Summer Updates - 037

[Sonic Screwdriver]

It doesn't sound like Faq has much in the way of ground defenses nor a very large presence in the tunnels. Off the top of my head, I'd want to take advantage of her obvious specialization towards air defense and have the primary offense be a force of archers and tunnelers/weinhammers (siege units that fit in tunnels).

[HandofShadows]

It doesn't sound like Faq has much in the way of ground defenses nor a very large presence in the tunnels. Off the top of my head, I'd want to take advantage of her obvious specialization towards air defense and have the primary offense be a force of archers and tunnelers/weinhammers (siege units that fit in tunnels).

If Parson does evet have to attack Faq I'm sure he will do something similar. Or he might just go one step farther and make a large above ground entry /roadway so a conventional army could just walk in.

[raphfrk]

If Parson does evet have to attack Faq I'm sure he will do something similar. Or he might just go one step farther and make a large above ground entry /roadway so a conventional army could just walk in.

We don't know if road building is even possible. Ofc, it could be based on the same trick that achieved the vocano. I wonder if Sizemore + Maggie is sufficient for that.

The rules for city capture are here and here

In GK, the zones split as

- Outer walls
-- included the space between the outer and inner walls
-- leads to court yard garrison sub-zone (must breech inner wall)
- tunnels
-- lead to dungeon garrison sub-zone
- Airspace
-- leads to tower garrison sub-zone

--> flying units can cross between airspace and outer wall zones
--> Tunneling units can cross between tunnels and outer wall zones

Garrison sub-zones (must croak all units in all sub-zone)
- Tower
- Courtyard
- Dungeon

It is likely that Faq has no dungeon zone. However, since tunnels are used to get there, they might connect to the dungeon.

Assuming that isn't the case, the an attacker needs to get passed the inner wall and kill all the units in the courtyard and then enter the tower.

Jillians main tactical decision is to break the link between the courtyard and the tower.

The only way to attack the tower is to take control of the airspace zone.

GK is an aerial power too. Once Stanley has his dwagon force built up so that it stronger than it was previously, he should be able to overwhelm Faq again.

Airspace becomes the main battlezone in Faq. Once the attacker gains control of airspace, they will have split the defenders in the courtyard and the tower.

Thus all the defense is focussed on preventing the enemy dominating the airspace. Complete control of airspace is required in order to attack the tower. As long as Jillian has flying units remaining they can cross into airspace to prevent an attack on the tower.

The outer walls are perches for aerial units and the tower has siege units being built. Presumably they will be siege units like ballistas, so they can fire at units in airspace.

The inner wall is purely designed to hold an attacking ground force so they can't just walk into the city. They can then be attacked by the city's aerial units. The design means that an attack must fight Faq on its own terms and forces them to fight in the air where Faq is strong.

The final attack on the tower is also made hard. Ideally, the attacker would have flying units that can fit through the doors. Ironically, Faq is probably most vulnerable to Transvito. Stanley would have to make a "beach head" with the dwagons and then have Knights dismount/jump. However, he can destroy all siege units via dwagon fire.

[Sonic Screwdriver]

We're not sure whether Jillian can truly separate the tower from the rest of the garrison. Since parts of a city can have effectively different levels, Vinnie's hinted that the outer walls are very low level, and level 1 tunnels are open to people just walking through; so siege units might not even be needed until you reach the garrison walls, and light ones at that. If Jillian was able to create a garrison with no dungeon and no physical connection between the courtyard and the tower, that screams potential weakpoint to me, if only we knew the rules more. It could mean enemy siege units can topple the tower for all we know, but there's got to be a flaw somewhere, no matter how improbable it is for someone to be able to exploit it.

[raphfrk]

If Jillian was able to create a garrison with no dungeon and no physical connection between the courtyard and the tower, that screams potential weakpoint to me, if only we knew the rules more.

Maybe something like siege ladders could be used to allow ground forces access. The disadvantage of this system is that any ground units she has cannot be used to defend the tower. Thus, she isn't getting the extra defense for free. She is putting all of her defense into being able to control the air and losing the contribution made by ground units.

Also, I don't think all capitals need to have a dungeon. It gives the benefit of more room (and in GK's case the income from the mines) but gives another possible point of attack.

It could mean enemy siege units can topple the tower for all we know, but there's got to be a flaw somewhere, no matter how improbable it is for someone to be able to exploit it.

I wonder how big the tower actually is. The tower is defacto her entire capital.

[DevilDan]

"It is likely that Faq has no dungeon zone?" Surely it's safer to assume it has one, however minimal?

[raphfrk]

"It is likely that Faq has no dungeon zone?" Surely it's safer to assume it has one, however minimal?

I guess it is a matter of opinion. Faq is basically a tower with a wall protecting the lower part of it. All resources seem to be going into the tower.

However, the dungeon zone might be there and just effectively filled in with dirt, letting Jillian create a dungeon at a later time.

[gameboy1234]

"It is likely that Faq has no dungeon zone?" Surely it's safer to assume it has one, however minimal?

I think GK had a dungeon zone because of the extensive mines underneath it. I doubt every city has gems to mine, so it's unlikely to have either tunnels or a dungeon. For example, the new GK doesn't have a dungeon, it has a Jail popped as a building now. (Which is empty, because as Jack pointed out, Decryption is the new dungeon.)

I expect that Jails are for most cities, and only cities with mines have dungeons (or are likely to have dungeons). A dirtmancer might decrease the cost of mining and dungeons, and mines might decrease the cost of dungeons even more.

[DevilDan]

I tend to think of a "dungeon" as merely the areas or rooms, whatever their function, located underground and below the tower.

