Middle Ages: To Pillage or to Conquer?

[AmnesiaA]

If you look back into human history, the one military unit that disabled quick military conquering for a while, and allowed for the establishment of large, well defended and peaceful cities, and even helped pull the world out of the dark ages, was the cross/long bowman and variations of. Fighting didn't stop, wars didn't vanish, but it was less common in this age, and during this period many nations, especially European countries, realitively peacefully grew and established themselves.

This is reflected in CIV4. During the middle ages, and before the invention of gunpowder, it is hard taking over the world. I find that to take even a single city you need a huge complex army, a lot of free time, resources, and planning. It's very difficult to pull it off, and often you'll either fail or make very little gain. So what should you do to keep the world in check, and make other nations feel sorry for going to war with you?

In most of my games I never take over any nation's cities during the middle ages because it is just too hard. But I also realize I have to keep nations in check, and do something when I get declared war on. Usually I park troops in forts near my borders, always ready to ride into the neighbor nation and defend my borders. But these troops also have another important role to play. I send a few of the fast ones, usually knights or horse archers, into the neighbor during war to not take over cities, but pillage the landscape until barely anything is left. I break road systems, resources, towns, farms, and mines, but don't go near the cities. This often works out fine, and by the end of the war I would have usually ended up pillaging most of my neighbor's landscape.

The short term effects are not too impressive, but the long term effects are strong. The nation ends up being behind in everything, might even go bankrupt, and ends up putting a lot of it's resources to rebuilding itself. This allows me to leap toward the age of gunpowder, and then conquer my broken neighbor since they are often behind.

In the end I prefer pillaging over conquering during the middle ages so I can conquer them later. Anyone do something different?

 

[Joh]

The middle ages for me tends to be a time of learning.

I focus on research, and never go into battle with middle age units. I have not even used a maceman yet.

wars tend to be so much easier with gunpowder, so I don't fight in the middle ages.

However, I don't tend to pillage, as I like to take fully developed cities intact during the renaissance.

 

[eg577]

For the middle ages all you need is large stacks of macemen and cataplults. Add one pikeman in each stack if you have them. This era is easier than others because the AI upgrades every archer to longbowmen once it has the money (and it gets a big discount on upgrading so that will happen almost immediately). As a result you will only face freshly made crossbowmen, if any crossbows at all.

Really, the AI is hopelessly lost against a SOD of units + siege in any era. After you declare war wait in your territory so he charges his stacks at you. You have the first shot so suicide half a dozen siege units at each stack then rip apart the rest. Now he is crippled and will only be sending a trickle of surplus units at you as they are produced. Stay in very large stacks in his territory so his defending offensive units don't try to counter attack. This also minimizes the impact of his defending siege.

 

[jeremiahrounds]

You can blast through the middle ages sickeningly fast so thats what i usually do. I start making units again when cannons are available (having rushed towards them and railroads). Stack attack units have serious life specially when railroads are coming fast and that gives a 1 move unit more legs.

 

[thordk]

if i go for conquest i try to get it done before the middle ages are gone. early swordsmen/axemen and cats can conquer the world for you if you're fast enough. for the civs right next to you, you don't even need cats most of the time. a nicely placed city with some goods like cow and a few hills is able to push out swordsmen at least in 3 turns with just 4-5 worked tiles.

later wars, or even modern wars, need much more developed cities.

though, if you go for war in the middle ages just get a stack of macemen, add 2 cats and maybe a fast unit to pillage iron etc.
adding workers might help if the civ you want to conquer is far away, building roads while moving.

 

[Eagle_Seven]

In my current game (Prince), I just ended a medieval war. Alexander was conquering all my neighbors, quickly exceeding my size and research potential. In an attempt to thwart his other invasions, I rushed and captured one of his largest cities with a size-15 mace/catapult stack. Unfortunately, he then rushed my weakest city with knights and captured it. We were at a stalemate, trading blows but gaining no ground for two-hundred years, until I researched gunpowder. The musketmen gave me the advantage, and I re-took my lost city, while holding my conquest.

THen he sued for peace, and I agreed. Although I'm now two techs behind the tech race, I've stemmed the point leader and stopped his expansion. So my medieval war was a success.

However, the medieval units do create a stalemate for a conqueror. So I would agree, that the medieval army is good to hold your cities until you get gunpowder. And get Gunpowder really fast!

 

[AmnesiaA]

In my current game (Prince), I just ended a medieval war. Alexander was conquering all my neighbors, quickly exceeding my size and research potential. In an attempt to thwart his other invasions, I rushed and captured one of his largest cities with a size-15 mace/catapult stack. Unfortunately, he then rushed my weakest city with knights and captured it. We were at a stalemate, trading blows but gaining no ground for two-hundred years, until I researched gunpowder. The musketmen gave me the advantage, and I re-took my lost city, while holding my conquest.

