A question about Forts

[Hobbes]

If I have cannon and a supply unit why would I want to make a fort in a
city? The cannon gives me +1 during a siege and the supply will help me put off surrender. If I build a fort I keep the +1 but lose the benifit of the supply unit and the flexibility of being able to move them elsewhere. The only benefits I can see are faster troop recovery if I were fortifying a level 1 city and the creation of a zone of contol around the fort.

Am I right with this?
Cheers, Chris

[Sol Invictus]

I believe you are correct. I have never been tempted to build a Fort.

[Queeg]

I've wondered the same thing myself. The costs do seem prohibitive as compared with the return. Given the strategic importance of fort-building to both sides in the FIW, this is one area where BoA seems lacking.

[Pocus]

You are forgetting that forts give a tremendous defensive advantage compared to a mere city. Anybody trying to assault an unbreached fort will learn in blood what I mean.

The best thing to do to defend a spot is still to have a fort and a supply unit (or a depot)

[Robin]

It's true that in independance war campaign I ve never had the need to built a fort, but in the franco-indian war, I use to built some, around the champlain lake. And these forts always usefull against the English.

[Hobbes]

I think it would be far better if a fort could be built with just a supply unit.
Keep the supply unit in the fort but make it fixed once the fort is created so that the supply benefit is still felt. Other supply units coming to the fort should also increase the defenders ability to delay surrender but they would not have to be fixed.

An artillery unit should never be lost during the building of a fort but if one is present the fort should give far better protection and siege bonus than without. A fort without an artillery unit would give some bonus but not much more than a city. What are the actual benefits to units in a fort over say a level 2 city when faced with assault?

It's the fact that you have to give up your siege supply bonus and the ability to subsequently relocate your artillery that makes them very rarely worth creating - and somewhat ahistorical.

I'm also a little worried that you may have a besieged force of 1,000 men surrendering to a force of 100 if a surrender occurs. I assume in this case
it would be up to the player to attack the besieging force before starvation occurs? Is this the way it works?

Cheers, Chris

[Hobbes]

You may say a fort without an artillery unit isn't a fort at all. That would be fine, without an artillery unit present it would get no more benefits than a city?

Just trying to keep the discussion going on this as it seems a weak point in the game to a few people.

Chris

[Pocus]

There must be a trade-off between retaining mobility and renforcing a position. We thus wanted the units used up in the fort construction. A side note: a fort give a +1 counter siege value for each level he has, so in essence the siege bonus of the disapearing artillery is kept.

As for having the artillery moved from the fort, this was exceptionnal. Aside from Knox adventure, I don't recall there was redeployment of this scope. So it is better to modelize that with a special event and not a rule that would be exploited (stripping rear-areas for from their artilleries).

About surrender: Yes there is some randomness involved. it depends mostly of the troop quality of the defenders. This is too modelize events like the fall of Louisbourg, in 3 weeks, even if the fortress was mighty, with a large size garrison, having ample guns and supply. You just have to accept a bad dice roll... except that we are less harsher than reality, because you are 100% garanteed that a supply wagon prevents surrender.

Lastly, fort effectivness vs city effectivness. I can only advise you to do the following trick:

- AWI campaign, disable AI
- Leave a leader and 3 British regulars in Boston
- Assault with the americans: proper leader and 8 militia.

Count losses.

Now build a fort before, and repeat. See how it fared for the Americans this time!

A fort is a tremendous advantage, really. Even regulars assaulting a fort fight at 40% efficiency, compared to (if I recall) 80/90% against a town. Its two different world of defensive bonuses believe me!

[Great One]

Lastly, fort effectivness vs city effectivness. I can only advise you to do the following trick:

- AWI campaign, disable AI
- Leave a leader and 3 British regulars in Boston
- Assault with the americans: proper leader and 8 militia.

Count losses.

Now build a fort before, and repeat. See how it fared for the Americans this time!

