19 replies to this topic

[Ridder Blauw]

¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤
SEE - Siege Weaponry & Monsters
¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤

Introduction

Siege weapons and monsters have always played an immensely important role in the BFME series, SEE in particular... although I was never fully satisfied by how it was all set up, there are a number of things that bother me concerning the destruction of an enemy base: why would it help to start swinging swords at a structure, stone or otherwise? Next up: why would you even bother shooting arrows at a structure? I can understand that it would help to have them be flaming arrows, but come on? There is like one or two faction in BFME that has wooden structures, plus with the new flaming arrows approach why even bother? What I could do with a siege weapon or monster could be matched with little more than one peasant horde... it was annoying. Therefore I have decided to show my ideal approach to sieges in SEE, please remember this is my opinion and is no way backed up by either Nazgûl or the SEE team.

DISCLAIMER: NOT ALL CONCERNS LISTED ABOVE APPLY TO SEE!

Chapter I: Structures
I've decided to start off with the structures, as I don't think starting with anything else could be justified. After all how can you talk about what you'll use to destroy structures when you haven't even talked about those. I must confess though, I can say with near certainty that some of the points listed below have been said to be my Nazgûl himself, I have added my own twist to it though.

Structures should be unattackable by anything but siege weaponry or monsters (trolls, giants, eagles and fellbeasts), and their health, like in BETA 4.7 should be quite high ranging from the lowest health for the resource structures to the highest health for the fortresses.

Also I propose that each and every structure in SEE is put under one of the following groups, each with one armor set:

Structure Armor Categories

• (1) Cloth (Harad), the weakest of structures, are perhaps by far the ones made up of tents, although here you could justify having units be able to attack it, and suggest not to do so due to balancing issues, unless you can find a solution to those. They are extremely vulnerable to both siege weaponry and monsters.
• (2) Wood (Rohan, Rhûn), quite weak though significantly stronger than cloth structures, they are quite vulnerable to both siege weaponry and monsters.
• (3) Rock/Earth/Stone Basic/Wood (Moria, Mordor, Lothlórien), the following structures have average armor, and provide decent protection against both siege weaponary and monsters.
• (4) Stone/Iron (Gondor, Isengard), above average, they provide great protection to both siege weaponry and monsters, although siege weaponry will remain at the upper hand compared to monsters.
• (5) Stone Advanced (Erebor), masters of stonework, the dwarves of Erebor, construct structures of exceptional qualities, not quickly torn down by both siege weaponary and monsters, both tactic and heavy siege weaponary will be required to take down there majestic structures.

I come to my conclusion on structures, stating my ideals above.

Chapter II: Monsters
As you will have read above, few monsters will also be applicable to use during sieges: trolls, giants, eagles and fellbeasts.

Trolls < Eagles < Fellbeasts < Giants

Italic = Applies towards rock throwing trolls!

As you can see above I have listed the order in which I rank their effectiveness against various structures, my reasoning for this is as following: although I believe both Eagles and Trolls have proven to posses amazing feats of strength, they will not be as effective against the defense of a well built structure. Fellbeasts came up next, earning their spot by their acts during the siege of Minas Tirith in which they aided immensely in ensuring it's capture. Lastly is the giants, they are of immense size and posses immense strength: weak structures like those of Harad, Rhûn or Rohan would not survive longer than a few moments against its power; Isengard, Gondor and Erebor however will take a while longer to take down, and I therefore would not charge at them with an army of Giants.

And so this chapter too draws to a conclusion, up next battering rams!

Chapter III: Battering Rams
This chapter concerns all battering rams, besides those of Isengard and Erebor.

A battering ram is a siege engine originating in ancient times and designed to break open the masonry walls of fortifications or splinter their wooden gates...

...Rams proved effective weapons of war because old fashioned wall-building materials such as stone and brick were weak in tension, and therefore prone to cracking when impacted with sufficient force. With repeated blows, the cracks would grow steadily until a hole was created. Eventually, a breach would appear in the fabric of the wall—enabling armed attackers to force their way through the gap and engage the inhabitants of the citadel.

As quoted above, battering rams seem effective especially when breaking open either walls or gates, proving most effective to the latter. Against structures it would probably be less effective, pointing towards the more obvious choice: catapults, trebuchets and their counterparts...

I wouldn't even waste a ram on the haradrim structures, as I don't really see how that would work out: although for the sake of balance don't make them go down on the first shot: perhaps the third would be more suitable. The other types of structures would probably prove more of a challenge, with their resistance rising exponentially, making them nearly useless towards dwarven craftsmanship.

To sum it all up, ideal during early game, use your rams to weaken the enemies defenses early, later use them to break open their gates and perhaps walls; but don't waste them trying to destroy a fortress.

