way to improve useless Fort!

[Blaarg]

Zone of Control in past civ games was simply a means of restricting movement. You can't just waltz on past the fort, ecspecially if there are other units near by.

If you took the other unit off my diagram, the 'A', then the enemy unit could move south east making the zone of control less useful. It makes forts really nice when they are used together. A fort every 3 or 4 spaces with a few other defenders back a bit to impede movement further can make it very hard for an invading force to enter your territory without addressing at least one of the forts.

They did work this way in one of the past civ games, and I really liked the way they worked.

I don't like the idea of giving them a maitance cost so you can build them on improvements. I think that would actually make them worse. I think I'd prefer an additional unit over a fort for that maintainence cost.

 

[LucyDuke]

I don't like the idea of giving them a maitance cost so you can build them on improvements. I think that would actually make them worse. I think I'd prefer an additional unit over a fort for that maintainence cost.

I agree that a unit would always beat a fort at the same cost, but there's got to be some sort of counterweight if they're to be allowed over improvements to prevent spam. Perhaps the cost of one-third of a unit? I couldn't say which numbers are best, but a full unit's cost, like I said before, would be excessive. It seems reasonable to allow them on improvements with some sort of drawback, though production penalties might be excessive, too. I'm not too concrete on any of this, just trying to throw some ideas out there. I want the damn forts to be worth building more than just on useless desert, however they're changed.

 

[Quetzal513]

I just did a quick little test about something I was curious about. It's a minor point, but units inside forts also heal like they were inside cities, +20%/turn, rather than just +15%/turn for being in friendly territory.

 

[Quetzal513]

I did really like how Civ3 forts worked with their zone of control, essentially if somebody was home you couldn't walk by without getting sniped. These maintance costs and counterweights would probably complicate things a bit too much, and who knows about the historical accuracy of all that. They're simply a tile improvement, on a hill choose between mine, windmill or fort.

Forts are probably more of a consideration as you move up in difficulty levels where the AI is going to be quite a bit more aggressive and invade with superior forces. Playing as a perfectionist builder it's natural to want to max out every city using every tile and to its fullest, but forts with zone of control might make it worth it to sacrifice a few border tiles. They also love to come in and pillage. If you could defend your borders with a few forts that would injure those maurading barbs or enemy civ then you'd have something; avoid confronting the fort to come in a try to pillage a few plots, but risk making yourself easy pickin's. That seems about right to me

I don't think I've ever seen the AI build a fort, so thats an issue. You shouldn't make them much stronger if you're the only one who's going to use them. But then what if the AI has forts all over his terrain, especially resources? How does that make you feel? Yeah, nobody probably cares. I'm just trying to figure out how to get the most out of what's already there. But I do like the zone of control

 

[NKVD]

yep they need a zone of control badly!

 

[SkippyT]

I think the fort is a good improvement.
The only bonus I might think about is maybe giving it a -50% colleteral damage..but the +25% defense is fabulous AND if you put a fort on a hill and put a longbowman with City defender I and II you've got a 10,2 strength unit!
City defense I: +20%
City defense II: +25%
Longbowman's city defense: +50%
Hill: +25%
Longbowman's hill defense: +25%
Fort: +25%
Fortification: +25%
= +195% defense
= 17.7 strength unit.
Imagine that.
The fort is good as it is.

That's goood.

 

[Blaarg]

I think the fort is a good improvement.
The only bonus I might think about is maybe giving it a -50% colleteral damage..but the +25% defense is fabulous AND if you put a fort on a hill and put a longbowman with City defender I and II you've got a 10,2 strength unit!
City defense I: +20%
City defense II: +25%
Longbowman's city defense: +50%
Hill: +25%
Longbowman's hill defense: +25%
Fort: +25%
Fortification: +25%
= +195% defense
= 17.7 strength unit.
Imagine that.
The fort is good as it is.

That's goood.

All that strength will do you a ton of good when the opponent's army just walks on by your fort and pillages all your improvements.

 

[gnome]

But, you could put a fast unit inside the fort, and attack pillaging armies... then retreat back to the fort and heal. I have found success placing forts near something I want to defend, where a city isn't close enough.

 

[Kissamies]

Probably needs Civ3 style weak sniping style ZOC. Some units, like archery, gunpowder and siege might get extra shots in this (or might be only eligible units for this). The alternative is to give units high retreat chance when attacking from the fort to make that "stack offensive units for counterattacking in there" approach worthwhile.

 

[Vladesch]

Units should get free attacks at stacks that move past (as standard even without the fort), but with a fort they should get an attack bonus as well as a defense bonus.

Forts should take hammers to build. Not sure how to implement this, perhaps have a special worker unit that costs more and is used up when the fort is constructed.

 

[CliftonBazaar]

All that strength will do you a ton of good when the opponent's army just walks on by your fort and pillages all your improvements.

Have to agree; I have never seen an opposing AI attack one of my forts.

 

[Seuss]

I think that the idea of building forts on improvements would be a good idea, but it needs a limit, how about 1 fort per city you control, and each fort gives cultural control of the tile to the units inside it, so you could send a worker with your SOD and fort up on a hill near an enemy city and the tile would be yours, but say the fort takes maybe 10 turns to build, never goes below 5 (regardless of how many workers you bring). The cool thing about this would be that the enemy would still be able to oust you from your spot, and then THEY would have an extra fort, while you had one less (so both sides have 10 cities, they took your fort so now you have 9 forts and they have 11

 

[Virtual Alex]

In Civ 3 you could build forts on top of improvements I think... But in civ 3 they also gave a much better bonus, and the didn't REMOVE the original tile bonus.

I would love putting a fort on my copper...

 

[GooglyBoogly]

In BTS the functionality of forts was improved greatly, althouh not to the extent some people have suggested here.

Some of the changes include:

Fort = Canal (up to 2 tiles wide)
this allows ships to move through forts and use them as a sea-bridge over land

Fort = Airbase
Aircraft can now be based in forts (same limit as a city w/o airport)

Fort = City

Forts work with city defender/raider promotions like a city

 

[mirthadir]

The problem with building forts in enemy territory is that they give you effective city defenses. If we allow you to take control of the tile with your fort, I for one, will burn dozens of settlers to do a 10 tile fort line from the front to the enemy cap and seize that on the first turn of war. I'd also be sure to canal up naval ships (for bombardment and AA).

Forts have their uses holding chokepoints on the borders, giving you additional air support on your borders, and as killing fields for AI SoD who wand in and can be decimated by CRIII seige while inside.

Zone of control will just be a mess. In CIV II you just used spies or cheap fast units to circumvent. Unless you make it ridiciously overpowered so I can't move in from the side and back out, I'm just going to use explorers to circumvent any difficult forts. As far as the cost of upkeeping; you will run a very hard path to make them useful without making them overpowered.


We already have enough trouble with the AI being dumb, something like this is only begging for the AI to get screwed more.

 

[bestbrian]

How'd you find this thread to necro? It must've been buried waaaaay back there.

 

[GooglyBoogly]

The problem with building forts in enemy territory is that they give you effective city defenses.

In BTS 3.17 at least, forts in enemy territories only work for the civ that has cultural control of the tile, they do nothing for any invaders - only forts in neutral tiles can be used by whoever has units within.

 

[da dick]

forts always worked fine with my phalanx units on hills, but forested hills have a lot more potential for impenetrable(sp?) defence.