Design: Fort Rebalance and Improvement

[Edmon]

Document Goals:
1) Forts actually useful to "Gamers" subtype of player.
2) Forts consistant with world logic for "Roleplayer" and "Casual" subtype of player.
3) Forts provide net benefit for "Casual" and "Roleplayer" subtype of player.
4) Resolve ZoC type problems for AI and players.

Constraints:
1) It is not wanted to be the case that it is desirable to have a Fort in every province.
2) Forts restricting movement in a consistant way is a developer design goal.

Current Implimentation Problems:
1) Fort is not mathematically nor tactically useful, so they will never be built by "Gamer" subtype players. "Gamer" subtype player will quickly realise this and delete/remove all of their forts.
2) Knowing that forts are sub-optimal, "Gamer" subtype players will often annihilate each other due to a lack of defenses, as well as crushing "Roleplayer" and "Casual" subtype players much more easily, due to the military and economic negative impacts of forts on such players.
3) Forts weaken all A.I. players considerably, by stripping them of the money they need to have a competitive military. It can actually cause, in some cases, the complete economic collapse of an A.I. nation.
4) Zone of Control is inconsistant and frustrating for players to deal with. It also frustrates the AI in certain cases, causing undesirable behaviour.

Proposed Changes:
1) Revise Fort cost down to 100G/level. This will price it at just slightly more expensive than the mercenaries needed to siege it. We do want to favour attacking over defense, but not so considerably. This will make a fort consistantly priced with other buildings.

2) The cost to maintain a fort will decrease to 0.25G per fort. This will make them less economically damaging to all types of players and the A.I. This pricing will ensure that forts will not be built in all provinces as it will still present some level of economic damage. "Gamer" Subtype players are still likely to delete many or all of their forts, but it is less rewarding and possibly more tactically punishing to do so. The chances of A.I. economic meltdown due to forts is greatly reduced.

3) Forts will prevent movement past themselves only. So if you move into a fort from any tile, your only move will be to go back to the tile from which you came while the fort stands. The idea will be to make a "wall" of forts. Their functionality on movement is more obvious, more realistic for "Roleplayer" subtypes. Forts on their own can be circumvented easily, by going around them. ZoC inconsistances are eliminated. Since the only available move into a hostile fort, is to move away from it into the previous tile, problems with movement from "fort to fort to fort" will also be eliminated. "Great wall of China" is now a thing.

4) A relief army arriving to assist a besieged allied Fort shall be considered the defender. Conferring useful tactical advantage for "Gamer" subtype players to exploit. This will likely also benefit other player types to some degree.

Other notes:
1) Simplification of existing rules is also a benefit.
2) Possible graphical change to show (an arrow?) from where an army attacked a fort (and thus the tile to which they may retreat).
3) If the attack is from a water tile and the transports are gone, do we wipe the attacker out? This would be the most consistant move, but also very punishing.

 

[grommile]

Direct income from internal production is pretty low in the early and mid game, once again unless you are massive or have acquired some nice mercantilism bonuses.

A province with a half-decent trade good (iron, copper, cloth) will yield, on day one, production income in the general vicinity of 60% of its tax income.

 

[Edmon]

A province with a half-decent trade good (iron, copper, cloth) will yield, on day one, production income in the general vicinity of 60% of its tax income.

Do you mean 60% of it's tax income if production = tax? So for example, if a province is both 4 tax and 4 production? There is no reliable general case rule you can give for trade or production that'd apply to all countries (or even a majority of countries) uniformly. Every countries production and trade situation is unique, you can't balance a uniform system around something that isn't uniform. Forts are a flat cost and tax is generally speaking, a flat bonus.

Even at 0.25g / month, I still think Forts are pretty punishing. If you subtract 0.25g for every province a country has, to simulate the mad desire to have a Fort in every province, most countries will be running a debt if they are also sustaining a maximum force limit army (which is what the AI and most players will do). However, small countries will relatively be less punished than larger ones. Which actually makes a nice change from all the changes that tend to favour larger countries.