Seeing as capturing units and interrogating them is possible in Erf, why wouldn't everyone want a literal dungeon just in case, though?

[gameboy1234]

I tend to think of a "dungeon" as merely the areas or rooms, whatever their function, located underground and below the tower.

Works for me.

Seeing as capturing units and interrogating them is possible in Erf, why wouldn't everyone want a literal dungeon just in case, though?

Not all sides may resort to Wanda's methods of "interrogation", hence the dungeon might not be useful for them. (Now I'm using "dungeon" to mean something different than just underground rooms.) The jail cell seems to serve the same purpose, sans cat-o-nine-tails.

[DevilDan]

One would imagine that the atmosphere of a proper dungeon would be more conducive to any form of interrogation than a simple jail cell in the middle of the city.

[Lightbender]

Assuming that higher level cities produce more resources, now that he has the schmuckers for it Stanley could upgrade all the conquered cities to, say, level 4, and make them easier to defend in case of a RCC Mk 2 counter-strike.

I'm new around here (been reading for a while) but to me this seems like a waste of schmuckers and whatever other resources it would take. You upgrade your main city for efficiency reasons and to protect your leader (Stanley dies, you're booped) but other than that, the primary reason to gain cities is for the resources right? Since we're clearly not dealing with an arbitrarily large amount of turns for Gobwin Knob (The other sides will move against them sometime), it would seem better to spend the resources gained from those cities on your military forces instead of upgrading the cities (by the time you saw a return from upgrading it might be too late).

[DevilDan]

I'm new around here (been reading for a while) but to me this seems like a waste of schmuckers and whatever other resources it would take. You upgrade your main city for efficiency reasons and to protect your leader (Stanley dies, you're booped) but other than that, the primary reason to gain cities is for the resources right? Since we're clearly not dealing with an arbitrarily large amount of turns for Gobwin Knob (The other sides will move against them sometime), it would seem better to spend the resources gained from those cities on your military forces instead of upgrading the cities (by the time you saw a return from upgrading it might be too late).

I quite agree. A city's walls are apparently only as good as the number of troops defending it, and I doubt that Stanley is interested in making each city impregnable to the detriment of his offensive capabilities.

[cloudbreaker]

Whether Faq has a dungeon, prison, both, or neither, I bet Jillian could design a pretty good one seeing as how she seems to have spent so much time in them.

As for getting ground-based large-scale siege engines to Faq, there are two other cities near by. GK could conquer those first and build siege nearby. That's assuming the nearby terrain is suitable for travel.

Also, Jillian might become a mom? That seems... odd.

[name lips]

I'm new around here (been reading for a while) but to me this seems like a waste of schmuckers and whatever other resources it would take. You upgrade your main city for efficiency reasons and to protect your leader (Stanley dies, you're booped) but other than that, the primary reason to gain cities is for the resources right? Since we're clearly not dealing with an arbitrarily large amount of turns for Gobwin Knob (The other sides will move against them sometime), it would seem better to spend the resources gained from those cities on your military forces instead of upgrading the cities (by the time you saw a return from upgrading it might be too late).

I quite agree. A city's walls are apparently only as good as the number of troops defending it, and I doubt that Stanley is interested in making each city impregnable to the detriment of his offensive capabilities.

I'm not sure I agree... In every civ-type game I've played, it's suicidal to simply upgrade a single city. Every city can be as good as the capital with a bit of investment. If your capital can support an army of 20 units, then 5 fully upgraded cities can support an army of 100 units. Upgraded, they can produce enough money and units to more than cover their own defense.

[dholm]

That's pretty moot, taking the Arkenpliers into consideration -- decrypted units do not cost upkeep.

[LordDarksea]

Reading some of those posts above, I keep thinking of Schrödinger's Dungeon... maybe Jillian could get some cat-girls for it

[raphfrk]

That's pretty moot, taking the Arkenpliers into consideration -- decrypted units do not cost upkeep.

Presumably, upgraded cities have improved production speeds. It seems unlikely that upgrades are purely for defensive reasons.

1 level 2 city might match the production output of 2 level 2 cities.

Even if the effect isn't that strong, upgrading a level 1 city to level 4 might be equivalent of capturing another city in terms of production.

Also, even if it is only defensive, it is likely that GK will need to protect itself against a counterstrike. The decrypted strike force can only be in 1 place at once. If they split, they lose a large chunk of their bonus due to both Wanda and the Arkenpliers.

[DevilDan]

I quite agree. A city's walls are apparently only as good as the number of troops defending it, and I doubt that Stanley is interested in making each city impregnable to the detriment of his offensive capabilities.

I'm not sure I agree... In every civ-type game I've played, it's suicidal to simply upgrade a single city. Every city can be as good as the capital with a bit of investment. If your capital can support an army of 20 units, then 5 fully upgraded cities can support an army of 100 units. Upgraded, they can produce enough money and units to more than cover their own defense.

We don't know the exact relationship between a city's size/level, the resources it can provide, and the units it can create. We know, for example, that some have rich farms around them and that Ansom thought this was important. Stanley would ideally make upgrade decisions based on the strategic importance of a city, the cost-benefit equation in regards to resources, the resources he needs or wants, and the units he needs or wants.

"More than cover their own defense" is a difficult statement. A city can always be conquered: how much you spend on its defense is a balance between multiple factors, including what else you'd rather be doing with that money or those troops.

[Yosarian]

I know the normal way to do things is to pop siege units in cities, but I wonder if Parson might manage to use his own knowledge from our world to do what they really did in medieval times and just build the siege equipment in the field near the castle out of nearby trees. Perhaps having a Twoll do naturally stuffamancy to help him create some of the small parts for a catapult?