War Tactics

bamf226

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I haven't played a lot of Civ and I'm working on getting better at all aspects. The last war I attempted didn't go so well even with a technological advantage. I used a two stack approach and took the capital first. I used the second stack to occupy the capital as I pressed forward to the new capital. Unfortunately, the enemy was able to generate troops before my third stack could arrive and retake the old capital as I took over the second capital. At this point I gave up and started from a previous save. I'd love to get some basic tactics for war that I might try out.
 
First rule is to be able to hold what you conquer. If you don't feel confident about this, its time to make peace.

That's offcourse easier said than done. In itself it's a good idea to attack the strongest point first to cripple the enemy, but it also has some drawbacks.
- you cannot "surprise" attack the AI b/c it takes to many turns before you can actually attack
- when you win you have to get some surrounding cities as well as the existing culture will complete envelop the old capitol making it useless for you. So why not capture all cities inbetween you and the capitol first. This will also make it easier to get reinforcements into the frontlines after your first wave.
- Your forces have probably sustained some damage on their way to the capital making them less effective.


Also bring a lot a siege units with you as well as some defensive units to help defending what you took.

Hmmm, this turned out to be not all too coherent, but I hope you get the idea
 
There's no golden rule to follow. Each situation calls for it's own strategy. But there's some things worth considering. I'm by no mean no expert in the art of war but I've learnt a trick or two to misguide the AI. There's likely plenty of articles by experienced players in the waracademy that may be worth studying.

I can't say what went wrong for you this time, though aiming at the capitals isn't always the best strategy. Gather intel first, see where the important strategic resources are. Can you cut them off these they won't be able to reinforce with new troops of any higher quality (depends a bit on age ofc). Is there any cities that's easier to defend when you take them, hit there first and make a stand to kill of the SoD that will likely come for you.

When facing a large enemy, a decoy stack may be worth considering to lure out his SoD to the other side of the continent while your main attack takes place some turns later at the other side. This will hopefully give you time enough to consolidate defenses in your newly aquired cities before the SoD reaches you.

Don't always keep every city, if you don't need it/can defend it, raze it, unless ofc there's some wonder or holy shrine that you really wants.

And finally, come prepared, I usually make the mistake of rushing my wars so I end up with a whole lot longer wars than really necessary just because I didn't send enough troops to begin with.
 
There are several articles on war in the war academy...
 
During the first part of a war the major target should ultimately be troops, not land. Once troops are out of the way land is just a matter of resources and luck. Splitting your stack is effective during the land phase to more quickly conquer land but if the enemy has a large stack somewhere you are generally better off first taking out that stack with overwhelming force (i.e., 1 stack with everything you can spare). Even better if you can get another AI to help take down that stack of troops.

If you are going to strategically strike inside enemy territory (such that if you do take the city you would be surrounded by culture) then either raze that city use it to draw the enemy stack to you. You may also want to consider, after making peace or getting capitulation, liberating that city for the positive diplo. Many of the buildings will have been demolished just from capturing and, as I just said, you will have reduced the power of the AI. You should also consider pillaging in this situation.

Normally, I find myself wanting land so I try to form a coherent and defensible border with the cities that I take. Alternately, I'll work toward the capital and other strong points without razing but eventually my goal is capitulation so I ultimately want to return the cities in good order so my new friend will actually be of some help and won't require overly much assistance in defending their land.
 
During the first part of a war the major target should ultimately be troops, not land. Once troops are out of the way land is just a matter of resources and luck. Splitting your stack is effective during the land phase to more quickly conquer land but if the enemy has a large stack somewhere you are generally better off first taking out that stack with overwhelming force (i.e., 1 stack with everything you can spare). Even better if you can get another AI to help take down that stack of troops.

If you are going to strategically strike inside enemy territory (such that if you do take the city you would be surrounded by culture) then either raze that city use it to draw the enemy stack to you. You may also want to consider, after making peace or getting capitulation, liberating that city for the positive diplo. Many of the buildings will have been demolished just from capturing and, as I just said, you will have reduced the power of the AI. You should also consider pillaging in this situation.

Normally, I find myself wanting land so I try to form a coherent and defensible border with the cities that I take. Alternately, I'll work toward the capital and other strong points without razing but eventually my goal is capitulation so I ultimately want to return the cities in good order so my new friend will actually be of some help and won't require overly much assistance in defending their land.

You can 2-part a stack, and it might be optimal as protective. Just take a relatively unguarded city deep in enemy territory, and camp it with cheap CG II archers or CG III longbows (an annoying protective specialty turned against the AI!). It's amazing what 3-4 longbows will do to early middy enemy SoD's, especially if they don't have knights yet.
 