THen he sued for peace, and I agreed. Although I'm now two techs behind the tech race, I've stemmed the point leader and stopped his expansion. So my medieval war was a success.

However, the medieval units do create a stalemate for a conqueror. So I would agree, that the medieval army is good to hold your cities until you get gunpowder. And get Gunpowder really fast!

Yeah, that's what I'm really noticing. A stalemate always likes to happen during the middle ages, even with the flush of UU. If I'm being a warmongering nation, I usually run to gunpowder and catch my neighbors off guard--the red coats/muskiteers REALLY make catching your neighbors off guard easy and to your advantage. If I'm a peaceful nation, I spend the middle ages living in peace and taking advantage of this since many other nations are doing the same. It's usually stupid to fight wars during the middle ages since stalemates will happen--unless the world is behind--and you will find yourself going nowhere, and maybe even losing the tech race and culture race in general due to fighting stale wars.

For the middle ages all you need is large stacks of macemen and cataplults. Add one pikeman in each stack if you have them. This era is easier than others because the AI upgrades every archer to longbowmen once it has the money (and it gets a big discount on upgrading so that will happen almost immediately). As a result you will only face freshly made crossbowmen, if any crossbows at all.

Really, the AI is hopelessly lost against a SOD of units + siege in any era. After you declare war wait in your territory so he charges his stacks at you. You have the first shot so suicide half a dozen siege units at each stack then rip apart the rest. Now he is crippled and will only be sending a trickle of surplus units at you as they are produced. Stay in very large stacks in his territory so his defending offensive units don't try to counter attack. This also minimizes the impact of his defending siege.

You're thinking of the early middle ages when the world is still converting from the classical period. It's still very easy to conquer the world even during this period. But when the world jumps into the... middle middle ages or beyond, good luck taking over the world. A stack of macemen and catapults will only take one city for you if you're lucky, and you will find yourself blowing resources trying to take a another city, or defending your borders from the impending pillaging. Even warmongers will end up hitting a stalemate eventually since the AI uses the defensive advantages of the middle age units well, and also has a tendency to pull other nations during this period where relations are often cemented against you.

This is why during the middle ages if I do go to war I defend myself religiously, make the battle grounds AWAY from cities, and pillage pillage pillage. If you're skilled at this, this might open the other side up to losing a few cities, but of course you best be careful. (I actually start using forts often during the middle ages since you'll need them. You don't want the battles near your cities during this period since the AI shows some intelligence and will pillage your landscape instead of bothering to take your cities, and this will make you fall behind and open you up to being conquered by gunpowder.)

 

[Breunor]

If you look back into human history, the one military unit that disabled quick military conquering for a while, and allowed for the establishment of large, well defended and peaceful cities, and even helped pull the world out of the dark ages, was the cross/longbowman and variations of. Fighting didn't stop, wars didn't vanish, but it was less common in this age, and during this period many nations, especially European countries, realitively peacefully grew and established themselves.

Sorry Amnesia, I don't agree with your intrpretation of history here (I do agree with your views on the GAME, though). By the way, I want to make sure you don't feel I'm 'picking' on you --- I just want to present my view of the period so please treat this as one historians' view of the period.

What caused the difficulty in conquest during the Middle ages was the fortification, especially the castle, and the formation benefit of the defense. History has had a see-saw between fortification and siegecraft and ability since earliest times. Castle building was the Norman secret weapon in the conquest of England. With the advent of castles, a small lord could hold up well against the strongest of forces.

During the Middle ages, the key to strategic victory in that age was getting the enemy fortress to surrender. The Medieval main army of Fance or England, for example, would take months to take even one castle. The cost of a siege was well beyond any possible gain. With castles littering the countryside, taking large territories was very challenging.

Therefore, warfare could be profitable only if the enemy fortress surrendered (or if there only a few of them, as happened in the Crusader States). So the attacker wanted to defeat the enemy main army. Then, if the fortress defenders knew no relief was in sight, they would often surrender.

Unfortunately, although permanent conquest was hard, the result was not peaceful. Rather the opposite. Italy developed an almost 'ritualistic', somewhat peaceful form of war, but it really didn't repeat very much in the rest of Europe.

Defense was so powerful over the offense in a fortification, that defenders would stay back. Then, the attackers needed a way to get the defenders out of their castles, and there was only one way to do it -- attack the countryside. So, for instance, when the English held field superiority in the 100 years war, the French always told their commanders not to respond to the English raids. However, the raids against the towns and countryside were so devastating, that for instance France was brought to its knees in 1360.

