Castle Discussion ONLY Topic

First of all, I realise there's probably been quite a few comments and suggestions about castles but, without sounding derogatory, a lot of what I've seen has been rambling and stuck in the middle of other ideas. I know for darn sure that if I was Armagan, I wouldn't bother filtering through all the incomprehensible stuff.

Also, I have already posted this in a dying thread but I would like to start a new one, SOLELY about castle ideas. I really think that these ideas are reasonable, feasible and would make castle capturing worthwhile and fun. I've tried to take development times and difficulty into account and, instead of just giving an idea, I've tried to explain how it would be implemented into the game world as we know it.

I would really appreciate it if anyone involved with the current development of the latest version of M&B would take a look at these ideas and tell me what they think.

Cheers!

(p.s ,if I'm being a bit cheeky reposting my ideas into a new thread like this, sorry mods and lock away!)


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Basically, although I'm fairly sure this will be worked on for the new version anyway, attackers need better AI. As everyone will have noticed, when they get to the top of that one single plank, they get very, VERY stuck. I propose more methods of entry to the castle, AI that gets the hell out of your way when you're trying to get in there and...well that'd do basically for actual castle attack.

Once claimed, I think there should be some kind of monetary bonus, a certain number of Denars per week (put it down to land tax or whatever). For a fee, you should be able to train any troops stationed there, more effectively than when you're just travelling around the world map. At the moment, it just doesn't feel like there's really much point in having the castles (aside from very small fringe benefits).

Extra things to possibly add if you've got development time / can be bothered!

Item storage at the castle.
Special weaponry unavailable elsewhere (at a painfully high price).

And the "long shot" suggestion, coding wise.

Interrogation of prisoners to find locations of caravans with nice booty. This could be done in the style of getting a mission from a castle, but with a random success rate. It would cost you denars and time (like a rest at a Tavern) and you may not get anything out of it. Success rate would heighten with more prisoners and a higher prisoner management skill. Literally, just an "interrogate" button, no graphical choose body part to mangle/slap/burn or anything, it'd be too incongruous to the games overall structure. Oh, and it'd look silly.

So in summary:

Better AI when infiltrating castle, with more ways of entering

Denars per week earned increases for owning castles, and better XP gain for stationed troops for a fee

Item storage

Special weapons / armour

Possible prisoner interrogation, which is in reality just mission obtaining but with random elements involved as to whether you would actually get a mission.

Let me know what you think anyway.

Well, these are all pretty generic ideas.  Having some staff like in BG II, with a few crises that pop up would be great.  Shops or craftsmen would be great.  Tons of things would be great, they all just take effort, though.

What the game mostly needs is more detail and to have fully flushed quests and stuff like this in it.  More real content.  Presumably this will happen in some form.

http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/topic,10843.120.html
There you go. Talk to the NPCs and build your castle anywhere. It has all that you said you wanted plus a hero horse. But the horse is buggy as hell and the cost to build up the castle is hellish.

-ST

I think that he was talking about the vanilla castles, and i agree they need to be polished.
*I posted this is a thread that got locked really quickly

  Hi everyone

I was wondering about the castles here and how they will get implemented into the game, their priority, Use, Will there be different sizes, Possibilities for an Modder to implement more castles,Castle AI Pathfinding, Graphic Aim, AI, Castle weapons, Wall breaking, Ladder/siege towers number, garrison training and open castles so that you can go from the top of the keep to the wall without loading scenes.

That is all my questions, i can list them one by one if it would make things better for the viewer.

Ill check in as soon as i can, Jacob


EDIT: i know that this has been discussed in great lengths, i just want to pile up the things that weve agreed on here. I will try to create an very simple castle myself and see if the AI gets better the less stairs and levels it go

Full-scale and full-length siege, which game time passes around for actions done. Which should be more complex than simple hack'n'slash-up-the-ladder (a.k.a. the old style).

Sieges can fail, even though if attackers killed 80% of the defenders, if the siege is still completely 'impossible' and they run out of food, they're defeated. During the siege, if your castle/city has great level of food supply and strong walls, you might be able to win by just staying still.

Manage 'things inside the walls', be it citizen, soldiers, castle cleaners, dish washers, gardeners, kittens... etc. Like setting the expenditure (ie. 'Adjustable Wage'), work hours, food supplies, weapon supplies, soldier recruitment policy (if you have a bigger place, like a town)

And while we are at it we can add 3-30 forces battles and Zealous kamikaze soldiers that attack everyone (And they prefer HUGE enemy parties, they blow up when they die  ) and we could add mortars and ballistas and we could add... Intelligent AI like from Half life 2!

