RELEASE WEEKEND 21-24MAY10: RELEASE 1 of 3

Bravo

Looks excellent.

I Like. 

So much stuff going live this weekend, it's almost literally unfathomably amazing.

And without further ado:

1. SIEGE ENCAMPMENTS
Limited Siege - using siege engines in one-off attacks - has been up and running for a while; and it's now time for Full Siege, which is now live and back onstream.

We should give you some explanation on how it works.

If you have:

• Barracks Level 20
• Siege Engines
• The Siege Encampment technology researched

... you can now send out armies under orders to Siege.

You can siege Capital Cities (more on this later) as well as second cities.

Sieges are divided into 5 Distinct Phases.

PHASE 1: MOVING TO SIEGE
On the Army Move screen, select your target city as normal (or choose "Send Army" from the map).

If your target is not a friendly city, you will have the option to Siege.

You will need to assign your army to take up position at a neighbouring square to the target city for your Siege (just like you do in Blockade).  This is where your army will set up its Siege Encampment, and so you will likely want to choose the most defensible square suitable for your army - in case someone counter-attacks your siege camp.

You will also need to select a length of time for the siege to last.  Please be aware that Sieges of less than 13 Hours are not permitted, as this is the minimum period of time to set up a siege camp and have at least one bombardment.   However, you are likely to want to set a substantially larger time than this, for a variety of reasons that will become clear as we go through the process.

When you're ready to go, send your army off.

PHASE 2: SETTING UP CAMP
When your army arrives at the Siege location it will begin to set up camp.

You (and the target city's owner), will be notified via email that a Siege Camp is being set up at this location.

Setting up the Siege Encampment takes 12 hours.

PHASE 3: BOMBARDMENT
When the Siege Encampment has been built, we take stock of the target city's current population.

Your death-dealing Siege Engines (vs Walls and vs Buildings) will hit the city at this point, and continue to hit the city every hour.

As the siege continues, your Siege Engineers become more confident with their equipment and range, and gain a 1% "to hit" bonus with each passing hour.

When the target city's population has been reduced by 75%, the city can be stormed.

You storm a city (and see a summary of what is going on with your siege camp at any point) from the Military Summary / Sieges page.

If - as the sieging player - you have sufficient population to settle another city of your own via settlers, then you will have the option to Storm & Capture. 

If you do not have the population requirements to settle another city, you have the option to Storm & Raze.  You can, of course, choose Storm & Raze even if you have the population requirements; it's up to you.  The point is that you can only capture a city if you would normally be able to settle another city of your own.

Choosing either of the Storm options then sets your army in motion from the next door siege camp and into the City.

PHASE 4: STORMING THE CITY
This is the final battle, pitting the Sieging army against the remaining defenders and reinforcements inside the city, and operates like a standard attack stratagem.

If the Sieging army loses the battle, it is destroyed and the Siege is lifted.

If the Sieging army wins the battle, the defenders are destroyed and we move into the final phase.

PHASE 5: FINAL OUTCOME
Storm & Capture
If you are able to, and have chosen to Storm & Capture, the city is now yours. 

You receive the city with the remaining buildings as they are, the existing distribution of the land resource plots, the current resoures in the city - and all of the technology researched in that city.

Your victorious sieging army transfers its orders to Reinforce in your new city for whatever amount of time remains from your original Siege timer.

Storm & Raze
If you have chosen the Storm & Raze option, the city will be utterly destroyed.

In both scenarios (Capturing & Razing), all units, armies, caravans, spells, trade offers and other effects belonging to the fallen city are removed from the game.

All armies incoming to the city (but which have not yet arrived) are turned back, immediately.

All armies surrounding this city on other siege camps or blockades have their orders transformed into "Occupy".

THE LOSING PLAYER
If the player who has just lost his or her city has more than one city, then it is simply lost and the game continues as usual.  If the city was the Capital City, then the Capital City flag shifts to the next largest (population) city that the player owns.

If, however, this is the player's only remaining city in the game then the player will be restarted with a new city (with some starting resources) in a random spot on a different quadrant on the map.  The losing player also starts this new city with all the research technologies that his lost city had accumulated to this point; which softens the blow somewhat.

We will be putting together a help file, complete with everything else you need to know and some helpful screenshots shortly.


2. REINFORCING ABROAD & THE PEACE OF THE CAMP
You can now stack armies on top of friendly armies who are stationed abroad using the Occupy stratagem.

Friendly armies are defined as those who are:

• Your own armies, or
  
  
• Armies belonging to people who are:
• in your alliance, or
  
• in a NAP with your alliance, or
  
• in a Confederation with your alliance

To reinforce another army abroad, simply send your army out with orders to occupy the same square as the friendly army for whatever preset time you choose. 

On arrival at the location, your army's Occupy order will be transformed into a Reinforce order.

You can stack as many armies as you like on a square.  Please note that this only applies to armies; not to caravans or diplomatic units.

Clarification: You may still only have one army performing a Siege or Blockade on any single square at any one time. ie you cannot stack 2 sieging armies, 1 blockading army and 3 reinforcing armies on the same square.  But you could stack 1 siege army (with a reinforcing army) on one square; another siege army (with a reinforcing army) on another square, and 1 blockading army (with a third reinforcing army) on yet a third square.

There are (as you might imagine) some caveats, clarifications and intricacies to this rule change, especially regarding multiple alliances with different relationships all interacting on the same square. 

The arriving army must be friendly with only one of the occupying armies to assume the Peace of the Camp, and therefore count the whole stack of armies as temporarily Friendly under a common flag of truce.

So it is possible to form a fairly unholy alliance of players defending the same square, so long as a player who is friendly with the arriving party is present before they arrive.

THE PEACE OF THE CAMP EXAMPLE Alliance A is enemies with Alliance B Alliance C is friendly with both Alliance A and Alliance B If Alliance C is in occupation of a square, then reinforcements from Alliance A and Alliance B can both arrive to help defend the square, and Alliance A and Alliance B will agree to the Peace of the Camp enforced by their mutual friendships with Alliance C. Even if Alliance C leaves the square the Peace of the Camp remains in force, and the armies from the 2 enemy alliances will jointly defend the square against threats to either party until their recall order.

We can certainly foresee some interesting strategies by players who take full advantage of these mechanics.