Temporary forts

[Omisan]

What's the use of building forts (General's ability)? I thought it was a good idea when moving troops in enemy territory, but I quickly realised it was a big mistake.

These tiny wooden forts are deathtraps. It's nearly impossible to effectively deploy your units inside. Yourranged units can' t shoot at incoming enemies. I really don't see how this is supposed to help defend my army. I would rather deploy on a regular battle map.

So anyone uses them? Am I doing something wrong?

[Mega Dux Bob]

IMHO Forts are really for slowing down another faction when they attack your cities on an inactive front. Best used in a pass with some junk foot unit. I personally never put my armies in one except to garrison them so they don't desert.

[CamelGunner]

They're good for me when I have a ton of horse units. I fly em all out the side gate and cut down their units out in the open. I've never actually defended one by staying inside.

[pike master]

do the stakes actually cause damage to cav or are they just for looks?

[holycow]

I've never used forts cause well, never had to.

Are you using forts to shuttle units? or to shelter army? cause if you're worred about getting ambushed or attacked while in enemy territory, try screening your main army with spy, low end cavalry, or peasants - just send these units(except for spy) ahead of your main path or to block other roads/paths to your destination.

[HoreTore]

Another good use, is to use them to slow down enemy reinforcements.

Say you're planning to attack toledo, coming from pamplona. You're marching down, but then you see a big stack coming from valencia. To stop them, plant a fort in their path with a merc/expendable unit in it. Unless they've got siege weapons(and reinforcements rarely do), they'll have to besiege and make rams, allowing you to deal with the army in Toledo.

As for defending, I usually use mountains and rivers, but where these are not available, I sometimes use forts. The brilliant thing about them, is that the enemy is forced to concentrate when they attack, and they'll be disorganised coming through the gate. Depending on your army and the enemy, this can be a big advantage.

[Hochmeister]

Forts have some great "gamey" uses like sacrificing one unit to slow down the enemy but like the op mentioned are deathtraps for a full stack.

I hope CA improves on this feature for the expansion as this should be something that should add to the game tactically and historically like the keeps and watchtowers of old.

Maybe a larger more permanent structure which can be placed almost anywhere within each province and improved from wood to stone over time??

[Re Berengario I]

Forts have some great "gamey" uses like sacrificing one unit to slow down the enemy but like the op mentioned are deathtraps for a full stack.

I hope CA improves on this feature for the expansion as this should be something that should add to the game tactically and historically like the keeps and watchtowers of old.

Maybe a larger more permanent structure which can be placed almost anywhere within each province and improved from wood to stone over time??

Approved! In MTW2 they should be like smaller castles. They'd add immensely to the gameplay and the immersion.

[Hollerbach]

The problem with making forts better or more usefull at present is that the AI dosn't really utilise them, so they are too easily abusable in 'gamey' ways as mentioned. You get to do this but the AI dosn't, so it's a clear player advantage

Not that I'm complaing about the AI on this, the relatively simple ( to a human) forts tactics described in this thread would be very difficult to encode for an AI, and indeed, you don't see them doing it.

I'm reminded of the classic Civ style game Alpha Centauri. It was amazing and had all these well designed and balanced features and improvements over CivII. The problem was that the y forgot to tell the AI about most of them so even on the highest level the game was a breeze (though still very enjoyable).

[dumas]

...the enemy is forced to concentrate when they attack, and they'll be disorganised coming through the gate.

That's why I use them too. Just like any other sieges, 3 Pikemen boxing in the gate and a couple swordsmen to mow down the trapped prey could easily take out an enemy army twice their size. Even defending against a full stack, they'll do significant damage and cripple the enemy calvary that just love to charge in first.

[TevashSzat]

Well, they are also useful for piling up merchants in it. Twenty merchants on the tow gold near Timbuktu will make a hefty amount of money

[Czar Alexsandr]

As a Russian turtler player I find myself using quite a few forts. And, despite the unpopularity of it.. I have started putting armies in the wooden boxes. The reason for this came because I needed a way to defeat thosse horrid Mongols.