Indeed, in the 14th century, there was a huge advantage to the defense even in the field -- here bowmen were important, but so were the defensive pikemen who could resist the attacking cavalry. (Battle of Courtrai, 1302, for instance). The dominant force later was the professional Swiss pikemen.

I kind of object to any view that the benefits of defense lead to the powerful growth in cities, and especailly that longbowmen and crossbowmen were critical in pulling the world out of the Dark Ages. Warfare in the Medieval period was horrible, an aboslute scourge. Wars were vicious and the common man suffered the greatest. As the countryside was attacked, burning of villages, rape, murder were grizzly common. It was not the romantic period often depicted in fiction.

Many many other forces were at work in ending the Dark Ages. The 'Official' end of the Dark ages in Europe was 800 AD, with Charlemagne crowned emperor. There was little decisive use of bows at all in that period. In many ways a later date may be better (11th century), but still, it wasn't bows that caused it. The growth of the states of Europe, the end of Magyar, Viking, and Arab raids, were accomplished largely through other weapons and developments.

Anyway, it was the castle that made defense so important starting around the late 11th century. Indeed, bowmen often aided seiges. The lack of bowmen before the 4th century BC made it difficult for the Greeks to capture cities. (See, for instance, John Warry's book on Classical Warfare). For instance, the defense advantage of the high Middle ages was apparent before longbows, and crossbows weren't decisive.

From a military standpoint, the key change to end the era was the advent of cannon. Cannon could bring down even the vaunted walls of Constantinople. Later fortresses developed to handle the new threat, but the defense advantage was changed.

A good simple source for this could be Maurice Keen's 'Medieval Warfare'.



From a game standpoint, I haven't used castles. I wonder how the game would change if the AI would put them everywhere? In the game, though, it seems like a good idea just to build longbowmen instead. The game is accurate. Against bowmen, castles, etc., the best way to bring your enemy down in CIV IV is economic warfare, or use your human ability to bring overwhelming force.

I would love to see a mod with a long game concentrate on this period. Most CIVVERS won't like it, since it is economic warfare that dominates. But it would be interesting!


Best wishes,

Breunor

 

[dh_epic]

Pillage Before The Middle Ages?

One interesting interpretation of history... it's possible to take out a technological equal (or even superior) by taking advantage of a pillage tactic. This is likely what happened when barbarians repeatedly sacked Rome in the late classical era. Rome was not conquered, but it did start to fall behind. Eventually it could not adequately support or defend its empire.

So if you're taking on a technological equal, you need to take advantage of the pillage. Absolutely. Maybe even start the pillage in the classical era.

Winning In the Classical Age?

But I don't usually even have to pillage. I find the middle ages to be a great opportunity to move ahead. My favorite time for war, assuming I didn't tire myself out with an ancient war (around horse archers or swordsmen).

The key is that you need to pick on someone who's beelined up the peaceful branch. While they're researching drama, music literature, even theology, you need to have Machinery. They wouldn't have maces or crossbows. If you're lucky, you might even be able to hit them before they have longbows. Their best units will be Catapults and Pikes. Crossbows and catapults (more catapults than they have) will be key to taking them down. (Mix in a spear or pike to defend against horses.) I usually start the war with them, and then the fast moving knights arrive just in time for the siege (once I'm done researching guilds). Soon after come the musketmen, to help bat cleanup.

How To Set Up For Medievel War

I find there's often a choice between ancient war or medieval war. If I find myself in a position to take advantage of horses, I usually end up doing an ancient war. And by the time the classical or medieval era comes around, I'm in desperate need of techs like currency and music and literature to consolidate my empire.

But if I find myself in a position to take a religion, the oracle can be your best friend. The easiest tech to grab from the Oracle is metal casting. If you're even further ahead, you might even be able to time it with Feudalism or Machinery. This is often the key move that sets up for getting medieval on someone's buttocks.

 

[AmnesiaA]

If you look back into human history, the one military unit that disabled quick military conquering for a while, and allowed for the establishment of large, well defended and peaceful cities, and even helped pull the world out of the dark ages, was the cross/longbowman and variations of. Fighting didn't stop, wars didn't vanish, but it was less common in this age, and during this period many nations, especially European countries, realitively peacefully grew and established themselves.

Sorry Amnesia, I don't agree with your intrpretation of history here (I do agree with your views on the GAME, though). By the way, I want to make sure you don't feel I'm 'picking' on you --- I just want to present my view of the period so please treat this as one historians' view of the period.

