Question: Defense Dilemma
 

As I get deeper into the game I often find myself playing "wack-a-mole" when forced to defend my area against incursion. By this I mean that I have a force sufficient to defeat the enemy force but they continually skip to another province. And yes... sometimes I can predict where they will go and ambush them, but this depends to a certain extent on luck which is just terrible.

And its just a fact that there are some geographies that have no bottlenecks and are thus really hard to defend. So its seeming to me that in these cases you would need to keep a defense force that was substantially larger than the attackers. That way you could corral the enemy and attack them in proper fashion.

Am I missing something with regards to area defense? Without an order like "intercept this army" I cannot imagine that I am the only one who is encountering it. Additionally, I can't believe that it is appropriate to say that the *defender* must have numeric superiority. Please let me know your stratgies for dealing this problem.

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

You generally have 5 options:

1) Blanket the area with armies, each large enough that local defence+army will be enough to defeat
2) Use traps or guessing methods to predict the next move and squash his army with your biggie.
3) Spam the you provinces with castles
4) Use a magical attack spell to jump the defence (the ghost spell seems effective for this)
5) Counterattack, devasting the oponents provinces just as he devastes yours.

Playing catchup is almost never worthwhile.

Disclaimer: I'm certainly no veteran.

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

Use real world tactics. If he is at the edge of your domain then boost defences in two provinces and build units there (archers are usually helpful to defence militia) while leaving the middle one weak. Attack the middle one and see if he doesnt attack it also in the same round.

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

There's one simple solution : play the Cradle map, it has lifelike bottlenecks and access routes, it makes the game more enjoyable than the usual "runner wars" where you chase the crappy IA armies invading from everywhere http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon8.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/rolleyes.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

As it sounds like you too favor singleplayer then I can also recommend creatinf a mod were you upgrade the province defence a wee bit. It's an easy and fun mod to make.

Machaka and Pythium, my favorite nations, are a lot more relaxing to play when their frontline defence don't rely on militia.

And I agree with PDF that the map makes a big difference. The Cradle of Dominion rewards a good defence but it can also be very frustrating when it's the AI who's turtling. Kingdom of Karan is a bit more open but still sports various bottlenecks that can fought over. So does the Middle Earth map.

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

Thanks for all your Posts yall, I appreciate the info. Sadly I still don't feel like there is a good strategy - see below for responses to each point:

1) Blanket an area w/ army+defense:
This tactic basically means I have to deploy far more troops (and spend on defense) a great deal more than the enemy has to spend to build an attacking force. This implies that the game is offense favoring.

2) Traps and Guesswork:
As I said in the original post I already do this - I'm looking for a better way :}

3) Castle Spam:
Technically, this solves the problem, BUT at the cost of ruining the fort resource gathering. This is turn (while costing a fortune) would also mean a terrific amount of MicroManagement since all your troop building could no long be focused on key forts due to resource shortages.

4) The Ghost Spell:
I looked thru the spell list and couldnt find this spell. Is it a nickname for something?

5) CounterAttack:
A valid strategy. But it sidesteps the fact that there appears to be no good way to defend.

6 + 7) AI Strategies:
Those are good strategies for the AI, but I am looking for MP strategies in the long term.


The only thing that I've seen so far that might really address the fact that offense has the advantage are these new maps that people are talking about. But it saddens me that this effectively means that Dominions 2 at the base level favors an all-offense strategy!

Please if anyone can think of a way I have listed, post it! I personally would be very disappointed if this was the way dom2 was built. Hoping I'm missing something somehow...

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">This isn't as huge a drawback as you'd think, particularly if you took either the Watchtower, knowing that you WERE going to do this, and as a result, have no resource-gathering to ruin anyway because the watchtower's admin sucks, or your nation's troops are either undesirable and/or have very low resource costs.

It should be noted that heavy, high-resource troops generally lack the strategic mobility to do anything useful anyway, because they move too slowly to actually reach a conflict: This is alleviated if your nation is astrally powerful and can gateway, but otherwise, heavies are simply too slow and useless, and cannot be produced in anything approximating reasonable quantity even if you have a solid admin grid.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Ghost Riders: D4, Conjuration 9. In combination with #3, Castle Spamming, you can easily keep the enemy off your back: When he shows up to bang on the gates, bury him in Ghost Riders. The Ghost Riders will slaughter his forces, but since you hold the fort, and the Ghost Riders evaporate after the battle, the province instantly reverts back to your control without having to send a cleanup crew. Your temples remain intact as well. This strategy is really synergistic with #3.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Against an AI, a castle will mire him down until he can take it, making his moves predictable, because an AI never aborts a siege willingly. Against a slash and burn pack run by a human, however, this is totally futile: Enemy armies inside formerly friendly territory always move first, even if they're attacking a new territory. The only way to catch them is to second-guess them, or intercept on the magic phase.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">You'd think that, but then why does my incredibly defensively-oriented castles+SCs style gather so much flak?

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

Don't get me wrong - I didn't try to argue against the usefulness of castle spamming. I agree that it solves the strategic problem perfectly BUT...

it breaks down the resource/production focus that (I believe) forts are designed for. Effectively with castle spamming I would be reduced to building like 2-4 units in every province and then running around to collect them all into a central location. I simply *will not* spend the majority of my turn time micromanaging my troops like that.

As the game stands now it is fun (wack-a-mole syndrome aside), but if I have to MM my troops every turn I know that my desire to play will evaporate quickly.

