way to improve useless Fort!

TylerDurdon · Jan 31, 2007

I think there's no one to disagree that fort are pretty useless! I personnally NEVER use them unless on a narrow passage with hill on edge of my cultural border which never really happen! My idea on how to improve is that they could be add up one on the other! Reaching up in level as you work on it... for example

lv.1 Fortification (actual fort +25% def)
lv.2 Fort (35% def + healing like a city)
lv.3 Castle (50% + heal + resist to cultural border as city does)
lv.4 Stronghold (need stone +75% + heal + resist cul - 25% if on hills)
lv.5 Some famous stronghold (need stone and hill +100% + heal + res. cul.)

Plus we need to make it AWFULLY long to get to Lv.5 so people cant really build them everywhere! or even limit them or exaust 1 Stone Ressources once lv.5 built!

the - 25% on lv4 is too avoid over powering it too soon and make it more like a step toward lv5.

Clayts · Feb 1, 2007

Its a good idea, the fort does need some changes to make it worth building. It would be a matter of balancing it so people don't building them everywhere if it would stop another Civ invading....

rugger11 · Feb 1, 2007

Clayts said:
Its a good idea, the fort does need some changes to make it worth building. It would be a matter of balancing it so people don't building them everywhere if it would stop another Civ invading....

How about forts on top of other improvements? That way you could build a fort on top of the iron and the mine to protect it.

Clayts · Feb 1, 2007

rugger11 said:
How about forts on top of other improvements? That way you could build a fort on top of the iron and the mine to protect it.

Interesting another good idea. I think a forts defensive % should increase by having selective units fortified there? or maybe having an upgrade system when it is attached like the other units?

Or maybe the fort should include its own units that are always stationed there but cannot move or attached (kind of like machine gun). it could then get the promotions and improve over time?

motherboard1 · Feb 1, 2007

forts on top of improvements might have peaple building them everywhere, just something to consider

I would love to see forts be buildable in enemy territory. also allowing them to have their own culteral border would be cool too, even if it was only on that one tile, it would negate the "units in enemy lands" upkeep.

rugger11 · Feb 1, 2007

motherboard1 said:
forts on top of improvements might have peaple building them everywhere, just something to consider

I would love to see forts be buildable in enemy territory. also allowing them to have their own culteral border would be cool too, even if it was only on that one tile, it would negate the "units in enemy lands" upkeep.

How about airfields in enemy territory? I would love to be able to drop some paratroopers into enemy territory and then build/defend an airfield.

motherboard1 · Feb 1, 2007

Well, I cant see anything wrong with that, in reality airfields were built and captured in enemy territory and then used against them

kristopherb · Feb 1, 2007

i ike your idea but how about making lv6 full blown city? with a free castle,walls and barracks?

good idea

LucyDuke · Feb 1, 2007

There should be some sort of improvement on forts, though putting them on top of an improvement would overpower them and they'd be everywhere. Maybe allow them on resource improvements at some sort of production penalty? I'd trade a hammer for extra defense on my iron.

Clayts said:
Or maybe the fort should include its own units that are always stationed there but cannot move or attached (kind of like machine gun). it could then get the promotions and improve over time?

I like this particularly, if a worker and a unit could team up and build a fort, where that original unit is permanently garrisoned to the spot. The unit would become a fort and be able to receive "fort" promotions, like medic, defense, and so on. If the unit is destroyed, the fort is destroyed, or the enemy destroying the unit takes over the fort?

rugger11 said:
How about airfields in enemy territory? I would love to be able to drop some paratroopers into enemy territory and then build/defend an airfield.

How about airfields at all? I'm sick of my planes being stuck based in cities, it's no good for long-distance war. And why can't bombers base on carriers? That drives me nuts.

Collier20 · Feb 1, 2007

Forts should be able to resist culture/create a 1x1 square of culture (Think Gitmo). They should also be use to base aircraft out of and harbor ships if by a coast. If forts can create an oasis of culture, this would be really helpful early on to stop your opponent for gaining access to resources. If aircraft (especially bombers) can be based out of forts, it makes them usefull later on. I always settle a tiny 1x1 island so i can base aircraft out of it. The city never amounts to much (no production and rarely do i get lucky enought to get a food bonus).

LucyDuke · Feb 1, 2007

Collier20 said:
They should also be use to base aircraft out of and harbor ships if by a coast.

