Making siege more interesting

[Darkcity]

Hello 0.A.D community,

I think currently siege engines in general are not interesting to play as they are handled as simple as any unit. I was thinking of introducing following changes to make them more interesting to play.

Top level idea: A siege engine shouldn't take popluation to produce but it will not move or attack untill units are garriosned. The attack and movement will depend on unit garriosned.

• Siege engine popupulation utlization: A siege engine shouldn't take any population or train, that means from current population of 3 to 0.
• Movement, attack & armor: Movement & attack will varies with respect to the number of units garriosned in the siege engine. While other statics will remian the same. The current and expected values can be seen in following table.
  

  	Current				Expected				Inputs
  Siege type	Attack			Speed	Attack			Speed (current*x/pop utlized)	Currently pop utilized	Unit Garrisioned
  	Crush	Pierce	Interval		Crush	Pierce	Interval
  Battering Ram	150		1.5	7.2	50	0	4.5	2.4	3	1
  Siege Tower	2.5	12	1	6.3	NA	NA	NA	2.1	3	1
  Bolt shooter		160	4	8.1	0	80	8	4.05	2	1
  Catapult		210	7	7.2	0	105	14	3.6	2	1

*Siege tower has impact only on speed and not other stats, as attacks depends on indivudual unit and not on siege iteself.

Lets take an exmple of battering ram.

• With 0 unit garriosned ram will not move or attack.
• With 1 unit garriosed, its attack damage, speed and interval will be 1/3rd of what is currently there.
• With 2 unit garriosed, its attack damage, speed and interval will be 2/3rd of what is currently there. 
• With 3 unit garriosned, it will behave as it behave currently. 
• More than 3 will not have attack on stats but you can garriosn in it as per current state.

Gameplay cases

1. You can train as many siege as you want but in order to use them, you will need units inside. Depends on your requirement you can garrsion 1/2/3 or more.
2. You are not pop constrained here but at same time you are, but tactically.
3. You can park the siege out of fight and after fight when you wants to kill buildings garrsion units and start.
4. This will also insure to use garriosing units in siege.

There are many use cases I can go about. But i hope you got the idea.

@borg-, @Stan`, @ValihrAnt, @Lion.Kanzen, what do you guys think?

Open for suggestion if you find it interesting.!!

Edited July 5, 2022 by Darkcity
Corrected table

[Lion.Kanzen]

I like the idea of movement speed, but not the values.

It should be able to move and cost 1 population. even 2

[borg-]

Interesting the speed, but I think it must cost population. One idea I've always had is that siege tower can capture towers and forts with ease. The more units inside, the higher the capture rate. I don't like this unit being just a mobile tower.

[Darkcity]

Ok, so following changes can be done.

Siege will cost 1 pop, and by default values of movement and attack rate and damage will be 1/current pop cost. For example ram will cost 1 pop with 50 cursh, 4.5 second of interval with movement speed of 2.4. As you garrsion more units till 3 (which is the pop cap) stats will increase. Garrsion limit will still be the same as before.

Idea is to promote garrisoning using hence people start using them as tactically.

We might not stop at just current stats but also allow stats boost by like 20% if fully garrsioned. something like that.

[Grapjas]

I much like the idea and i think it will bring interesting new gameplay to the table. Instead of adjusting damage values i think it may be more logical to only touch movement speed and attack speed values with the exception of the ram. I think it'll be fine honestly it not costing population because siege is still expensive and it indeed technically still costs pop to be able to effeciently use them.

[Darkcity]

My thinking was also same @Grapjas. We maybe leave other values like damange & armors but modify movement and attack speed. Also, give bonus for extra garrion so people prefer garrsioning them instead of treating them like normal units which cost more pop but comes with high damage. 

[Grapjas]

25 minutes ago, borg- said:

One idea I've always had is that siege tower can capture towers and forts with ease. The more units inside, the higher the capture rate. I don't like this unit being just a mobile tower.

Siege towers should make you able to unload units over walls imo. When clicking unload you should be prompted with a choice where to with a simple area highlight around the mouse pos. But an increased capture rate makes sense too.

 

Imo rams need bonus attack damage against gates and catas need their splash damage back. 

[real_tabasco_sauce]

3 minutes ago, Grapjas said:

Imo rams need bonus attack damage against gates and catas need their splash damage back. 

+

[Darkcity]

This can be initiated as seprate thread as well. But to add.

