The meatgrinder

This is my own term for when you willingly choose not to capture an AI city, although you can, because the AI keeps throwing units into it.

Recent example: medieval war, I'm Ragnar, fighting Wang Kon. I reduced his city to a single damaged Horse Archer defending, but noticed he had several more units -- Hwachas, a Maceman, more Horse Archers -- within a square or two. Since I had a well-promoted city-capturing stack with CR Trebs and Macemen, I withheld the attack. Sure enough, next turn Wang had moved four more units in... and I was easily able to kill them.

In extreme cases I've seen a meatgrinder go on for three or four turns, killing a dozen or more AI units with minimal loss.

Has anyone studieda this in more detail? Are some AIs more likely to fall for this trick than others? (Turning it around: are any AIs bright enough not to throw units into a doomed city?)


Waldo

like the title description.

no answer- although a fellow civer came over once and watched game and said - "you like #%$# with them"

the reverse can also hold true- a defensive anvil they smash against.

Hrm interesting topic. What difficulty where you playing on? Maybe the AI acts differently on higher difficulty levels... Although maybe not. Maybe it will still let you meat grind them lol.

Because the AI will trickle in reinforcements as often as not I use a stack of mounted to take care of most inbound defenders. When they're not doing that they're handy for pillaging improvements.

I've been (ab)using this when in the rifle/cannon eras and it works hilariously well. I've also had success with sacrificing cities to an enemy stack just to take them out with my own CR treb/cannons the next round.

Valid strategy or abusing the AI?

I like the "meat-grinder" strategy and use it mostly for intercontinental invasions. It's great for eliminating the AI SoD. Once that happens, the rest of the intercontinental invasion is a cakewalk. In my thread on Small Empires I talk about this kind of strategy used to only capture 2 cities of the largest AI civ and being able to capitulate him.

Yup, I use this too sometimes. Something different, but using the same principle: if your SoD and the AI SoD are about the same strenght I always wait for them to come so I can be the attacking stack. In these situations it's rather lame how much advantage you get from sacrificing a few siege units in order to win all the other battles with >90% chance. But you need something to make up for the AI bonusses on higher levels

I have done it many times as well. Works in any era. This is especially good for cutting down high unit prohib civs. I have used it many times v mehmed and monty. Just sit on a hill while you wait if possible.

I've found that defending typically has the higher percentages, unless you have a highly promoted CR force. I like capturing the cities then letting the units suicide on my protective longbows or riflemen etc.

^Bad idea against AIs that actually build enough siege. If you have a stack coming at you with plenty of cannons or artillery, you want to be the one attacking it, not letting it attack you. If you just declare war and charge into the nearest enemy city, you can get sliced up by collateral damage when the enemy's SoD arrives.

Naglimund - the snare that traps the hunter

Fei Kelei said:

^Bad idea against AIs that actually build enough siege.

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There's no such thing as enough siege.

The problems I can see with this tactic are - your stack of CR units will heal slower out in what is presumably AI territory, and it may be hard to reinforce them or withdraw them if a larger-than-anticipated stack shows up. Like that of a DP partner or vassal of your enemy.

Not that those can't be overcome, but when I have a city for the taking, I usually take it. One fewer city for the AI to build/whip/draft defenders in.

Well the main advantage of this tactic can best be seen when the AI does not correctly reinforce the city. Many times it will attempt to reinforce the city you are attacking with units that cannot defend well (knights, cav, arty) and they can be better killed that way. such units function much better when they are attacking.

I use this tactic quite often. It works very well for getting an experienced SoD, and prevents the enemy from counter-attacking you when half of your troops take the city and the other half are in a wounded stack outside. If you kill all but one of the new defenders with 2-move units then you can move your whole stack into the city at once.

The only time this gives problems is against PRO AIs because they can easily re-enforce the city with CGIII Longbows or Riflemen after your first attack. Then your wounded trebs or other siege often have problems dislodging them.

Another form of the meat-grinder is to not take a city, leave several units in it, and attack the city for several turns with your siege, getting them well promoted and building up XP for generals. This works well, too. If you have a mix of trebs you want to upgrade and cannons in your stack, you can attack each unit in the city twice! The damage floor of the treb is higher (75% vs 80% for cannon) than that of a cannon so a treb hit defender has a little bit more health to be blasted off by cannons. This effectively doubles the amount of general XP you can get for this tactic. When your trebs reach the "magic" amount of 17 xp (13 or 20 for CHA), then you can take another promotion and upgrade them to cannon. I think the same works for the cannon/artillery upgrade.

NPM

6K Man said:

The problems I can see with this tactic are - your stack of CR units will heal slower out in what is presumably AI territory, and it may be hard to reinforce them or withdraw them if a larger-than-anticipated stack shows up. Like that of a DP partner or vassal of your enemy.

Click to expand...

Make sure you have a super-medic in your stack (I usually use a woodIII-medic unit instead of medic III) and your siege can heal very quickly to attack again. Also, having enough siege allows you to rotate your siege around so some can attack while some heal.

Of course, you do run the risk of getting attacked by a larger enemy stack of another nation, but usually this won't happen because the allied AI usually puts this stack in your territory, not that of his ally.

Just make sure you have enough home defense!

NPM

I do this all the time in medieval war, because Trebuchets are wonderful when used against cities and... not very good otherwise. It works well; often enough there's an extended and epic battle over a single city after which the AI falls over and dies.
In other eras it has its uses but it's not quite as dramatic.

I use very few CR Macemen though - Trebuchets are my can opener of choice unless there is only a single strong defender. Since Macemen will be called on to defend against many things (Swordsmen, Longbows, Pikemen, siege units) I like to give them more well-rounded promotions.

Another bonus: AIs can be quite single-minded about which city they defend. While you're tying up their army, mobile units can often take lightly defended cities elsewhere; especially if your mobility comes from Guerilla/Woodsman II (I think the AI doesn't take these into account at all).