How does bombardment work>

[Arnold_T]

a quick CIV4 newbie question:
I just had the city defences of one of my (walled) cities reduced by an enemy from 50% to 0% with bombardment in just one turn. How does that work?
He only one Catapult next to the city. Can one catapult do all that in one turn?
He also had 7 Elephants, & horse archers, a couple a swordsmen next to the city too. do they all get to bombard too?
And now that the defences of my city are down from 50% to 0% does that mean the walls are effectly non-existant? or is there another defence bonus for just being a city tile?
also how does that impact archers with the city defence bonus (50%) and city defence upgrade (20%).
Basically wanting to know if my troops in a situation like this should be abandoning the city before they get crushed!

 

[champinoman]

The only way to reduce the cities defences that much in 1 turn with 1 siege unit is by using a spy. A spy can cause a 1 turn revolt in your city which reduces the defences down to 0%. However (someone correct this please if I'm wrong) I believe your walls still count as extra bonus on top of the defence your culture had acquired.

Also, any city defence bonuses your archer has are still in use as long as you stay in the city. Leaving the city would make your archers weaker and also lose their fortification bonus (25%).

 

[Shurdus]

Archers get a bonus while in a city. Outside a city they are less strong so yes, the very fact that archers are in a city makes them stronger.

The bonus from your wall is a seperate one from the bonus you get for culture. The 0% defense you see is nothing but cultural defense and it says nothing about other modifiers you may receive. The bombardment did not help to forego the effects of your citywall.

 

[Bostock]

Humm? Revolts drop defenses down to zero percent no matter whether they're generated by culture, walls, castles, Chichen Itza, or a conga line of ninja midgets.

 

[Shurdus]

Humm? Revolts drop defenses down to zero percent no matter whether they're generated by culture, walls, castles, Chichen Itza, or a conga line of ninja midgets.

Really? So indeed a revolt does completely negate the wall?

Well holy crap on a stick batman, that makes walls even more pointless that I ever imagined possible!

 

[Windsor]

The 0% defense you see is nothing but cultural defense and it says nothing about other modifiers you may receive. The bombardment did not help to forego the effects of your citywall.

This is wrong. The % defense number you see is the total(walls+culture). That's also why this number will drop if you select a gunpowder-unit since they ignore walls.

Walls(and castles) can be bombarded down and a units defending a city in revolt will not get any advantages from walls.

 

[Bhruic]

The only real advantage from walls/castles when it comes to bombardment is that they get bombarded slower (a lot slower for castles) than without them. Which can be useful if you need the time to get more units into the city.

Bh

 

[Bostock]

The OP need not worry as much about revolts as it might seem -- they are very rarely used against the human in single player. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised to hear that the event described had happened to him in multiplayer.

 

[UncleJJ]

a quick CIV4 newbie question:
I just had the city defences of one of my (walled) cities reduced by an enemy from 50% to 0% with bombardment in just one turn. How does that work?
He only one Catapult next to the city. Can one catapult do all that in one turn?
He also had 7 Elephants, & horse archers, a couple a swordsmen next to the city too. do they all get to bombard too?
And now that the defences of my city are down from 50% to 0% does that mean the walls are effectly non-existant? or is there another defence bonus for just being a city tile?
also how does that impact archers with the city defence bonus (50%) and city defence upgrade (20%).
Basically wanting to know if my troops in a situation like this should be abandoning the city before they get crushed!

A single catapult can only reduce the defence bonus from walls by 4% in one turn. No other early units can reduce defences. All seige units, some ships (e.g frigate) and aircraft (except airships) can reduce defences by bombardment, no other units affect a city's defence. If a city is in revolt, for any reason (including a spy) all its defences are reduced to zero.

The defencive bonus of a city from either culture or walls is completely separate from and cumulative with the inherent city bonus some troops get (e.g archers) and the City Garrison promotion. All these bonusses are added togther, so an archer in a city with walls that has the CG2 promotion gets a bonus of 50% (walls) + 50% (archer in city) + 45% (GC2 promotion) and can get further bonusses for fortification or being on a hill. Bombardment by seige etc. can only affect the city defensive bonusses from the walls or culture. All the other bonusses can't be affected directly but can be countered by promotions on the attacking troops (e.g. CR2) and by collateral damage from seige or aircraft

If a spy is used to revolt city to get rid of the defenses then there is nothing you can do about it since it will happen in the opponents turn and only lasts one turn.