ik i really hated that. might try to get into the source code and fix the glitch that makes the ai place things poorly. the wolf would be a great ai enemy if ya know sure worked properly and his entire wall system wasn't bypassed because a tree and a dairy farm blocked it....
@@edi9892 horse archers + shields+ crosbows (few hundred of them), and no need to destroy anything else than a path for melee units, tho this takes a fuckton of time to do (but works on every castle of every lord)
Ad a kid, I always admired the Wolf's multiple mangonel castle to the point that i emulate his castle design as my own. Its really challenging to beat him since i always use swordsmans to swarm his castle.
My personal tactic against every lords is to have both Macemen and Horsemen Archers to do a frontal attack in order to divert the attention of the enemy's Bowmen, Arabian Bowmen, Crossbowmen, Mangonels, and/or Tower Ballistas (we'll call them Defensive Ranged Units for simplicity) while having Assassins infiltrate the castle and open the gate, allowing what remains of the Macemen to enter the enemy lord's castle. Even if the Assassins are found out, the Horsemen Archers can take out the enemy's Defensive Ranged Units, while the Macemen can quickly tear down the castle walls without having to worry about the enemy's Defensive Ranged Units. While this works on most lords, I sometimes have to improvise if I'm against certain lords. Nizar is the only lord in which this tactic simply wouldn't work. Thus, employing Spearmen, Pikemen, and Horsemen Archers (sometimes along with Fire Ballista) would be my tactic against him.
@@bre4kd0wn1Horse archers are nice but you can also use half the men, spam catapults and trebuchet to just delete the AI Lord’s walls and rush macemen into the gaps.
They do make some rather unique and original castles. I have spent a long, CONSIDERABLE amount of time in both castle builder and skirmish mode to try and come up with a unique castle without constructing lionhearts square castle, wolfs 2-edged tower castle, or even resorting to the lifeless "spam towers and xbowmen" design. Its pretty hard, so props to the original creators/designers who made something, unique, effective and hazardous at the same time.
I always found the Pig to have unique but strong castle designs, especially when he gets scared and starts pumping out crossbows like a madman. The Wolf also has a small box castle with two square towers sticking out diagonally that is quite an effective design, he can actually get them setup quicky and with little space.
I've always loved the fact that Wolf's castles always have a fatal flaw in their design (usually that you can attack them from behind). Like his character, they seem unbeatable but you just need brains and courage.
I was 100% expecting the Rat to be at #1 as a meme but yeah that mangonel castle was a huge pain. honestly the toughest one was the butterfly for me as even when i mass produced trebuches like i usually do to destroy the castles the butterfly is the hardest for me to invade fully.
I really aggree with Frederick. I love his castles and it really bothers me, that he doesnt make enough units. Both for defense and attacks. He just sits there with 100k gold and 80 units...
edit his file aic and let him buy weapons from the market, that's why he doesn't make a lot units, 'cause in vanilla he can't buy weapons from the market and he has to rely only to his workshops, that are few
1:15 Lookout towers actually provide less "dodge chance" than square and round towers, although the difference isn't that big. Their tiny diameter is probably what makes units survive annoyingly long, since arrows that miss their intended targets may still accidentally hit other targets which happens a lot more on crowded larger towers.
I will not completely destroy the tower because it can be rebuild instead i destroy it partially until it collapse then stop so the enemy dont have the chance to rebuild it
For me, Nizar is the most difficult lord to siege. Every other AI lord can be just overrun with mass arabain arches, but if you attempt to clear this fella's defences with horses, you will lose many to traps and if you didn't expect this, you will have to retreat before the siege could take any significant effect. Then, when the archers are cleared, you can send in some troops to clear the motes. Alternatively, you can try to pass through the gates, but the maze Nizar builds is filled with traps, that means even more casualties if you attempt to play by his rules. Even when you're finally in, there are 60 invisible assassins waiting for your unsuspecting army Hhhhh, so annoying The cleanest way I've found to beat Nizar is by tearing down his turrets using siege weapons, then cleaing up remaining ranged units with horses, setting his castle on fire with fire balistas whilr bombarding the keep with arrows - this will clean all assassins, economy and firefighters, so now you just have to get through the traps and moats I agree that multiple mangonels are annoying, but you can still overrun them with sheer brute force and then send assassins to do their thing - fast and simple
I just send mass waves of slaves and spearmen as human minesweepers and rush him with knights, siege weapons, and macemen. And if that fails, I just shell him with cows to keep his economy down then send another wave of slaves and macemen.
