How to deal with strong PD?

[Zeldor]

Well, I am MA TC and I am fighting against very big PD supported by hordes of longbowmen and knights.

[VedalkenBear]

Ah. That probably means that you are fighting against Man. IIRC, almost all of Man's PD is Slingers. What I would do is see if you can forge/procure a Staff of Storms. If you can, then you can 'shut down' his missile troops, use Storm Power on all of your Air mages (IIRC, MA TC should get some Air picks on their CMs), and cut loose with the Lightning, which is effective against heavily-armored troops like Knights.

Alternatively, if you have the Air magic to do it (say, on a Pretender), Wrathful Skies would also work. Hope this helps.

[Zeldor]

MA Man has Longbowmen in PD. And puts many additional behind PD.

[Ozymandias]

When your enemy builds an unassailable stronghold you should fight him elsewhere.

Consider your reasons for wanting to take the extremely well defended province. Three that occur to me might be that you need it to access your enemy's provinces, you need to prevent troop production from that province, or for victory point reasons.

When access to your enemies provinces is restricted to a single province it is a good time to consider diplomacy. Your border must be short, so a prudent garrison need not be terribly large. Furthermore your foe has already made a sizable investment in static defenses which I would not interpret as an aggressive act.

In the case that you need to stop troop production, consider the rituals which cause unrest. If you keep the unrest over 100, no troops will be produced in the castle.

If you must take the province to prevent your enemy's ascension try using assassins and commander slaying rituals on the province. Horrors, Lamashtas, and battlefield wide negative spells are good ways to wreck emplaced forces without using your own armies. Damage shields and morale effects are both good ways to disperse unscripted chaff. Instant travel spells might still allow you to make attacks on other more weakly defended vp provinces. This is also another time to use diplomacy to your advantage, as every other player also shares the incentive to not lose.

[VedalkenBear]

Zeldor: Still, the Staff of Storms negates that. MA TC also has quite good Cavalry. Placing them on the flanks and telling them to attack Rear at least has a chance to bypass the PD and get to his real troops.

Arrow Fend is another easy way to negate missile troops.

As far as Battle Evocations, Falling Frost is your best bet. Most of your CMs can cast it, and the damage should be devastating against Longbowmen. Ice Strike is later in Evocation, but all of your CMs can cast that. Your Earth Alchemists can Earth Power into Blade Wind, another deadly spell against longbowmen. Similarly, your Fire Alchemists can Phoenix Power into Falling Fires.

[Zeldor]

VedalkenBear:

I know how to deal with them later, but the problem is that I got into game with difficult research and made some bad choices. And situation was much worse for me earlier so I am a bit behind with research and number of mages. Even troops with Parry 7 are not so effective against longbowmen.

[Twan]

About 40-50pd being a big investment or meaning the ennemy planned a static defense it's not always true. A so high PD has more chances to be the result of events on an already defended province considering the price (21 is the highest commonly used PD for castles, then an event +20pd or 2x+15). I had this kind of provinces in two successives games playing with luck 3 (except the province was useless because not on my border).