We are looking for a balance between it being desirable to have a fort in every province and the current situation where it is desirable to obliterate all forts except in the capital. I am all ears to costing suggestions if you don't think 0.25g/month is a good compromise.

 

[grommile]

We are looking for a balance between it being desirable to have a fort in every province and the current situation where it is desirable to obliterate all forts except in the capital. I am all ears to costing suggestions if you don't think 0.25g/month is a good compromise.

0.25g/month for a basic fort sounds superficially reasonable. Perhaps someone should roll up a mod and share the results of its outcomes?

 

[sparta105]

How about this:

Level 1 fort (castle):
- cost to build: 150g
- maintenance: 0.25g/month

Level 2 fort (bastion):
- cost to build: 200g
- maintenance: 0.5g/month

Level 3 fort (star fort)
- cost to build: 300g
- maintenace: 1g/month

Level 4 fort (fortress):
- cost to build: 500g
- maintenace: 2g/month

Actual prices require testing to be balanced but I don't think these are unreasonable.

 

[Ilightmaster]

Proposed Changes:
1) Revise Fort cost down to 100G/level. This will price it at just slightly more expensive than the mercenaries needed to siege it. We do want to favour attacking over defense, but not so considerably. This will make a fort consistantly priced with other buildings.

2) The cost to maintain a fort will decrease to 0.25G per fort. This will make them less economically damaging to all types of players and the A.I. This pricing will ensure that forts will not be built in all provinces as it will still present some level of economic damage. "Gamer" Subtype players are still likely to delete many or all of their forts, but it is less rewarding and possibly more tactically punishing to do so. The chances of A.I. economic meltdown due to forts is greatly reduced.

3) Forts will prevent movement past themselves only. So if you move into a fort from any tile, your only move will be to go back to the tile from which you came while the fort stands. The idea will be to make a "wall" of forts. Their functionality on movement is more obvious, more realistic for "Roleplayer" subtypes. Forts on their own can be circumvented easily, by going around them. ZoC inconsistances are eliminated. Since the only available move into a hostile fort, is to move away from it into the previous tile, problems with movement from "fort to fort to fort" will also be eliminated. "Great wall of China" is now a thing.

4) A relief army arriving to assist a besieged allied Fort shall be considered the defender. Conferring useful tactical advantage for "Gamer" subtype players to exploit. This will likely also benefit other player types to some degree.

1) It should remain the same price at cost but i propose that it prevent a province from being looted like half of it.

2) Montly price should be scale on the level of the fort up to 1 per month a max level.

3) One question what happen when you siege down a fort and there are two other adjacent to the first one. You can go through ? If so i agree with that.

4) Mmmok

You didn't mention how it would deal with provinces without forts.

 

[Grand Historian]

I can agree with both sides of the argument in this; forts are indeed useful (and underrated, much like Prestige NI's), but there's still an undeniable advantage in swarming an enemy in mercenaries and Forts can be prohibitive.

How about this:

Level 1 fort (castle):
- cost to build: 150g
- maintenance: 0.25g/month

Level 2 fort (bastion):
- cost to build: 200g
- maintenance: 0.5g/month

Level 3 fort (star fort)
- cost to build: 300g
- maintenace: 1g/month

Level 4 fort (fortress):
- cost to build: 500g
- maintenace: 2g/month

Actual prices require testing to be balanced but I don't think these are unreasonable.

Seems balanced to me - and a good idea.

 

[kakatua]

"Forts are no useful for gamer players" You never played a single great multiplayer in your life.
Trying to balance the game in single player is a waste, because we cant balance player vs IA.
I value the effort to make the ZoCs and Forts a more logical thing, but your balancing is entirely incorrect.

