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.

 

[Atlantians]

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.

Well, maybe instead, having a Fort increases the defense bonus of units stationed at the province, and attacking an enemy sieging army on a fort reduces the terrain defence bonus that army gets?

 

[Dark Kain]

Well, maybe instead, having a Fort increases the defense bonus of units stationed at the province, and attacking an enemy sieging army on a fort reduces the terrain defence bonus that army gets?

That would be better.

 

[Edmon]

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.

Number 4 is working as intended.

1) Of course if I value defence, my capital will be in the mountains and it will have a fort there. This should be the case now because it simply makes sense logically.
2) It doesn't make them immune to conquest:
> If they hiding on their capital on the mountains, siege out the rest of the country first.
> If they are hiding somewhere else hunt down their army and wipe that out first or surround the capital with stacks so they can't lift it easily.
> What is the wargoal? If it's not their capital and you can't straight up beat them in the mountains, just win the war goal and weaken them.
> It is doubtful that they are entirely a mountain nation unless they are tiny, grow elsewhere and then go back and crush them with numbers.
3) It costs them money, capitals are usually preferred in places with excellent trade goods or important centres of trade for the economic benefit.

I doubt with the changes that it'd be optimal to simply have a capital fort, since it's of benefit now to have forts to hold the enemy still so you can intercept them and get combat benefits.

 

[Dark Kain]

Number 4 is working as intended.

1) Of course if I value defence, my capital will be in the mountains and it will have a fort there. This should be the case now because it simply makes sense logically.
2) It doesn't make them immune to conquest:
> If they hiding on their capital on the mountains, siege out the rest of the country first.
> If they are hiding somewhere else hunt down their army and wipe that out first or surround the capital with stacks so they can't lift it easily.
> What is the wargoal? If it's not their capital and you can't straight up beat them in the mountains, just win the war goal and weaken them.
> It is doubtful that they are entirely a mountain nation unless they are tiny, grow elsewhere and then go back and crush them with numbers.
3) It costs them money, capitals are usually preferred in places with excellent trade goods or important centres of trade for the economic benefit.

I doubt with the changes that it'd be optimal to simply have a capital fort, since it's of benefit now to have forts to hold the enemy still so you can intercept them and get combat benefits.

The -1000 modifier for asking land without occupying any fort would still make you virtually unconquerable. Of course you can still be on the losing side of a war and being weakened at the peace table, but still it would be virtually impossible to directly conquer land from you, even if the wargoal is occupied.
It's not that building mountain forts would be advantageous: only mountain forts would ever make sense, because of the massive damage advantage that any possible direct confrontation would inflict to the siegee. Building even a single fort on plains would suddendly make your nation more vulnerable to conquest, while at the same time reducing the potential damage you can inflict to your enemy with direct confrontation on your home ground.

Maybe it is working as intended but, in my humble opinion, it is not a good design.

Having forts just reduce the province terrain penality for their owner would be a better way to fix mountain forts issues.

 

[Edmon]

The -1000 modifier for asking land without occupying any fort would still make you virtually unconquerable. Of course you can still be on the losing side of a war and being weakened at the peace table, but still it would be virtually impossible to directly conquer land from you, even if the wargoal is occupied.

1) The -1000 goes away after a while if you occupy the war goal and get it to +25%
2) Gamers do this "capital only fort" thing to prevent you getting Warscore now, except they do it in farmland where attacking troops will enjoy +25% morale and no terrain penalties. So really, there is no change in that one specific case anyway.
3) This would encourage the actual building of a line of forts to prevent movement, don't look at one change in a vacuum, a single fort cannot project ZoC in the changes, so bypassing it to get damage done will be much easier if it is alone.

 

[DukeofSerbia]

Hi.

In general I support you and I tested it for my next mod. I run a lot of observe mode games. I did the following:

1)
(common/buildings/00_buildings.txt)
Fort prices from 200/400/600/800 lowered to 150/300/450/600.

2)
(common/defines.lua)
FORTRESS_COST = 0.5 lowered to 0.25 i.e. monthly maintenance lowered from 1 ducat to 0.5.

Not like you radically proposed but still.

There are two distinct trends - Europe and ROTW.
In Europe, there is increased number of forts because higher income countries like to build them a bit more (Aragon like to build Great Wall of Pyrenees). And not only they build them more, sometimes they build forts in province right to the next one . But I noticed that there are always some countries which ignore forts even destroy them after conquering new provinces. So some parts of Europe are great walls and other lack them.
ROTW is more or less the same. Even rich countries like blobed Indian countries or blobed Andean/Chinese doesn't increasingly build them even they have money.

 

[Grand Historian]

ROTW is more or less the same. Even rich countries like blobed Indian countries or blobed Andean/Chinese doesn't increasingly build them even they have money.

That seems more like a problem with the AI than anything else.

 

[DukeofSerbia]

All right, after several runs (I will post later in strange screenshot thread), there is always one country which massively profit from this - Timurids!

Now they can afford army and its maintenance so they easily crush Persian rebels and not only that, they blob like crazy. Sadly, they don't expand into India even whole game have "Richies of India" mission because of the famous deadlock in India so they can't form Mughals.

 

[Grand Historian]

All right, after several runs (I will post later in strange screenshot thread), there is always one country which massively profit from this - Timurids!

Now they can afford army and its maintenance so they easily crush Persian rebels and not only that, they blob like crazy. Sadly, they don't expand into India even whole game have "Richies of India" mission because of the famous deadlock in India so they can't form Mughals.

