Sieges need to be reworked

[Lighthope]

As far as I can tell, there is no reason, as an attacker, why you'd want to siege a castle. I always assault it as soon as my army gets there.

Sieges should have more strategic value.

Historically, the idea of a siege was to starve the castle into surrendering. It was not unusual for the defenders to reach an agreement with an attacker over sieges. Generally, the defender would agree to give up the castle without a fight if reenforcements did not arrive by a certain date. In return, the attacker would agree to full quarter.

A good fix would be this:

If a castle runs out of food, they lose. (Sieging armies automatically feed themselves from the land while seiging a castle.)

An attackr has two choices:

1) Starve the castle out. If this is the choice made, the longer the siege, the more likely troops will desert. After all, sieges are long and boring. Desertion is always a problem.

2) Attack before the castle gives up. If this choice is made, if the province is conqoured, there is an additional morale penalty beyond the "Nostalga" factor. Add another 20 points for the chaos of an attack. That will spur a lot more rebellions for a lot longer, causing the attacking country to consider very hard whether they want to press an attack or just starve them out.

Thoughts?

Lighthope

Pearls of Wisdom - 99 percent of lawyers give the rest a bad name.

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[lt1956]

Interesting...... But

I think they did this to allow you to siege or attack. Most would just siege is there are too many penalties. I think they wanted to people attack the castle instead of starvation. Just restrict yourself. Sometimes things can be done to kinda cheat or on the otherside to make things harder. Some people play to find loopholes, I play for challenge. I put limits on myself Idea is a good one though. As it would give reason not to attack if population hates you for it! lol

Lt

[Lighthope]

The problem is, as it stands now, there is no reason whatsoever to siege. That's the problem that needs to be fixed.

Lighthpe

Pearls of Wisdom - I've asked hundreds of people what race they belonged to, and not one of them said they belong to my race . . . the human race.

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[craZcelt]

A few more thoughts on sieges, and how they might be improved:

First, I agree with Lighthope that as it is now, sieging (as opposed to assaulting the castle) seems counter-productive. For some reason, the besieging army does not set up their formations beyond archer/siege-engine range, since during the siege you often experience losses while technically no 'assault' is taking place. The whole concept of 'siege attrition' applied in the game seems strange, with bonuses given for wall type, tower type, etc, etc ("siege defense" is one thing when you're talking about how well defenders can fend off an assault, but why would an attacker camp within catapult range when they're trying to starve out the enemy??) This is shown more dramatically if you try to starve out a castle equipped with ballistae and catapults... your losses can be devastating. That would make sense if you were actually sending men against the castle, (in which case it'd be an assault of course, not a siege) but not if you're just waiting things out.

I like how you can actually define the general placement of your armies by attacking a castle from different angles, sides, etc. (either joining your forces or 'ringing' the castle placing armies on both sides, etc)... I think that's a thoughtful addition for more tactical players. However, this accuracy isn't implemented if you need to bring in your other marshal by 'reinforcing' - (by clicking the empty top portrait in the Battle View): for example if he was not actually involved in the siege before you decided to assault the castle - in that case, it seems quite random which side of the map he appears from... This is a bit weird... if both of my marshals attacked a castle from the West, it's not very likely one would show up from the opposite side of the castle... and this also happens with enemy reinforcements... I reloaded a time or two once to check it out, and the enemy appeared in several different positions... I know 'time' is accellerated for the reinforcing armies (their progress bar goes FAST considering how far they have to go and the fact that battle is in real-time in B.View), but enemy armies shouldn't really be able to circle around the entire area and come at me from behind in the time it takes to fight one battle, or even before I've reached the enemy!! :)

I also like how they handled 'breaking a siege', whether it's the defenders charging from the gate, or a friend assaulting the besieging army... so, in my opinion, sieging a castle with intent to starve/wait them out should take longer, long enough for allies to potentially attempt to rescue the defenders, but no attrition should really happen, since they don't have tower-mounted trebuchets in this game, and as the attacker I'm sure not going to camp my army within range of anything inside the castle.

