An idea for sieges.

[Red Cougar]

Well, before I get started two things... three actually.

1. My first post so, hi everyone .

2. Yes, I read the second sticky. I just amazed that no one has come up with this particular version of the idea yet.

3. When I type my brain gets five miles ahead of my hands so please excuse the ineveitable grammatical and spelling errors.

Ok, now to business

I've been playing M&B for about three days now (yes, and I'm already making suggestions...) and have read the forums and think the idea of adding sieges to the game is great. But all these ideas are insanely complex.

[rant on]What everyone seems to overlook is that a siege is, from a tactical standpoint, a very simple concept. You take an army, surround the city/fort/castle, then you simply sit down and wait for the enemy to run out of supplies.

Now in M&B that would just be plain boring but it emphisizes a point, you don't need catapults and the like for a siege. Take them out of the picture and you've probably cut the time it would take to implement sieges by a significant amount. I say get a working siege system in first, the equipment can be added in later to spice things up.[rant off]

So now that my rant is over here is my idea for a siege system:

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Starting the siege

1. Park yourself on the city in question and select a "siege" option from the menu.

2. Army needs to be atleast 3/4ths the size of the defending force.

3. The two lowest tiers of each type of soldier (farmer, watchmen, ect.), don't count towards that minimum as they wouldn't have the battlefield experience necessary to be of any help in a siege.

4. You need a minimum of 4 in tactics in order to start a siege yourself, otherwise you'd have to find an existing one and join in.

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The defenders advantages

1. Attacking force gets a -8 battle advantage automatically, unless it would be lower to begin with. That is reduced to -4 if the attacking force is roughly the same size as the defenders, 0 if they outnumber them (again lower units don't count).

2. Since the defenders have access to the cities supplies, there is a 60% chance that defenders will only be knocked out instead of killed.

3. Unconscious defenders recover on midnight, every day.

4. The only way into the city would be via the front gate. Now, this would be a choke point for the defenders to take advantage of so the defending froce will always out number the attackers three to one in actual battle.

(seems overpowered but keep on reading)

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How the siege works

1. Friendly warparties will arrive to help you with the siege.

2. Enemy warpartys will show up to harass you and occasionally escort caravans.

3. Enemy caravans will come in groups of three at each of the different times of the day ( morning, afternoon, ect.) unless there are already five caravans enroute to the city. Each caravan that reaches the the city will resupply it (all unconscious troops will be revived and ten new defenders will be added).

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What you actually have to do

1. The city can only be attacked three times per day.

2. If you prevent all enemy caravans from reaching the city for three days, the defenders lose advantages #1 and #2 until a caravan successfully arrives. After seven days they lose #3 as well.

3. City falls when all the defenders are dead or if it goes for 15 days without caravans. The number of enemy warbands doesn't matter, as long as you starve the city/kill the defenders you win.

4. That being said, enemy warbands will launch a siege of their own to retake the city if they aren't dealt with quickly after the dust settles.

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And thats it. So questions comments? Did I make myself look like an idiot in my first post?

 

[Roach]

3 caravans 'how' many times a day? Dawn, early morning, morning, noon, afternoon etc? For fifteen days? That's erm, hundreds of battles to fight before you can starve the city..

Even if you just try to stop enough to deny the defenders advantages 1 and 2 you're fighting over a hundred battles. As well as random attacks from warbands.

There'd want to be some serious prize for capturing that city..

 

[Red Cougar]

You don't need to kill off the caravans, just stop them from reaching the city. Caravans are only have 25 units at the best, they're not coming anywhere near you or the war bands. I suppose it could be set up so only 5 caravans are in the siege at any one time.

 

[Klokkwork]

Even still, your army has to rest every two or three battles. Resting can take up time. The siege idea is a good one, but it needs some major adjustment as far as how many battles, how long it takes, and how many people you're thinking should be in any one battle instance at a time.

With a 40-man limit, I can just picture a single battle lasting for hours as more enemy troops just keep pouring in. Now I've joined my fair share of battles in the overworld map, but I sure hope AI parties aren't considering joining a battle I'm in.

 

[Kelpo]

I would think that if a city is under a siege, the defenders might send pretty significant relief forces to lift the siege, so the caravans would have a lot more troops travelling with them than normally, not less. Anyways, capturing a city should be hard, there's nothing wrong with that.

