Best-odds unit auto-picked in defending?

[segawang]

It supposed to be. I believed this as well... However...

I moved 2 catapults and a horse archer to an enemy city. The defenders are 2 archers and a spearman. I started the bombard, and also there were my reinforcement on the way.

However, he made a move first, using the spearman to attack my stack. My horse archer would have disadvantage, coz the spearman has 100% bonus vs mounted units, so that is 6:8 in favor of the spearman. However, my catapult should have the advantage, coz there would be no bonus on either side, so the odds is 5:4 in favor of my catapult. All the units only had at most one promotion like Combat I, thus will not affect the results significantly. My forces were in a forest, but neither horse archer nor catapult would receive defensive bonus, so the forest didn't matter.

The computer strangely picked my horse archer to defend the attack from the spearman, and consequently lost to that horse killer. Who can teach me why it wasn't my catapult fighting the spearman instead?

 

[Zeviz]

Catapults and other siege weapons are always picked last on defense. I guess it makes sence, because it would be annoying to lose your catapult to a counter-attack during a siege, leaving the rest of your strike forse unable to take the city.

 

[segawang]

I'd rather have a choice here.

I remember that When I was taking some cities, they had catapults in the city. Those catapults were definitely not the last units AI picked on defense, coz it's clearly in my mind that catapults were not the last units I destroyed when capturing the cities. My best guess here is siege weapons are the last pick in the same round of combat. In that way, in the example I gave in my first post, if my horse archer won the fight against the evil spearman, injured or not, my catapult would take the next one if any, though there was still a horse archer there. Just a guess though.

 

[Smeee]

As a general rule I never ever move seige weapons or horses around without some sort of defensive unit. Axeman, maceman, archer or whatever.

By moving your Horses with your catapults your loosing the speed advantage so you might as well go prepared for battle

The AI tailors its units attacking and defending based on what it knows about your units.

If you have swarms of horse arches then it'll make swarms of Spearmen cos thats all it needs to beat you. To some extent in the early - mid/late game you need to have a faily well balanced army or you really are relying on vastly overwhelming numbers.

Currently my war on the American has bogged down a bit as a penalty for me not bringing enough SAM Infantry to defend my stacks as a result the Yanks are pounding my tanks and mech inf with swarms of helicopters.

Same problem different era.

 

[Astax]

You should know computer picks horse archer to be the stronger unit than spearman if its combat 1 and Shock, because it is. 6 * 1.35 vs 4 *2.0 is 8.1 vs 8.

If you attack a city that has spearmen and archers on defense with such a horse archer, its often the archer that defends provided he's got garrison. Your catapult could have be little bit damaged. Had your catapult had drill promo it would probably be the defender :/ For some reason cataputls arent used to defend so oftem. Mayeb its cause I usually have stronger units stacked, but I wouldnt want them to be the defenders anyway, since I save em for bombarding. Maybe that's coded into what determines the defender too.

Anyway yeah when Im swarming with horse archers I use the Shock promotion line cause it can match up to even spearmen. This allows me faster mvoement withotu any axemen slowing me down

 

[Thalassicus]

I wish you could Designate Defenders like in previous games; I HATE it when it picks prime assault units to defend when you've got a half-dozen other unexperienced defensive units running along in the stack. Why would units with City Raider promotions ever be used for defending against enemy attacks in an army, except as a last resort?

Say you have Swordsmen with City Raiders 1-3 and Combat 1, along with Axemen with some field combat promotions. They bring up a counterattack force, suicide some cats against the stack, then attack with axemen. The first 5-6 rounds your Axemen all get somewhat injured, then when they attack your swordsmen run out, defend, and get killed! I'd much rather lose some wounded 4-xp rookie axemen than diehard 16-xp veteran city raiders.

You should be able to designate defenders in a stack. Wonder how hard it would be to do this...

 

[segawang]

As a general rule I never ever move seige weapons or horses around without some sort of defensive unit. Axeman, maceman, archer or whatever.

By moving your Horses with your catapults your loosing the speed advantage so you might as well go prepared for battle

I disagree with this point, and there's no NEVER EVER situation in my mind. I only made the best move I could according to my situation in the game. I usually put a horse with my attacking stack together, so that I could use the horse to pillige every turn.

I don't want to discuss about strategies here, coz that's kinda of off topic.

 

[segawang]

You should know computer picks horse archer to be the stronger unit than spearman if its combat 1 and Shock, because it is. 6 * 1.35 vs 4 *2.0 is 8.1 vs 8.

If you attack a city that has spearmen and archers on defense with such a horse archer, its often the archer that defends provided he's got garrison. Your catapult could have be little bit damaged. Had your catapult had drill promo it would probably be the defender :/ For some reason cataputls arent used to defend so oftem. Mayeb its cause I usually have stronger units stacked, but I wouldnt want them to be the defenders anyway, since I save em for bombarding. Maybe that's coded into what determines the defender too.

Anyway yeah when Im swarming with horse archers I use the Shock promotion line cause it can match up to even spearmen. This allows me faster mvoement withotu any axemen slowing me down

I said that all the units only had at most one promotion, so no Shock for the horse archer.

However, I had the same observation as yours, that when my horse attacking a city guarded by archer+spear, or Longbow+Pike, the computer stupidly picked the archer instead of spear to defend. I did make a calculation at that time, the conclusion was that spear would always have better odds of win than the archer, no matter considering first strike and the foritied bonus or not. I think the related settings in the game need to be reviewed.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

You should know computer picks horse archer to be the stronger unit than spearman if its combat 1 and Shock, because it is. 6 * 1.35 vs 4 *2.0 is 8.1 vs 8.

If you attack a city that has spearmen and archers on defense with such a horse archer, its often the archer that defends provided he's got garrison. Your catapult could have be little bit damaged. Had your catapult had drill promo it would probably be the defender :/ For some reason cataputls arent used to defend so oftem. Mayeb its cause I usually have stronger units stacked, but I wouldnt want them to be the defenders anyway, since I save em for bombarding. Maybe that's coded into what determines the defender too.

Anyway yeah when Im swarming with horse archers I use the Shock promotion line cause it can match up to even spearmen. This allows me faster mvoement withotu any axemen slowing me down

Actualy HA with shock (and C1) v. Spearmen are

6.6 v. 7 (4+100%-25%)

so still at a slight disadvantage.. not counting the other bonuses the spearman may get.