Gather intel first, see where the important strategic resources are. Can you cut them off these they won't be able to reinforce with new troops of any higher quality (depends a bit on age ofc).

What do you consider an important strategic resource?
 
Normally, I find myself wanting land so I try to form a coherent and defensible border with the cities that I take. Alternately, I'll work toward the capital and other strong points without razing but eventually my goal is capitulation so I ultimately want to return the cities in good order so my new friend will actually be of some help and won't require overly much assistance in defending their land.

So you take the city, build it back up and give it back? How do you get capitulation? How long do you build up the cities before giving them back?
 
What do you consider an important strategic resource?

Resources that allow the AI to build military units. Copper allows axes and spears. If you are attacking with mounted troops, you don't want to see spears. If the AI only has 1-2 sources of metal like that, you might be able to pillage it immediately so it can't whip out any axemen or spears. That's a big deal in the ancient times. Obviously if they have iron working the same applies to iron (assuming you can see it). You can tell what techs they basically have by looking at the tech trade screen. Another huge classical resource is ivory. Elephants > all before pikes basically (their counter unit, the spear, breaks even with them. Any sort of stack defense and the wellies are almost immune).

Really, it's just those 3 resources until oil/uranium start really coming into play. Oil allows for tanks, air units, and ships. If at all possible, keep it out of the opponent's hands. Uranium is a little less flexible, but still lets them build ships...not to mention nukes if it comes to that...

Other resources are important, but play less of a direct role in war.

Edit: Forgot horses. They're a strategic resource too. Pillage them also, especially if you're heavy on axes (which chariots counter)
 
When it comes to city capturing, generally I'd choose heavy production cities or cities holding onto strategic resources (horses, copper, iron, etc). The capital can be heavy production but isn't always, and it'll probably be towards the center of his empire, have a higher culture defense than other cities, and be better garrisoned. Take their production, and they can't produce units as quickly and eventually you will overwhelm them.
 
Biggest headache for me on war tactics now is partisans popping up on BTS when you raze a city. Was at war with Byzantians and after happily razing 2-3 cities i found 6+ axemen roaming around. (This is my first game on BTS) i think this shows why a stack of units is important. I will certainly be including more chariots in my stack when i attack now.

Thankfully my dog soldiers were at hand. I did reduce him to 2 cities from 6-7. My game is going really slow though. Its 1000ad and no one has longbowmen on monarch level (including the AI) . I used to see them around 300bc on warlords. Probably due to fact that i grabbed the free religion from the Oracle rather than Alphabet or pottery. Also i didnt trade away Alphabet to half the known world.

Game has not been helped by lack of catapults. Also im surrounded by empire with protective trait and with AI cities with archers on hills with 95% defence bonus plus 20-50% cultural bonus. The average dog soldier would die before doing any real damage. Happy to report stacking up 4-5 dog soldiers, a few swordsmen and 4-5 cats soon takes out the AI cities once the cultural defence is gone.

I normally have one stack for attacking unless im sure i completely outweigh the AI numbers. you will need a constant supply of troops from your empire to reinforce any attack. You do also need to let some units recover and some units hold your captured cities.

It will take a game or two to get used to BTS for me. Especially spies.
 
when you think you have enough units, build more. even you've built more units, build even more.

oh, and get a medic III unit.
 
Be the first one to rifles. When you get to rifles, have a big stack of consisting mostly of seige and maces, but bring some stack defenders and some mounted guys. When you get to the first city, bombard the cultural defenses then soften up the defenders to the point that the seige units can't do any more damage to them. Kill them all with your maces, but use a horse on the last defender so you can abandon the city and go back and hide in the stack that's being defended by a few rifles. The ai will recapture the abandoned city and flood it with units. Repeat, but the second time, use a rifle to capture the city, and have one to guard the stack. The ai will have sacraficed a buttload of troops and if done properly you will only have sacraficed your overwelming seige units. As soon as the maces reach CRIII, promote them to riflemen. CRIII rifles are unstoppable, as long as you can protect them between cities.
 
Is it important to bombard until the percentage is 0? This is typically what I do as I thought it would make it easier for attacking with ground forces.
 
Is it important to bombard until the percentage is 0? This is typically what I do as I thought it would make it easier for attacking with ground forces.

Depends on what you're using. If your units are considerably powerful compared to defenders (aka CR rifles vs longbows), it isn't necessary. You can also get away with just slamming flanking II horse archers/curies/cavalry into the city, since around least half of those will live typically, then mopping up.

You can also just use spies to cause a revolt, instantly dropping down defense for a turn.

Otherwise...bombard it down. When I use siege, it's often half my army. Bombard it down/cause collateral damage. Good times.
 
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