Even still, your army has to rest every two or three battles. Resting can take up time. The siege idea is a good one, but it needs some major adjustment as far as how many battles, how long it takes, and how many people you're thinking should be in any one battle instance at a time.

I don't think you should even be able to siege a town by yourself (you could of course try, but the number of enemies you'd have to fight should be overwhelming), but rather have an allied war party or suchlike siege it first and then just help them out.

 

[JoshRose]

THis is an interesting concept. I think you have made it a little too complex though. I don't think it's neccesary to implement all these rules.

What you are trying to do is ensure that the defenders have a very significant advantage, which they should. But, the real advantage should simply come from having the keep. If you line your castle walls with skilled rangers, you should be able to take out lots of opponents before they ever reach the gates. That alone would be enough to justify not having all of these rules as to how many attackers the enemy has, and when the defenders respawn, and that defenders only get knocked out, etc.

Giving the advantage to the defenders should be accomplished through good castle design, and good troop placement, not underlying rules that the player never even sees.

 

[Roach]

Take inspiration from history!

- if the siege isn't lifted by the defender's army within a certain time period, the city fathers will agree to capitulate. Happened at Stirling castle in one of those interminable fracas between the glorious Scots and despicable English. Very gentlemanly.

- allow the besiegers to build fortifications of their own ringing the city and facing outwards, to help protect against armies trying to lift the siege.

- fire dead cows over the city walls to spread plague (my favourite)

- and finally have it common knowledge (as it was throughout the Medieval period) that if the city capitulated immediately, that was the end of it, you get to sit in the castle, they pay taxes to some other overlord, everyone's happy. If they resist you kill every second man when you take the city and throw the women to your troops. Get a reputation for adhering to this strictly and you'll never have to siege a city after the first!

 

[Red Cougar]

Ok I'm updating my first post after this.

Kelpo basically summed it up for me, losing a whole city isn't a minor thing so of course the enemy will go through ridiculous lengths to save it. Most of the time sieges last for hundred of days as each side pours in troops.

As for the warparties, the number of enemy warparties doesn't mean anything, once all the city defenders are dead its over, even if there are four 80 man warbands sitting outside the gates. But then again the enemy would immediately try to retake the city with a siege of their own so they still have to be dealt with a some point.

 

[Klokkwork]

--El Guapo and Dusty Bottoms (Three Amigos)--
EG: Together we...?
DB: Burned the village!!!
EG: And...?
DB: Raped the horses!!!
EG: And....?
DB: Rode off on the women!!
EG: And we...?
DB: Pruned..
EG: ..Pruned..
DB: The hedges..
EG: ..the hedges
DB: ..of many small villages
EG: ..of many small villages....who the hell are you??!!!

 

[Red Cougar]

THis is an interesting concept. I think you have made it a little too complex though. I don't think it's neccesary to implement all these rules.

What you are trying to do is ensure that the defenders have a very significant advantage, which they should. But, the real advantage should simply come from having the keep. If you line your castle walls with skilled rangers, you should be able to take out lots of opponents before they ever reach the gates. That alone would be enough to justify not having all of these rules as to how many attackers the enemy has, and when the defenders respawn, and that defenders only get knocked out, etc.

Giving the advantage to the defenders should be accomplished through good castle design, and good troop placement, not underlying rules that the player never even sees.

Your missing the point, this is a very basic idea that could be implemented quickly. All the fancy stuff like the wall lined with archers can be added in later and various rules can be phased out as they become obsolete. Think for a moment, the AI can barely hand steep hills and your suggesting walls? I imagine archers would be pouring over the sides to their deaths like lemmings while they trying to get clean shots at the knights who are all bunched up against the wall trying to get at the archers.

 

[JoshRose]

Yes, but if you remove any sort of actual tactical advantage, and simply give the defenders all these hidden advantages that the player never sees... what is the point of having the seiges anyways? Essentially they would just be different battlefields with no purpose.

In order for a seige to have that extra excitement, there needs to be some actual tactical advantage to the battlefield.

They could simply remove the open ledges from walls, and have them aligned with some stones, so that you could not simply walk off of them. And some straight waypoint paths could be scripted for archers to ascend the stairs and reach the walls.

