Castles fundamentally alter Alamaze?

[Lord Thanatos]

I am playing in my first game after 3 years or so . . .

I am learning some things on the fly (and making errors every turn).

I learned that a Castle prevents siege.  Seems odd, but okay.  I could see the siege going from 3 turns to 4 turns, but not a big deal.

I learned that a Great Castle prevents political actions.  Really?  Once the massive stones are in place the backbiting, rumors, blackmail, etc . . . simply cease?

Legendary Castle?  Not sure yet what it does . . .

I guess castles are intended to be taken via military conquest?  Got it!  Wait . . . all defensive strengths of fortifications were just improved in the last update?  So attacking castles are much harder than previously was the case.  The only remaining tactic to deal with castles was made considerably more difficult?

I am confused!  Looking for the rationale here . . .

Coupled with The Rex victory condition being increased from 4 regions to 5 regions I can see Alamaze turning into SOLELY a building/artifact hunting game.  Dismiss all your armies, raise wizards to cast Hidden Ore and Bounty, raise a few Great Castles and roam the land obtaining artifacts seems like a viable strategy to me.  Games will now last longer, you get status points for castles and artifacts over more turns now.  The earlier Castles are built and artifacts obtained the more valuable they become over time.

Two questions: 1) how are players dealing with castles/fortifications (Wizards destroying the defenses?); and, 2) am I overstating the case for kingdom building in Alamaze or is it still viable to take resources from others?  The more troop maintenance is increased the fewer resources are available to build those Great Castles.

Truly am looking for the thoughts of my fellow gamers.

[Senior Tactician]

I'm also thinking they over-tweaked fortifications a tiny bit, but it doesn't prevent military kingdoms from dominating the early game, as they always have, and from wizards dominating the late game, as they always have.  Not much has changed as I can yet see.  We have yet to complete a single game that started under the new rules, I'd give it time.

[Pine Needle]

In the game that just ended, the WA took out two of my legendary castles relatively easily, and I took one back. So legendaries are not impregnable.

Here is the WA army and he case fear, valor and wind, had 25% artifacts, and took 19 % casualties.
Commanders
Warlord Bol the Scimitar
Grand Marshal Wolfbane
Captain Kazinor

Wizards
Power-6 Eagle Borne
Power-6 Mennemik
Power-5 Havix Moondust

Brigades
4 Warlock Elite
1 Warlock Veteran
3 Hill Giants Veteran
1 Trolls Veteran
2 Trolls Regular
3 Paladins Elite
2 Paladins Green
9 Orcs Elite
2 Rock Golems Veteran
1 Rock Golems Regular

Combat Factors
Forged Armor Legendary Castle
Forged Weaponry Resolved Morale
Excellent Leaders

Tactical Selection
Determined Attack Veterans To The Gate

And here's my AN army, I had 50% artifacts and cast wind and avenging angel. 23% casualties

Warlord Apollis
Warlord Sun Tsu
Grand Marshal Uli Sharpblade

Wizards
Power-8 Isis of Stardust
Power-8 Zin Kasan
Power-4 Platonius

Brigades
3 Ancient Ones Elite
1 Ancient Ones Veteran
1 Mammoths Elite
2 Mammoths Veteran
3 Minotaurs Elite
2 Minotaurs Veteran
4 Westmen Regular
2 Ghouls Regular
7 Skeletons Elite
2 Skeletons Veteran

Combat Factors
Forged Armor Legendary Castle
Forged Weaponry Confident Morale
Renowned Leaders

[PTRILEY]

Yes troop composition is huge. Even wizard kingdoms with limited companions, must rely heavy on summoned troops. The undead have some advantage with fear until it’s nerfed, but if they don’t have forged armor and weapon they will break on the walls. And in group combat, destroy undead spell kills 1 undead unit above P2 so if that’s all u got, you gonna get hurt if a P8 or P9 cast it. Military kingdoms have to move fast before those big forts are built. Magic kingdoms that don’t get the trolls/giants/mammoths will have to get Minotaurs/ Rock Golems and recruited troops like Zamoran (3 give 10%boost valor) westmen (boost to shield) and Paladins/Vikings (much better troops) and wildlings (in winter regions/during winter huge bonus attack and defense).

That same game, one of my best groups with max Minotaur/skeletons/Ghoul/and 4 Spectors. Supplemented with IL/Chamilion/westmen/Northman still had to blast the legendary castle a couple of turns before it was able to overcome defense. So troops are huge. Oh and the AN intervention spell is overpowered it’s made to stop group/group, not group/pop attacks. But parking a group on a pop and using it stops the group to pop attack. Not the intent of the spell, or it would work as a group/pop spell as well. Should be much higher lvl spell or have no effect with group/pop interaction. Imo.

[Acererak]

At risk of sounding like a broken record......the reason the fortifications were added in the beginning, and now powered up yet again is because of the bonuses leaders and mages give groups. Since PCs cannot station leaders or wizards (which makes zero sense), you thus are always at a disadvantage versus a group. As we all know 3 Warlord groups with 3p5+ are common late in the game. These give so much bonus to pc value- augmented by forge, and companions then add in wizards. It’s never going to be fair or work well until pcs have slots for wizards and leaders that allow them to receive the same bonuses and spells for defense.

[Ebenezar Blackstaff McCoy]

I think the one thing that's weird is castle's cannot be sieged.
This really hurts a few kingdoms that have advantage to siege what's the point really.

[Lord Thanatos]

How does one obtain forged weapons and armor?

None of our discussion addresses why political actions cannot be performed when a great castle is built.

[PTRILEY]

How does one obtain forged weapons and armor?

None of our discussion addresses why political actions cannot be performed when a great castle is built.

That’s the advantage of the castle, no political action can be taken.

[PTRILEY]

I think the one thing that's weird is castle's cannot be sieged.  
This really hurts a few kingdoms that have advantage to siege what's the point really.

I think the siege is irrelevant now, if you have a group that big to over come a great or legendary castle, with just some magic you can probably take it by straight out assault.   In this last game I had a great mage tower on every legendary castle, if you could siege it, I would just pop a Army on the pop and get me a 250% increase in all my attack spells.  Bet the siege would end pretty quick.  I had a group that would have inflicted 87,000 in damage before the first arrow was sent.  P11/P9/P9  earthquake/tornado/crack the sky.   Not including the three presence lightning attacks. Just saying.

[Pine Needle]

How does one obtain forged weapons and armor?

Forged weapons and armor can be purchased once you build (or capture) a forge at a PC. Mike's Corner details the cost. The advantage of forged weapons and armor is that they can't be stolen from the group. The disadvantage is they're expensive, a multi-stage process, and can't be transferred from group to group once purchased.