That bit sounds to me like a way-too-easy-to-implement canal, and pretty exploitable. If there were some way to tell the game to let the boat out only the way it came in, awesome, but as is it seems overpowered.

LoopyLewis · Feb 2, 2007

What if only siege units could attack a fort? Makes sense.

Like the idea of airfields too

TheAmerican · Feb 2, 2007

How about allowing them to be built on another Civ's territory, and it effectivly gives you that tile ? That way you could keep on eye on the civ, or have a place to launch attacks from.

Chaos_BF1942 · Feb 2, 2007

The levels of forts sound good, I hate how they are so useless.

The Airfields sound good, but the enemy (or you) should be able to capture them.

LucyDuke said:
And why can't bombers base on carriers? That drives me nuts.

Well bombers don't really go well on carriers. The only raid with bombers that were based on carriers was the Doolittle Raid, and those were medium bomber; and they could not land back on the carrier.

Gen.Rommel · Feb 2, 2007

Seeing as how important castles and forts, and holding them, has been through history, they should be vastly improved, better defensive bonus depending on the territory, and of course, the ability to build on improvements. I wouldnt be afraid of someone building forts on every single tile just because they could because that would take too long, and theres more important things for workers to be doing. Also, Any unit who fortifies/gets emplaced in a fort should get the bonus, and not differentiate between units. I like the idea of having units permanently placed into the forts, perhaps with the reintoduction of zones of control, which would make them actually useful.
Another important thing is getting airfields back, and everyone has listed the reasons for that ;-) just giving my vote for it as well.

Quetzal513 · Feb 15, 2007

The number of times forts have really played out a key strategic role in my games could be counted on one hand. But there are a couple of elements that some players may be missing.

Yes, they only yield an additional 25% defense bonus (although you don't have to chop forest/jungle) yielding up to a max of 100% defensive bonus. But they are also considered as cities in calculating combat odds. So if you park a unit with a city garrison 2 it also gets the +45% for defending a city. In an ideal situation you may have a CG3 longbow dug into a fort on a forest/jungle hill. This would turn your strength 6 into 21 (unit ability: hills +25%, city +25%, fortified 5 turns +25%, promotions: +75% city defense (+10% melee), tile defense: forest/jungle +50%, hill +25%, fort +25%) It'll be quite a while until someone could play king of the hill with that bowman. And obviously city garrison is available with new units all through the modern age. So using city garrison promotions takes advantage of more than just the +25% bonuses of forts.

Now for the second part, where the actual strategy enters in. If you have such heavily defended forts the enemy will typically avoid attacking such positions. Nuts! and you wanted them to test their strength against your strength (However the AI sometimes has done just that! I laugh as 10 units fall down the slip 'n slides I had installed in those forts) But what you can do is focus where they will try to move. There have been a few games where I had a small border with a rival, maybe 4 or 5 tiles across. The forts allowed me to essentially force their initial travel onto defenseless flatland terrain. Forts are nearly as effective without hills, and still nice even if there aren't any trees; deserts are naturally good places since you're not going to build much else on them) Sacrifice a few catapults and you're ready to mop up their stack. Whereas if they'd entered your terrain through that highland jungle you'd have been wetting yourself.

I believe that if you could build forts over existing improvements players would just spam them on every tile, especially resources. Given the city garrison bonus, it would take some serious firepower to make a dent in any of these. Leaders with the protective trait might be able to take the best advantage of forts (but hardly any reason to choose such a leader). It wouldn't be too much of a stretch to produce a few CG3 archery/gunpowder units with a couple first strikes. Anyway, just a few thoughts on how to use forts more effectively.

gettingfat · Feb 15, 2007

The solution to avoid fort spamming is simple - just count each of them as a military unit and tag a maintainence cost. It should also be able to be built on improved tile, but the production will be reduced (-1 hammer on production oriented resource, -1 food on food-based resource, or -1 gold on commerce-based resource). This price can certainly be adjusted after some testing (e.g. can add 0.5 unhealthy factor if built within the fatcross, whatever you name it). The bottomline is, if you can pay the price, go ahead to spam it.

Forts should have 3 functions: defensive bonus, ZOC, improved visibility range (and probably the 4th, some resistance to culture). The defensive bonus should increase with the discovery of certain techs (masonry, machinery, engineering, feudalism, etc.), but receive a penalty facing gunpowder units. Some promotions will negate the ZOC. A fort on the border will allow the units stationed there to see 1 tile further, at least after discovery of optics.

