war on many fronts...

[sav]

what is the best strategy when yr up against an enemy who is basically just as strong and just as large as you, and you share a very long common border. in my war vs the russians i picked one city of theirs to seige, but it seems they also picked one city to seige - the one closest to their besieged city - so we had a 65 year battle (in the 1800s) for nothing. THEN they appear suddenly in the heart of my territory and take my two highly productive cities AND my capital - how did they have enough units to attack and defend where all the besieging was going on, AND attack my central cities? I had every city producing units as fast as they could, I was spending all my money on building new ones...
we had a HUGE mountain range seperating most of our land, but there were a few gaps where roads were built.

So how do you wage an effective defensive war along a long front with only a few channels of attack, when the opponent has better attacking weapons (dragoons and cannons to my catapults and crusdaders). all money is being spent on rushbuying units, so diplomats wouldnt really be a lot of use. ????????????????

in the end what happened is they took a few of my cities, but i managed to hold out long enough without buying any more units to purchase one of their cities, which made them quickly sign a treaty. i was then able to buy back most of the cities i lost, but at reduced populations and strenghs. i dont want to have to do this next time! any tips would be appreciated, as fighting a large empire is almost always where i go wrong in my games

 

[Smash]

It might be better value to buy the incoming troops than rush your own.Not always though and certainly not if they are Democracy.

Got to keep them at bay.Mountain fortresses can have greatly outdated units and keep entire armies at bay.You want to establish "choke points" where ais have to funnel thru and are either picked off or lose to a well entrenched defender.
Other routes should be kept closed.Pillage roads if you have to.The whole first half of the scenario Red Front is like this.Hold off vastly superior units and numbers by concentrating forces in key areas.Your biggest advantage over the ai is you are clever and it is not.Exploit this weakness.
Watch the seas.The ai is not terribly adept at seaborne invasions but occasionally they can manage a half assed attack.Aggressive patroling is needed to keep them from ever reaching your shores.

The best defense is a good offense.I'd much rather be fighting in their backyard than mine.

 

[Darius]

how do you wage an effective defensive war along a long front with only a few channels of attack

The answer is: don't. The best defense is a good offense, so I'd say just annihilate the other civ quickly so there is no need for a defensive front.

 

[Morgasshk]

Never let civs on the same continent as you get that big... or close...

Keep them smaller than you, keep them under you thumb and make alliance, then wipe out at your whim...

Always keep a two move unit in your cities - to stomp any catapults, cannons on roads a square away... they will never win against anything higher than horseman as they have pis.sweak defence... if they attack you, they WILL (ok, 90% of the time) kill a unit...

If making lotsa money, buy cities, if not keep building up defences with small harrying force at the fore, then it them with a few (>8) units at once rather than a trickle of only one or two a turn...

If you don't care about your rep, (which, if you get the wonders that make everyone love you it won't matter) you just keep making treaties with them - build up a bunch of units - smash, another 2 or 3 cities and then whe they start having a cry, just play dumb and make a cease fire or peace treaty (depending on how stupid they are - snigger...)

and if you are being oppressed and have seriously disadvatages - ie you are small and they are big Then well... if you are in king, emporer or diety, you may stay alive, you may be able to drag it out, but most cases unless you take a serious offensive right from the start you will get pounded in these difficulties...

I have on many occaisons had many a transport full of cavalry (>8 = 64 units) landing on a continent/island with hostile civ on it and all 64 units getting creamed and only taking one or 2 cities (ok, only twice, but was very similar and many many units!!!)... and this was on PRINCE difficulty - and they only had musketeers and a few riflemen!! I found it much easier to bribe the cities from then on... dodgy buggers... grrrr, grumble...

Until they got democracy - then I went rank with nukes and started a new game... I attack earlier now...

Morgasshk.

 

[EdwardTking]

General Points


(1) The AI cheats at unit production. It can often produce
one unit per turn per city; even if it doesn't have the
necessary shields.

(2) If the AI is attacking one of your cities and you are
attacking its city opposite you; then you may end up
fighting between cities; where it is difficult to
maintain a good casualty ratio. In my experience;
it is often effective to go on the defensive where
defensive terrain or city walls exist; and attack
elsewhere where you can move units up to AI cities.

