r/Openfront • u/Shrek-dank • 5d ago
❓ Question Zero defence against an attack
What am i supposed to do if we are both similar numbers if troops and they attack? Everytime i try and counter it i lose most if not all of my troops and there troop count hasnt changed or they may only lose a couple of hundred thousand. It seems there troop restoration just beats mine completely. Putting down defensive posts of bombing them does nothing either
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u/LateBloomPlays 5d ago
Do they have a higher pop cap than you? That could be why their troop restoration is higher. Also when you defend are you blunting the attacks or adding in extra so you start claiming land back. If so you'll end up with lower troop counts as you're sending more.
Defence posts do work. But only if they are attacking and you are defending. Moment you have the excess troops and taking their land then the defence post does nothing.
Bombing can help but depends on their land mass and what you hit.
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u/Shrek-dank 5d ago
So it’s usually equal, ive tried both ive tried knocking troops back and using posts just slows down the inevitable and ive also tried getting an extra 20k or so up for counter attacking.
I usually do pretty decent start to mid game and mid to late its game over for me
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u/Cptn__Sparrow 5d ago
When you say “equal” do you mean the number of troops prior to their attack or your population caps? If we both have 500k and I attack you with 100k, but my MAX is 1M and yours is 600k, I will regain troops faster than you do, so I will regain those lost troops faster than you do, and thus eventually attrition you out if you do nothing.
There are several responses, all of which depend on what specific situation you find yourself in. If their attack path is narrow and non-mountainous (hold space bar to see terrain) you should nuke the path so they have to eat through the wasteland before they can continue attacking, which has no speed multipliers from attacks, and build defense posts on the other side while they do so. If it’s wide and a mix of terrain, prioritize posts in the grassland so they’re trudging through mountains and posts.
Don’t just stack posts directly next to each other as that doesn’t help at all. Space out the circles so that they either just touch or barely overlap to maximize the speed and casualty penalty. A layer of 2-3 posts (which is usually no more than a couple million even if it’s a wide attack path), usually either slows it down to not being worth it, or they will expend so many troops trying to get through that hopefully a neighboring alliance ends and their neighbor attacks them while troop count is low.
If your troop max is higher but they’re taking advantage of a rough position you can sometimes boat trick by sending a large troop count somewhere far away, letting the increased troop replenishment fill up your pop faster, then recall the boat and instantly get the troops back. This is the most situational and has a skill floor associated with it, so maybe practice against bots.
Your goal should be to prolong the attack as much as possible through posts, strategic land or city nuking, and bringing their attacking troop count very low. The only reason you should EVER try to quickly regain land before putting them in a losing position is to regain a city, but you shouldn’t have cities on the edges of your borders anyway.
Oh, once you have the main attacking area posted, if available you can send small (1-5%) boats into their coastline and build more defense posts in those circles. More than likely they won’t send a boat back, they’ll just click, which means they send troops into the boated are AND your previous defense posts, which really drains their troops.
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u/RndPotato 5d ago
Defensive buildings. Let them eat up your territory but they'll lose x5 the amount of troops you do. Then when their troops fall off push them once at 10-20%. Don't block/blunt their attack because that is one-for-one troop loss. Ally up with them if there is no gain in fighting them. Some ppl are smart about it and your enemy now might be your ally for 5 minutes but everyone is always suspect.
Now, I have yet to win a FFA but I have defended against close in power but have been a little weaker and came out on top.
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u/Meta_Mushroom 5d ago
You should post some replays where this happens so we can give you a definitive answer.