More defensive srtructures for the Dwarves !

[Le Sournois]

Dear Edain team,

First I want to congratulate you for the new update 4.8.2 which is in my opinion just incredible.

The new Travel camp concept is just absolutely perfect, I was so excited when I saw all those changes. Before that against Brutal AI, it was hard to take Erebor, because defensively, they are not that good.

But with those new Travel camp, as soon as Dale can be built, Erebor will be a wonderful choice, for with a beginning good enough, a Travel camp and the possibility it carries with it to get other subfaction units, let's combine what which is undoubtedly the best (and coolest) elite units of the game (Ironbreakers) with one of the best hero of the game (King Dain and its leadership) and that's quite a result !

Ered Luin finally get an easier access ot mithril mail which are prevalent to their subfaction, and sure the Unburnt also won't deny a hearty welcome to their counterparts from the Iron Hills.

Iron Hills also enjoy this update for Khazad-Dûm Vets are now easier to get and they can be buffed as hell with that subfaction.

That's a wonderful balance, big thanks for this upgrade.

Going back to the subject, there is still one thing I don't like with the Dwarves when I'm playing it in castle start.

One of the emblematic powers you get with the Dwarves are the runes which can buff and make buildings stronger. But what is frustrating is that with this form of castle start, you get all your buildings in the corner or far from the citadel.

When the ennmy will come, they will do so from the sides, and they will ofte bypass the buildings to attack directly the citadel, so that defending the buildings with a rune is not a point while your citadel is under attack.

I think those buildings ought to block the pass to the citadel and even maybe to the base. Gondor castle for example, would in fact benefit more from these runes than the Dwarves because their buildings are near the gate and near the Citadel. For Rohan, it makes sense they have and rectangular castle for their gameplay and design is based on speed and distance.

What I would love to see implemented only for the castle and freebuild start because camp starts are fine, is another type of builder exclusive to the Dwarves (sorry, one more).

It would introduce a very restricted part of free build system inside the faction, but far less evolved than Misty Mountains. Those builder for example would be recruited in the citadel and would cost maybe 400 to differenciate them well from other builders.

They would have only one charge of built, and would only be able to build inside the base, or inside the influence of the citadel in freebuild. They could therefore put a building just behind the gate, so the ennemy will have difficulty to ingore it.

it would be named something like 'defensive pillar"but I'm not good in finding names for buildings especially in English.

Those structures would grant a very brief boost of armor for all of the allied troops that stand close behind and close on the sides of it something like "every 10 seconds, grants 90 per cent armor for allied units during only one second".

Those building could be improved by runes, they would not have a huge armor nonetheless because the goal is not to make Dwarves unbeatable. Only one builder could build this construction at the time, the recuit time of this builder would be resonably long, however their construction time would be quite short once on the field.

I hope you will like this suggestion, and I will play Dwarves quite a lot the next days for sure with the new update !

[The_Necromancer0]

Isn't this essentially already possible? In freebuild, you can build everywhere you want and cast runes on these buildings. In castles, you have access to the last line of defence plots right in front of your citadel.

Although I also don't understand the problem. The runes are intended to only help buff the building they're cast on. The player is also incentivized to target the citadel due to the intact bastion, regardless of other buildings so I'm not sure the effect you're aiming for is achievable.

[Le Sournois]

Ennemy AI like Isengard and Mordor, they love space, so the more distance there is between buidings, the happier they are, because they enter the base as a flood and conquer all the space. With buildings more grouped together, and less space between buildings as it is with Gondor, this flood impression is somewhat mitigated : the ennemy have to destroy some internal buildings to really conquer the space, the buildings act as a stopper.

In the case of a rectangular castle, the ennemy do not need to destroy any buildings to do so, often they have the space as soon as they enter, they manage to grab foothold on your territory, let other units pass the gate, so yes you have line of defense, but no, because line of defence is too close from the citadel, and the ennemy has often conquered a lot of space inside your base.

You then just have to let the unstoppable dispiriting flooding armies pillage you without being able to reconquer the space at strategic points enough, get a healing building close to the gate for example in order to repel completely the ennemy.

so that is the problem : too much space inside your base, not good at all for a low faction like the Dwarves.