What caused the difficulty in conquest during the Middle ages was the fortification, especially the castle, and the formation benefit of the defense. History has had a see-saw between fortification and siegecraft and ability since earliest times. Castle building was the Norman secret weapon in the conquest of England. With the advent of castles, a small lord could hold up well against the strongest of forces.

During the Middle ages, the key to strategic victory in that age was getting the enemy fortress to surrender. The Medieval main army of Fance or England, for example, would take months to take even one castle. The cost of a siege was well beyond any possible gain. With castles littering the countryside, taking large territories was very challenging.

Therefore, warfare could be profitable only if the enemy fortress surrendered (or if there only a few of them, as happened in the Crusader States). So the attacker wanted to defeat the enemy main army. Then, if the fortress defenders knew no relief was in sight, they would often surrender.

Unfortunately, although permanent conquest was hard, the result was not peaceful. Rather the opposite. Italy developed an almost 'ritualistic', somewhat peaceful form of war, but it really didn't repeat very much in the rest of Europe.

Defense was so powerful over the offense in a fortification, that defenders would stay back. Then, the attackers needed a way to get the defenders out of their castles, and there was only one way to do it -- attack the countryside. So, for instance, when the English held field superiority in the 100 years war, the French always told their commanders not to respond to the English raids. However, the raids against the towns and countryside were so devastating, that for instance France was brought to its knees in 1360.

Indeed, in the 14th century, there was a huge advantage to the defense even in the field -- here bowmen were important, but so were the defensive pikemen who could resist the attacking cavalry. (Battle of Courtrai, 1302, for instance). The dominant force later was the professional Swiss pikemen.

I kind of object to any view that the benefits of defense lead to the powerful growth in cities, and especailly that longbowmen and crossbowmen were critical in pulling the world out of the Dark Ages. Warfare in the Medieval period was horrible, an aboslute scourge. Wars were vicious and the common man suffered the greatest. As the countryside was attacked, burning of villages, rape, murder were grizzly common. It was not the romantic period often depicted in fiction.

Many many other forces were at work in ending the Dark Ages. The 'Official' end of the Dark ages in Europe was 800 AD, with Charlemagne crowned emperor. There was little decisive use of bows at all in that period. In many ways a later date may be better (11th century), but still, it wasn't bows that caused it. The growth of the states of Europe, the end of Magyar, Viking, and Arab raids, were accomplished largely through other weapons and developments.

Anyway, it was the castle that made defense so important starting around the late 11th century. Indeed, bowmen often aided seiges. The lack of bowmen before the 4th century BC made it difficult for the Greeks to capture cities. (See, for instance, John Warry's book on Classical Warfare). For instance, the defense advantage of the high Middle ages was apparent before longbows, and crossbows weren't decisive.

From a military standpoint, the key change to end the era was the advent of cannon. Cannon could bring down even the vaunted walls of Constantinople. Later fortresses developed to handle the new threat, but the defense advantage was changed.

A good simple source for this could be Maurice Keen's 'Medieval Warfare'.



From a game standpoint, I haven't used castles. I wonder how the game would change if the AI would put them everywhere? In the game, though, it seems like a good idea just to build longbowmen instead. The game is accurate. Against bowmen, castles, etc., the best way to bring your enemy down in CIV IV is economic warfare, or use your human ability to bring overwhelming force.

I would love to see a mod with a long game concentrate on this period. Most CIVVERS won't like it, since it is economic warfare that dominates. But it would be interesting!


Best wishes,

Breunor

Oh wow thanks for that very informative arguement I actually greatly agree with you about midevil warfare, but I still have a slight emphasis on the long bowman in my interpretation, even though your arguement has shown me it isn't ALL that changed war during this period. I read a book called 'The greatest ignored inventions in human history' and the long bowman was nearly no.1. The reason was it's power--able to go through armor--and range--able to hit an army before it even touched the city walls--revolutionized war, and gave man a period of 'peace' during the mid/late middle ages--even if there wasn't total peace, of course--to help launch them into the renaissance. This defensive unit used with walls and castles made it a very difficult weapon to go up against, and stalled or even prevented wars from happening. Some even say that if it wasn't for this strong long firing bow, the middle ages would have been a period of endless brutal wars instead of a period of slow economic and scientific/religious growth.

Pillage Before The Middle Ages?

One interesting interpretation of history... it's possible to take out a technological equal (or even superior) by taking advantage of a pillage tactic. This is likely what happened when barbarians repeatedly sacked Rome in the late classical era. Rome was not conquered, but it did start to fall behind. Eventually it could not adequately support or defend its empire.

So if you're taking on a technological equal, you need to take advantage of the pillage. Absolutely. Maybe even start the pillage in the classical era.

