Slayer of Cliffracers wrote:
Weak argument indeed. You only have a limited amount of resources to build walls. To build walls in poorly defensible positions is worse then than no walls at all.
Oh, so the defender can't have enough resources for both, but the attacker has unlimited projectiles and missiles and troops... and any losses incurred in taking a fortification is insignificant... while the troops lost by the defender are vital... even though in the history of the world only trickery (and disese ridden corpses) ever managed to make an attacker lose less troops then a defender during a siege.
Given the sheer length and of the Great Wall the likelyhood of you being able to initially attack from both sides are pretty slim.
Yeah, it's not like the wall took centuries to get to it's current length, it was magically made over night...
You can send your initial weaker army to attack from the other side, build up your other army to be a lot stronger and then set a date that both armies will descend upon the portal-fort at the same time. Once the portal-fort is your hands, you don't have to worry about the counter-attack and now have a nice forward base with a steady stream of reinforcements and supplies.
Because taking the fort/gatehouse before the near-by town (near enough for you to attack) sends reinforcements is a guarantee... and your smaller force is totally safe prancing around enemy territory unopposed...
And of course if the portal was totally unguarded they wouldn't have the same steady stream of reinforcement without actually having to waste time taking any fortifications... and the element of surprise on their side, without having to announce their presence by prancing around enemy territory to get to the portal...
I see you are having a hard time figuring out what I am talking about.
It's roughly similar to why real castles (like the one I just visited recently) have archways on their descending staircases designed to thwart enemy missile fire. The reason that the attacker has such a massive advantage if the defender is near the portal is that effectively he is the position of an archer behind an archway.
To all intents an purposes the attacking catapults are behind a massive indestructable archway. A catapult stone (like all projectiles before the invention of rifles) fires at an arc not a straight line. The projectile ascends into the air and then descend downwards onto their targets.
But if the defender fires to hit the attackers catapults, he will have to fire over the portal in order to hit their real location (relative to him). But if they fire over the portal then they won't go through to the other side. It's like a massive archway blocks their way except the archway is simply the fact what doesn't hit the portal doesn't go through it.
Yet the defending catapults within a certain distance of the portal can fire uninhibited because their firing arcs allow their projectiles to descend right down on their enemies heads. The same goes for arrows, ballista bolts and every single kind of missile weapon.
I think it's more about the fact that you don't know what you're talking about...
Fun fact, angles work both ways, so if X can fire from his position to Y's position then Y can fire to Xs position at the exact same angle...
Unless the portal has an actual effect on the kinetic force of the projectile both sides can fire the same...
Unless you're talking about the walls getting in the way, then that's another thing, which can easily be take into account when actually building the damn thing, that's what architects are for...
Yes the attacking catapults are pretty close because your idea was building a fort in front of the portal exit.
Which means they're in range of regular fire... and actually in better range of catapults from beyond the wall... as they can easily just fire them at an angle where they go through the portal while descending...
Of course you'll say that another force is attacking from outside, but again you're ignoring that the whole idea was about portals close to a town, and if the enemy get that close without the town forces attacking it you've already lost...
A chokepoint isn't much use if the enemy can drop rocks and arrows down onto you for all eternity.
Pretty sure rocks and arrows aren't an unlimited resource... and it still is, for the same reason why those 300 spartans (and 1000 slaves and other greeks) stayed behind... it buys time for others to assemble forces...
No ThunderTitan. You had already conceded that what you were building was a keep/gatehouse in front of the portal exit, not a wall/fort around the whole area.
What's the point of a gatehouse that doesn't cover the whole space around the portal? And if you bothered to check thos picturs of the Ishtar gate you'd see that they used walls very well there... and frankly well outside the range of any projectiles coming from the gate, unless the catapults are so close that throwing a fireball inside the gate would burn all catapults.
And i'm sorry, but if you keep using the fort as an argument (see above) i see no reason for me to limit myself to a gatehouse (which btw wasn't your idea anyway, and i just found it a more cost effective method then a full fort).
In confined spaces quality matters far, far more than quantity. And the attackers can fire so many arrows that the defenders 'quality' is taken out of action should they try the same trick.
And the sky opens up and swallows the whole town, clearly indicating that they should have never build any fortifications, or even a settlement there, because they where useless in this one situation that i'm using as if it's the only possibility, i mean it's not like the defenders can fire arrows... man, i really hope you're trolling, because otherwise you're one self deluded idiot...
Also, stop trying to evade the point already...
The guys with the buckets of water *are* the same as the troops doing the dying. As soon as they feel the heat they can throw their buckets in front of them to add to the effect. As they temporerily suppress the fire, more men emerge, throwing more buckets of water to clear their passage as the firewall emerges.
So instead of holding weapons they use buckets... and then switch to weapons... yeah, i see no disadvantage there...
And you're assuming the firewall isn't behind them already, cutting them off, and they have time to use the buckets before they get killed...
Or that if firewalls are so weak to water (making them a rather useless spell) the defenders wouldn't just switch to fireballs...
Resources.
And of course one can't have enough resources for two or more walls... that's always the case, and not a totally an arbitrary limitation you places on the defenders to make your ideas work...
When the portal fort is in the attackers hands, you'll find it's more more defensible than it was for the defenders......
Except the parts where the walls are already damaged from sustained (and apparently unstoppable) catapult fire, full of mud (from all the water), and damaged by a plethora of max level creatures...
And of course that means that if the defender had build the fortifications on the other side he would have had a great advantage... glad you admit that, maybe ill need it later...
Given how the game works there are no portal-forts. So one way or another I am right. It's only a question of which particular way am I right.
Actually there are, they're just not right on top of the portal itself, but they can easily be placed right in front of th portal in such a way so you can't got anywhere from the portal unless you go through them...
And actually at least some of the gatehouses are unconquerable with any size army, which is why you need to visit a tent or answer a riddle to pass throughout them....
So you're right in the way of not knowing the game very well... or at least being able to abstract enough to think of those gatehouses as easily placeable in fro of a portal...
I got that... but it looks more like your debating about a portal outside someones castle, than nimbyism. And it is not making alot of sense.