jpg

Had a rough start here since I comfortably positioned myself on the archer tower then wondered why only archers spawned--turns out everyone else already ran out x_X

Stupid question: How do you get that report to come up?
 
ramonb said:
Just press [BackSpace] while in battle.

Beware, You wont be able to attack/defend while report is on.

taleworlds needs to publish its own manual already x_x

id say this strategy works better in castles than towns. towns are soooo boring and linear. i believe some rhodok towns received an overhaul slated for the upcoming patch, but let's hope that carries into their siege scenes too. youre better off standing at the default position for those.
 
Ohh, it's the return of the murder bride. :grin:

I've been using that same tactic too sometimes, mostly back in the original M&B, Native Expansion against those pesky Dark Knights. Works like a charm!
 
There's a giant flaw in this plan that I'm guessing the AI fails to see. Your archers are no longer protected by a wall, making them pincushions if the enemy decided to place his archers in that nice archer tower above the gate. Do they not stop and shoot at your archers at all?
 
Gufnork said:
There's a giant flaw in this plan that I'm guessing the AI fails to see. Your archers are no longer protected by a wall, making them pincushions if the enemy decided to place his archers in that nice archer tower above the gate. Do they not stop and shoot at your archers at all?

they will fire a few arrows as they walk. if theyre alive by the time they reach your infantry at the bottom of the stairs, theyll switch to melee. they may score a rare kill if one of their arrows gets a lucky hit. compared to your organized line of consistent arrow fire, the enemy's three or four arent threatening.
 
Nice strategy, I took a castle recently like this where my troops just swarmed up the ladder and didn't bottleneck at all.  I have wondered about defense strategies, but this might work nice if it comes to that.
 
Anthropoid said:
But the siege starts with all your guys crammed on the walls. How do you get them down into the Brailey so nice and neat?

the fastest way is to choose Everyone and hold down F1 in the general downstairs area. from there, position your archers once everyone is standing at the bottom, then plug the stairs with infantry, heroes, and dismounted cavalry.
 
Defensive troops never run out of ammo, they get replenished every few minutes AFAIK.

That said: this is genious! For one thing, it will shorten those huuuuge assed big battlesize battles considerably - it's really the most boring thing in the world to watch this crap while defending, and boredome leads to recklessness, and recklessness leads to death, and death leads to autocalc, and autocalc always leads to defeat :sad: So yay, I'm definitely going to try this at some point if I have the nerve :smile:
 
Anthropoid said:
Wolfrug said:
Defensive troops never run out of ammo, they get replenished every few minutes AFAIK.

Too bad it doesn't work that way for the player  :mad:

yeah, always save one arrow to TK a friendly archer/xbowman if you really need to use your own ranged attacks to turn the tide, otherwise, i suggest do what i do and pace your firing. only target high tier enemies like mamlukes, knights, sergeants.

it's okay to run out of ammo though. just switch to melee and stand ahead of your infantry and to the side of the stairs to engage the enemies. that spot will always be available to you so none of this 'nearby soldiers, hold position out of the way' business to get yourself in the front lines :smile:

edit: forgot to mention, since attacker reinforcement waves take a while to enter the castle from where they spawn, use that time to pick up some ammo from corpses. typically theyre either on the stairs or some just fall to the side of the stairs.
 
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