Splash damange was broken imo in a23, all you needed was just catas and few units to slaughter everything. But yeag some amount of splash damange can be added for exmple elephant attack damage that @borg- was suggesting. It has to be minor so it doesn't become nuisance like a23. For example hit damage to a units should be like bolt shooter but and rest units take 1 damage in lets say 1 meter redius.  Point is it shouldn't be op.

Back to making siege tower intersting. I have another idea to it. Following can be done.

1. Make siege tower units attackable. In this case units will be garriosned on 2 layers of siege tower 10 on bottom and 10 on top. ground units can attack the units. Point is siege tower units armor will be increased just like wall garriosned units. So, they will behave like moving wall (only for analogy). This logic can be applied to boats also, which I'm in high favor.
2. Allow capturing from siege tower. This will be like giving option to siege tower to both either attack or capture a building. The capture strength will be equal to number of units garriosned in the tower. Point is, Siege units will take less damage compared to ground units as they are garrsioned in siege tower.
3. Movement speed variation as units increased or decreaed in siege tower.

I think these conversation can be initiated on separate threads as well. Including improvements for boats.

[Outis]

6 hours ago, Grapjas said:

Instead of adjusting damage values i think it may be more logical to only touch movement speed and attack speed values with the exception of the ram. I think it'll be fine honestly it not costing population because siege is still expensive and it indeed technically still costs pop to be able to effeciently use them.

Excellent ideas

[faction02]

6 hours ago, Darkcity said:

Hello 0.A.D community,

I think currently siege engines in general are not interesting to play as they are handled as simple as any unit. I was thinking of introducing following changes to make them more interesting to play.

Top level idea: A siege engine shouldn't take popluation to produce but it will not move or attack untill units are garriosned. The attack and movement will depend on unit garriosned.

• Siege engine popupulation utlization: A siege engine shouldn't take any population or train, that means from current population of 3 to 0.
• Movement, attack & armor: Movement & attack will varies with respect to the number of units garriosned in the siege engine. While other statics will remian the same. The current and expected values can be seen in following table.

  	Current				Expected				Inputs
  Siege type	Attack			Speed	Attack			Speed (current*x/pop utlized)	Currently pop utilized	Unit Garrisioned
  	Crush	Pierce	Interval		Crush	Pierce	Interval
  Battering Ram	150		1.5	7.2	50	0	4.5	2.4	3	1
  Siege Tower	2.5	12	1	6.3	NA	NA	NA	2.1	3	1
  Bolt shooter		160	4	8.1	0	80	8	4.05	2	1
  Catapult		210	7	7.2	0	105	14	3.6	2	1

*Siege tower has impact only on speed and not other stats, as attacks depends on indivudual unit and not on siege iteself.

Lets take an exmple of battering ram.

• With 0 unit garriosned ram will not move or attack.
• With 1 unit garriosed, its attack damage, speed and interval will be 1/3rd of what is currently there.
• With 2 unit garriosed, its attack damage, speed and interval will be 2/3rd of what is currently there. 
• With 3 unit garriosned, it will behave as it behave currently. 
• More than 3 will not have attack on stats but you can garriosn in it as per current state.

Gameplay cases

1. You can train as many siege as you want but in order to use them, you will need units inside. Depends on your requirement you can garrsion 1/2/3 or more.
2. You are not pop constrained here but at same time you are, but tactically.
3. You can park the siege out of fight and after fight when you wants to kill buildings garrsion units and start.
4. This will also insure to use garriosing units in siege.

There are many use cases I can go about. But i hope you got the idea.

@borg-, @Stan`, @ValihrAnt, @Lion.Kanzen, what do you guys think?

Open for suggestion if you find it interesting.!!

I like the use of color for the table.

Edited July 5, 2022 by faction02

[faction02]

Maybe reintroducing sieges capture would fit with some of the ideas here. For example if sieges can't move without units inside, stealing ungarded sieges could be a fun part of the game (not sure why it was removed in the first place).

[Lion.Kanzen]

20 minutes ago, faction02 said:

Maybe reintroducing sieges capture would fit with some of the ideas here. For example if sieges can't move without units inside, stealing ungarded sieges could be a fun part of the game (not sure why it was removed in the first place).

We have to improve that capture mechanics.

Should be able to be captured if it's damaged.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

3 hours ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

Should be able to be captured if it's damaged.

maybe not damaged per se, but empty like @faction02 said.

Perhaps like buildings, they should be impossible to garrison if below X% HP.

This way you must capture, rebuild, then garrison.

