Castle walls?

[Merry Jolkar]

What is the formula to determine how much damage is done to a castle wall in a siege? Some forts seem impentetrable. The enemy camps outside the walls, sieging them, but they are just too thick. Do the walls get repaired at a rate proportional to the damage they take?

Thanks much, Merry

[Sheap]

The answer to this question is (more or less) in the FAQ.

Short Version: The defender's siege ability is subtracted from the attacker's. The result is deducted from the strength of the walls. Castle walls don't "regenerate" unless the siege is lifted (in which case they are repaired fully), or a spell such as Arcane Masonry is used.

Siege ability is primarily based on the strength stat of the unit.

[Norfleet]

Originally posted by Sheap:
Castle walls don't "regenerate" unless the siege is lifted (in which case they are repaired fully), or a spell such as Arcane Masonry is used.

Castle walls will be fully repaired if the siege is broken and the province reverts back to the owner's hands. Castle walls *DO* regenerate if the defender's strength now exceeds the attacker's strength, such as if the attacker withdrew forces, the defender summoned or teleported in more units, the attacker was attacked and suffered casualties, or the attacker attempted to storm with some of his forces and failed.

[liga]

From Manual Addenda (and a thread somewhere in this forum)

Siege ability is something like ((besieger's strength)² / 100)+bonuses)

Bonuses are +1 for flying units, +1 for city guards

[Johan O]

Where the walls of a castle are broken down is determined by adding up the siege and defense factors of the attackers and defenders, respectively.

The base formula for that is the strength of the unit squared, divided by 100. Thus, a unit with 10 strength counts as 1.0, while a unit with 20 strength counts as 4.0. Some units get bonuses and minuses in the final score. For example, flying units get an automatic +1. Sappers get +5 (IIRC). Mindless units get their final score divided by 10 if defending. And some units (like the Man heavy infantry) get a castle defense bonus of +1.

Once the total scores for all the defending and attacking units are calculated, the difference (if the attackers get a higher number) is subtracted from the defense value of the castle. Once that number gets below 0, then the attackers can storm.

[Master Shake]

bye bye
Liga

[Vynd]

What happens if the besiegers are attacked and win? Does the siege continue as before? or does it start over? I ask because when this happens to me, I always get the "We have begun to beseige..." message, even though I started many turns ago. And if nothing else that makes it feel like it is taking longer.

[Norfleet]

If the besiegers are attacked, and defeat the attackers, the siege continues uninterrupted, with one exception: If the attackers included people who attacked by choosing "Break Siege", and as a result, nobody is left in the castle, the castle immediately falls without a storm. This is probably because if everyone charged out of the gates, nobody was left behind to close the gates behind them.

However, if the castle was empty to begin with, and attackers from outside the province failed to lift the siege, the siege continues uninterrupted.

[Sheap]

Reviving this thread (cost 5 death gems) to ask a related question about Arcane Masonry.

On turn 1, a castle's walls are breached. On turn 2, the defenders cast Arcane Masonry, while the attackers try to storm the castle. Does Arcane Masonry prevent the attack, or does it fail to work, or does it depend on something else (siege values of the armies?)

Also, in searching the forums, I found a Thread which implies that it doesn't work at all, or might even be counterproductive. Anyone know for sure if this is/was a problem or has been fixed?

[Norfleet]

The Arcane Masonry works, and will repair the walls....but it will not stop the attackers from storming. The walls, however, will be repaired in the relevant manner should the stormers be repelled, and there are still people outside besieging.

[HotNifeThruButr]

That formula seems unrealistic to me. Destroying things is much easier than repairing it. Can you think of a situation where ten guys on the outside take a catapult to the wall and launch rocks at it, which is how most people would try to break down a wall. Each time a rock from the catapult hits a wall, a dent is created and bricks are knocked from the wall, which is what I think catapult rocks tend to do to walls. When the defenders see a dent, say there's a hundred of them, they all swarm out to that place (and keep in mind that catapult rocks tend to hit the outside of the wall instead of the inside surface) and with bricks and mortar, repair it until it's good as new. The ten men outside can hurl as many rocks as they want, but the hundred in the castle will keep coming out and repairing the wall forever.

What if there was no siege engine involved, which I assume is the case because siege power is dependent on strength. Are the attackers going to take hammers or pound at a wall with their fists until it breaks down?

What exactly is the siege simulation simulating?

Edit: edited to make it more dev-friendly.

[ June 25, 2004, 13:06: Message edited by: HotNifeThruButr ]

[liga]

I think that is just a simulations ... during a real siege a lot of things could happens (siege machines, rocks, burning oli, big machines form inseide throwing on besiegers).

An easy way to simulate that is just count the number of biesiegers and people inside the catsle and compare ... if besiegers are more powerfull they could be abel to damage the walls, otherwise people inseide the catle are able to keep them far and make soma repair.

Using the strenght of the units make sense becouse usually during a siege strenght units are able to better than weaker ones ... but I think the intent of developers is just to find an easy formula to simulate, not to reproduce in details a siege

good play
Liga