I find that although they do hinder your ranged infantry's accuracy they offer four walls of protection that hinders the enemy even more. Also if you have a general to spare and think he can actually win try putting him in and sallying at night. Since archers can use fire arrows they technically have more accuracy at night and the enemy horse archers are basically firing blind. In one battle I killed two Mongol stacks and lost a grand total of 10 archers using them like this.

If they actually attack you have a advantage for your Infantry since they can wait behind walls until the enemy attacks and there's like a ft or less of closing distance.

I am aware the fort's not the best defensive structure. But my forts in Ryazan are the best defensive structures I own now. But if I hadn't lost it I wouldn't have found a use for forts. Which is basically just a place to sit until the enemy attack.

[pike master]

i knew that the fort would protect your merchants but i never thought of stacking them in there. that would actually make it worthwhile. 8)

[Kraggenmor]

I used to wonder the same thing and used to never use them.

I have come to find forts to be a priceless strategic tool. Especially for breaking Mongol stacks.

Place a fort at the end of a bridge or geographic choke point and you will absolutely control access in and out of your territory.

Tired of non-allied troops just wandering around your turf?

Forts.

Need to shelter that crippled army at the end of it's move while it's trying to outrun an enemy army?

Forts.

Need to delay an enemy advance so you can build up or move troops in response?

Forts.

Want to break several Mongol stacks BEFORE they get to your settlements?

Forts.

For that last one, I typically had a stack of troops inside the fort and outside the fort. One thing to keep in mind is that, the idea isn't necessarily to stay inside the fort but, to get the enemy to commit to entering it.

Once they are committed to a gate, or breach they've made, you have them!

Pin their leading forces with some of the troops inside the fort and send the rest out through the uncovered exit to flank them. Of course archers should have been harrying them with flaming arrows the entire time regardless.

Of course, I am not saying that I run about throwing forts down everywhere. Proper tool for the proper job and all that. Used for the job they're intended for, forts rule!

[dunno]

This was suggested by some else in another thread some time ago, but the idea was to scale fort size by army size (makes sense, more soldiers = more builders). So they'll need maybe 3-5 fort size templates and the largest could equal the wooden castle settlements or something. Cost would be scaled appropriately, of course. I think that's the best way they could improve forts in some future patch/expansion. Right now it's completely backwards and unintuitive to be better off defending on open land than behind fortifications.

[Quillan]

Forts aren't there for you to hide inside. They are there to pin the enemy, either strategically or tactically. Place a fort at the end of a bridge, and the enemy will stop on the bridge. The following turn it can only move forward one square, either to besiege the fort or to sidestep it. After that they can continue moving, so you have delayed the army by two full turns without engaging in combat. Tactically, you make them pile up trying to enter the fort and hit them from both sides.

Troops don't go rebel in forts, as far as I can tell, so a network of forts slightly less than 1 turns march apart will allow you to move captain-led armies in safety.

[vonsch]

Troops don't go rebel in forts, as far as I can tell, so a network of forts slightly less than 1 turns march apart will allow you to move captain-led armies in safety.

I use forts, though less (so far) in MTW2 than in RTW, where I used them a lot as strategic defensive posts.

But I keep forgetting the use you mention here. It's annoying having reinforcements go rebel not just for the loss of troops, but because they then cost you more troops in removing them from your reinforcement path. And all it takes is an agent to keep the fort "alilve." Or a unit chopped down to a couple of men. The 500 cost is paid back pretty easily if you prevent one unit from going rebel. The ongoing support cost can be very low if you use severely depleted units or agents you would park in that area anyway (like spies keeping an eye on things). Or if you have a steady flow of units passing through so there's always one there anyway.

As far as the AI use of forts goes, they seem to not build them. But they sure did like using them in RTW. One downside of using them defensively is the AI would take and hold them, effectively stoppering your bottleneck in their own favor. But that still mitigated an invading army's threat level, so it was very much worth it. The AI tended to park the army that took the fort in it and just sit. Fine with me.