Now, once the calculations for defender morale, affected by food level, relative garrison size & strength, etc, dictate that some/all units within a besieged castle have become desperate enough to do something about the situation, they could either: (as Lighthope suggested) defect/desert from the defending army, (this could be represented sortof like 'damage', i.e. the men-count of a squad depleting over time after food runs low, etc, since deserters would generally slip away in smaller numbers, instead of entire units giving up simultaneously), or they might be convinced by their commander to charge the enemy lines, at which point a 'siege break' event would be triggered, and the player given a choice as to whether or not they want to handle the attack manually or automatically, in the usual way. Whether or not all defending squads or only some are charging from the gate(s) could be calculated as well, since controlling large numbers of men and overall morale gets increasingly difficult when they are hungry, stressed, and underslept, etc.

So, to summarize things, I'm suggesting that to attack a castle you could:
A) lay siege...
PRO's: - this would not cause army losses to either defender or attacker, and once the food level in the castle runs out or low enough, the defenders begin either defecting or are more likely to charge, causing a 'siege break' attempt, which you could decide to do automatically or by yourself in Battle View... *Important note: if a siege break attempt happens, you should have a fair amount of time to set up your formations - after all, you've been sitting around for a long time during the siege, so your camp should be prepared.* ...OR, the most ideal outcome happens, and the defenders completely surrender, give you the castle/town, and any enemy troops disband.
CON's: - sieging would take longer, allowing greater possibilty of reinforcements to arrive, and depending on how much food the castle has stored - thus how long it takes to starve the enemy - your own army morale should begin to falter after a while, since they i) are not involved in any 'action', thus they get bored... ii) begin to question the bravery, honor, etc, of their leader... etc. (This effect could be worse if you are attacking a castle in your homeland(s), ex: an opponent sneaks around your army and takes your castle, you return and lay siege to regain it... but choose to starve out those inside - including your people, livestock, hostages, etc. Your men would not be very happy about it!)

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(Note: idea for possible expansion/sequel: add the nationality of your troops, decided by where you recruited them. Two groups: - either countrymen: troops hired locally from one of your 'home provinces', which could be either lands you started the game with, or the patriotically 'united' lands of certain nations like Scotland, England, etc, and/or lands you've eliminated the 'nostalgia' from, etc... or foreign troops hired as mercenaries, or from provinces you have that still feel patriotic to their motherland (i.e. nostalgia still existed there when the troops were hired).

*Any negative effects of the above could be modified/eliminated as their squad experience goes from 0-3 stars... maybe positive effects go up as well; a morale boost for troops fighting for their home nation for example.

Anyway, maybe this could affect sieges as well, since you could either be using countrymen or foreign troops, and this could either help or hurt their morale for sieges that last longer.
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B) assault the castle directly.
PRO's: - happens relatively fast, lower chance for enemy reinforcements, and you can take advantage of beginning the battle with your full/maximum army morale. Enemy surrender should still be possible if you manage to breach the walls and rout the enemy forces.
CON's: - obviously this can be risky depending on how well the castle is defended so you may suffer losses or even get your butt kicked.
Hey, if you want instant results, you have to pay for 'em!

Everything I've said here is just my opinion on how this element of the game could be improved, and is only a suggestion. :)

If you've read this far, congratulations!
You have my thanks. :]

CraZcelt

[Lighthope]

Very well thought out, craZcelt. I get the feeling, though, that the patch coming out will address only small and/or easily fixed problems. Many of the things being asked for by players would require some major changes which would require more than a small patch can address.

Of course, it could be possible that this patch coming out is only a temporary fix after which they begin to work on the major changes that need to be done. Hope hope hope...

Lighthope

Pearls of Wisdom - Are dog biscuits made from collie flour?

