Move stack to hill before attacking?

dylanmeditates

Warlord
Joined
May 14, 2012
Messages
260
I often find myself tromping towards an opponents capital with a stack of, say, elephants and catapults and maybe an axe. Sound familiar so far?

Then I see that there is a hill next to the city either one tile further from where I will ending up or maybe even behind the city. And I get to thinking, man I'd really like to attack from up there.

The question is, is it worth it to take a turn or 2 extra to move up on that hill and attack from there? Is it worth considering that in some instances it will take 3 turns or more to bombard the cultural defense bonus down to 0? should I set up on the hill and do it, or just go for it from flat ground the first turn I have the chance? If I have to heal my units before I attack, should I get them up on that hill first?
 
Phants and cats don't get defense bonus. Moving uphill just for the axe getting defenses. Not worth at all by a mile.

Thread killed.
 
Thread killed.

The question remains, an could be reformulated like:

How often do you waste a turn moving to a defensive terrain (hill / forest) or to a better angle (not across a river) before attacking a city?
Are better odds worth wasting a turn sometimes?
 
AI can throw at you suiciding cat, its collateral does not depend on defensive terrain. If you have stuck big enough AI will not attack you anyway. Wasting turn is pointless.
 
I'll usually get away from the river unless I'm getting really good (>90%) odds on all my guys. I don't prioritise hills but if I can get on one I won't waste it. Also, I'd make sure to maneuver before you reach the city. The AI switches into whipping mode only when you're close, so it tends to be better to get to the best position immediately.
 
It's very rarely useful once you are so far into the game that you have stacks. Early on when you are choking opponents by placing Archers on Hill/Forrest tiles it's more important.

Later on all the forrests are gone and the 25% from Hills don't do much.
 
I often use the turns my catapults are bombarding city to deploy the gross of my stack on surrounding hills/forests, leaving a few units to protect the catapults.
Avoiding river crossing is usually a must. Too much penalty unless your troops outmatch defenders by an era.
 
If you haven't crushed your opponent yet and you must worry about stacks in the dark, hills are also usefull to get one more visibility range to see incoming counter attacks.
 
Yeach the units he mentioned have no defensive bonus. The key point for me is each turn you delay your attack the AI will whip another defender. Or move another defender in.

If I am attacking with 6 pults and 8 phants and I see only 2archers and 1 axe defending I may consider the odds and attack. If the odds are unfavourable I could bombard 1 turn and risk 1-2 more units the next turn. Or bombard and risk my phants on 60-90% odds.

It's all about risk and what losses you are willing to accept. With a strong stack you would hope to lose less than 20-25% of attacking units. If you are losing 50-90% of all units you needed a bigger stack in the first place.

If you have axe/phants in stack unless the Ai hase mace they will struggle to damage your units. He may attacked the stack with 2-3 pults but that is minimal.
 
I like to put my stack on hill or forest tile while capturing city myself. It feels safer when you know that the defenders can't wipe your stack off while you are seeking for their city. I'm still not ready to move around the city for better defence bonus. If you wait too much the enemy can whip some extra units in their city!
 
I like to put my stack on hill or forest tile while capturing city myself. It feels safer when you know that the defenders can't wipe your stack off while you are seeking for their city. I'm still not ready to move around the city for better defence bonus. If you wait too much the enemy can whip some extra units in their city!

If you scout out the AI you should know what to expect. Power ratings are normally a give away.

The big difference between the AI and the player is the AI keeps 4-5 units in each city. The average immortal player will form a big stack and take down the weak Ai with more advanced units. Holding maybe only 1 units in other cities if needed.
 
Top Bottom