Chapter IV: Ranged Siege Weaponry
This chapter concerns catapults and such sorts of all factions, besides Erebor and Isengard, as I'll be talking about them later. Ranged siege weaponry should function as an irreplaceable tool during both mid- and endgame, tearing down many structures with relative ease... Once again the resistance to ranged siege weaponry should rise exponentially, although they should remain useful to the very strongest of structures.

That as much wraps it up for ranged siege weaponry, only one more part remains, Erebor and Isengard.

Chapter V: Erebor and Isengard's Advanced Siege Weaponry
Much of what I've said before applies to both of these factions, there's only one key difference: Erebor and Isengard have a more various range siege weaponry, deadly siege weaponry.

Erebor, housing the masters of craftsmanship, can tear most structures down in a blink. Their siege weaponry has the highest accuracy of all, and rarely misses. Their array of siege weaponry is also cheaper than the other factions, granting them a bonus especially useful during early game.

Isengard on the other hand handles things differently, they are not scared of losing some accuracy for firepower, even if it results in allied casualties. Deadly, explosive and expensive siege weaponry is their advantage, often resulting in devastating consequences.

Conclusion

I hope you enjoyed reading what I have said above! I may expand upon this if I have the time and motivation, please don't forget to comment!

Edited by Ridder Blauw, 10 October 2011 - 04:18 PM.

[Arthadan]

Quite interesting. I share most of your thoughts, but there are some things I'd like to point:

As you have noted, swords and arrows are of no use against walls. In game, it means that once your enemy has built walls there is no reason for you to build anyting but siege machines (except some archers... damned Eagles and Fellbeasts!). In real life, however, it was enough to breach the walls and then the battle was fought mainly by infantry.

My point is that infantry should be able to "conquer" buildings, meaning they should be able to kill anyone inside so the enemy can't use it. I think it could be done in a similar way to capturing a neutral building (the unit gather around it and can do nothing for some seconds). After that, the building would be slightly damaged and "desactivated" (useless). The owner could "activate" it again repopulating it. This could be managed in two ways:

1) with a "repopulating" button when you click on the building and have one of your units near it.
2) sending a worker from your fortress

Personally, I prefer the first option. Repopulating should be cheap but slow.

Only buildings which could not be occupied this way would be the ones producing units.

So, you can breach the walls and then swarm in with your troops taking the most of the enemy buildings (then it has sense the enemy has also troops within his walls) but you have to destroy the fortress for example with siege machines.


Anyway, I'd make the construction of walls slower.

About monsters, I can't see how an Eagle or Fellbeast can actually damage a stone structure so I'd rather limit them to tents and wooden ones.

[Gollum]

I think a lot of the points you make are very very good. But if you think about it then wouldn't you have to make trebuchets etc. less vulnerable to swords and arrows I mean you could argue that they too are wooden/metallic structures. The only problem I see with this would be the imbalance. If there was a way to make it work I think siege could work the way you want it... But if siege is more of a late game "unit" and siege will become one of the only ways to destroy buildings you could make one game last for far longer than needed and cause some fans to turn away from the mod. If siege is going to be so dominant I find it hard to see the need for units such as swordsmen and archers and cavalry if I could just get siege and say gandalf and aragorn and destroy people. I think where you are thinking is great and has a lot of potential but for me at least, I would need to see it in action

[Radspakr Wolfbane]

SEE already has the element to a point.
The huge health on structures makes siege more important.


It would be interesting to see those changes implemented and they could work.
Like using Ships for naval battles, you'd use Siege weapons for Siege.
The one exception I would say is that if their are Axe/Hammer/Torch wielding fighters like the Dwarves they'd function as Sapper units which is something
I did for LW that works well for Hit and Run and also allow Heroes to damage buildings.

The big problem with Infantry not damaging structures is Hit and Run tactics would be rendered obsolete at least on farms.

[Nazgûl]

Makes me wonder if you saw the prep I made in Armor.ini RB or if it's just a coincidence that the armor part is so similar to what I'm gonna do I've always wanted to differentiate the armor settings based on the structures material. And I've always wanted to hinder units from attacking structures, but that doesnt seem to be possible dispite numerous attemts to adjust the AI that keeps on attacking structures so badly that they run past units on the way to reach the buildings... lol. Anyway, I will implement armor adjustments very close to your won ideas regardless if they sprung from mine or not. But in line with SEE's realism factor SEE will function around armor based on material which atm are sorted like this:

- CLOTH, as in the tents of the desert people of Harad. Very weak and high flammability, but undisputably the fastest structures to build, probably around 30 sec buildups for normal structures.

