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Trueshot defense strategy

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Whistlemist View Drop Down
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    Posted: 25 Jan 2015 at 00:30
I'm thinking of the best location defensive-wise for my capital city. 7 food squares are not an option because I'm using Tenaril. This means mountains are a good option. I'm wondering, from a purely defensive point of view, which is the best location for an Elven capital with an army mostly of Elven Trueshots:

1) Large Mountain entirely surrounded by Large Mountains. Seems good at first, but it seems that the most important battles, if seiged, are early on when the city army goes out to attack the seiging army. In this scenario, would my army of archers get a big penalty for attacking up a steep mountain?

2) Mountain surrounded by hills. Defensive bonus if attacked, but perhaps not such a large penalty for attacking uphill if I sally forth?

3) Hill surrounded by plains. Defensive bonus if attacked. Ditch all Trueshot strategy and have a cavalry to sally forth.

4) Hill/Mountain surrounded by mixed terrain of hills/mountains/plains. There are many more available locations of this description and perhaps this outweighs any advantages from the above strategies where I control the terrain of the battle. Have a greater component of cavalry & infantry in the army to be able to fight on all the surrounding terrain.

What do you think?
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Artahm View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Artahm Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25 Jan 2015 at 00:55
A 7 food large mountine sourrounded entirely by plains is what you wanna go for and this is how you do it: 

http://forum.illyriad.co.uk/the-magical-7-food-mountain_topic4094.html
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Rill View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Rill Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25 Jan 2015 at 01:34
Trueshots get a bonus when attacking on a mountain.

The main disadvantage in having a city surrounded by mountains, even if you are an elf, is that usually when you are being sieged you need other players to come to your aid.  Because cavalry travels so much more quickly than any other unit, cavalry units are most often what is used to relieve sieges.  Therefore people prefer to be surrounded by plains, where cavalry has an advantage, because it is much harder to defend a siege camp that is set up on a plain and therefore easier to defend against a siege there.

I'd be very interested to hear what Kumomoto has to say on this topic.  To me he is the elf who has the most experience in defending and attacking in the mountains.  I still remember some of his actions in the Valar and Consone wars.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Whistlemist Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25 Jan 2015 at 03:09
If plains are the only way to go, then cavalry is the only useful soldier and we should all be humans. I'm thinking that what really disadvantages elves here is the absence of high food-value squares in the mountains. Seems like a structural imbalance in the game which 5% magic bonus doesn't compensate.

Another thought - a bunch of elves banding together in the mountains would lessen the advantage of cavalry speed and make Trueshot seige relief more feasible.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Whistlemist Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25 Jan 2015 at 03:24
Another thought - if cavalry are what's normally used to defend sieges, then aren't sieging armies also usually cavalry heavy? If you build cities in the mountains and take away the effectiveness of cavalry altogether, might that not reduce the size of many armies that might siege you? If you also take care to establish your cities in a region where your alliance is strong and foot soldiers can travel shorter distances, are we getting close to a valid alternative military strategy?
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Rill Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25 Jan 2015 at 03:35
Defending armies are not usually cavalry heavy, even on plains.  Usually on plains you use spear troops, since those have extra defense vs. cavalry (for most units, kobolds being the exception).  The reason people don't defend a siege with cavalry is that cavalry are too expensive to build and maintain relative to the other troops.  

The people who are planning the siege can coordinate among themselves when the siege will land and have troops travel long distances to arrive in a (relatively) surprise attack -- at least the square on which the siege will land is not known until it actually does so.  This means that people who are defending against a siege have less time to prepare than the attackers do, so they will be more likely to need to use cavalry for a quick response.
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Rill View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Rill Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25 Jan 2015 at 03:37
Being an elf surrounded by other elves in the mountains is a valid strategy, by the way, one that Kumomoto used good effect in the Valar war, if I'm remembering it correctly.  That's part of why I would love to see his comments in the thread.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Brandmeister Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25 Jan 2015 at 03:41
Originally posted by Whistlemist Whistlemist wrote:

If plains are the only way to go, then cavalry is the only useful soldier and we should all be humans.

A silly statement, but one which I have heard often. Every tool has its place. Cavalry is an ideal tool for breaking sieges because response time is critical and it is very fast, so it makes sense to surround cities by plains. Marshals are superior in this role to knights, incidentally. Infantry excels at general purpose attack. Bows and spears are good defensive units (vs infantry/bows and vs infantry/cavalry, respectively) that work well together to defend tournament squares and sieges.

By the way, trueshots are inferior to sentinels in almost every respect. Their only real advantage is a slight edge in attack power, which comes at a far higher build cost and a lower speed.

There are many mountainous areas with high food dolmens. If you wish to pursue your mountain strategy, look into Tor Carrock and those areas.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Brandmeister Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25 Jan 2015 at 03:45
@Rill: It is also worth mentioning that most cavalry defends half as well as it attacks. Not an enticing defense option when spears are less expensive and build much faster.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Anjire Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25 Jan 2015 at 15:03
Originally posted by Brandmeister Brandmeister wrote:

 
By the way, trueshots are inferior to sentinels in almost every respect. Their only real advantage is a slight edge in attack power, which comes at a far higher build cost and a lower speed.
.

Sentinels are exactly equal to Trueshots in attack power/time and are greater in all categories with regard to defense power/time.  



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