Timurids easily crushing the rebels and blobbing like crazy doesn't seem like a benefit.

 

[Edmon]

Timurids easily crushing the rebels and blobbing like crazy doesn't seem like a benefit.

But this is exactly what a player does, sells all the forts and blobs out. It's an improvement because it's player-like.

 

[Atlantians]

Timurids easily crushing the rebels and blobbing like crazy doesn't seem like a benefit.

It allows for an historical outcome.

 

[Grand Historian]

But this is exactly what a player does, sells all the forts and blobs out. It's an improvement because it's player-like.

I think he meant that the Timurids keep their forts and still manage to pull it off.

 

[Edmon]

I think he meant that the Timurids keep their forts and still manage to pull it off.

Yeah, thats the point, you can keep them now and actually project military power properly.

 

[DukeofSerbia]

They still fail half time but not in 20-30 years as usually destroyed by Persian rebels. I would say they now mostly survive until around 1550.
Proof how forts destroy ecomony and AI just don't know to delete them when it should.

 

[grommile]

It allows for an historical outcome.

The historical outcome is that the Timurid empire collapsed under a mixture of internal and external pressures, allowing the White Sheep Turkmens to seize most of Iran in the 1470s.

Subsequently, in the 1520s, after seizing Samarkand for himself three times only to in turn lose it three times, a Timurid prince known as Babur seized the opportunity presented by chaos in the Sultanate of Delhi to set himself up with a sizeable kingdom.

 

[Edmon]

This was quoted today in another thread, so I'm bumping it up.

Still think it's the best solution. Seems like there is a "forts" thread every week.

 

[Crenickator]

I do have one question. While ZoC will no longer be applicable to armies, will it still apply to the seige-ability, let's say, of nearby provinces? Unless I'm mistaken, a nearby fort will still automatically flip nearby un-forted provinces to the fort's owner. I do like this mechanic, and with better fort system in general, I'd like to see a blanket of forts across your inner homelands being a viable tactic, in addition to the wall at the border. This also helps diminish the desire to delete every single fort in your defensive line as soon as your border moves. Perhaps a bonus to unrest reduction or some other passive bonus to adjacent provinces to sweeten the deal?

 

[Chaos_TLW]

I do have one question. While ZoC will no longer be applicable to armies, will it still apply to the seige-ability, let's say, of nearby provinces? Unless I'm mistaken, a nearby fort will still automatically flip nearby un-forted provinces to the fort's owner. I do like this mechanic, and with better fort system in general, I'd like to see a blanket of forts across your inner homelands being a viable tactic, in addition to the wall at the border. This also helps diminish the desire to delete every single fort in your defensive line as soon as your border moves. Perhaps a bonus to unrest reduction or some other passive bonus to adjacent provinces to sweeten the deal?

How about a cost decrease to fort maintenance in case the province is controlled by the Nobility(or equivalent) Estate? Perhaps balance it with a slight increase in base autonomy for the province, to encourage setting up lines of defence in unproductive border regions instead of your economic heartlands.

 

[Edmon]

I do have one question. While ZoC will no longer be applicable to armies, will it still apply to the seige-ability, let's say, of nearby provinces? Unless I'm mistaken, a nearby fort will still automatically flip nearby un-forted provinces to the fort's owner. I do like this mechanic, and with better fort system in general, I'd like to see a blanket of forts across your inner homelands being a viable tactic, in addition to the wall at the border. This also helps diminish the desire to delete every single fort in your defensive line as soon as your border moves. Perhaps a bonus to unrest reduction or some other passive bonus to adjacent provinces to sweeten the deal?

In theory, if you made a wall, then provinces inside it would be protected and thus unable to be sieged. Those outside the fort wall would be vunerable to attack, which kind of makes sense. Though, I am not against forts unsieging provinces near them, it could be left in and there wouldnt be much of an issue.

 

[Crenickator]

In theory, if you made a wall, then provinces inside it would be protected and thus unable to be sieged. Those outside the fort wall would be vunerable to attack, which kind of makes sense. Though, I am not against forts unsieging provinces near them, it could be left in and there wouldnt be much of an issue.

It's just that I'd prefer there be more to the equation than "Get through the border wall of forts and you have free run of the country". While your suggestion is a great improvement, I do foresee every player building a line of border forts, and tearing them down and rebuilding every time the border shifts, and there being little to no reason to build a fort anywhere else but your capital. It would be a waste of money to do otherwise.
I would like to see something of a defense in-depth, where even though the border forts have been sieged, the country still has strong points within that must then be seiged to truly control the country. It's just that since these forts may never see combat, especially to a skilled player, they need additional benefits to justify the cost but not so much that you can just put a fort in every province. A passive benefit to all provinces within the ZoC seems like a good tradeoff, and make the benefit non-stackable with other forts, and you provide a good, useful way to make forts worthwhile almost everywhere, in differing roles.
On the border, you have the wall of forts that prevents enemy movement. In the corelands, you have a blanket of control zones that, while not preventing movement, still hamper the enemy.
The question then, is what would make forts worth it to put in home territory, where they may never see combat?
Reduced unrest or autonomy in the ZoC might be a good idea, allowing you to keep some of your border forts active to help pacify the newly conquered lands beyond the old border.
Additional loyalty and influence to Estates being given control of a fort province could be another.
A small bump to army tradition, maybe?
Then there's always straight manpower, but we'd be stepping on the toes of the Barracks line.
I'm just spitballing.