And yes, the AI gets stuck on steep hills, but in reality, the AI is pretty freaking good. I mean, there are many other retail games I can think of that have far worse AI than the soldiers in this game. It would just require some stricter waypoints when soldiers were inside the keep.

 

[Papa Lazarou]

Another thing, in the latest version (.711) Dhorak keep now has walls with battlements on which the player can actually walk. You can get to different wall sections through turrets at the corners.
To me this suggests that Armagan is considering battles with this sort of terrain piece and presumably the associated AI.
Even without these changes to the battlefield, sieges and even assaults could be considered for implementation

 

[JoshRose]

Yeah, I would assume that he has some thoughts of turning the keep into a battlefield. Of course it could just be another town, with merchants and blacksmiths, but as you said, we can walk the walls and such, so perhaps it is in the cards for MNB.

 

[Archonsod]

The easiest way to implement it would be to stay true to historical sieges.

Very little fighting actually took place, usually it was a case of attrition - disease and starvation were the main weapons.

When you siege a town, both sides have an attrition level. The attackers level will be set for the entire siege (say 3 or 4). The defenders will start out low, and begin to increase the longer the siege lasts (start at 0, +1 every 2 days). At the end of the day, each side loses an amount of men (randomly chosen) equal to the attrition level (disease, starvation and desertion). The character and NPC's won't be lost to attrition (though it may reduce their health). Once one side drops below 10 men the siege is over. If it is the attacker, then they no longer have enough troops to maintain the siege and must move on. If it is the defender, then the city will surrender to the besiegers.
Caravans will attempt to fight through the besiegers as normal. If the caravan succeeds, it reduces the cities attrition level by 2. If the attacker defeats the caravan, then their attrition level is dropped by 2 for 2 days.
The defender may elect to sally at any point. A sally pits a small number of the defenders against a small number of attackers in a normal battle. If the defender succeeds, they increase the attrition of the attacker by 1 until the end of the day. There are no additional benefits should the attacker win, beyond the loss of those defenders involved in the sally.

Winning a siege should change ownership of the city. If the attacker is a faction member then it should change to their faction, otherwise it should become neutral. If the attacker wins they will also have the chance to loot the city, which should give a lot more cash and booty than normal.

 

[Phoboshobo]

I generally like the idea.

I dont think all towns should be takeable. Otherwise the game will finish quickly with Vaegirs or Swadians winning outright and the game ending (with the loss of your character). If say three towns on the map could change hands that would be good by me.

The towns could add bonuses to the owning faction like extra horses or armour. Not enough to completely imbalence the game.

@Roach
Atrocities: Scots....6 English....half a dozen. Braveheart wasnt exactly realistic. Hang on... you were being ironic wernt you? (Im bordering on Aspergic so Im not sure).

 

[Archonsod]

Never trust the authenticity of any film which portrays an important battle without the pivotal feature which not only affected the battle, but also gave the battle it's name (Stirling Bridge)

It was fairly usual though. Full blown sieges were incredibly rare, especially sieges of cities. More often than not sieges rarely lasted more than a week. Usually the defenders would only hold out if there was a chance of being relieved. Otherwise they would only hold out for as long as honour dictated they should. Actual attacks during a siege were rare, in fact in many cases small markets or fairs would spring up around the besieging army. As far as cities went, sieges were mainly a show of force designed to embarrass the owning monarch.
The only time sieges really became deadly was against castles or similar fortifications, and even then it depended on the reason for the siege. Most were used not to take the castle, but to keep the garrison inside to prevent them re-enforcing the regular army.

 

[Roach]

Braveheart? Realistic? Tartan kilts 4 centuries before they were invented? A 'sword' based on a 16th century Germanic one? Wallace the son of a peasant? No bridge at Stirling Bridge? Edward I a total bastard? Bob the Bruce a mercenary git? (Actually those last two are pretty accurate)

Nah, the only thing realistic about Braveheart is that all French chicks are, indeed, foxy.

Yeah, restrict the number of vulnerable towns to keep the game flowing along. Freeform for the win, and it means you can capture the cities for the Swadians then switch sides and take em back Ad infinitum.

Put in an option to raze the city to the ground (with or without a salting of the earth afterwards) for when you finally get bored. Truly the world is your mollusc.

Edited to say: if I spent less time pontificating I could have got in Stirling before you. Bugger.