[HoreTore]

I've seen the AI build forts lots of times. The turks, egyptians, poles and byzantines seem to be the ones building them most.

Got an egyptian fort utside Acre(along with 10 mongol stacks....) as we speak.

[pike master]

ive seen em do it to but usually at random with no logic behind its placement aside from it being on a road.

[Forward Observer]

I know it's "pie in the sky" at this point, but wouldn't it have been nice if one could build a fort and eventually turn it into a full scale settlement, just as such things happened historically.

I think forward_observersville has a nice ring to it

[Philippe]

I like to build forts at road intersections and choke points like passes and river crossings. In RTW I manned them with the cheapest and most expendable unit I could find, usually peasants. I haven't played M2TW much and had started to use the same tactic, until I noticed that peasants aren't really that much cheaper than real units, so I may try peasant archer garrisons.

I didn't have a problem with the forts in RTW (and especially BI) because they were very much in character with the spirit and practise of low Empire fortifications. And since the real limitanei were a pretty useless bunch, peasants as garrisons made sense and a good stand-in. I didn't even mind too much that the forts would vanish if not garrisoned, because that felt right. Besides, the way I was playing them the only time they would ever be empty would be the turn after an attacker moved out. So it made sense that the fort would vanish (i.e. no peasant maintenance cost for upkeep, no strategic flypaper). And it made the need to reconstruct the border defenses very tangible after a barbarian horde swept through.

Unfortunately the BI rationale for peasant garrisons in forts doesn't work in M2TW. Temporary field fortifications weren't as common in the middle ages as in Roman times. And the places that I build forts at would have been held by motte-and-bailey castles that would eventually convert into stone towers. [Actually, most of the places I build forts at would have been small towns, but let's not get too real]. If you travel around Europe today you can still see the ruins of these things, so they most definately shouldn't vanish overnight.

If I could wave my magic wand I would create three classes of fortifications: temporary camps, wooden towers, and stone towers. The temporary camp would be much cheaper but much more ephemeral that the present fort (when the army building it leaves, it goes poof). Wooden towers could probably work like current forts, but would have much better defenses and very limited garrison capabilty. Stone towers would be like wooden towers, but even more expensive and permanent.

[pike master]

right now christian peasants in mtw2 rock. the only problem i see is their low morale but as far as animations they can hold their own against most infantry units in the game. not sure about a bogged down cav unit but id say they could own them too.

also i think the settlement castle thing should be blended together. just give cities multi-tiered walled systems. and the fort into fortress thing seems to make sense to me.

however id still like to know if those stakes surrounding the forts can kill horses or are they just there for looks?

[Omisan]

If I could wave my magic wand I would create three classes of fortifications: temporary camps, wooden towers, and stone towers. The temporary camp would be much cheaper but much more ephemeral that the present fort (when the army building it leaves, it goes poof). Wooden towers could probably work like current forts, but would have much better defenses and very limited garrison capabilty. Stone towers would be like wooden towers, but even more expensive and permanent.

I agree, I wish we could build smaller castles and stone towers. Assault and sieges on smaller structures could be more fun than huge cities and fortresses.

[Budwise]

One very big use for Forts. Putting Merchants in so you don't lose them. After turn after turn of this "Let the CPU take over another Merchant crap" I got fed up and built a fort on two of the main exports in Stolkholm. Now, I don't have to worry about losing merchants or AI leaving their area to attack mine via trade. ANother question, why the hell does the AI seek out my resources and leave theirs alone? Do you get better traits as a merchant taking over other merchants because I never try to put another merchant out and I never had a trait 10 merchant before. But, I always lose my merchants to others.

[Suraknar]

Well I really liked, the Fort/Town choices in M2TW, it certaintly adds more flavor and tactice.