Winning In the Classical Age?

But I don't usually even have to pillage. I find the middle ages to be a great opportunity to move ahead. My favorite time for war, assuming I didn't tire myself out with an ancient war (around horse archers or swordsmen).

The key is that you need to pick on someone who's beelined up the peaceful branch. While they're researching drama, music literature, even theology, you need to have Machinery. They wouldn't have maces or crossbows. If you're lucky, you might even be able to hit them before they have longbows. Their best units will be Catapults and Pikes. Crossbows and catapults (more catapults than they have) will be key to taking them down. (Mix in a spear or pike to defend against horses.) I usually start the war with them, and then the fast moving knights arrive just in time for the siege (once I'm done researching guilds). Soon after come the musketmen, to help bat cleanup.

How to set up For a Midevil War?

I find there's often a choice between ancient war or medieval war. If I find myself in a position to take advantage of horses, I usually end up doing an ancient war. And by the time the classical or medieval era comes around, I'm in desperate need of techs like currency and music and literature to consolidate my empire.

But if I find myself in a position to take a religion, the oracle can be your best friend. The easiest tech to grab from the Oracle is metal casting. If you're even further ahead, you might even be able to time it with Feudalism or Machinery. This is often the key move that sets up for getting medieval on someone's buttocks.

Ahh, that's one way to win during the middle ages, pick on a weaker power, or a less advanced power. I am always really careful though. A peaceful AI usually likes to have an ally.

 

[Breunor]

Glad you liked it Amnesia!

The longbow DID greatly impact the 100 years' war. It was a powerhouse weapon. Its biggest 'weakness' was that it took specific training. The English army was helped by Welsh longbowmen who trained from early age.

Longbows were actually much better weapons than early guns. The advantage guns had were that they were easier to train people. So you could bring people into an army and give them guns, it took years and years to use a longbow.

In 'real life', the ability to get longbowmen was hard. An army of them would have been fierce indeed! If you could get as many longbowmen as you can get in CIV, they would have dominated warfare. (OF course, in real life, you also needed pikemen with them).

Best wishes,

Breunor

 

[madmaven]

I think the agreement is that war during this period in the game is weighed to the defender, whether it's the longbowmen, the pikeman, the fort, the castle, the musketeer, all are great defensive advancements. That being said, it seems advantageous to try to get into a good position by this time and then hold. If the AI doesn't like it let him waste all the effort building siege weapons and a tall stack of units to try to take out your three or four longbowmen in a city or defensive area.

Knigts are a nice unit, and can be used effectively to pillage his landscape.

I would only go to war during this time if 1) you can win the game by starting and winning the war or 2) you will eventually lose the game unless you strike a blow to a civ or two.

I think war during this time has more to lose than to gain. Yes, you may take over a city with a 15 unit stack, but like you've pointed out: the time and coordination and effort needed to do this can also be a drain. Pillaging is the better option unless you absolutely need more cities and / or you can put yourself into a decisive position by knocking over the civ.

 

[Breunor]

Madmaven,

I agree that the game dioes a pretty good job with history, and that a war of conquest isn't worth it. I tend to be a builder. But, if I had a military superiority, you cna do int he game what worked well in real life -- raid. If you ahve a superior army, and the AI hides behind ts defense, you can wreak havoc, curtting them from resources, burning down their villages.

Taking out the commerce improvements, in particular, is very effective since it takes so long to go from cottage up. At this point int he game they can generate a lot of commerce. So, an opponent not able to fight in the field can be crippled.


Best wishes,

Breunor

 

[anton_z1]

I usually avoid middle ages as much as i can. Longbowmen are a pain in the ass (Even with catapults you need a pretty huge power to get the cities). However it may be good to attack certain specifi cities (read cities with religious shrines and wonders ).

Another problem with middle age is low production comparing to the price of units. I mean An axe/sworsmen cost nothing, comparing to a stack of pickeman, maceman and such.

 

[travathian]

Since my preferred civ is the Chinese, the middle ages are when I go a conquering with Cho-Ko-Nu. A SOD with a few spearmen, catapults, and tons of Cho-Ko-Nu own anything they come across. 2-3 first strikes negate those that defending archers/bowmen will have. Bonus vs melee means they own axemen. Each one that attacks causes collateral damage to 5 or so defenders.

In the ancient era I build archers to defend cities, but give them Drill I. I go conquering with axemen/horse archers. Once I get Machinery the left over axemen come back to defend the cities, the archers get upgraded to crossbows. Survival rate is decent thanks to all of the first strikes. And each victory just means more and more first strikes. HA are used to pillage if needed or to pick off stragglers away from the stack.