( my only serious suggestion would be the ballista  )

And i got thinking... castle only post  or maybe towns fit that description  but i would like some kind of repeating ballista in one or two of the castles as content in the finished game, i think that catas are overkill for this game since the short range and killing power only fits sieges and long huge meleés ala MTW2 ( i still prefer Trebuche for that  )

And there i got carried away too  well the combat is most important for now, i would like to duck run realisticly and sprint and crouch with the shield above me, as an one man shiel wall alä King Arthur Arthurian movie. now that wouls be something, and i would like the whole body to move when they attack it just looks silly right now, atleast everything except the overhand doublehanded attack,

And there i went offtopic 

anyway the dionisa mod is something fot that person that would like more sieges in both defence and attack and the one who would like to create their own castle

thaimodz said:

Manage 'things inside the walls', be it citizen, soldiers, castle cleaners, dish washers, gardeners, kittens... etc. Like setting the expenditure (ie. 'Adjustable Wage'), work hours, food supplies, weapon supplies, soldier recruitment policy (if you have a bigger place, like a town)

Click to expand...

Ninja kittens?

Fun fact: kittens were especially useful during sieges, both as an alternative to dropping rocks on attackers and as emergency rations when supplies ran low.

On the subject of Castle Income. I would suggest somethings easy to achieve:

1) Anyone of the peasant, farmer, refugee etc class who you station at the castle gets involved in some kind of productivity. (though there's a population cap)
2) Rather than simply generating gold, they could additionally produce a particular trade good such as wheat or dried fish, depending on the local resources, which need to be traded for hard currency.
3) Non-civilian Garrisoned troops should still demand a weekly wage (though perhaps less than active band service). Otherwise you conveniently end up with 50 black knights waiting at your castle.
4) An inventory, obviously.

Ideally you'd be able to set up caravans, set priorities such as productivity or troop training and have missions where you must defend against increasingly powerful enemies, but i realise that's all a little way off yet...

Navardo said:

3) Non-civilian Garrisoned troops should still demand a weekly wage (though perhaps less than active band service). Otherwise you conveniently end up with 50 black knights waiting at your castle.

Click to expand...

Ye gods, man, that takes away one of the only reasons for taking castles! It'd have to be significantly less than what troops get paid in the field: perhaps it could be deducted off the top of whatever proceeds your peasants are bringing in, as opposed to being sucked out of your pocket. That way you might have to strike a balance between the number of troops you're stationing in a garrison and the number of serfs who are keeping them fed. You could keep a strongly garrisoned castle bringing in next to nothing on the income front, or you could go the other way and have an army of farmers cranking out the denars, with a pair of drunk watchmen manning the gatehouse.

ok here is my take, I have only just started playing but I am a fan of Harnmaster, which this game reminds me of.

Castles require staff, so you will need:
Cooks,
Servants
Alewife
etc.

Then Craftsman:
Weapon smith
Armour smith
Black smith
Ostler
Hound master
Ostler
etc.
The advantage to craftsman is that they can make weapons far cheaper than it is to buy, quality should be based on their skill, the higher the skill the more they cost to hire and maintain
Men-at-Arms:
Huntmaster
Soldiers

These all require payment so you need peasants to work the land, but peasnats need protecting so you need those pesky soldiers, your castle could be subject to raids and peasants get killed or captured, you can convince refugees to come to your castle for protection, have two new skills one called: Fief Management, based on INT, the higher the skill the more money you make. The other is Rulership, based on charisma, which helps you convince people to join your fief and stops desertions and/ or run aways

The money is actually goods but it is already calculated that you are trading this with passing caravans or with your neighbours, and it is conveniently converted to cash.

Regards Herald

*Humbly*
http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/topic,16876.0.html

Anyone interested in learning to code?  Or at least doing concept?

All i can say is that, Rember that Castles and towns are different things. Putting people to work in your castles shouldn't bring up products.

Until the AI causing the soldiers to get stuck on the walls is fixed, would it be possible to change the place where the ramp touchs the wall by removing the crenellations so they wouldn't get stuck? Maybe make it look like a catipult hit there.

yeah castles and towns diffrent things...so add a feature to pay a good amount of gold to start a town?(first u get castle then start a town)

you should be able to take catapults nd stuff lyk tht wen u attack a castle

My eyes bleed from the grammer and spelling in the last post. 

the inventory of the castle is a good idea, as store money is a good thing as well. Maybe it should have a limit to the garrison of troops, and you can upgrade the walls and the space occupied, to make the limit of troops bigger. And one thing that is really needed is try to solve the problems of soldiers getting stuck in the walls and in the planks, and the first update to make is the larger wall, it will do easier to the troops pass trough. One last thing is to make specific troops like archers be deployed in higher places like towers, and the infantry/knights start in the sections of the walls that are being attacked.

Or more than one ramp. I usually have to shoot Borcha out of my way.

Also, when I retreat behind a hill when I am attacking a castle to reload and snipe, after awhile the enemy archers and knights come down and swarm me. But when I am facing them directly they get stuck on the wall. Any ideas?

Rathyr in extranpc mod in the missions to assault/defend a castle it's possible(u can't but sappers can)