terrain and Use of Forts in Civ3

[kevincompton]

Heres some questions I've always wondered since Civ1:

1. Does terrain give defense bonus? Like a fortified unit on a mountain stronger than in a valley? What about hills? Woods?

2. What are forts really useful for? I know that they would increase the defense, but I rarely find need to apply this. Do they help move your border out, like in R of N? if not they should.

 

[ForTheEmpire]

1) Yes. Plains, Water tiles, Grasslands, Desrt, Tundra, and Flood plains give 10% bonus. Forests and Jungles provied 25%. Hills give 50%, and Mountains give 100%. Rivers provide 25% bonus if the attacker attacks over one. Fortifying a unit gives 25%. Towns of 6 and lower pop. give no bonus but if they have a wall, provides 50% bonus. Cities of 7 to 12 pop already have the wall effect of 50% and does not stack with an exisiting wall. Metros of 12 and up pop give 100% bonus. And the bonuses stack through additively, not multiplicatively. So a fortified spearman in a size 3 town with a wall, that was built on a hill gets a bonus of 125%, and he's now a 4.25 defense unit.

2) Forts can be built on any land terrain, providing 50% bonus. Someone said also that the Zone of Control ability is provided to units in fortresses. This I'm not sure of. And no, no border expansion with forts, they serve as defensive outposts and nothing more.

 

[bob rulz]

I think the Zone of Control is onyl in Conquests, although I'm not sure.

And doesn't fortifying only give a 10% bonus?

 

[ForTheEmpire]

It should be 25%, unless conquests changed that.

 

[bob rulz]

Oh, nevermind. Looked it up you're right.

 

[kevincompton]

Does anyone have examples of instances where they effectively used a Fort? I've always liked the thought of it, but havn't found good application as of yet.

 

[ManOfMiracles]

If my territory is separated from another civ by an isthmus, I'll block the bottleneck with units in forts. Crusaders are prime for this since they can build their own forts. This is an early action to keep scouts and settlers out of my land. Then I have lots of time to fill my land before the opponent can sail around the block. I've also done this on longer borders if the other civ kept encroaching but it takes too many units to do it well.

 

[Tripwire]

I use forts, but only as a precaution when embarking on a military campaign. Depending on the lay of the land, I'll try to find a line of hills or mountains and build forts in a line stretching from one side of the land mass to the other. This makes a good fall-back position if the enemy counter-attacks with more strength than originally planned.

It's only come in handy twice that I can think of, but it gives me something to do while building up an invasion force or airlifting/transporting units to a new theater of operations. It doesn't expend any workers and can be done fairly quick.

 

[Paradigne]

It doesn't expend any workers and can be done fairly quick.

How do you build forts without workers? Do you try to get Crusaders a lot?

 

[Dave the Monkey]

How do you build forts without workers? Do you try to get Crusaders a lot?

I think what is meant is that the worker doesn't 'become' the fortress in the same way as a worker 'becomes' an airfield, outpost or colony.

Once the fortress is built, the worker is still there to be used.

 

[norwegianviking]

On topic: remember crusaders can build fortresses too.

Off topic: It's too bad crusaders only come from knight's templar.

 

[Samson]

oes anyone have examples of instances where they effectively used a Fort? I've always liked the thought of it, but havn't found good application as of yet.

I have used them, where you have a high defence terain tile (esp. mountains) next to a front line city. I build a road first, then a fort and keep a few good defenseive units there. generaly the AI will then not bother attacking it, and you can hammer him while he is waiting next to your city, getting loads of leaders.

 

[Mr. Do]

As fa as the AI is concerned, it'll only build forts at bottlenecks in its territory, and on resources outside its territory, before it builds a colony to the square. I can understand the former but not the latter. Myself I used to build loads of forts but not any more. I used to think they'd be neat on top of easy-to-defend hills and mountains, but the ZOC they get is mostly useless, and doesn't work anywhere nearly as effectively as in Civ 2, so you mighgt as well not build them there at all. So that leaves squares that cost one-movement between your city and your borders to build them on, to stop the AI taking a city the same turn as it attacks; but if the AI attacks, it's going to capture your forts unless you really cram them with troops, in which case the AI'll probably just go round them, leaving you with the choice of abandoning your forts to protect your city or leaving your city vulnerable. ay ay ay.

 

[SwitchbladeNGC]

I put forts on my resourses if I get Crusaders.

 

[Azimuth]

If I'm defending an area continuously it makes sense to build a fort there if the workers are not too busy.

 

[Tripwire]

How do you build forts without workers? Do you try to get Crusaders a lot?

What I meant was that the worker doesn't become the fort once it's built. Dogpile a lot of workers onto a tile and you'll have a fort in 2 turns, 1 if you have a railroad on it. Of couse, I spend most of my time post-Ind so it's not hard getting workers from point A to point B instantly. I can see how this might be more of a burden in pre-Ind when all you have are roads and possibly a big empire to deal with.

 

[Thangorodrim]

Forts hold bottlenecks

 

[Kiech]

I have recently seen the AI (Germany) build quite a large number of forts, around bottlenecks. I also notice they put up a lot of radar towers as well. I haven't been able to figure out their motivation though, as the way they build the forts/towers seems to be a bit random.

 

[Tripwire]

Kiech: Yes, I see the AI use radar towers all over the place and they'll typically have a unit fortified on those squares. RT's give a nice defense bonus (albiet just one time per turn), so I guess it makes sense. But personally, I don't think the drawback of losing a worker is worth the benefit of a small, once-per-turn defensive boost though.

I also see the AI built forts, but not on chokepoints, just resources.

 

[Phal78]

One thing I have noticed is that the AI tends to attack units in the open (provided they are not too well defended) before going for your cities. If your in a war of attrition then the one rifleman that wipes out 3 or more enemy tanks because he is sitting in a fort on a mountain between your enemy and your cities is definately worth the cost. The AI can usually out produce you so forts definately help in this respect.

The other thing it does is that the AI will have less units left to attack your city - often buying time for you to rush defence into it.

I often build forts at critical fronts along my territory - not as a complete stopgap measure - but just to slow the AI down a bit.