Err... sorry, I didn't like what I left this post before. Think that it was a mess, so I've re-did it.



One ting I've noticed is how easy is to take an enemy city (against AI), and how fast you can take all AI cities with only an army. I'm sure not he only one, I read it before (don't remember where) on this forum. Another thing which actually loses any sense is siege a city. I lots of people doing it? I think no. Why? Because if there's no garrisoned unit, you have to fight only against one, two or three milita units, which normally can compete with your 6-units army, which is generally far beyond in equipment and XP.



Then, why to siege a city, and why to put this option?



Looking at this techs I thought about what the devs have in mind when creating the siege option., take a glance:







All of them adds city defense cap (DC from now), with the exception of Medical center (fast healing units) and Infantry cantina (+1 militia). Even the vaulters specific tech adds DC:







As long as I know, what actually is doing the dense cap is adding health to garrisoned units, in a way that they don't start taking damage in their own health until the damage is greater than this DC, And I've read on this forums that a part of this, the damage doesn't stacks: if damage taken exceeds this DC, the unit doesn't start loosing its own health until the next turn.



Then, I asked again: why they did do it?

I think that the answer is: you'll defend you cities having units garrisoned in it. This units will have very high health if you build all the improvements giving DC, and a part from this they'll recover fast with Medeical Center and have the support of the militia (which in the actual game status can't defend a city by its own).



I think that if the AI or a player has units garrisoned on cities, and this units are gradually upgraded, you'll think twice before attacking the city without a previous siege, because probably you'll be facing an stronger army (this is an army similar to yours but with very higher health)



For all of this, my proposition to give a sense to siege are the following changes:

- Teach the AI to put units in city garrison, keep them updated accordingly to era and build the improvements that give bonus to garrisoned units.

- Teach the AI to keep this units reasonably upgraded.

- The actually queue mechanics that doesn't allow to built units when city garrison is at max CAP, changed to one that when city garrison is at max cap, any new build unit will be spawned as a new army with one unit (so usless to fight incoming armies without support, and if you're planning to put it into new army, you'd span it anyway).

- If army abandons the garrison to fight the conquering one, it loses the buffs.



I think that with this suggestions player will start sieges on cities instead of taking it attacking on the first turn, giving more challenges to them.



A part from the suggestions above, I think that the following can be good thing to think about:

- Make the garrisoned units cheaper to upgrade. Carefully, only reduce cost on dust, not strategic resources or any other thing needed. Also an specific requirement of being previously garrisoned for some turns, to avoid the idea garrison -- upgrade -- new upgraded cheaper army.

- Improve the techs/buildings that makes garrisoned units gain XP per turn.

- Have a tech/building that allous you to have 1-2 more units in a garrison than in a normal army.

- Give special abilities to armies when they are garrisoned, like +1defense/era or similar.

- Reduce the upkeep for garrisoned units.

The AI keeping troops garrisoned in their cities would certainly be a welcome addition. However, a few more ways to add additional militia units would also be welcome, so a reasonable defense against small armies could be maintained without the upkeep of a full army. Perhaps not enough to stop an attack, but enough to inflict notable casualties.



I've heard rumors that the combat system is due for a major overhaul, though, which might necessitate a complete overhaul of the siege system as well.

May be not teaching the AI to have a full army garrisoned in each city, but having 4 units garrisoned in a city+ 2 militia (3 in capital) + 40HP extra to everyone (60 for vaulters), provided you builded all defensive improvements, against a same era 6 units army, will give the attacker some reason to bring reinforcements or put a siege before attack the city, and this, with 4 garrisoned units up of 6 that you can have in army after meritocratic promotion.

I think that simply telling this to AI will change the one-turn city conquer mechanics, without doing much changes to actual game techs, buildings, etc...

You are suggesting that garrisoned units gain a "buff" (health or otherwise) from Defense Cap? And if the DC is reduced to below zero, the buff is removed and garrisoned units begin to lose health? I just wanted to make sure if I understand correctly

lo_fabre wrote:


- The actually queue mechanics that doesn't allow to built units when city garrison is at max CAP, changed to one that when city garrison is at max cap, any new build unit will be spawned as a new army with one unit (so usless to fight incoming armies without support, and if you're planning to put it into new army, you'd span it anyway).

- If army abandons the garrison to fight the conquering one, it loses the buffs.

I fully agree with both of these suggestions

lo_fabre wrote:
A part from the suggestions above, I think that the following can be good thing to think about:

- Make the garrisoned units cheaper to upgrade. Carefully, only reduce cost on dust, not strategic resources or any other thing needed. Also an specific requirement of being previously garrisoned for some turns, to avoid the idea garrison -- upgrade -- new upgraded cheaper army.

- Improve the techs/buildings that makes garrisoned units gain XP per turn.

- Have a tech/building that allous you to have 1-2 more units in a garrison than in a normal army.

- Give special abilities to armies when they are garrisoned, like +1defense/era or similar.

- Reduce the upkeep for garrisoned units.

I also agree with those ideas, especially to give the player manual control over upgrading militia as well as making them cost 50% less Dust (or even 60% +) to upgrade, which can be increased with certain buildings maybe?



because right now the militia are almost nothing but expensive meat shields. These suggestions are great cuz we are not making huge changes like "adding Defense Towers" (even though it would be really cool to have defense towers )

KrimsonVagus wrote:
You are suggesting that garrisoned units gain a "buff" (health or otherwise) from Defense Cap? And if the DC is reduced to below zero, the buff is removed and garrisoned units begin to lose health? I just wanted to make sure if I understand correctly

Yes, I think it works like this. If you attack a city without a previous siege, look at defending units, they have a grey part in health bar, and don't start loosing its own health until this grey bar disappears. I think this grey bar is corresponding to city DC.



If I'm wrong, I'll be glad someone corrects me. Thanks in advance.