Of Fortresses and Enclaves

from Elemental Forums

Sorry if they already posted something similar but this has been around my mind lately:

I want to be able to build a fortress in the middle of nowhere (or somewhere logical) and I want this structures to be like kinda powerful able to stop at least 1 or 2 turns a medium invading army, and as the developers where saying that you would have to give your power to create cities, but I would like fortreses to not be like cities, to be able to build them like you build a city wall (much more expensive obiously) and be able to make them like the starbases in galciv2 (not as powrful as in sins:Entrenchment) they take from your income but not monstrously so, the can make good chocke points but not stop an entire armada by themselves, and also to be able to build something like forward posts less expensive than fortreses, like towers or something just so you know an army is coming to wipe you clean and that these structures are not as complex as cities and instead of taking of magic thay take from your resources but not so little that you can have 250 fortresses just some of them to keep chokepoints or trading routes.

Sorry for the long post. v_v

10,288 views 9 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

You call that a long post?!?! :rofl:

I gave this a bit of thought earlier on another topic. It would be handy to build outposts of different types. Fortresses for soldiers, messenger posts for shipping and mail, that sort of thing. One challenge with military fortresses is that you can't force people to attack them in most situations. You can build a wall to block off a valley and put a fort up over the only gate for example. But there will be plenty of situations where your fort will have a lot of empty space around it.

What you can do however is station an army inside it. The army can leave the fortress and defend a much bigger area. They can retreat to the fort if things go bad and if the enemy attacks the fort your troops have a big defensive advantage. With an army on the prowl the enemy wouldn't be able to waltz past. If they did your army would attack them from behind and or cut off thier line of retreat.

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Other than a massive line of sight, what else is a tower good for? I have never seen a massive stand alone tower in medival history, the only parallel I can find are the German flak towers. Those have a specific term that means "aboveground bunker" but I forgot what it was. How would they function defensively? If the tower falls you would lose everything...

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Tamren, reply 1
Other than a massive line of sight, what else is a tower good for? I have never seen a massive stand alone tower in medival history, the only parallel I can find are the German flak towers. How would they function defensively? If the tower falls you would lose everything...

His idea for watchtowers would just be for the line of sight. I agree with him. And even if there aren't many examples of tall stand-alone towers in medieval history, there are plenty of examples in modern history. And even if the concept wouldn't make sense in real life, it's a feature I'd like to see in the game. 

Also I agree with mot of the original post. Being able to build forts separately from cities would be a nice feature, and having them be a constant drain on resources would be a good and sensible way to prevent people from building them all over the place. This could be combined with the whole Zone of Control idea, where the mere presence of an occupied fort slows down enemies in range.

Star Control: Origins
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

I definitely hope that the 'rethought 4X economics' plus the tile-based city format will facilitate multiple types of population center. I'd like a map that included villages that will stay villages, and other villages with potential to grow into cities because of reasonable things like having multiple trade routes run nearby. And we need minining towns, mill towns, etc., that all 'connect' to a relatively close city but are not part of its tileset.

Fortresses should definitely fit with a larger 'non-city population center' system. Think of the camp followers who settled along Hadrian's Wall back when the Roman Empire actually kept it defended. And, yes, I definitely would like to be able to build something like Hadrian's Wall. Hilltop forts that can send out sorties to hassle larger forces moving through their territory would also be good fun, at least if they can be fairly automated.

Re standalone towers, it's a fantasy game and they seem like a neat idea to me just for looks, but also to serve as things like a mage's reseach facility, a prayer retreat, or a 'safe house' for an imprisoned (or hiding) notable, e.g. Rapunzel. If nothing else, we should perhaps have a quest or three that take place in an isolated tower whose line of sight is large and empty of 'civilization.'

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

Forts should be able to harass based on their garrison.

 

The counter to that would be a razing strategy- get some light cavalry, and raze their crops.

 

The problem is TBS games often end up as cavalry/speed-fests, that's something I'd like to avoid with Elemental.