Do you mean to include an artillery and supply with the 3 British regulars in the first example, because if you don't the comparison is meaningless. Nobody disputes that a fort is better than nothing, but is it better than an artillery and a supply? I don't know myself, but I don't think this has been addressed yet.

[Hobbes]

Hi Pocus, thanks for that. I still don't have a feeling I will want to build many though. They still get breached pretty quickly - which is probably as it should be. I'm not an expert on this period but there is something that just doesn't feel quite right.

Maybe the fact that the guns were not removed from forts is it. Even if it rarely happened the people that put them into the forts thought they could be moved if the need arised? I'm not sure what the reason is but there seems
to be a problem with the game model judging by others comments. Either that or the people at the time were misguided in building them. A possibility?

One other question open to all, If I have 1 militia, 1 artillery, 1 supply unit, 2 regulars and one 1 star regular leader defending a fort what configuration would you use to defend the fort? Lump them all into one unit? Split off 2 to join with the leader? Or 3? What would you use and why?

Thanks, Chris

[Pocus]

I'm not sure what the reason is but there seems
to be a problem with the game model judging by others comments.

I want statistical evidences and some numbers-crushing

Here are some numbers, 1776 campaign, Boston (no AI):

Case 1: Boston City, Howe (3-3-4), 3 infantry rgts, 1 artillery, 1 supply

against Washington (6-2-3) 2 Milicias, 1 light Inf, 5 Continental Rgts.

Losses: Americans 197 hits, British 64 - American defeat (~ 3 AME hits for 1 ENG (oops BRI ) hits.

Case 2: Boston City + Fort, Howe (3-3-4), 3 infantry rgts

against Washington (6-2-3) 2 Milicias, 1 light Inf, 5 Continental Rgts (as before)

Losses: Americans 175 hits, British 40 - American defeat. (~ 4.3 hits ratio)

So it is better to be in a fort, even if you have to spend one art and one supply.

[Hobbes]

Having thought about my question above about what is the optimum way to divide up armies in a fort I think it makes no difference as long as a basic leader is stacked with the artillery to avoid the command penalty loss to the artillery siege value.

As far as I can understand it the CP loss has no effect on other besieged troops as they play no active part - only their average troop quality is
of any importance so you could just defend a fort or city with the unit with the highest TQ and move all other units away from the fort as it will become a death trap to many troops if a surrender occurs (Unless you are planning a sortie of course).

Chris

[Queeg]

Having thought about my question above about what is the optimum way to divide up armies in a fort I think it makes no difference as long as a basic leader is stacked with the artillery to avoid the command penalty loss to the artillery siege value.

As far as I can understand it the CP loss has no effect on other besieged troops as they play no active part - only their average troop quality is
of any importance so you could just defend a fort or city with the unit with the highest TQ and move all other units away from the fort as it will become a death trap to many troops if a surrender occurs (Unless you are planning a sortie of course).

Chris

That doesn't seem consistent with what I'm seeing. I haven't looked at how seige results are calculated, so you may be correct there. But during an assault - either after the walls are breached or before - it seems to me that all troops participate. It sure seems harder to me to capture a fort manned by five regulars than one with a single militia.

[Hobbes]

Yes if the attacker resorts to an assault it is better to have more troops but if he is trying to get a surrender only the guns and TQ matter
I think - so the leader should be stacked with the guns unless you expect an assault. I think the system works pretty well, I'm just trying to get a full understanding.

Thanks, Chris

[Pocus]

Defending troops do count if an assault is commited sure. On the other hand if you are too strong, the besieger will surely prefer to wait for a surender. If this case this is the average of the best TQ + the average TQ (the elite motivating partially the rest of the troop).

[Hobbes]

Thanks Pocus, the elite motivation is something I had not heard of before.
Chris

[Pocus]

Just to give a numerical example, if you have 3 regiments, one of British Line (TQ 9 iirc) and 2 of militias (TQ 6). Average is 7 ((9+6+6)/3), so the TQ used will be the average of 7 + 9 (from the line), giving 8.