- WOOD, as in Lothlorien, Rohan and Rhûn structures (+ some Mordor and Isengard ones). Better durability than Cloth, but with high flammability off course. Medium buildup times around 60 secs.

- METAL, as in some of the scrap metal structures of Moria etc. Very high resistance to flame, but only slightly stronger than wood against crush damage from siege equpiment and similar attacks.

- ROCK/SOIL, as in Moria, some of Mordor and Isengard structures (pits etc). Stronger than wood and with high restistance to flame, but not as solid as stone vs siege damage. Longer buildups of 90 secs.

- STONE, as in Gondorian structures. Stronger and better quality than the raw rock material. High resistance to flame. Long buildups of 120 secs.

- "CEMENT" (name pending), as in the extremely durable structures of the dwarven technologies where buildings are made to last trough most ordeals. Maximum restistance to flame and any forms of attacks. Buildups of 180 secs.

[njm1983]

Well Im with Naz' Principles. Thats exactly how I would break down the "armor" types for buildings and even use specific types depending on the buildings visual appearance.

As for the siege units. having played 4.5 and dealt with the massive amounts of flying units to an excessive degree, Im not so sure I like them being able to attack buildings. They are massive and could potentially do damage to some structures but in all honesty in the films they only really attacked troops and emplacements like wall trebs.

Every faction could have some form of battering ram the anims exist, so itd be a matter of new models and binding to the skl.

I do like Arthadans idea for using infantry to "neutralize" enemy buildings. the question is how would it work using the known game mechanics? For gameplay purposes it shouldnt be instant - otherwise youd have people sending troops to "turn off and on" buildings all the time. The only ability I can think of that would work for this type of play is the "dominate" spell which turns creep buildings to your control. But its instant. Maybe that would be ok for level 1 buildings and if the power turned the building to team neutral, Higher level buildings could be knocked down a level until reaching level 1 before being turned off. I dunno, seems a lot of headache to me, for so small a thing, such a little thing

Edited by njm1983, 10 October 2011 - 10:18 PM.

[Nazgûl]

I'm also giving "flyboys" some serious thought in line with your comments NJM. They are a PAIN when attacking in lare numers (like 9 fellbeasts) or respawning often (read Gwaihir). Now, I also think that RB is right considering their sie and power - they should be able to attack structures, and I do seem to recall Fellbeasts demolishing not only trebs in Minas Tirith but also tearing parts of buildings and dropping them on units. I think that we could solve this by making respawn much longer for powerful creatures like Eagles and Fellbeasts. Perhaps I can also make the mount fellbeast button use a timer or even a limit in useage so the nazzies can only use fells once in each life they get. SEE shouldnt be about air battles (OR naval warfare) - that's only icing on the cake. SEE should be about large number of units (hordes) battling it out against eachother while seige units and heavy monsters like trolls and ents attack the enemy base structures, while heroes primarily act as boosters for troops.

Now, do take notice that the different armor types above does not mean that a faction uses one of them only. Most factions have various types of structures, so for Isengard for instance it would mean that the Warg Pit has WOOD armor, while the Uruk Pit has SOIL. In Moria many structures would have ROCK armor, but some would also have METAL. This way the realism heightens and the outcome of an emeny attack on a faction's base would be less predictable as it no longer only matters how many structures the base has, but also what kind they are.

Finally, the new generic archer ability Flaming Arrows which has been turned into a one shot attack with reload timer, should be vastly strenghtened into a strog anti structure attack which would be devastating for CLOTH and WOOD armor in particular, whilst being virtually useless against others, especially the dwarven "cement".

[Ridder Blauw]

Nazgûl I was bored, and I thought about what you said.

That's why I made this topic, perhaps its best you do that when you have the time.

I also agree with you on all points.

Yeah I used the vague information to make my post from Naz, I also agree with all your points made (By Nazgûl), Arthadan although your idea is quite nice the SEE team does not want to go there (for now), advanced coding is a chasm from whence there is no return.

Also what I did was kinda round up what I thought, it wasn't mean to say everything concerning siege and structures.

Let's see how this all works out in balancing.

I think a lot of the points you make are very very good. But if you think about it then wouldn't you have to make trebuchets etc. less vulnerable to swords and arrows I mean you could argue that they too are wooden/metallic structures. The only problem I see with this would be the imbalance. If there was a way to make it work I think siege could work the way you want it... But if siege is more of a late game "unit" and siege will become one of the only ways to destroy buildings you could make one game last for far longer than needed and cause some fans to turn away from the mod. If siege is going to be so dominant I find it hard to see the need for units such as swordsmen and archers and cavalry if I could just get siege and say gandalf and aragorn and destroy people. I think where you are thinking is great and has a lot of potential but for me at least, I would need to see it in action

Did you read my post? I said that the heavy siege weaponry is more mid to late game. Early game you can use some of the more simple stuff like battering rams.