(3) Other comments are correct.


(i) You should not let AI get too many cities on your
continent in the first place; but it may be a scenario.

Get those warriors out early and use zone of control
to keep the AI in small corner of the continent.
My personal experience is that if I let the AI grab
2/3 of the main continent; then at deity level;
I am in severe trouble.

(ii) Likewise the best defense against Dragoons and Cannons
is to include catapults and mobile counter attacking units.

(iii) Diplomats can be very helpful. Bring dowqn city walls
and once the AI capital is captured; buy up the rest of
their civilisation.

(iv) Choke Points may be created using preworked settlers
to create fortresses if none already exist.


In Your Circumstances

(1) PROBLEM

The underlying problem is that the AI has significiant
superiority in both numbers and technology.

Good human play can offset one; but not necessarily both.

Obtaining superiority in numbers is difficult;
so you must first address the technology deficit early.


(2) REMEDY:

Stage One: Temporarily Sacrifice A City

Decide which city you can afford to lose; sell off all
improvements and evacuate it homing its units on
other cities and build two diplomats nearby. Spend
any cash rush building elsewhere.

Let the AI capture the empty city.

If the AI offers cease fire/peace agree (pay it off if
necessary) and build defensives and units.


Stage Two: Diplomatic Theft and Incitement

If the AI does not offer ceasefire or breaks its truce;
then steal technology from your former city and incite
a revolt; taking care to select best military technology.

The AI will normally agree peace; if your reputation is
not too bad; after losing a city.

You can then build better units.


Stage Three: Defend and Let the AI Suffer Casualties

Having neutralised AI technology superiority; you
should be able to defend adequately. Build up your
defenders and local tactical reserves until all is safe.


Stage Four: Build Up Stategic Reserve

Build up a separate strategic reserve of no less
than 10 and may be as many as 50 units.


Stage Five: Attack In Strength

When the AI breaks the ceasefire or at your convenience;
deploy the reserve strategically against one or two
key AI cities; rather than piece meal in separate actions.

If possble sneak units past zone of controls using
diplomats or by sea.


Stage Six: Sell Improvements in Captured Cities

Withdraw from captured cities; if not readily defendable.
Remember Afghanistan where the Russians tried to hold
cities. Once you do that you are on the defensive again.
Do what the americans are doing: attack and back to base.

When AI captures; attack AI again wherever weak.


Stage Seven: Rest

If most of your attackers become damaged; then accept AI
pleas for a cease fire and rest those red lined men.


Stage Eight: Strategic Attack Again

Reinforce with replacements and attack AI again.

Hope this Helps!

 

[unknown_spirit]

If you want 'War-lite' or war made easy, make good use of Diplomats & Spies. Use them to subvert cities by inciting revolts. This also takes over all units occupying the city (or is that supported by? I can never remember). Good for quick reinforcements and territory gain. Also, NEVER LEAVE A CITY UNGUARDED, even on lower difficulty. The AI may be stupid, but even it knows to take a city with no defenses, therefore no threat, before trying to storm one crawling with units. Also, your cities should ideally have all the defence-raising structures (City Walls, SAM Battery, Coastal Fortress) just to be on the safe side.

 

[Nishdog]

I agree about not letting cities go undefended, but for a different reason as mentioned before. If the AI conquers one of your cities it plunders some cash. If it is a big city they'll usually take a lot of cash. AND they get to steal a tech from you, so if you have something you don't want them getting their hands on, defend your cities!

But I also agree that when you're the underdog, spies are the way to even the battlefield...spies are one of the most cost effective units in the game and versitile as well. Sabatoge on Walls/Fortresses, factories, and happy improvements (cathedrals, temples, etc...) can instantly send an enemy into turmoil.

If you want to attack a city but are afraid you can't defend it once you've taken it, use your spies to poison water supply until the city is down to size 1...then attack the city once and it is gone. Attack the square again and all the units within the city are also dead. The added bonus, of course, is that once the city is gone, all the units supported by that city are also gone. That's why I like to use the spys to investigage cities and determine which ones are supporting the majority of the military...I'll target those first.