Yeah nizar is really difficult, his castle isn't that hard to siege (Units die almost instantly), it just takes ages to do so! Moat and killing pits are the real issue You can brute force your way through anything in this game, but I can guarantee you you're gonna have the most casualties against Wolf's 4 mangonel castle, the firepower is insane on that one
@@Jefflenious I killed all of their defences with only 34 crossbow men without beseiging the actual castle, but climbing on the walls of hiss allay and ordering to shoot from there(the castles were right next to each other)
ever since the day I lost against lionheart with his swordsmen, I began designing my castle like nizar's, just moats, towers, and gates. my favorite castle design, though, is saladin's. not too thick, easy to maintain
the best defense "castel" depends on the economy imo, the wolf with 40k gold start will always result in a strong defense, also he can quickly repair the dmg of material and units. if he starts with 8k or 10k you can rather easly run him down early because he wastes his gold on empthy stone with no units. saladin is another annyoing lord with sucha good economy that he can print his units, esp. a stack of flame throwers thats lights up the area around the fire pit is and the billlions of arabian swords man and archers makes it quite hard to run him down.
when i was a kid i was always afraid to attack wolf and for some reason his small castle with only two towers was always the hardest for me to deal with, i wasn't the best at that time never even used shield so i guess that's why
Hey Jeff! How about making a video ranking the AI's when they are your allies in terms of how they behave, how to help them, which ones are more useful, etc. It'd be really nice video! Also worth nothing that some AI's really struggle to fit all of their castle assets with the stock Stronghold maps (namely Richard in some missions lol and Wolf) and their success depends heavily on their starting gold to build their defenses.
Usually some AI makes really good use of Gold. Caliph is terrible at helping you. But if we fed him nice, he will be a lot of help while he attacks and harass other AI lords everytime. Richard will always try to help us(attacking and defending), but he might get out of gold really fast doing this. And so on.
@@silvioantonio6952 in my experience nazir has always been an amazing AI ally, same with Emir, I would put them on the same level in terms of being a good ally
i go with lionheart Abbott and not saladin but sallin? the chilled easy feasting arab lord. he tends to defend himself well enough i dont have to constantly bail him out. and if you ask for help specifically with resources he almost always helps. like i could ask for 500 apples and hed send 500 apples. then 10 minutes later asl for another 500. meanwhile asking for 10 from another lord would be all. oh sorry champ all out maybe later. Abbott depending on the game since one game hed be helpful the next hed say piss off. but Abbott would generally be useful... when he decided to be helpful that is
Ruins my day to see Wolf's mini castle, such a simple and small design, but there's just so many archers and crossbowmen on his keep that can defend his castle from attacks on all sides😭
Castle #2 is build in the campaign, when you have to fight all 4 dukes. It was sooo hard for me to attack, as i could not use iron or stonemines close to his castle and it took ages to get troops. The only mistake of this castle is the connection of the lower front wall with the gates. I managed to capture the outer walls by using a siege tower and sending macemen around. There was still heavy fire from his keep raining down on them, so i had to follow up with a combo of Crossbowmen and shields stationed on the outer ring. When the defenders were dead i could dig out the rest and attack.
Just try out the new UCP patch and the AI fixes. Add in some improved AI behavior via extensions and you've got a real challenge. Wolf managed to defend himself against 250 horse archers, 150 crossbows, 20 catapults and 80 mace men. He had about 300 troops on his keep alone (not sure how tho) over a 600 or so population. Add in towers with mangonels+balistas+crossbow men, fire pits EVERYWHERE outside his keep that he will keep replacing, fire bllistas near the walls outside, spike traps everywhere inside, crusaders and pikemen guarding the king.