Feel welcome to try Gollum, in SEE heroes are not super heroes... they die just as quickly as gondor soldiers when in the midst of battle.

Edited by Ridder Blauw, 11 October 2011 - 05:15 AM.

[Nazgûl]

Moria will soon be ready for beta testing, so G and other can have a go and look for bugs and imbalances

[Gollum]

I meant in late game RW I don't want to get into a fight over something like this. I was just stating my opinions no offense was intended you did ask for comments so I gave them to you

[Ridder Blauw]

I wasn't mad.

It's just that me and Nazgul will find a way to ensure that most units will remain usefull till the very last second of a game. Even though battering rams will be most usefull to use during early game, during late game they'll still be the best way to take down a gate. Hopefully RG will be able to find a way to make the AI build walls!

Also I don't see a problem with siege and a few monsters being the only ones able to attack structures? Siege weaponary will be extremely delicate and weak vs. units.

We will find a way to have it all work out, this is all for a later stage. A new beta will not be postponed because of this, and why would it matter to you if it would?

Edited by Ridder Blauw, 11 October 2011 - 03:33 PM.

[Nazgûl]

Having AI build walls is not that hard, but time consuming as each map wpuld have to be edited with waypoints/markers where the AI can build walls. And G, dont be alarmed by RB's posts from time to time - he's not quite as good with words as he is with coding

[Gollum]

Haha just dont want to get into any scuffles I'll make sure I don't take things to seriously next time. Grond is what make Mordor effective

[Ridder Blauw]

Grond will be powerfull but slow and expensive. Trust the SEE team, we'll find a way, we always do.

[Nazgûl]

Indeed... I spent about 4-5 hours today on Giant's locomotor (walking and running) and splat dust FX (when dropping dead) alone... just adjusting speed and timings into perfection, lol. So, we WILL put a lot of attention to detail, trust me. SEE dc will be balanced and awesome

[njm1983]

Hope that the giants not final, lol. He does some psycho speedy running when ordered to attack! Lmao!

[Nazgûl]

Hehe take a wild guess Check again... this night was productive

[isledebananas]

I don't think you can judge siege based on simple things like accuracy and damage. That is pretty much the least important stuff in a way. Its obvious they are going to be good against buildings and with the ranged ones have some accuracy. But there are some more important factors which limit their use. Things like hit points, attack rate, and most importantly movement speed. Their should be variation between factions in how they siege and the siege machines should reflect this and not just be uniform versions which are stronger or weaker.

I think my main point is that siege needs to complement the factions playing style well. There is more to it than simple damage here. Movement and Organization in relation to the main army I think plays far more of a role than simple damage. If you make siege pretty much a ranged slugfest it makes siege very stale. Also, siege machines that are so similar but just vary based on damage disadvantage some factions while making others too powerful.

Isengard is great at doing the slugfest since it can keep pressure on you with its quickly built and good damage/hp troops which are highly maneuverable preventing you from countering on them. They can afford their cheap warmachines to be flung at the enemy and even die since they are cheap and can get to your base with little problems if they keep up enough pressure on you. The Dwarves are the opposite both their bases and their troops are meant for endurance and not to pressure or spread around the map quickly. Dwarves take a while to set things up, but are meant to also stay around for a while. If they had siege much like Isengard their whole game plan would be screwed up. Once they come into your base they can't afford to quickly lose any siege since their troops can't keep the pressure as well. Enemy cavalry can just go around the main army and cut off any reinforcing siege or even non-pike troops. So for them having ridiculous damage like Isengard is not as important they need siege that can shrug off a single miracle blitz by enemy cavalry. If Dwarves come into your base they need to be able to stick around and do significant damage since they aren't gonna be able to manage that very often since they are a slow faction. Isengard though can afford to retreat or lose everyone and still not be disadvantaged since when you go to counter they should have a sizable force ready to throw at you again.

---------------------------------

For the Harad Structures since they are weak you can simply make them cheap and quickly built whereas others are more expensive and take a longer time. I also had an idea for one of their spell book powers which increases the speed at which their structures are built plus increases experience gain of buildings meaning they can level up a lot faster than other factions. This counters the weakness of their buildings by allowing them to set up shop a lot faster than all others. This won't make them broken since their infantry is too weak to be too much trouble early game without significant numbers. But allows them quick map control limiting their opponents ability to get a powerful economy running.

Edited by isledebananas, 27 October 2011 - 03:13 PM.

[Ridder Blauw]

This post misses alot of important stuff, but it was just to give an idea, we'll figure it out.