 

[Edmon]

"Forts are no useful for gamer players" You never played a single great multiplayer in your life.
Trying to balance the game in single player is a waste, because we cant balance player vs IA.
I value the effort to make the ZoCs and Forts a more logical thing, but your balancing is entirely incorrect.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_true_Scotsman

I'm pretty sure I've had plenty of "Great" multiplayer games, thanks. However you define that.

Optimal players don't make, nor keep Forts except in very specific and rare cases. This is due to the snowballing economical nature of the game. Prehaps you should watch videos of competitive players playing something like Starcraft to understand why defences, even without maintenance costs, rarely if ever get made.

 

[zdlugasz]

Regarding ZoC movement, I will put here something I proposed many times before (before Cossacks changes):

1. you can move toward enemy fort (original rules) which means
- from neutral/your province you can move to any neighbouring province
2. from occupied province you can move to any controlled/neutral province, ZoC blocks movement toward enemy controlled provinces only
3. you can go back

 

[kakatua]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_true_Scotsman

I'm pretty sure I've had plenty of "Great" multiplayer games, thanks. However you define that.

Optimal players don't make, nor keep Forts except in very specific and rare cases. This is due to the snowballing economical nature of the game. Prehaps you should watch videos of competitive players playing something like Starcraft to understand why defences, even without maintenance costs, rarely if ever get made.

You should read again that fallacy.
And your comparison to Starcraft, I can see every Terran build Planetary Fortresses after second base, which is the almost the best comparison to a fort.
It protect a zone, normally a fount of resourses(beside give no damage in return in EU4), has a high cost, control your enemy movement(in starcraft, control your too because concavicites), and give you time to prepare a defense, because u cant properly defend every possible flank. Mech strategy...
Of course if u put a Planetary Fortress from your first Central Command you'll be snowballed.

 

[Milith]

Prehaps you should watch videos of competitive players playing something like Starcraft to understand why defences, even without maintenance costs, rarely if ever get made.

I've got a couple issues with that line of thought.

1. According to you, building static defenses is pretty much always suboptimal in strategy games, so why even bother trying to balance them. If you believe that, on the contrary, defensive structures can be balanced, then perhaps the issue with defenses in SC2 is balance, not the concept of defense, so all in all talking about SC2 is irrelevant.
2. Competitive Starcraft is a 1v1 game, while EU4 is more of a free for all. And guess what, when you play FFA Starcraft, the optimal strategy becomes expanding your economic base while deterring the other players with static defenses, in the hope that they will kill each other instead of you.

You still haven't addressed my arguments about forts serving as a deterrent in the FFA environment that is multiplayer EU4, instead you always go back to unrealistic 1v1 scenarios to justify your point of view. Tell me, would you rather attack someone with no forts and 60% of your army, which means you can possibly end the war in a year or two, or someone with 50% of your army and a ton of forts, who can make the war last 10 to 20 years while he looks for allies and/or sows dissent in your country?

 

[Edmon]

I've got a couple issues with that line of thought.

1. According to you, building static defenses is pretty much always suboptimal in strategy games, so why even bother trying to balance them. If you believe that, on the contrary, defensive structures can be balanced, then perhaps the issue with defenses in SC2 is balance, not the concept of defense, so all in all talking about SC2 is irrelevant.
2. Competitive Starcraft is a 1v1 game, while EU4 is more of a free for all. And guess what, when you play FFA Starcraft, the optimal strategy becomes expanding your economic base while deterring the other players with static defenses, in the hope that they will kill each other instead of you.

You still haven't addressed my arguments about forts serving as a deterrent in the FFA environment that is multiplayer EU4, instead you always go back to unrealistic 1v1 scenarios to justify your point of view. Tell me, would you rather attack someone with no forts and 60% of your army, which means you can possibly end the war in a year or two, or someone with 50% of your army and a ton of forts, who can make the war last 10 to 20 years while he looks for allies and/or sows dissent in your country?

