Castles

**Furious Mental** · 10-03-2006, 14:44

A long time ago I read something (don't know remember if it was by a developer or the games media) saying that famous cities and castles would be depicted accurately in the mod. So far I haven't seen any castles or cities which I recognise although this being said I don't know many. Can anyone tell me if indeed this is or isn't the case?

**Beelzebub** · 10-03-2006, 14:56

I really hope so, it would add so much to the atmosphere, but so far we havent seen any besides the Krak des Chevaliers. Hopefully they are something that just arent in the version of the game that these screenshots are coming from (there were some placeholders in the scottish/hungarian/polish unit rosters we've just seen).

**Darth Nihilus** · 10-03-2006, 15:10

I realize that it is not the most important feature, but I would really like if they did that. If the Wall's of Constantinople really had walls. That would be awesome if the castles really resembled their real counterparts.

*I think I said "really" too many times

**Furious Mental** · 10-03-2006, 15:21

Also I think it would be great if castles which aren't on the battle map were represented in custom battles. For instance the seat of government in Wales is apparently Caernarvon (which had better resemple its namesake), but it would b great if the other massive English castles there- Beaumaris, Conway, Harlech, Caerphilly, Rhuddlan, Kidwelly etc. were available in custom battles. Even better, it would be great if the "make your own castle" feature from MTW made a return, though this seems unlikely.

**Vladimir** · 10-03-2006, 17:00

Originally Posted by Furious Mental

Also I think it would be great if castles which aren't on the battle map were represented in custom battles. For instance the seat of government in Wales is apparently Caernarvon (which had better resemple its namesake), but it would b great if the other massive English castles there- Beaumaris, Conway, Harlech, Caerphilly, Rhuddlan, Kidwelly etc. were available in custom battles. Even better, it would be great if the "make your own castle" feature from MTW made a return, though this seems unlikely.

Uh, could you tell me more about that?

**Furious Mental** · 10-03-2006, 17:20

I haven't played MTW for a long time but I do remember being able to place the elements of a castle in the battle map editor. Hence make your own castle. I'm not talking about the campaign mode if that's what you're thinking.

**Dracula(Romanian Vlad Tepes)** · 10-03-2006, 18:37

The best way i think is that you could construct all your castles in the campaning.You make hoe many layers you want and so on.

**Furious Mental** · 10-03-2006, 18:49

Yeah that would be awesome. Hopefully CA can be convinced to add it in an expansion.

**Bob the Insane** · 10-03-2006, 19:02

I don't know...

I am not sure I want that much depth... I mean it is Total War not Total Architecture...

I mean you can have too much depth in a empire building game, just look at MOO3 for the classic spreadsheet based 'game'...

I would like to see more variety on the settlements though...

**Furious Mental** · 10-03-2006, 19:06

Well I think the game should give you the choice to choose either a preset template or make your own fortifications. The latter is more time consuming but means you get to tailor the defences as you see fit and perhaps make them better.

**Dracula(Romanian Vlad Tepes)** · 10-03-2006, 19:32

I wanna build myself

**Martok** · 10-03-2006, 22:27

Originally Posted by Bob the Insane

I don't know...

I am not sure I want that much depth... I mean it is Total War not Total Architecture...

[laugh] Very true. While I don't deny that designing your own castles would be immeasurably cool, I think that would be adding way too much micromanagement to the game. As long as the castles conform to the local landscapes (and the screenshots we've seen so far indicate that they will), I'll be content.

Originally Posted by Bob the Insane

I mean you can have too much depth in a empire building game, just look at MOO3 for the classic spreadsheet based 'game'...

GAH! [shudders at the mention of MOO3] Yeah, that was what you could call a "management management" game....

Originally Posted by Bob the Insane

I would like to see more variety on the settlements though...

Me too. I very much hope that we dont' see "cookie-cutter" towns & cities, especially with ones like Constaninople, Cairo, Jerusalem, etc.

**highlanddave** · 10-03-2006, 23:36

i can understand why building your own castle design has not been added. it is actually alot of work to make sure any random castle that a player might design would really work.

if you look at the stronghold number one game the whole engine was designed for you to place, block by block the whole wall. that made it easier to deal with complex curvature of the earth. the player must also be careful to place pieces right next to one another to assure, "no holes". this kind of thing can cause ctds unless the game to designed to work with such abnormalities that can occur. if you notice, most of the cities and castles in mtw as well as rtw are on completely flat ground. what happens to a long segment of wall that would be placed partially on a cliff face? that kind of thing has to be programmed.

i played the undone campaign in chivralic total war mod. it really wasn't completed and wasn't meant to be played. i attacked a city. once it was in the city map the whole castle was suspended 20 feet in the air. it crashed part way through the battle.

it would be a nice feature for some players, but it would take alot of manhours to make it workable.

**screwtype** · 10-04-2006, 09:11

Originally Posted by Bob the Insane

I don't know...

I am not sure I want that much depth... I mean it is Total War not Total Architecture...

Actually, it can work very well. The Amiga version of Lords of the Realm II had a castle editor which was fun to use, and it certainly didn't detract at all from the overall gameplay. It was just there if you wanted to muck around with it.

In practice, you didn't need to use it much because once you'd hit on a basic affordable little castle design that could house a reasonable number of troops and store enough food for them to last a few turns, you didn't need to do any more. And like many games, once you had the finances to really expand your castles, you were already the dominant faction so there was no point in going for better defences.

All the same, I found it enjoyable to add little knickknacks to my castles as time went on, like moats and stuff. I think it would have been even more fun if those extras had played a more important role in the game, but regardless, it really isn't the sort of subgame that has to get in the way of overall gameplay. As long as they provided a standard set of castle designs for you to choose from in addition to the design-your-own option, you wouldn't need to spend any time on it at all if you weren't interested in it.