Seige Effects

[Bummer_Duck]

Hi

I can't seem to find a out what happens when I seige anothers castle. I might have missed it in the manual, as it's hard copy (ewww). Can they recruit troops? and do they still get the provincial gold inc.?

Also, can't seem to find the pdf version of the hard copy manual, only the addendum...can someone point me to a link?

Thanks in Advance!

[Alneyan]

Hello, and welcome!

When one of your provinces is besieged, you cannot recruit units or build a lab or a temple. In addition, you can no longer set your tax rate, though you will still get half the taxes of the province (the other half goes to the besieger). Your supplies will also be determined by your castle supply characteristic; this value will be halved after every turn, so your army will eventually run out of supplies (unless you have another way of getting supplies, via magic).

There is no PDF version of the manual, though there are a few PDF files dealing with specific aspects of the game: for example, there are a Quick Reference file listing summoned creatures, and another one all the magic items you can forge.

[Taqwus]

Also, no reanimation for the besieged -- although they can still summon troops. The besiegers can no longer assassinate commanders as it's technically their province and you can't assassinate in friendly territory, and can alter tax policy or pillage the province to their hearts' content.

Isn't supply reduced less quickly -- something like 1/(1+n) of base after n turns of siege?

Can't recall who gets usage of the magic sites. I suspect it'd be the besieged, as IIRC the besieger doesn't get full information on what the known sites are until he takes the castle.

[Ironhawk]

Additionally, the besieged cannot destroy it's buildings while the province is occupied. So if you are ever planning to Scorch Earth, you'd better plan ahead.

[Bummer_Duck]

Great info! Exactly what I wanted to know. Thanks!

One last round of questions (hopefully) :-)

Let's say I own a province next to my opponets castle. I move in to his castled province the next turn, and he takes my adjacent province. Ok...not a great scenerio, but as long as I don't route in an attack on my seige army, I'm OK?

Also, let's say I route...if I caste some distant province attack spell (Call of the winds?) on another adjacent province, and take the province in the same turn I route, will that provide a place to route too?

Thanks in Advance!

[Alneyan]

On the topic of sieging: you can destroy your lab when besieged (and can only do so when you are besieged), but you cannot destroy your other buildings, no matter what the circumstances are. Of course, any enemy will have no trouble destroying your temples. The magic sites are indeed used by the besieged, and your formula for supplies makes more sense Taqwus.

You do not need to have an adjacent province so long as you do not rout, so you will be fine in the first case (unless you rout of course). Magical movement, including teleporting spells and remote summons, happen before mundane movement, so your birds would seize that province before the battle of your army. If that army happens to lose, they would be able to retreat to the newly conquered province.

[Chazar]

Few more notes about siege:

I think supply formula is: CastleSupply/2^(n-1) where n is the number of siege turns, i.e. supplies are halved every turn, which is quite quick...
The sieging force cannot pillage! Only preaching and blood hunting is allowed.
Labs functions as normal, so you can instantly transfer wine skins into besieged castles, provided that there are enough leaders and a lab present
Siegers do not see who is in the castle, except if they bring spies along
Stealthy commanders may leave their castle while under siege (due to a bug, it is possible to convince the game that they take even non-stealthy troops with them, see my bug report. Doing that might be considered cheating maybe.).


Question: If I besiege a castle on one turn, and move all siegers away, but at the same time bring in new troops for sieging, is the castle defence repaired meanwhile?

[Alneyan]

If the siege is maintained, the castle walls are not repaired. Leaving a single commander besieging the fort would be enough to make sure the walls are not repaired. In one game, independents besieged one of my castles, and brought it down to 0 strength. When the independents were dispatched by another player, the walls were still down to 0 strength, before the "repair/destruction of the walls" phase.

However, I do not know what happens if you take all your army with you. My guess is that your reinforcing army would move in before the siege can be broken by the besiegers, as movement between friendly provinces should happen first. But don't quote me on that.

[Endoperez]

Sieging ability is (str squared)/100, plus 1 if flying, + siege bonus. Are other abilities a factor?

Defence bonus is (str squared)/100 + defence bonus. Being mindless gives a big malus. Probably adjusted by some other abilities, like flying.

[bone_daddy]

I haven't seen this happen (yet), but if a besieged force attempts to break the siege and fails, is it possible for the besieger to take the castle as a result of the besieged player's failure?

[Agrajag]

Not directly, but if the besieged throws all of his forces at the besieger and they ALL die, then the fortification is left undefended and (theoretically) should be breached in one turn and then captured without a fight.

[bone_daddy]

Ok, thanks. I thought that might be the case, but I've never seen it happen. What made me think that it might be possible was that I once took a province when an independent discovered a Harvester I had sneaking in the province. The Harvester ended up taking the province when the attacking forces routed.

[bone_daddy]

One other question on siege breaking. If the defender attempts to break the siege and fails, will all of the defender's forces be destroyed (assuming all available forces are involved in the breakout) or will some forces survive and rout into a neighboring province or will they all retreat into the fortress?