Citadels Can Be Pillaged?

[docbud]

I wasn't aware that Citadels could be pillaged. It's happened in a few games of mine lately, and I wasn't aware that it could happen. What good is a Citadel if it can be pillaged? I thought any enemy unit near it or unit would get wiped out. Tonight it was a barbarian, but the other night it was another civ.

I'm confused about it. If it can be pillaged, why even build one?

I took a screenshot.

Thanks

[callan]

Any terrain improvement can be pillaged, including those made by Great People. To get the best use from a Citadel you need to fortify a unit in that tile. He then gets a large Fortification bonus (100% iirc) while the citadel will damage any unit adjacent to it every turn.

[Silverfuturist]

Originally Posted by docbud

I wasn't aware that Citadels could be pillaged. It's happened in a few games of mine lately, and I wasn't aware that it could happen. What good is a Citadel if it can be pillaged? I thought any enemy unit near it or unit would get wiped out. Tonight it was a barbarian, but the other night it was another civ.

I'm confused about it. If it can be pillaged, why even build one?

I took a screenshot.

Thanks

I just nuked a guy in multi-player, it pillaged his citadel well.

If I think my citadel is in danger of being pillaged, I keep a worker close so that it can quickly repair the improvement the next turn (with liberty it repairs same turn and can do damage at the end of that same turn, not sure about tradition.) The AI isn't sophisticated enough to make a plan to knock out your citadel. Humans come up with creative ways to get that thing pillaged!

[docbud]

Thanks guys

I was getting attacked from a different area and I figured my citadel would keep my other city safe for a turn or two while I dealt with that.

I just thought that any unit near my Citadel when the turn ended would have damage, especially barbs. I was surprised to see it was got pillaged.

The turn ended and he was next to it--shouldn't that have meant he would have suffered major damage?

And then the next turn he was in it.

And the next turn he pillaged.

I thought he would have been killed somewhere between those turns just by being near the Citadel or in it.

[joncnunn]

It's 3 points of damage.
Usually not enough to kill the unit, but if you have ranged units nearby, should be able to kill easily.

[Uberfrog]

Yeah, it's 3HP if a unit ends its turn next to the citadel (which I guess accounts for some of the damage the archer seems to have taken).

Once they are on the citadel itself, I don't believe they take the hit, which is why you should always garrison a unit on the citadel itself. They get a huge defensive bonus as well, which is always nice.

[joncnunn]

Originally Posted by Uberfrog

Yeah, it's 3HP if a unit ends its turn next to the citadel (which I guess accounts for some of the damage the archer seems to have taken).

Once they are on the citadel itself, I don't believe they take the hit, which is why you should always garrison a unit on the citadel itself. They get a huge defensive bonus as well, which is always nice.

Enemy units on the citadel take the hit along with adjoining units.

In the Korean scenario as Korea, its actually best NOT to have a unit in the citadel itself; instead you place the citadel within 2 hexes of the key city in which you intend to hold, with your Korean UU inside that city (later a cannon) along one or two more of your UU within range. (Again, later you might have cannons). Also you'd have a Great General inside that same city.

This is enough fire power to blast away any enemy unit that just ended its move on the citadel itself along with multiple adjoining tiles with all of them having been damaged.

Basically if you have a melee unit on the citadel it dies to the attacks by multiple Samaris even with the defensive bonus. In this case your unit probably took 2 Jap units with it and the citadel's bombard would kill the 3rd, but an attrition war is not in Korea's interest even at killing 3 enemy units for every 1 lost. (Japan starts with something like 80:1 superiority)

[docbud]

Thanks for the explanations.

Normally I do what joncnunn does, but I was short of troops as I had barbs attacking in another place and was fighting with Japan as well. I had to make a “dignified” retreat from my citadel.

[Raiki]

On a very slight, yet citadel related, tangent: I think the AI might actually be smart enough to realize that a citadel will cause it to have a Bad Day.

In my most recent game, I was playing as Persia (to get the 5 GA trophy, not as hard as I thought it would be) and my closest neighbor was Siam. After roughly 130 turns of on-again off-again (mostly on-again) war with him (I'd intentionally settled my second [and final] city to cut him off on a small peninsula) I got sick and tired of him murdering the melee units I'd left on my borders. I used the second GG I earned to pop a citadel right on my borders, behind a river. I fortified a Rifleman in it, who stayed in that spot all the way to Mech Infantry. I also had a few cannons and my second city right behind it.

The turn I built the citadel, Rammy retreated. Two turns later he sued for (finally) unconditional peace. He never declared war on me again, for the rest of the game. Not even when I stole away every single one of his CS allies. Not even when I denounced him and demanded gold. Not even when I started building the Utopia Project. Not. Once.

Has anyone else had this experience?

~R~

[strijder20]

Are you sure it's not just because you had more pointy sticks than rammy?

[Raiki]

Originally Posted by strijder20

Are you sure it's not just because you had more pointy sticks than rammy?

Quite positive. I was going for a peaceful win, so I had the bare number of units. Even when I upgraded them to Mech Inf and Artillery, I was still dead last in pointy sticks. I think I had a total of maybe 4 units, but I had a really convenient mountain range that made it so I only had to defend roughly 3 tiles so, with the exception of Rammy's elephant spam, they were enough.

Considering that nothing else had changed, I'm inclined to believe that the AI takes citadels into account *somehow*.

~R~

[smallfish]

Originally Posted by Raiki

Quite positive. I was going for a peaceful win, so I had the bare number of units. Even when I upgraded them to Mech Inf and Artillery, I was still dead last in pointy sticks. I think I had a total of maybe 4 units, but I had a really convenient mountain range that made it so I only had to defend roughly 3 tiles so, with the exception of Rammy's elephant spam, they were enough.

Considering that nothing else had changed, I'm inclined to believe that the AI takes citadels into account *somehow*.

~R~

He realized he didn't have enough corpses to drown you with due to difficulty level limitations.

Therefore he didn't want to break his empire just over you.

[docbud]

I've had civs back off when I plopped down a Citadel as well. Was kinda cool to watch 'em retreat