Attack strategies? Tips?

[bpheater]

I'm playing as the Iroquois, on Prince difficulty, and I am struggling in a war with Greece (the only civ that has a higher score than I do, and close to the same amount of military units). I am dominating on defense, because I hit them with city bombard and archers before they even get the chance to attack my cities. But they do the same exact thing to me when I try to attack! I'm not even bothering with horse units because they suck at attacking cities, and I have just reached the point where I can make longswordsman (research lead). I'm quite low on iron as well.

My basic attack strategy involves bringing one siege unit along with one longswordsman, one Mohawk, ane either a warrior or an archer (low on upgrade funds). My siege unit will of course start hitting the city from two hexes back, while my other units hammer away at the city I'm attacking. I haven't successfully taken a city yet because the city bombard/archer combination usually wears melee units down to less than half health in one turn, which renders it useless after one more city attack (so I withdraw). It's almost like I need to bring double units to take the city, but with no unit stacking the other units would just be sitting and waiting to get hit with city/archer bombardments.

Any suggestions?

 

[wurstburst]

You should have 2 seige units and at least 3 attackers plus maybe 2 others that you can swap out when the initial attackers get injured. You should be able to take out a city in 2 turns with that, if you aren't behind in tech.

Horses are actually pretty useful in a city attack. You can zip them in, do a few points of damage and zip back out, leaving a space for another attacker to attack on the same turn. You aren't going to take a city with just horses, but they do help - especially when you are short on iron.

Archers and warriors won't be very helpful in taking a city.

 

[bpheater]

Well, I guess I'll pop out another siege unit and dish out some change (ouch) to upgrade my warriors before the next advance. It's probably going to take about 10 or 15 turns to get everything ready but if it works it works.

 

[UknowsI]

Remember to have one medic next to the units taking damage. The best situation is if the enemy shoots at a fortified melee unit in rough terrain with a medic behind him. This will give your siege weapon time to bring down the defences. It seems a little random who the AI will shoot at, but a medic will always be useful.

And the other poster was right. You should bring more units.

 

[AxelRhodd]

When I go to war I normally have a General tag along with my attackers to boost their morale...

 

[pickle]

with the new patch if their city is in a good defensive position and has walls you can forget about a quick capture early in the game.

i'm sure that the city bombard is stronger since the patch too.

just finished my first game since the patch and none of the ai were able to take a city from each other until the industrial age when america started spamming B17s and went on the rampage. even then they were pretty ineffectual.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

You need more units and decent bonuses (promotions + great general)

Usually 1 siege unit and 4-6 swords/longswords will spank most AI below deity. Just make sure you have shock or drill II as appropriate and surround/pound AI cities with 2-4 swords/longswords. Most AI units can easily be killed then you can heal off the damage and go.

The siege unit is to help wear down the AI city. Archers aren't very good at it now by comparison; a lone treb can frequently hit for 4-6 damage in medieval, enough to make taking a city favorable to a couple longswords.

Ultimately if you killed their army and have a good chunk of current or advanced basic infantry (swords, longswords, muskets, rifles, infantry+) you can beat down cities w/o too much trouble even now. It's just the -33% on the horses that screw them.