There was this one type Wolf would build where he would make a motte and place catapults behind the the water. I did not see it in this video but, it was tough to siege for sure.
Two things, the butterfly caste is awesome in its own way because it looks like an angry looking face (like the wolf. The most makes his eyes). Even though it's actually only strong in forward direction like most of his castles, I love it. Second: due to lack of walls and siege equipment, the nizar is extraordinary vulnerable to fire ballistas and catapults. He can be a pain, but this way it's only because of the assassin's when he attacks, not because of his castle.
I really wish there was a special button in the game, just for instantly placing castle designs at the center of your keep. One that requires the same amount of resources to build if you did it manually, and the same or custom designs of the opponents. That would be so great.
How do you manage in this game to put all your buildings inside you castel ? In stronghold 1 there wasn't a limited area for constructions if i remember well, but here , there is ?
wolf's castles suffer from map placement - very easy to mess him up if placed somewhere at the edge of the map so that a huge chunk of one of the big castles doesn't fit or blocks some path, thus ruining his economy. In any case - any of these can be dealt with easily with the help of the mongol horse archer army. 150-200 usually does the trick. Even with mangonels.
Wolf's "front" side of the castle is actually not its front side, its the back side and yes he put more defence at the back than front. Especially the mass square tower one, i think some version of it doesnt even has gate at the back between the 4 square towers
Saladin is way too OP to defeat, it takes 10 to 15 mins to get him. And the Caliph this is the guy we have to kill in 1 min because he is so annoying. I try to get troops as soon as possible, and then attack Caliph first (even if there are 7 enemies)
Saladin is actually fairly easy to defeat if you target his weaknesses... ironically, the key to that is to unleash your inner Caliph, as most of Saladin's castles are really prone to burning down completely once they catch fire, alongside and troops and workers moving around in it on the ground. When his economy lays in burnt ruins so he cannot spam troops, a siege tower and some macemen are enough to overrun him quite nicely.
@@Heroesflorian ally? Whenever I ask them to give me something, they reject. Even after 10 mins i ask them for 5 stone, they reject. Whenever I ask them to defend my castle, they reject. Whenever I ask them to attack someone, they reject. And then, they ask for stone wood and iron and more resources? I would rather do a 1v3 bruh
I find Nizar quite easy to be honest, because of the very easy cheese of Mass Fire Ballista + Portable Shields. His base is way too clumped making it very easy to burn it to the ground repeatedly even if he had 3 wells, because the firemen AI is quite stupid.
Actually the wolf'w mangonel castle would be Nearly inpenetrable if his gate had two additional towers, and he would also build 1 each in the corners instead of just on the side
Best castle is 5 towers filled with archers and removed stairs behind them (you cant limb into tower anymore) it beats any AI siege attempt easily since there is no walls to scale they dont even unpack their siege machines near towers. Spice things up with a mote around towers and little wall around ur king for bait and extra protection purposes.
a few trebuchets behind a wall near the towers is great for siege engine defence or throw a cow in the path of a massed enemy. also xbows instead of archers, way more effective especially against armor troops
I think wazir should be in rank 10, on one hand he has a defense strategy with fire but on the other hand his defense is weak against fire, sometimes his fire pit burns his own house, attacking him with slaves is also very easy
There should be games of Stronghold, where people don't rush each other with horse archers and knights, but a game of castles, who can make the best castle, you can even make an event around it, but there should be limits, nonstop tower castles, although good, are boring.
how to deal every wolf castle is attacking his economy in early game, if the castle is big,he need more time to build, use asassin to sneak his economy, in late game use massive horse archer to destroy his defense,catapult useless because his castle has thock walls
Im curious how did devs "made" every of those castles & their variations Did the devs just made up and chose best design to rank their ai ? Used a random castle maker AI ? Inspired by real design or player made or unused one from stronghold 1 ?
With the unofficial user patch, you can look into all the so called aiv files mentioned in the video. Each lord has 8 aiv files and thus 8 types of castles. Stronghold 1 did not have aiv files, so they probably aren't the inspiration. The design does not seem random either. Maybe some are based on real world examples, but many look like they were a creative drawing (Snakes S-castle) or just a square or circle. I suppose that most of them were just handcrafted castles that suit the AIs personality. The Aiv editor allows you to produce very nice castles yourself.