I'm not addressing your point about Fort's deterring other players from attacking you because it is nonsense. Forts to do not deter good players from attacking you, having an enormous army does that. Having allies and friends that will cover you does that. Ability to get away with the war without interference does that. Forts are the very last thing I think about when I hit the declare war button, other than the thought that your fort in the mountains by my boarder is going to lead me to so very easy warscore and your going to have much less army projection to defend it with.

Defences in Starcraft are more complex, but the general case that you don't want to make them if you can at all avoid it remains true. It becomes not true when:
1) You know the other player has given up economic growth to build for an attack. In which case, he must get damage done your economy -now- to prevent your victory later.
2) You reach the unit limit of 200/200, so then defences become an optimal way to increase military capability, if only slightly.
3) Defences provide something an army cannot easily, the key example is usually detection.

Unlike in EUIV, defences in Starcraft can actually help you to win fights. But they only work if you know the other player -must- attack as per point 1).

Starcraft II is like this:
If they attack, I defend.
If they defend, I expand.
If they expand, I attack.

EUIV is like this:
If they attack, I attack and it's a stalemate.
If they defend, I expand.
If they expand, I also expand.

Thus, the only ways to win are to constantly expand until someone forces an attack. If you choose to "defend" by building forts, I use that money to expand and I win.

This is naturally very general case, but will hold true. You can believe me or you can respectfully disagree. But what I've said here is the honest to god truth and I can find you many top level pro gamers who will tell you the exact same thing word-for-word about any strategy game.

Until you understand why it is true, you will consistantly be beaten in games by people who do understand the concepts to be true and then exploit them fully. You'll probably hear them use phases like "Never float" and talk about stuff like "Tempo" more than actual strategy. In some ways, the actual tactics can take a back seat to the raw math that is "aggressive snowballing".

I can start anywhere in the world in EUIV and have almost half the planet in 80 years or so if I remain unmolested by a player. At that point, if you've not done the same, it doesn't matter how many forts you've got.

 

[Milith]

I used to play SC2 at a Masters level and I'm very aware of the concepts you're talking about, but they don't tell the whole story in this context. My entire point hinges on the fact that EU4 is an FFA game and you keep ignoring it, this conversation is starting to get frustrating so I think we will indeed have to agree to disagree.

 

[Edmon]

I used to play SC2 at a Masters level and I'm very aware of the concepts you're talking about, but they don't tell the whole story in this context. My entire point hinges on the fact that EU4 is an FFA game and you keep ignoring it, this conversation is starting to get frustrating so I think we will indeed have to agree to disagree.

It being an FFA has nothing to do with the game at all. Your success in an FFA situation where some or all players can attack you early on is entirely down to your abilities in social manipulation, social engineering and your social status within the group of players. Your fate will be entirely down to your ability to persuade people to not attack you (or attack others and not you).

 

[kakatua]

Being a FFA has everything with the game.
In a 1v1 you know who will attack you and who you will attack. Ever.
In a FFA you need basic defense in every flank to give you time to join your defenses and counter-attack. It give you time to finish a early war before be blitzkrieged and almost fully occupied. It can(and probably will) avoid all your enemies to join their armies. It's Napoleon strategy. Divide and conquer.
And, again, in a map full of players, the countries without exploration are locked to "If they expand, I expand". IA doesnt pass from 1550 in Europe. To explorers, forts give you time to bring back your armies from colonies.

 

[Crenickator]

Being a FFA has everything with the game.
In a 1v1 you know who will attack you and who you will attack. Ever.
In a FFA you need basic defense in every flank to give you time to join your defenses and counter-attack. It give you time to finish a early war before be blitzkrieged and almost fully occupied. It can(and probably will) avoid all your enemies to join their armies. It's Napoleon strategy. Divide and conquer.
And, again, in a map full of players, the countries without exploration are locked to "If they expand, I expand". IA doesnt pass from 1550 in Europe. To explorers, forts give you time to bring back your armies from colonies.

