Question on Sieging and Castle Defence

[onomastikon]

Hello, still new here, excuse me if this is obvious, but I see some confusing things when I enter a province with an enemy fortress or an enemy's army enters mine. First of all, the units I have there apparently dont "defend" the castle as I thought they would; when I click on the commanders, I get the choice of changing their activities to "defend castle" or "break siege", and the pop-up info for "break siege" has something to do with recalling my pretender god (as if he died?) -- what is the deal? (Note: I am still playing the demo, waiting for game...) When I view the battle, I dont see the castle walls either.
Also, when attacking a foreign castle, I get mixed feedback as to what is going on (sometimes I hurt their walls, sometimes not, sometimes I win vs enemies, sometimes there are none there).

I checked out Cherry's thread, but see no info on this -- any clues as to the breakdown of what actually goes on when armies meet at a fortification?

Also, are some units better at raiding castles / defending them than others? (I know some are specifically for that, like some tunnelers I ran up against (forget their name), but does every race have something that tends to work better (e.g., blunt objects vs. archers?)

Also, is there any way to repair castle walls, or is this done automatically (cherry's guide mentions repair, but not how).

Last side question: When I defeat an enemy castle (or vice versa), do I need to search for magic sites or are they automatically there?

thank you

[ January 07, 2004, 08:29: Message edited by: onomastikon ]

[General Tacticus]

The default order for units in a province with a castle is "defend castle", meaning they stay inside and man the walls, and won't challenge an invading force. If you change it to "patrol province", then and only then will they meet the invaders.

Once the invasion force is in command of the province, it starts sieging the castle. This takes time and men, and there is a repair factor too (I have had both "you can't damage the wall" and "the enemy is repairing the walls faster thatn you damage it" reports). I don't know what the repair factor is, it probably has to do with defense value and/or number of units inside. It is done automatically.

During the siege, the besieged party can send their armies to attack the besiegers ("break siege" order). Or they can stay put and wait "defend castle".

Eventually, the walls will be breached. At that point the invaders can storm the castle. This result in a battle in the castle, complete with walls (if the castle has any), open gate (since the walls are breached), towers that fire arrows, and so forth. And both armies of course.

Some units are better at sieging, as you noticed (try ulm's engineer). Otherwise a militia is about as good as a Ulmian plate with shield, as far as I know. The bastle inside the castle is basically just another battle, although with a few twists, and mostly the usual considerations as to which armies are better apply. It depends on who besieges whom, what armies are defending, and so forth... Of course the walls add unique considerations...

Defeating a castle is like any other province in terms of sites : whatever the enemy knew about, you know. What he didn't know about is still hidden and need to be searched for. With the added twist that you don't know what the enemy searched for (well, you can guess). In the scenarios so far, everybody knows about every site at his capital, so if you capture a capital you don't have to search, but that may not always be true.

Originally posted by General Tacticus:
Otherwise a militia is about as good as a Ulmian plate with shield, as far as I know.

In dom1 the sieges were mostly based on strenght.
So, indeed, Ulm infantry (str 10) is only marginally better than militia (str 9).
Each turn of siege decreases a fortress defense value by a number of points equal to a difference between the number of defenders and besiegers. When the fortress defense value is reduced to zero the besieger may storm the castle.
Only the Strength is important (size does not matter) :
A unit with STR 5 = 0,2 point. Str 9 = 0,8 pt. Str 10 = 1 pt. Str 15 = 2,2 pts. Str 20 = 4 pts. Etc.
Flyers get +1 pt each. So, the weak black hawks (STR 5) are still average siege units (0,2 + 1 = 1,2).
Some units have a bonus (Halbardiers when defending, Sappers when besieging etc).
Mindless beings count only for 1/10th as defenders, but they have no penalty as besiegers.
The Wall Shaker adds 25 pts, and the Gate Cleaver adds 50 pts.

Dunno if this changed a lot in dom2 however.

Cheers