I've got a question which doesn't fit to this Video but is related to stronghold crusader. In which Version of the game are 80 Missions? My Version only has 50 Missions. And in Mission 80 were opponents i have never seen before. Is this some kind of add on?
I find saladin kinda easy to beat since you can destroy his entire army and economy with 5 fire ballistas and 10 shields. But the mangonel and ballistas are kinda annoying
Hard to rank, since the castles themselves are not the issue for me But rather quantity of lords and their defenses or attacks Like for example, defeating one Rat is simple, but if you face 7 of them with aggressive AI.... that's hell 😰
Just get a few towers with archers, no walls needed. I hardly build walls, unless there are really a lot of enemies which you gotta defend until they are broke like in the last crusade missions. Fancy castle design is overrated imo
@@tschabow5608 Yep. I will either use a simple box to protect my core buildings, and then place lookout towers and sometimes some sqr towers farther out away from my castle to do all the killing. Its way cheaper economically, and gets the job done. I might eventually expand my walls out towards the build distance limit once my economy is stable so I can expand and protect my expanded economy easier, but mostly I try to use the maps design to just wall off chokes if possible. You can also use a wall of all towers if you want to prevent any wall scaling and get additional siege defense equipment, or a moat if you want a cheaper option. But I almost never really find this necessary. A lookout tower with like 20 fire archers crammed into it does a lot of work at taking out most early game forces while being very cost effective, and you can expand your defenses after that. I personally really like to abuse fire ballista because of their range. Since they can either outrange or have even range with anything attacking you, it can allow you to defend with very minimal damage taken saving gold. Just spam a ton of fire ballista for defensive purposes and then once you have a ton of them just utilize them offensively (albeit slowly) to widdle down enemy units on towers. If you mix in some crossbows or archers into you ballista ball and maybe some shields if youre going against a other ballista on towers, its practically impossible for the AI to beat you back. Then you just contain the opponent and dry out their funds by essentially spawn camping their firepit and setting fire to their castle over and over with your ballista, or just send a melee force in once the walls are cleaned up to slay the lord. Getting a squad of catapults will be nice if the enemy has a thick wall, plus it makes things go faster.
Yes, the #1 castle is surely hard to beat. I round up catapults on the side with shields to tear down the small wall But it gets complicated, soon as the Walls go down and i rally my pikemen to dig the moats, they either get obliterated by my catapults or wolf's crossbows ☠️☠️
It's a fanmade patch, currently the most popular patch too ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-fpOD3BKe3VY.html Watch this video for more info!
Castle designs where the tower is replacing the wall isnt that great in my opinion, as its a big target that you can focus down more easily. However the saladin castle designs, where the towers are kind of separate and the wall simply connects to them are much more difficult to deal with. However it has the issue that the gate is still an easy breach point. The wolfs castle with the water bridge gate with multiple layers are very hard to deal with efficiently. Its not even just killing the enemy units. Just the effort to gonthrough multiple, thick layers of walls, and theres water and traps surrounding it, it takes a lot time and multiple types of units to get through. He has the issue that it takes a while to build, but if you cant deal with him early, its quite a hard encounter. The kaliphs castles are annoying for melee units, but if you get a few catapults, you can very quickly dismantle half his castle. Its just too weak. If only it didnt have the towers replacing the wall, or at least it was surrounded with more walls so they were harder to deal with. Could become so much harder with a little more investment
from first i knew that this specific aiv.6 of wolf is the best... i can't kill wolf with 1 attack and this is the only castle that i cant kill with 1 attack
@@foxboi6309 placing well removes some kinds of rocks in 1 tile radius, including the sides of cliff, which leaves a hill without stones ad edge, build wall on that edge and staircase off that wall
yes just edit AIC file of any AI you want, and increase the number of the parameter "AttForceBase" and "AttForceRandom", be aware thou' as increasing this values, will increase the time AI takes to recruit those army and attack with the bigger size.