 

I would say these changes should be accompanied by a buff to rams in general, since they will now be harder to use. Perhaps also an increase in hack armor, slight decrease in crush.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

10 hours ago, Darkcity said:

1. Make siege tower units attackable. In this case units will be garriosned on 2 layers of siege tower 10 on bottom and 10 on top. ground units can attack the units. Point is siege tower units armor will be increased just like wall garriosned units. So, they will behave like moving wall (only for analogy). This logic can be applied to boats also, which I'm in high favor.
2. Allow capturing from siege tower. This will be like giving option to siege tower to both either attack or capture a building. The capture strength will be equal to number of units garriosned in the tower. Point is, Siege units will take less damage compared to ground units as they are garrsioned in siege tower.
3. Movement speed variation as units increased or decreaed in siege tower.

 

1. agree

2. agree

3. this should be not be linear all the way to 20. how about 5 units is max speed.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

I think it is best leave bolt shooters and catapults as is currently, since they have dedicated soldiers to operate them. (their models include soldiers).

It is weird to garrison a bolt shooter.

[Darkcity]

1 hour ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

I think it is best leave bolt shooters and catapults as is currently, since they have dedicated soldiers to operate them. (their models include soldiers).

Yeah, they can left alone for a while.

1 hour ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

this should be not be linear all the way to 20. how about 5 units is max speed.

We can use 3 (which is the current pop taken by siege by the tower). If siege training takes 1 pop, then default speed will be current speed/3 (no pop taken then no speed). Once you garrsion 2 more then its speed becomes same as of now. If you fullly garrsion then 20% speed bonus (We can or can't do this).

The idea is to not bind 3 pop to siege forever. That 3 pop should be utilized other place also. Example - battle. But at the same time interaction with siege should also increase. 

[Outis]

8 hours ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

We have to improve that capture mechanics.

Should be able to be captured if it's damaged.

Maybe the garrisoned units are kicked out after the siege unit is damaged below a level, and it is captureable when not garrisoned. So, to capture, we damage the siege unit first, get rid of the garrison, then capture. This way, it is not a disaster when your siege is captured because it is time-consuming to capture and the siege unit is vulnerable when captured.

[Darkcity]

2 hours ago, Outis said:

Maybe the garrisoned units are kicked out after the siege unit is damaged below a leve

Kicking out feature is already there

Capture was removed this alpha but i think it should be added back. We can add that to changes as well to make them more interesting. As @faction02 pointed our capturing empty siege should be easy, and if we make them immovable with garrsion then this will make things interesting.

Think of case where, empty siege is laying at enemy base or inside arsenal. You capture the empty siege garrsion your units and start attacking. 

 

[Grapjas]

7 hours ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

since they have dedicated soldiers to operate them. (their models include soldiers).

Certainly can be changed if needed.

Ballista's needed up to 8 people to function, i think a catapult wouldn't be far off. I think bolt shooters were ideally a 2 man job at least but can't find a good source really. If i'm not mistaken, bolt shooters were ballista's too just of a different caliber. Maybe the historians know more about this.

[chrstgtr]

Anything that requires siege to be garrisoned sounds incredibly annoying...It's micro that a lot of know we should do now but don't because it's a pain and clunky 

[Lion.Kanzen]

3 minutes ago, chrstgtr said:

Anything that requires siege to be garrisoned sounds incredibly annoying...It's micro that a lot of know we should do now but don't because it's a pain and clunky 

I agree with this. Except battery ram.It literally worked like this. Even in AoE.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

47 minutes ago, chrstgtr said:

Anything that requires siege to be garrisoned sounds incredibly annoying...It's micro that a lot of know we should do now but don't because it's a pain and clunky 

thats why I am willing to see the siege tower tower changes, you already have to garrison them anyway. I think they should primarily deal a capture attack, with arrows being a secondary cabability.

Edited July 6, 2022 by real_tabasco_sauce

[Outis]

51 minutes ago, chrstgtr said:

Anything that requires siege to be garrisoned sounds incredibly annoying...It's micro that a lot of know we should do now but don't because it's a pain and clunky 

This is an RTS so i expect some micro is in order to win. Besides, siege units are generally not plentiful, so i expect it will be manageable.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

17 minutes ago, Outis said:

This is an RTS so i expect some micro is in order to win.

micro in fighting is good, but forcing micro is not. Imagine having to train horses from the corral in order to train cavalry.

I think what has been suggested could be done well with siege towers, perhaps with rams. If these changes are brought to rams, rams should be more powerful and more costly, so you would need to "micro" fewer rams.