But as he was saying before, the cost and the way forts work now do not give you much of an advantage, even when they slow down the enemy, because of the way attacker penalties currenttly work in favor of someone seiging, and the cost of forts is such that it would literally be more cost effective to keep an army parked in your homeland rather than blanket it with forts.

 

[kakatua]

The problem about the attacker get the terrain bonus are real. It make a fort in mountain give only a time and attrition gain, but if the enemy has free time to waste time there, it is undefensible.
If you give the defensive bonus to the defender, it becomes overpower. You will never siege a fort in mountain, because it can take 2~3 years of commitment of troops and the enemy can only came and win easily. No bonus to the siege army will be enough.

About the end of ZoCs, a fort in every border province and the low cost, do you remember the times of siege every province, right? You can recruit 7 infantry mercs and maintain 2 with the money of this "new forts". Tell me how 2 infantry will make such a difference in a 100k+ war than a fort. It doesnt help you to isolate enemies, or make them have to attack you in a bad terrain, or anything else. 2 infantry is less than a 1 variation in the dice roll in the hundreds of dice rolls in a war like that.
The actual ZoC is a mess, with overlap and the free walk between 2 neighbors forts, a lot of stackwipes because siege race and the bonus to the siege army). It is still a mess in the sense of 2 armies in the same siege, coming from different directions, can walk together, but this proposal doesnt solve it too.

 

[Atlantians]

Ideas for OP:

-Broken armies should ignore the fort movement constraints and flee to nearest allied fort away from enemy capital.

-You should not be able to manually retreat an army except into an adjacent controlled or allied province.

 

[Atlantians]

Have you generated models to suggest that this is the appropriate cost for small/medium/large nations? If you pulled the number out of your arse, then it's just a number... if you have math to backup your claims, it'll hold more sway, IMO.

Larger nations with more provinces would need considerably more forts.

 

[Dark Kain]

Proposed Changes:
1) Revise Fort cost down to 100G/level. This will price it at just slightly more expensive than the mercenaries needed to siege it. We do want to favour attacking over defense, but not so considerably. This will make a fort consistantly priced with other buildings.

2) The cost to maintain a fort will decrease to 0.25G per fort. This will make them less economically damaging to all types of players and the A.I. This pricing will ensure that forts will not be built in all provinces as it will still present some level of economic damage. "Gamer" Subtype players are still likely to delete many or all of their forts, but it is less rewarding and possibly more tactically punishing to do so. The chances of A.I. economic meltdown due to forts is greatly reduced.

3) Forts will prevent movement past themselves only. So if you move into a fort from any tile, your only move will be to go back to the tile from which you came while the fort stands. The idea will be to make a "wall" of forts. Their functionality on movement is more obvious, more realistic for "Roleplayer" subtypes. Forts on their own can be circumvented easily, by going around them. ZoC inconsistances are eliminated. Since the only available move into a hostile fort, is to move away from it into the previous tile, problems with movement from "fort to fort to fort" will also be eliminated. "Great wall of China" is now a thing.

4) A relief army arriving to assist a besieged allied Fort shall be considered the defender. Conferring useful tactical advantage for "Gamer" subtype players to exploit. This will likely also benefit other player types to some degree.

Other notes:
1) Simplification of existing rules is also a benefit.
2) Possible graphical change to show (an arrow?) from where an army attacked a fort (and thus the tile to which they may retreat).
3) If the attack is from a water tile and the transports are gone, do we wipe the attacker out? This would be the most consistant move, but also very punishing.

I like overall the ideas on paper, but proposal #4 is overkill.
The sieger is already forced to be static for a long time on a mountain regon, if the siegee is granted an automatic and massive combat bonus in the province such province would become virtually inconquerable and so gamer type will try to own a single fort build on a mountain capital region to make themselves virtually immune to conquest.
I really like #1,2 and 3.
Especially #3 let's remove the Zoc shenaningans and the game will become much more enjoyable.