How AI should attack + defend cities

[razor436]

Offense
Concerned with how the player always beats the AI in wars, I was looking for an easy strategy for the AI to use, and here is what I came up with:
(note: only using ground troops)
1. Make sure attack stack includes at least 10 siege weapons
2. Bombard city till city defense = 0% (with many siege weapons, it should take at most two turns)
3. On the following turn, attack defenders with siege weapons
4. On same turn attack city with stack of death.

This way, it GREATLY improves the survival of attack units, so the AI only needs to replace the siege weapons for each assault.
I noticed that currently the AI sends a good size army near my city, but once it arrives it sits there... waiting..... for what I have no idea. Hopefully this strategy can fix that.

I admit I did not think this through quite thoroughly, I forgot about players flanking with cavalry. But, in my defense, with a lot of siege weapons in a stack, the player may not have enough cavalry to kill them. The AI can still bombard cities to 0% with injured siege weapons in 1-2 turns and damage to some extent defenders. In the end, I think the AI will have greater success then the current strategy.

Defense
To help the AI defend better, he should keep a stack of siege units ready to attack an SOD near a city. Then the weakened SOD can either be pummeled by defending units, or SOD will be forced to retreat to heal.


Naval Blockades
By the way, to whomever it may concern, I attached one of my save files.
What you need to know:
- I have no access to oil or uranium, therefore I have no navy.
- I'm at war with, well, almost everyone, but one of my enemies (Saladin) can make destroyers.
- One of my towns is blockaded. Is there a reason why Saladin does not blockade all my coastal cities?

 

[Dom Pedro II]

Offense
Concerned with how the player always beats the AI in wars, I was looking for an easy strategy for the AI to use, and here is what I came up with:
(note: only using ground troops)
1. Make sure attack stack includes at least 10 siege weapons
2. Bombard city till city defense = 0% (with many siege weapons, it should take at most two turns)
3. On the following turn, attack defenders with siege weapons
4. On same turn attack city with stack of death.

1. Yes, the AI doesn't use enough siege weapons.
2 and 3 Absolutely disagree. If the city has 5% defenses at the start of a fresh turn and the combat odds are favorable, that siege unit would be much better spent attacking the city that shaving another 5% off the defenses. If, for example, the AI has bombarded the city from say 15% to 0% in one turn and still has more siege units, then it should weigh the ability to take the city this turn with the remaining units. If it can't, it should wait until the next turn.
4. Yes, the AI should definitely use its SOD on the same turn as a collateral damage attack.

This way, it GREATLY improves the survival of attack units, so the AI only needs to replace the siege weapons for each assault.
I noticed that currently the AI sends a good size army near my city, but once it arrives it sits there... waiting..... for what I have no idea. Hopefully this strategy can fix that.

Yes, I've seen those idling AI stacks too. And I've also seen the AI launch suicidal attacks against cities. They'll usually win in the end, but they'll break their force doing it.

Defense
To help the AI defend better, he should keep a stack of siege units ready to attack an SOD near a city. Then the weakened SOD can either be pummeled by defending units, or SOD will be forced to retreat to heal.

Agreed. The AI currently makes too little effort to attack invading armies. Personally, I think it would be a nightmare for me if I had the AI smashing into my SODs with collateral damage units... even attacking with non-siege units hurts my good units thereby making city conquest more difficult.

Naval Blockades
By the way, to whomever it may concern, I attached one of my save files.
What you need to know:
- I have no access to oil or uranium, therefore I have no navy.
- I'm at war with, well, almost everyone, but one of my enemies (Saladin) can make destroyers.
- One of my towns is blockaded. Is there a reason why Saladin does not blockade all my coastal cities?

Agreed. The AI needs to make better use of economic warfare in general.

 

[razor436]

2 and 3 Absolutely disagree. If the city has 5% defenses at the start of a fresh turn and the combat odds are favorable, that siege unit would be much better spent attacking the city that shaving another 5% off the defenses. If, for example, the AI has bombarded the city from say 15% to 0% in one turn and still has more siege units, then it should weigh the ability to take the city this turn with the remaining units. If it can't, it should wait until the next turn.

I agree with your disagreement. That is pretty much what I had in mind, but I could not explain it so well.

 

[r_rolo1]

I need to leave here a word of caution about making strategies for AI warfare: do not take human SP games in big consideration. The standart human tactics on SP are made to shred a not so smart AI and rely heavily on the AI tactical weak senses. A lot of siege in a stack will be completely smashed out if the oponent uses smartly flank attack and their own siege and , if there is a inteligent use of espionage, you don't even siege units so much as that ( in fact, if you want Blitzkrieg, siege will only hinder you ). Not mentioning that a smart oponent ( note I'm talking human or AI in here, just in smartness scale ) will only let you get near of your cities if he can't avoid it and that, even if capture cities, they might become death traps pretty easily ( because the defender will probably maintain control of most of the tiles surrounding the city....

Note that i'm not criticising none of the ideas posted here per se ... I'm just saying, that, before thinking on how to attack a city, the AI should think on how to warrant their troop survival on field and in enemy cities and to make sure that any enemy stack ( human or not ) never reaches their cities, and in case it does, make it die there . IMHO this points more for various types of SoD ( attack, counter attack, speed attack, counter speed attack, all the above with naval and/or air support ... ) and more than one SoD tactical code than a simple does it all SoD recipe and a "Hulk smashes cities" strategical thought line alone. But that might a lot of work, though ....

 

[Cowardly Maggot]

I think the most important and easiest thing to fix is the suicide city assaults by AIs.

I am thinking of attacks with armies which are obviously inferior to the defending force, where the defending and attacking units are of similar quality, but the attackers are outnumbered plus fighting uphill against fortify bonus and possibly even city culture-defense bonus. These attacks are so boneheaded that they must be fixable.