I actually think Firaxis miss a big chance leaving fort untouched in Warlords.

Clayts · Feb 16, 2007

Quetzal513 said:
The number of times forts have really played out a key strategic role in my games could be counted on one hand. But there are a couple of elements that some players may be missing.

Yes, they only yield an additional 25% defense bonus (although you don't have to chop forest/jungle) yielding up to a max of 100% defensive bonus. But they are also considered as cities in calculating combat odds. So if you park a unit with a city garrison 2 it also gets the +45% for defending a city. In an ideal situation you may have a CG3 longbow dug into a fort on a forest/jungle hill. This would turn your strength 6 into 21 (unit ability: hills +25%, city +25%, fortified 5 turns +25%, promotions: +75% city defense (+10% melee), tile defense: forest/jungle +50%, hill +25%, fort +25%) It'll be quite a while until someone could play king of the hill with that bowman. And obviously city garrison is available with new units all through the modern age. So using city garrison promotions takes advantage of more than just the +25% bonuses of forts.

Now for the second part, where the actual strategy enters in. If you have such heavily defended forts the enemy will typically avoid attacking such positions. Nuts! and you wanted them to test their strength against your strength (However the AI sometimes has done just that! I laugh as 10 units fall down the slip 'n slides I had installed in those forts) But what you can do is focus where they will try to move. There have been a few games where I had a small border with a rival, maybe 4 or 5 tiles across. The forts allowed me to essentially force their initial travel onto defenseless flatland terrain. Forts are nearly as effective without hills, and still nice even if there aren't any trees; deserts are naturally good places since you're not going to build much else on them) Sacrifice a few catapults and you're ready to mop up their stack. Whereas if they'd entered your terrain through that highland jungle you'd have been wetting yourself.

I believe that if you could build forts over existing improvements players would just spam them on every tile, especially resources. Given the city garrison bonus, it would take some serious firepower to make a dent in any of these. Leaders with the protective trait might be able to take the best advantage of forts (but hardly any reason to choose such a leader). It wouldn't be too much of a stretch to produce a few CG3 archery/gunpowder units with a couple first strikes. Anyway, just a few thoughts on how to use forts more effectively.

Great post - taught me a thing or two about forts. I might even use em now

Blaarg · Feb 16, 2007

The way to improve the Fort is to give units in a fort a 'zone of control.' Like the way they did it in Civ 2. (or was it 3?) In civ 1 all units had ZoC, which was really irritating, but if you could use it to your advantage, it was powerful.

Zone of control worked like this: The 8 spaces around the fort were the fort's zone of control. As long as there is a unit in the fort, the zone of control is active. If an opposing unit is in the zone of control it simply can not move to a space that is adjacent to any of your units.

F = Occupied Fort
_ = Empty Space
X = Enemy Unit in the Zone of Control.
O = Unoccupied zone of control.
A = One of your Units

______
_OOX__
_OFO__
_OOO_A
______

In this diagram, the enemy unit can't move west or south, because it would be moving from the Zone of Control next to another unit namely the unit in the fort itself. It also can't move south east becaue it would be moving next to another of your units. It can only move North, North East and East, or it could attack the fort.

It would be nice if cities with Castles gave the city a ZOC as well.

LucyDuke · Feb 16, 2007

Wow, this thread keeps getting better! Quetzal513, thank you, you've clarified that they actually can be useful if used properly, and you've illustrated how to use them properly. gettingfat, I think you've hit the nail on the head - if there's a maintenance cost, that addresses spamming while still allowing them to be built over improvements. I don't think it's necessary to count them as full regular units, though if they were built with a sort of "attendant" military unit to begin with, a unit that would be permanently attached to the fort, that would offer a midway solution.

As for zone of control, if the castle gave the city a ZoC, they wouldn't feel so useless any more, and I think that would give the Spanish Citadel the oomph that it's missing now. I confess I don't perfectly understand the concept, but here's how I would implement something: Any enemy unit that enters the ZoC is forced to attack the fort's attendant at a reduced strength. The forced attack gives function to the ZoC, and the reduced strength weighs against the enemy's benefit of saving one movement point before the attack.

way to improve useless Fort!

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