Forts useless without Zone-Of-Control? Yes.

[MattPilot]

If i were to use mobile units in forts, with 2 retreat upgrades, then i'd have a total retreat chance of 55%.


I really like the idea of giving forts an offensive attack bonus (or lowering an enemy's strenth by 25%), an ability to heal units faster, and perhaps a retreat bonus for all units that make attacks from a fort.

[Cardozo]

The power of a fortress was never that it had a 'Zone of Control'. Your enemies had to attack fortresses for strategic reasons - they didn't want to be attacked from multiple directions by multiple armies.

Can't really comment about the game though, as I expect it to be delivered today or tomorrow.

[Fleme]

I actually had a valid use for a Fort yesterday when I was playing a OCC game online. Otherwise the squares surrounding my town were plains or grassland except for one square which was hills. This hill was connected to another hill that was under the control of my opponent. We both had forts on our respective hills and he had the upper hand, military-wise. I had, however, massed a good bunch of cannons so he really couldnt approach through the flat lands, since that would have made his armies vulnerable to my rank 3 Barrage cannons.

Well, in conclusion, we sat in our forst and exchanged some shots every now and then and due to the fact that both of us were sitting in our forts with riflemen with guerilla and +25% against everything imaginable, it was just a test of patience. Well, his patience ran out and I mutilated his army which was twice the size of mine due to my artillery and then claimed victory. Well ok, the fort didn't do this for me but it sure made it easier.

Otherwise I agree with the points made here, we need ZoC and forts to serve a real role to make them worth losing the production bonus.

[Gibsie]

Originally posted by Volstag
You just reverse the "problem": one warrior unit can pin down multiple stacks of modern armor (for example).

So the armor would attack and wipe out the one warrior, surely.

[Mylon]

The game mechanics as they stand favor huge stacks of militaries. To properly protect your borders, you have to give up this stacking favor, which in turn makes protecting your borders useless. ZoC allows someone to guard a decent sized area (as opposed to a single tile) and still retain certain advantages: fortification bonus, stack size.

Fortification is all about scouting and knowing the area you're in and, where possible, preparing it to be in your favor. Like digging ditches and putting down sharpened wooden poles to make a calvary advance much more difficult, just as an example. Technically it's possible to do this to an area larger than your army occupies, and move to make use of the space where your army is needed.

In other words, Zone of Control.

[kseecs16]

I think ZOC, while it would make forts more useful, would make things more unrealistic and gamey than the current forts. I fort is only useful in reality if it controls a critical area like a bottleneck, or if you can man it with enough force to operate from it offensively. If you have a fort on the hills surrounding your town but its manned with 1 unit an army of several units can justifiably march right by with little worry - figuring the cost of attacking is not justified by the gain. But if you have 4-5 units mostly mobile attakcers, then they have to address the problem and attack the fort. So the fort accomplished its goal of diverting the enemy from the cities and making the enemy fight on your terms.

If you didn't have the fort you'd be fighting in yo ur city radius and be getting pillaged and losing resources. I think forts are okay right now, but some sort of healing bonus - or evolving defensive bonuses might make them more attractive.

[RobC]

Originally posted by =DrJambo=
One thing that might have worked is if forts also imparted a 25% "attacking" bonus when attacking from the fort. Coupled with a faster healing rate this might really make them worth building, as it would force enemy units attempting to travel round a fort into dealing with it rather than simply ignoring it.

Until they capture the fort tile from you and then get the healing and attacking bonus for themselves!!!

Sure, you could make the bonuses only apply when within your cultural boundaries, after all there aren't enough advantages for the defender in CIV.

[Kc7mxo]

I'd settle for forts not tearing up terrain improvements myself.

I also think that city walls have been pretty marginilized by the city defense bonus.

[CiverDan]

I have yet to build one fort. First They dont provie ZOC. Second, they kill the improvments on that terrain. So you cannot use them to secure resources. I tend to agree they only have usefulness in specialized terrain situations.

[ElConejo]

Is there any way to make them so they dont remove improvements?

[MattPilot]

I'm not certain, but i believe you can.


Look in Civ4improvementInfos.xml and let us know what you find out.

[Sarxis]

Originally posted by Bhruic


Is the 120% really that much better than 95%? 6 str Longbow gets 13.2 instead of 11.7. So basically a 1.5 bonus.



How so? Your 6 str Longbow is going to attack? 13.2 down to 6, not too good odds. Or are you going to stick more troops in there? At which point the AI can just swing around you, and troops you might have had defending your city are now useless.

Bh

I think I forgot the extra +25% longbows inherently get for hill defense (apart from any promotions).

Putting a fort directly next to your cities, unless there are actual bottlenecks in the terrain, is probably not going to do that much good, you are right. But I've been building them on the perimeter of my borders. I'd much rather meet the enemy at the borders than at the thresholds of my cities, or near their resources. And yes, the idea is that you put a garrison of mixed troops in the fort, instead of leaving all of your armies in the cities.

Not that I am arguing with you - I still think forts need more than what they currently provide.

[sophist]

I like the 25% attacking from forts bonus. However, it would be inconsistent not to apply that to cities, or cities with Walls or a Castle. I also like allowing artillery units in forts to bombard units in adjacent tiles without attacking outright. Again, to be consistent, that should apply to cities.

It may seem like this just increases defender advantages, but consider that it could also be used offensively. There could be a Combat Engineer unit (Sapper for earlier in the game) that can build certain improvements in hostile territory. Then you could build a fort next to an enemy city and use its advantages in protecting your force.

[ElConejo]

Originally posted by sophist
......you could build a fort next to an enemy city and use its advantages in protecting your force.

I have always thought that would be awesome... but once again is it doable? (I have not been able to look at anything for the Civ4 editor... )

[Kc7mxo]

It may seem like this just increases defender advantages, but consider that it could also be used offensively. There could be a Combat Engineer unit (Sapper for earlier in the game) that can build certain improvements in hostile territory. Then you could build a fort next to an enemy city and use its advantages in protecting your force.

worked for the romans.