Garrison helping on attack/use of garrisons

[Alan_Sylver]

i just noticed that garrisons do not help on attacking an adjacent army. If so, are they totally useless against attacking armies? Because these are always more that 1 stack, and even a full garrison isn't strong enough to beat them. But if you bolster them with external stack, the enemy just ignores them and runs to the next place. In practise, the enemy can force me to fight without garrisons by running up to the next sector instead. But then the garrisons do not help at all against attacking armies.

So how am I supposed to use garrisons against attacking armies, not just against wild roaming beasts?

 

[Luke_Falcon]

My understanding is that you're not supposed to use garrisons in that way. They are like you've mentioned, mostly used to fend off marauders. Additionally, they can help an army protect a base or city, but that's it. They are a defensive tool. Think of them as the wall building from previous games: helps to defend your units in a city, but useless for shooing away raiders.

If an enemy stack checks you, by just standing there menacingly, you either need to use an operation to soften them up or bring another stack of yours as reinformects.

 

[Alan_Sylver]

Assuming that garrisons are mainly against marauders, why should I build more than the first garrison building? It's always been enough to fend off marauders up to now.

 

[Luke_Falcon]

Assuming that garrisons are mainly against marauders, why should I build more than the first garrison building? It's always been enough to fend off marauders up to now.

Not building beyond the first level is a valid strategy and probably you'd only want better garrisons in very important cities, like your HQ or one with a valuable sector. However, on higher difficulties, the marauding armies can become quite dangerous. Furthermore, continuing with the wall analogy, this is a passive defense. It's supposed to help you ward off attackers and buy you time to bring reinforcements. If you are playing aggressively, you won't need them, but if you're on your back foot, you might want to consider building a few.

 

[Alan_Sylver]

Thanks.

 

[HousePet]

If you build the same level garrison in all your colonies, then there isn't anything easier for an attacking stack to go for instead.
And your stronger garrison will slow them down more.

 

[Ericridge]

And if your garrisons get attacked, you want to make it worth the while by inflicting as much losses on the attackers as possible before they get slaughtered. In rare cases it is possible to force a draw if you can outrun the attackers for like 6 turns xD Think of it this way, each unit that your garrison manages to kill is a unit that cannot lay siege onto your city.

If your militia can kill at least one enemy unit, that's great! If they kill six, that's a humiliating victory for the attackers and a incredible win for the militia. If you kill 0 units, that's a expected outcome.

 

[Iguanaonastick]

I have won many battles thanks to garrisons.

If I have 1 defending stack + garrison and the AI has 2-3 attacking stacks, they will attack even with the garrison in place. And the ensuing tactical battle is not only easier to win, but it lets me use the garrison troops as cannon fodder so I lose none of my "real" units.

If the AI instead goes off to attack some random sector... well, as Ericridge says, use the garrison on that other sector to kill a few of the enemies, and if you repeat this a few times you can then counter-attack the remaining enemy with your single stack and win even without garrison boost.

Incidentally: it definitely helps to build more garrison buildings. At the highest tier garrison, every random sector base or imperial defense that the AI attacks will be defended by multiple tier 3 units. Even unmodder these can take out multiple enemy units. (Provided you command them yourself.)

Turrets have less value, since they only protect the colony capital and a pro-active defense means the AI will rarely attack those. Then again, they don't cost upkeep and are immensely helpful if you do happen to be attacked, so they're still worth it.