If you don't have the resources to do all that, just do limited, quick operations like sabatoge cathedral in all border cities and/or steal a few military techs. Maybe sneak in a horse unit to pillage some mines or send a defender into their territory and fortify it on a mountain.

Another thing I've noticed is if you send a boat along their coast, the ground units will follow the boat. So you can use the boat as a decoy to divert units from your intended target. Once the units are gone, go after your target quickly with defenders ready to secure the area. Chose your targets smartly and after a few times of doing this and your enemy will be markedly weaker; and you will be stronger and have stolen a few techs in the process. As was said before, choose the techs wisely and use them for military techs so you can modernize your force during the ensuing cease-fire.

 

[sav]

wow, thanks for all the help! in the end, i managed to hold out for a few turns long enough w/out rushpuying units, saved up a bit of cash and bought one of their cities. once they were on the back foot, and i had an 'in', it was all over. ok, so a few cities got nuked... but it ended up ok.

so for the first time i have decided to play past 2020 - its me, the small persians, and the large babylonians. we all have all the tech advances possible, its around 2090 and ive just decided to eliminate the tiny persians so i can concntrate on my main mission - defeat the babylonians.

What kind of warfare would best work against a single equally strong and widely distributed enemy, with all the tech advances discovered? ive never fought a war using primarily stealth bombers and the like. This is going to be a war not on any fronts, but completely global... should be fun! keep in mind i dont really want it to go too nuclear... im assuming his cities are all defended with sdi's - i tried to sabotage one the other day, and got something ive never seen b4 - it is defended by barbed wire and guard dogs?!

 

[Darius]

2090? Well, whatever's fun

 

[Nishdog]

This is how I'd go after the babylonians:

If possible, go after their capital city first. If you can do this they may go into a civil war, splitting the empire into two warring factions. Then you can concentrate on one civ at a time, buying enemy cities with spies (i'm assuming by 2090 you have a huge treasury), sending in horwitzers and mech infantries to take over cities w/ stealth fighters to take out partisans.

If the capital is not accessable by sea or is too well defended, try going after a few large coastal cities to gain a foothold on their territory and then just bulldoze through their cities as mentioned above (horwitzers, infantry, fighters)...at this point when scoring is no longer an issue, you may just as well go to fundy (if you're not already there) or at least communism so you don't have to deal with unhappiness from lots of units. Set your science rate to 0% since future tech is useless to you now...max the tax rate out and use the cash for bribing cities and units.

And there's no reason to exclude nukes from the fight, either...using them against a large naval stack can be a cost-effective way of clearing the oceans for your battleships, AEGIS cruisers, carriers, and transports. Plus, no pollution in ocean squares and SDI will do them no good if you attack in the middle of the ocean, away from their coastal cities.

Basically, mobilize your entire civ for war...there's no other reason to exist at that point in the game.

 

[unknown_spirit]

Originally posted by Nishdog
This is how I'd go after the babylonians:

If possible, go after their capital city first. If you can do this they may go into a civil war, splitting the empire into two warring factions....

Split a civ in two? COOL! What happens? Does it add another civ to the list or do some cities join you voluntarily? Is capturing the capital the only way to do it, or is there any other alternative?

 

[Simon Darkshade]

Originally posted by unknown_spirit


Split a civ in two? COOL! What happens? Does it add another civ to the list or do some cities join you voluntarily? Is capturing the capital the only way to do it, or is there any other alternative?

It occurs if there is civil disorder, and if the enemy civ is bigger than you, and if there is a "spare" civ available. The cities then divide into the rebels and the loyal. Taking the capital is the only way to schism a civ.

 

[Enforcer Talen]

I had a 1k yr 3 way war once. I sent 8 guys to each of my perimteter cities, rush built city walls, and researched liek crazy.

 

[bellisaurius]

Don't forget island hopping. As the AI -even at large sizes- is rather inept tactically, if you can get some local control of the sea lanes, their units are functionaly dislocated from each other on islands.

This means you can focus your limited resources at those points, take over two or three of his cities at a time, and not have to woryy about him hitting you back, except with paratroopers (but of course, these are porbably large cities, and give off lots of guerillas) which can be easily defeated.

Fight in the mainland only when you're finally strong enough.

This is of course assuming that you can't hit his capital or getting one of his good remaining wonders...