How to keep the borders safe?

[HJ]

I need some advice on how to deal with long borders or multiple-front wars. On big maps, there usually aren't many choke points, and the nature of the game makes the borders very sieve-like. Obviously I cannot have an army in every province, and the AI has a tendency to bypass my armies and outlaying provinces and instead go on a rampage in my back lines, destroying my income, and forcing me to retake all that again. Sure, those armies starve, but by the time I manage to deal with them and retake everything, the new ones appear and the cycle repeats itself. In addition to that, the AI tends to recruit armies in those newly conquered provinces and buy them defense, even when they are completely cut off, which makes it harder to reconquer them. The same thing happens with multiple-front wars. If I'm concentrating on one opponent and trying to catch all his roaming hordes, at the same time another AI nation will touch my borders on the other side of my empire, and do the same thing that I was just trying to prevent that first nation from doing. So, what is the best way to keep them off my back? As I said, I cannot keep an army in every province if I'm in a middle of a big continental mass, and buying defense everywhere is expensive (and often results in crappy performance by giving me unarmored militia and slingers). What would be the best way to deal with opponents who avoid direct clash of the major armies and instead turn to guerilla tactics?

[apoger]

#1 Take the inititive. Make your enemy chase you in his territory.


#2 Province defense


#3 Hold back a reaction force that can respond to threats.


#4 Use a pretender that can cast teleport or cloud trapeze. Use that as a quick repsonse to enemy incursion.


#5 Fortify provinces to slow enemy incusion


#6 Try to develop army countering tactics that involve sacrificing lesser resources in order to break larger incoming forces.

For example:
Some sacrificial Poison Slngers, Bog Beasts, or Hydras can often kill a huge number of enemy troops with poison.

[ November 19, 2003, 04:11: Message edited by: apoger ]

[NTJedi]

apoger has listed most of them.

Another important tactic is setting traps for the AI.
Example= Leave an undefended territory on the front lines for one turn. Move your units into that territory for the upcoming turn. Lots of the time the AI will move its units to attack the territory... and because your moving into that territory on the same turn you've caught him.

Also from what I've seen the AI only responds to what it sees... it doesn't try to plan on what you will do. So if you have 150 troops on territory_A and 2 troops on territory_B the AI will only try to attack territory_B. (Unless it has a more powerful army then territory_A.)

[ November 19, 2003, 04:45: Message edited by: NTJedi ]

[Chris Byler]

Originally posted by apoger:
#1 Take the inititive. Make your enemy chase you in his territory.


#2 Province defense


#3 Hold back a reaction force that can respond to threats.


#4 Use a pretender that can cast teleport or cloud trapeze. Use that as a quick repsonse to enemy incursion.


#5 Fortify provinces to slow enemy incusion


#6 Try to develop army countering tactics that involve sacrificing lesser resources in order to break larger incoming forces.

For example:
Some sacrificial Poison Slngers, Bog Beasts, or Hydras can often kill a huge number of enemy troops with poison.

You left out a big one: siege him. (Or was that included as part of #1?)

By laying siege to their forts you deny them recruiting ability, which keeps them from replacing their armies. The AI will usually try to lift the siege even if it has insufficient force to do so, so you can destroy or weaken its army while at the same time preventing it from reinforcing. Then you buy a second army at home (or some mercenaries) and start conquering provinces.

Make sure you bring some mercenaries to take point when you storm castles. You wouldn't want to risk your own valuable troops.

[Taqwus]

Remote summons (e.g. Army of the Dead, Call of the Wild, Angelic Host, Imprint Souls et al) can also help somewhat.
Don't forget the leader-killing spells, too; Earth Attack, Seeking Arrow, Mind Hunt and such. If the army has no leaders, it can't move.

[HJ]

Thanks for the tips. I guess I have to adjust my strategies to this porous nature of borders a bit. Whenever I can focus my forces on one side sufficiently, I have no problems, but when they employ the termite strategy, I lose ground and money and get pushed back. I guess I'm being to straightforward and expect them to do the same.
Cheers,