Terrain and Building alterations.

[HotShot]

For ease of the reader I shall split this in to the following sections so you can read the ideas which suit you.

1. Moats, man-made watering holes and other water related ideas
2. Trench system and dugouts
3. Paths, roads and other related ideas
4. Larger housing ideas

• Moats, man-made watering holes and other water related ideas

My first idea is to add player made water based objects. The first part of this is for the player to be able to create a moat, the definition of a moat is as follows "a deep, wide ditch surrounding a castle, fort, or town, typically filled with water and intended as a defense against attack.". As that is the definition, players could create a ditch at first using their civilian troops and then they would have to set them to "fill the moat" where they would have to retrieve water from a nearby source to add the water to it or they could even leave it unfilled and just have it to protect intruders from directly accessing their walls or their city/village. For friendly troops, civilians, animals, etc, to be able to cross the moat the player would have to create a draw bridge or simply a normal bridge (which I would explain in the paths, roads and other ideas section of this topic. If someone was to attack someone who was surrounded by a moat they would have the option to "cover the moat" which could mean they dig next to the moat and throw mud onto the moat, which in a sense would mean the moat is taking damage. For example, a moat starts at 25/25 (like health of a wall, or unit) if a troop manages to successfully dig 25 x dirt, sand, rubble etc into the moat it would take it to 0/25 meaning the moat is "destroyed" or "filled in" (this removes that section of the moat from the game.

My second idea on this subject is the man-made watering holes, which means simply adding a building into the game which is essentially a small ditch filled with water, this could be used as simply a visual effect (to make your city look nice) or you could use this watering hole to aid you in filling in the moat. A watering hole would be able to store 150 x "water" to be used in filling a moat. To create a moat you would require to use food as the resource, making it somewhat difficult to create a large moat, for the watering hole you require food and wood or maybe food and stone, I believe this would work as you're basically feeding the troops for their manual labor, meaning that it wouldn't be too overpowered as creating several watering holes or moats could be quite expensive.

• Trench system and dugouts

Here's my next group of ideas, it all kind of fits in to one in this section. Basically, yet again these would be created by the military/civilian troops available to you, to create them you require, food, wood and stone. The use of them is for ground troops to be placed in them to keep intruders at bay but you want to be careful how you use them as obviously the enemy can enter them and take control of them also. Whilst a troop is in the trench or dugout they gain a defensive bonus and it is harder for an enemy outside of the trench to successfully hit them, trenches and dugouts are created the same way as a moat and destroyed the same way also. If it is possible units in the trenches should be somewhat hidden from the enemy unless they are in direct sight or are close enough to notice, meaning they can be used for surprise attacks or ambushing unsuspecting victims.

• Paths, roads and other related ideas

Now, I understand and have read some parts of the forums regarding this, some have said it isn't possible but I completely disagree, I played a RTS game which managed to incorporated this, it needed nerfing as people moved incredibly fast on the roads, but with some work I'm sure it is possible, if not now, then definitely in the future. Firstly paths would be useful in your town/village/citadel area, increasing movement on them by something like 10% or maybe even lower, walking on the set terrain on the map would clearly hinder your speed. Roads where essential for civilizations such as the Romans to move large amounts of troops across Europe as fast and easy as possible, they introduced the idea to a vast amount of Europe around the time set of this game. The building of roads would require vasts amount of stone to create them, but yet again you receive a speed bonus for those who walk on them. Roads may provide a useful bonus to those who build them, but then also to attackers, simply rushing in through a road that your enemy has built would be brilliant, meaning roads would have to be guarded otherwise it could make you vulnerable to a quick attack. Also, at the moment a small river can prove tricky for you to pass, introducing the idea of bridge making would be great, you would need to research it in the city stage at maybe a University or probably just researched at your civic centre, constructing a bridge would cost a large amount of resources, and would take quite a long time to create, but also you would need access to the other side where your bridge is being created otherwise you can only build half of the bridge, meaning it isn't overpowered.

• Larger housing ideas

Basically, as you can train multiple units by holding shift and clicking I think you should be able to do something similiar with houses, you hold shift and then press the house and it groups them together as a five and uses as little space as possible, meaning you can quickly build multiple houses to get your population up. Then you could add the following, "Holding shift, press houses once" - This would mean you place five houses in a vertical line. "Holding shift, pressing house twice" - Place five houses in a horizontal line. "Holding shift, pressing house three times" - Places house like such : : . "Holding shift, pressing house four times" - Places houses like such * : : This means you can neatly and compactly place multiple houses at once. For obvious reasons placing five houses would cost you the usual amount of placing them one at a time, five times, but it's just ease of use and means you can place them quickly and get straight back into whatever you was doing before.