However, I also agree what everyone says here, which also gave me the following ideas, it could have been made differently, in that, all settlements are of the town type, and generals with armies can build Forts (as they do now) that could evolve to Fortresses, cstles, citadels within the same territory as a give settlements.

When in enemy territory one could build a Fort but not evolve it to a fortress and beyond.

And finally, the cherry on the top, Fortesse/castels could ultimatelly participate in the economy of the province by having roads etc (It would require a more dynamic road system because the placement is selected by the player.

To offset some placement of a Castle to some more sensitive areas, there could be some restrictions as to where a fort encampement can evolve beyond.

Like if lets say you made a fort in the middle of the road because you were fighting and defending etc, it would be considered a temporary thing just if you were in enemy territory, while if it was a bit farther in the green pastures/desert etc it could be good terrain to evolve it more.

What this means is that a Province can have more than one "settlement", it can have a sprawling town which is the basis of that territory, but it can also have Castles(there can be a maximum of castles able to be built depending on how big a prvince is).

Castles pretty much can have same function as they do now able to make better units etc. And of cource, would add to the overal defense of the province.

At this point we can intruduce astate in between A or B ownership.

For instance if the enemy captures the City of a give province, but that province does have a Castle , then the ownership becomes contested between the sides A and B.

Additionally, Ctles can draw their recruitment from the City Pool (this can also help with issues of over population in towns). If the city falls to enemy hands the castles of the contested province cant recruit anymore.

So the idea is for the player to mobilise a relief army.

Vice versa, an enemy could contest a given territory by taking over castles.

Holding all castles but not a city will dramatically reduce the production of a city its trade and limit its devellopment, it could also sclae it production queues 10 fold, the city could still contruct buildings but at 2x the original build times.

And finally castles can be Abandoned by owning player or destroyed all together by enemy (instead of captured). It is a choice.

As destroying castles captured by the enemy is a way to uncontest a province.

This could indeed be a real revolution to the series, and its future devellopment.

[TinCow]

Forts in M2TW are useful in the exact same way they were in RTW: to block strategic points with a small garrison. The most effective fort use I have ever seen was one I engineered in a RTW:BI WRE PBM. Check out the following post and you'll see specific screenshots showing how forts allowed me to secure the entire European border from the English Channel to the Black Sea with only 4 armies.

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...9&postcount=32

In M2TW the choke-points are different, but there are many places that could benefit from a similar system. The Pyrenees, Alps, and Danube are borders that could work like this.

[Taiwan Legion]

all these suggestions are nice, but they're kinda far out. One thing they could and SHOULD do really easily is just give forts better layout. As of right now, it's just a square with wooden walls and bunch of tents in the middle. No strategic placement at all. Make it like a real camp would look like.

[DukeKent]

Forts are very handy. Great death traps for mobil armys like the mongols. My biggest complaint is the indestructible features in the layout of the fort. A wooden gatepost and tents stop cannonballs to protect the soft enemy soldiers cowering in the middle square. A bit ridiculous to say the least. Makes you want mortars for all factions when you get to the gun powder age.

[Czar Alexsandr]

I had a battle once where I had already defeated one Mongol stack but another one was coming and my archers still had arrows.. so I placed them behind the stakes and flanked the stakes with spears...

Lol. Ask any of thosse poor Mongol Heavy Lancers. The stakes kill.

[Whacker]

Forts are very handy. Great death traps for mobil armys like the mongols. My biggest complaint is the indestructible features in the layout of the fort. A wooden gatepost and tents stop cannonballs to protect the soft enemy soldiers cowering in the middle square. A bit ridiculous to say the least. Makes you want mortars for all factions when you get to the gun powder age.

That's one of my major beefs about siege battles with the changes made since RTW. In RTW you could destroy just about anything with arty fire, in M2TW there's hardly anything beyond gates and towers you can destroy. At the best you can knock holes in walls and put some nice big holes in buildings but you can't knock them all the way down. Something else I miss is the ability to just have your troops manually shred a building by clicking on it. In my view everything, including trees, needs to be fully destructible.