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[Arcador]

Sieging is conected with the morale. High morale - longer siege. No food - rapid morale drop => unit desertation.
I've won sieges without loses in those manner (as Lighthope posted already).
Those are very complex ideas (and good), but I fear if any of them finds place in future patches, it will be some of them (not all).

[Lord Elric]

Definetely good ideas about siege fixing. Especially on easy levels there is no point of siege-ing castles at all.

[OSDSET]

i like sieging to me its just killin them without them even touchin you even tho it takes longer.

[Haegemon]

A door keep for the iner-citadel could be fine. But anyway the doors of a fortified city are so weak that I conquered a stone fortified Rome in a Blitzkrieg move early in the game, only with an army of peasants, while enemy was waiting until I crossed the door. I thing that every upgrade in the fence and addition of towers in the city wall could add a group of "town archers' guard".

The iner should be defendable. This means that the doors should be closed and the knight should be inside, but on horseback thats imposible and the iner-citadel loses it's efect.

Why the the moat is not "viewable", has the citadel moat? Why don't make it visible and use the ladermen to pass through the moat? Or maybe an upgrade of the ladermean, with longer and bigger laders raised to the wall with big ropes....?


...

[OSDSET]

@Haegemon: Yea we should be able to see the moats and i really like the laddermen idea

[Bloodsucker]

The siege is pretty pointless in KoH.Thats because I'm almost always in peace with everybody and when I want to conquer something i bring my marshal infront of the castle i want to attack,declere war on the owner of the castle,assault the castle,as soon as i win,i propose peace to the former owner :-).I dont have time for sieges,because they last very long,and enemy can bring reinforcements and his allies can declere war on me etc.

[Hector]

hahah

excactly my strategy blood****er:D

[ulfn]

The only time when I am using sieges is when waiting for the piety to reach 1000 (then doing the assault), so I can take over ownership of the city immediately. This "siege time" lower the injuries/kills inflicted on your own men.

[Lighthope]

> This "siege time" lower the injuries/kills inflicted on your own men.

I haven't notived this at all. Whenever I tried to siege, I lose men during the siege, and then the enemy starts an assult. So I end up in an assult no matter what. So why bother with sieging at all?

Lighthope

Pearls of Wisdom - "Getting used to change is never easy. But living a stagnant life is even worse." - The Doctor (Doctor Who: The Perfection Society)

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[Elvain]

I haven't notived this at all. Whenever I tried to siege, I lose men during the siege, and then the enemy starts an assult. So I end up in an assult no matter what. So why bother with sieging at all?

Don't forget that it also depends on the level of fortification of besieged town (what would be the sense of fortification then if not losses of besieging army?)

This is just question of your strategy. If you see very well developed town, start the siege and if you see no bonuses on enemy side, you can continue(and won't have big loses), if you see some bonus on enemy side, it means town is fortified and you should prefere assault.

IMO it should be balanced little more. Fortification ahuold cause longer sieges instead of so many loses, I don't know why knight looses so many man diring the siege, but IMO most of them should be lost by fleing instead of being killed. So:
siege-no fortification -> long siege -> morale doesn't drop much -> mo significant loses
siege-fortification -> even longer siege -> morale drops down -> soldiers flee -> marshal looses soldiers
assault-no fortification -> very fast, but bloody assault -> loses significantly higher than in noral siege
assault-fortification -> better to do it on your own

But this needs one thing to be fixed first: defending AI should have more advantages during the siege:
-Archers shooting above the wall should be far less effective than they are
-Archers on walls shuold have better advantage, I haven't noticed any, their range should be significantly different than range of assaulting units
-citade should be a CITADEL, with closable gate. If defender already lost walls, he should pull back to the citadel. Resistance to arrows should be evenhigher there. In the other hand, if attacker captures the citadel, it should be his victory, if there are original defender's units left, another battle should take place, assault of just captured town.