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">More or less. If games are to end, ever, the game must be slightly favored toward offense. Otherwise, everybody would just hole up. A few points, though;

a. Firstly, you don't have to pay upkeep for you PD. He does. PD combined with a real army is more powerful than it seems, though not against huge armies.
b. If you can enclose his army and break it, even partially, he will lose those troops. Breaking (parts) of an army is usually not that hard. Enclosing big armies corks well. Also, see 2.
3. He will (probably) be fighting in your dominion. This is a huge handicap, especially since breaking quickly becomes a real troop killer. Cavary and/or flying units set to e.g. hold+attack rear do a terrific job in capitalizing on breaking.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">The key here is TRAPS. Humans can also be tricked. Use baits (you pretender works well), partially concealed armies, hide your armies just beyond sight and so on. This is how dom was meant to be played, I think.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Yeah, it works, and it sucks. I fervently wish that castle spamming is killed by a balance adjustment of some sort. I suggest an global earthquake like spell, that destroys 10% of all castles in the world. Mhu-hahahahahaha. I'll put castlespamming on my deathlist together with wish and the clam http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">As I said, it is important that offense is slightly favorable to defense. Also, it is easy to forget how expensive that pillaging-army-until-it-dies strategy is for the offensive player. Try doing it to the AI once, and see how well it works for you http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana"><sniff mode=disdainfull> That was just examples of 2 and 5 </sniff> http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">All-offense is a catostrophy. Try it againt the AI if you please. No amount of offense is going to give you dominion, and dominion is a key to victory.

BTW, all of this advise is useless against the Vampire Queen-wielding camp. Against those, only a high dominion and extensive alliances help http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif And you will still get beaten.

To quote an english author that rose to some esteem. "I'd rather be a canker in the hedge than a rose in his grace.": I'd rather lose every single game than stoop to micromangement. Too bad the best magic school (blood) cannot be used without mucho micromangement http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon8.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/blush.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon8.gif

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">If you want to explain to me how there's a resource/production focus in an admin-10 castle, be my guest. The Watchtower is DESIGNED for castle-spamming, as it has basically no admin value of any worth.

The drawbacks are that spammable castles have crappy defense, and are thus only really meaningful as a brief delaying tactic.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That's because castle spammers don't build troops, they build mages. As you can only recruit one mage per turn, regardless of how much gold you have sitting around, you have to spam castles in order to be able to increase your mage output bandwidth.

A strategy specifically centering around the spamming of castles tends to also involve the production of a buttload of mages.

There's also the minor problem that without castles, building temples is ultimately a futile endeavor as they constantly burn down in raids. Without the temples, you're liable to be dominion-killed very easily. I'm sure some people would argue the situation is not quite as drastic, but in one game, I spam castles everywhere and temple everything....I *STILL* have enemy dominion in my lands. Obviously, I'm not building enough temples.

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Esben have described it well. What he said can be applied to both SP and MP. Since you didn't mention what type of game you are playing, I'll add 2 more options that are very effective for dealing with AI but much less usefull for MP.

6. Passive defence against AI:

"channel" the enemy forces by using your PD and local defenders. The enemy hoard will almost always attack the most weakly defended province (based upon total number of defenders there including PD). By using it you can make them attack specific province, but before they arrive, you can orginize "welcome comette" by moving all your nearby troops into threatened province. (remeber your movement between friendly provinces will happen _before_ enemy's movement).

7. Active defence against AI:
The best defense is a good offence. If you have enough armies, go after enemy's capital. When you'll arrive most of AI's troops will drop whatever they are doing (most likely raiding your countryside) and will run to rescue their besieged capital. Just make sure you have enough forces to withstand their continious attacks and/or can bring more reinforcements when needed.

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

Follow the raiders, and heavily defend only the valuable provinces.

A large raider army that gets cut off will starve (unless it doesn't need food), and one that is followed will only occupy one of your provinces at a time.

Small raider armies can be worn down efficiently by PD combined with small forces.

PvK

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

Raiders have always (historically) been a problem to those being raided, and they still are (spec. forces). The best way to beat raiders is not (as suggested) to follow them around until they starve and slowly die out (as this will cost you lost income and time) but to trap them. There are many ways of doing it. Uncastled temple provinces make an excellent trap. The enemy will be drawn to your uncastled temples like flies to honey. What the enemy doesn't know is that you're moving lots of flying units, or you're building lots of province defence, or you have lots of hidden units, or your pretender is flying in. Of course, one way to effectively beat raiders is to cripple their leadership. Seeking arrows (air 3) are optimal for this, as you know that the enemy doesn't have any dome of protection in a province without a lab. As mentioned by norfleet, ghost riders also work quite well against weaker armies (armies not heavily protected by priests, wizzards, SC's). Assassins also work well, as they force the enemy to divert some of his forces to 'guard commander' - which means that you will have fewer enemy units to fight on the front line. If you're fighting mages, equip your assassins with elemental protection. Raiding will always be a problem, so make more of a problem for the raiders than it is for you http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I wholeheartedly agree.

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

If you really hate raiders, you could try playing one of the death based nations like Ermor, whose dominion kills off all of their population. No population equals no supplies, so its much more difficult to raid these nation's territory. That's not to say it can't be done. Just that it is more difficult and costly, especially if the raiders want to head deep into your territory instead of staying along the fringes where their forts might provide them with some food.

Obviously this doesn't address the problem when it comes to normal nations. But if you find raiding really frustrating then maybe the death nations would make for a more enjoyable experience for you.

Re: Question: Defense Dilemma
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">This doesn't really address the underlying problem of random parties sacking and burning down unprotected temples, or the fact that provinces now instantly switch to enemy control and you have to send a clean-up crew to deal with this nonsense. Ermor, of course, has fewer problems with this than other nations, having troops everywhere usually sitting around gathering dust, but the loss of the site income and temple is aggravating....and it really IS necessary to build temples everywhere.

I have a game going where I'm a sizeable power on the map, and have temples in every province...yet for some reason, enemy dominion continues to get in. Clearly, this is unacceptable. I must build more temples until this goes away.