What is best dutchy building.

[Jurras]

So what is everyones opinion on this now that people really know the game now? I thought the military acadmies were pretty solid since you can just get a large amount of quality knights.

[Zero, Dark Knight]

Depends on your play style, but I quite like the Siege Works and the Jousting one.

[Professor Hardknocks]

It depends on what I am doing. I usually keep only one Duchy per heir (partition cheese), so I don't usually build the ones in places I am giving out. Tax Collector is hard to beat if I am giving it away, it gives them more money to give me. Family Palace is decent for the ones I am keeping for myself. That's what I usually do.

Note: I might choose different if the area I am playing has a specialized MaA that I can buff up a bit.

[JC]

Siege Works, in the Duchy of the Capital, with something like the Tower of London if possible.
Always good to siege faster while your home takes longer when besieged.
After that, yeah, playstyle determines the second one.

[JuX]

Depends what your doing, but for generic solution the military academy is lovely. as knights are absolute beasts when you pump up their efficiency and limit. Gets even more absurd when you reform religion to give everyone even more prowess.

If you got many holdings you can also use other duchy buildings to upgrade specific types of units to absurd levels. Like blacksmith stacking to create most durable army in existence with spearmen and heavy infantry.

[The Blind One]

Knights are not that big of a deal once you are at the level of a grand duke, king or god forbid emperor.

Siege works however becomes more important the bigger you get and the bigger the enemy is that you need to beat.

Each fort level takes 90 days to siege without siege equipment. With proper siege equipment this can be reduced to less than 20 days ...

Properly played ... you can siege your enemies faster than they can call in allies and link up with them ...

So I prefer siege bonuses over other bonuses since the war will be over faster and you end up spending less on army maintenance that way.

[EA Latium]

It really depends, it's a matter of preference.

[Jurras]

Originally posted by The Blind One:

Knights are not that big of a deal once you are at the level of a grand duke, king or god forbid emperor.

Siege works however becomes more important the bigger you get and the bigger the enemy is that you need to beat.

Each fort level takes 90 days to siege without siege equipment. With proper siege equipment this can be reduced to less than 20 days ...

Properly played ... you can siege your enemies faster than they can call in allies and link up with them ...

So I prefer siege bonuses over other bonuses since the war will be over faster and you end up spending less on army maintenance that way.

this seems like a really good point, i didnt know you could reduce the time for siege that long.

[JuX]

Originally posted by The Blind One:

Knights are not that big of a deal once you are at the level of a grand duke, king or god forbid emperor.

Knights are absolute mad lads, even in late game. I have 28 knight limit with average of about 20 prowess cause couldn't be bothered headhunt the perfect knights. With effectiveness of 365% using 3 duchy buildings at lvl 2 and martial perk.

Each point of prowess is 100dmg and 10hp and will be multiplied by 365% knight effectiveness factor. So the average knight of mine will be 7300dmg and 730hp. Not to mention higher the prowess the less likely they die or be captured in battle and cannot be countered to reduce their damage, unlike men-at-arms.

[Mikey]

siege works increases the damage each siege engine does which translates into faster sieges.
Personally I wouldn't use siege works but instead boost your prefered combat troops.

With a single siege works at max level you can choose to have 2 instead of 3 siege groups late game for quick and easy sieges with roughly the same efficiency. It is a diminishing return on how many siege engines you have so you will never need more than 3 to begin with.
With that said siege engines are very cheap to maintain compared to your other units which is why I prefer the unit specific ones. They reduce cost of MaA's by up to 10% each while boosting relevant stats by up to 30%.

So here is a scenario for late game:
You can have up to 10 MaA slots each with up to 17 tiers. Lets say you have access to 2 duchy buildings.

Siege works: 2 maxed bombards augmented by duchy buildings will give you 32,64 siege progress a day with 8 units of your choosing backing it up

Unit specific: 3 maxed bombards will give you 30,6 siege progress a day with 7 units backing it up but with the effectiveness of 15 due to duchy buildings

[Jurras]

Originally posted by Mikey:

siege works increases the damage each siege engine does which translates into faster sieges.
Personally I wouldn't use siege works but instead boost your prefered combat troops.

With a single siege works at max level you can choose to have 2 instead of 3 siege groups late game for quick and easy sieges with roughly the same efficiency. It is a diminishing return on how many siege engines you have so you will never need more than 3 to begin with.
With that said siege engines are very cheap to maintain compared to your other units which is why I prefer the unit specific ones. They reduce cost of MaA's by up to 10% each while boosting relevant stats by up to 30%.

So here is a scenario for late game:
You can have up to 10 MaA slots each with up to 17 tiers. Lets say you have access to 2 duchy buildings.

Siege works: 2 maxed bombards augmented by duchy buildings will give you 32,64 siege progress a day with 8 units of your choosing backing it up

Unit specific: 3 maxed bombards will give you 30,6 siege progress a day with 7 units backing it up but with the effectiveness of 15 due to duchy buildings

So ideally with 2 duchies one siege works and one blacksmith would be best? I am playing in northern germany so I dont think we really have any unique units.

[Mikey]

2 blacksmiths, you dont need the siege works if you use an extra siege engine instead and you reduce MaA cost by 20% instead of 10%

[CrUsHeR]

You can replace it later, and most of the time i found it the most efficient to start with the royal preserves. Lots of money, bonus development and popular opinion which have always their full impact.

[Lovecraft's Cat]

Blacksmith because it stacks with barracks and regimental grounds. That way you can make superhuman soldiers if you have a high enough domain limit.