 

Speed tends to kill exponentially in these types of games, and even GCII had major issues with it that were patched throughout, and in a blunt force fashion at the end, so I wonder how Stardock will solve this.

 

 

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

In reference of GW Swicord comment yes thats right I was also thinking that mines and other off cities structures would be necessary for the game, like economy boosting mines or quest based towers would also be a neat adition. k5

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

Ah yes that right. Cities are multi tile affairs so it stands to reason that fortresses could be as well. Your personal castle could occupy multiple tiles inside an even bigger city. That castle would still work if you transferred it into the middle of nowhere.

Reply #7 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Tamren, reply 1
You call that a long post?!?!
 One challenge with military fortresses is that you can't force people to attack them in most situations. You can build a wall to block off a valley and put a fort up over the only gate for example. But there will be plenty of situations where your fort will have a lot of empty space around it.

I like the idea of having fortresses and watch towers and Tamren makes a good point you can’t force an invading army to attack a fortress but historically you only build fortress to protect something of high value or great importance. That being said similar to Galciv 2 and military starbases depending on what upgrades were put into them their strategic value changed. I hated that upgrade that slowed my ships down in enemy space or reduced my fleet’s firepower. I would think similar effects could be included in fortresses for Elemental where the attacking player or AI wouldn’t have to risk assaulting a fortress but some negative effect or annoyance would be present until the enemy nation was destroyed or the fortress captured / destroyed. 

Reply #8 from Elemental Forums Top

I really like what Civ games did for that.  Workers could build a Fort that provided defensive fortification.  In addition, you could "fortify" units (but them onj defense) and if you left them alone they would also get a bonus.  I think that would be good to have.  So maybe a list for some fun fortification features.

  • Unit Defense
    • Innate Unit Skills - A defensive rating for each unit would have inherintly.  Ex: Archers have 1 attack, 2 defense NORMALLY, plus maybe +1/+1 against unshielded targets without magical armor or something.
    • Unit Skills (Training) - Via battle experience or direct training for a particular skill, gives a unit extra defensive points.  Ex Archer normally (1/2) gets +50% bonus with the Skilled Defender Trait, maybe even at a cost to their attack powers.
  • Terrain Defense - Every block of terrain modifies each type of attack in different ways.
    • Plains/Grasslands - +50% Attack when mounted.
    • Hills - +25% Defense to all units.  -25% Attack for Mounted Units.  -25% mobility for all units.  Visibility bonus for defender, negative for attacker.
    • Mountains - Maybe same as hills except better bonuses etc.
  • Tile Constuction Defense
    • Worker units can build and modify "Fort" modifications to tiles.  They have upkeep per turn and can obtain a certain number of upgrades (increases powers and cost).  Can be taken over and used by any team once built.  Can be deconstructed for resources, but it takes a number of turns equal to 2+ number of addons.
    • Or there could be prebuilt "Watch Tower" locations at random spots along the map.  It adds a little defensive and sight bonus, but is expandable to give you more options.
    • Upgrades
      • Looking Glass - Extends sight range by another 2 squares.
      • "Unit" Niches - Gives the building several "native" units that will be unable to leave.  Player can change the unit whenever he wants but it will have an upgrade cost and will take several turns to resupply the tower.  Will still take a min of 2 turns, Forward training camp hurries normal production tho.
      • Magical Nodes - Increases Magical research by X points.
      • Forward Training Camp - Allows units under X Cost to be trained locally.  Requires Housing add-on.
      • Housing - Allows settlers to move into tower.  Allows better upgrades and can repair the building if damaged.

These are just a few ideas for singular defensive buildings.  Maybe one could build a wall that extends arounds one territory but costs a LOT of men and resources to keep up and running.  Prolly only good for NPC run nations (neutrals).  Just a couple thoughts. ^^

Reply #9 from Elemental Forums Top

To anyone to see this post a similar one is here: https://forums.elementalgame.com/337109

 

By the way I like the idea of terrain bonuses think it will be added it will be nice to have a battle like the one in Hellmshole in LOTR 2