Siege mechanic is extremely bad

[sandman25dcsss]

Before you start blaming me, realize it takes 4 turns to siege an outpost with foritifications 40, not city. Enemy landed near my capital and built outpost in 1 turn for 25 gold, now my hero will need to spend 4 turns to destroy it. It is turn 38 if it matters.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2972875288

[sandman25dcsss]

Originally posted by Testikles:

There are no siege projects going on in your screenshot, is there a reason why you did not take them? They can reduce siege time by quite a bit.

So enemy used 25 gold and a scout and I should use a hero and pay gold/mana???
Devs should nerf it somehow.

[Vegetable Vampire]

Originally posted by sandman25dcsss:

Originally posted by Roderick:

Yeah, my bad, cities cost 200 imperium.
40 defense still comes with some gold and turn cost.

20 defense is free and it is still 2 turns.

So what exactly is it that you would like to be changed about sieges?

[sandman25dcsss]

Originally posted by Vegetable Vampire:

So what exactly is it that you would like to be changed about sieges?

I am not game designer, but I would exclude outpost from siege mechanic or at least remove hero requirement. Compare to pillaging - any enemy unit can pillage, any unit can repair the damage.

[The Former]

I get what you're saying, but I think gold and time vs. gold and time isn't necessarily a comprehensive comparison. There are other factors at play that affect the overall value.

For instance, the outpost with a pre-built wall requires a 50 Imperium investment. Granted that's not much considering it's a once-for-all purchase, but it still requires an investment, and to be available at all requires Materium affinity.

Also consider that if it's undefended, you don't really need a whole stack. You could siege it with one stack and have the other going out to intercept anyone who might try to return and lift the siege. Or you could send a disposable 50 gold unit to siege it while your army stack went invading, forcing the enemy to either respond to the siege or lose the outpost and respond to the invasion. These are choices the outpost, as a stationary beast, doesn't have the luxury of.

Oh, and there's the fact that Outposts cost 10 gold to upkeep, which is almost as much as a Tier 2 unit.

[The Former]

Originally posted by sandman25dcsss:

Originally posted by Vegetable Vampire:

So what exactly is it that you would like to be changed about sieges?

I am not game designer, but I would exclude outpost from siege mechanic or at least remove hero requirement. Compare to pillaging - any enemy unit can pillage, any unit can repair the damage.

Personally I think this is no good, as it defeats the purpose of the outpost, which is to fortify territory for future exploits. If it can be pillaged in a single turn, it's not much of a fortification.

Consider Julius Caesar. He built fortified camps all over Gaul to stage his attacks, and because they were effective fortifications, they served as very effective footholds. So this strategy of building an outpost close to your enemy is tried and tested. If it's close enough that you can see it and you don't want it built, you have time to get there. Forced march if you must.

If they get it up quick and it already has a palisade... Well, like the one guy said, those are the skills they took and they're powerful skills.

[Shadowing]

25 gold with specific empire upgrade, 50 basic. And it still takes time to set up, you had ample time to stop it. Either enemy is specialized in building outposts or you werent paying attencion. Either way its your fault, even in worst case scenario you seen enemy get there and build that outpost, and had time to stop him.

[Vegetable Vampire]

Originally posted by sandman25dcsss:

Originally posted by Vegetable Vampire:

So what exactly is it that you would like to be changed about sieges?

I am not game designer, but I would exclude outpost from siege mechanic or at least remove hero requirement. Compare to pillaging - any enemy unit can pillage, any unit can repair the damage.

I suppose that would be okay.

[badger vortex]

They should let you siege outposts without a Hero. Big part of OP's complaint was it tied up his Hero stack for several turns for a very low investment, which is understandable

[Wlerin]

The problem isn't the outposts, it's that your heroes are limited to cities built.

[Ruinous]

Originally posted by Wlerin:

The problem isn't the outposts, it's that your heroes are limited to cities built.

Really isn't much of a limit if you've a half-way decent economy, the penalty is only something like 30g a turn per hero over the limit iirc.

[Wlerin]

30g per turn is quite a lot of regular units.

[aqvamare]

Originally posted by sandman25dcsss:

Before you start blaming me, realize it takes 4 turns to siege an outpost with foritifications 40, not city. Enemy landed near my capital and built outpost in 1 turn for 25 gold, now my hero will need to spend 4 turns to destroy it. It is turn 38 if it matters.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2972875288

Add siege project, they reduce the turn number from 4 to 2.

The 4 turns are only "off sieges" in non hot spots, were you have any time you want.

On important sieges, the game and design wants you to use siege projects, which speed up the progress, like you would do in real life.

[Shadowing]

Originally posted by Wlerin:

The problem isn't the outposts, it's that your heroes are limited to cities built.

they arent they are just more expensive when you dont have city per hero. Same with max cities it just plops negative modifiers,

[UkrainianDoomer]

I like siege mechanics, even though admittedly they could've done them better.
Thing is with previous AoW games you could just blitz through multiple cities in a single turn like they were nothing. In AoW4 cities are now a rarity. Sure not having to siege will result in a faster game, but siege gives the defender a chance.

The only downside is that the defender can still reinforce a city with new troops from outside, which makes no sense as it is besieged.

[sandman25dcsss]

Originally posted by badger vortex:

They should let you siege outposts without a Hero. Big part of OP's complaint was it tied up his Hero stack for several turns for a very low investment, which is understandable

Exactly! I created similar thread on Paradox forum (it will be more visible for devs I think) with suggestion to remove hero requirement.