Knights and Merchants.net Forum

Hi guys, I've recently seen/played some games where it seemed the attacker would have the eventual disadvantage, and this resulted in very defensive and boring gameplay. I'm still kind of new to the game, but I was just wondering how this has been discussed and possibly been dealt with in meta?

Thanks!

Well, it's hard to say. It might be just that the attacker was not clever enough, it always depends on the situation. But yes, in last versions the game has gone a bit more defensive than it was.

A bit? Now this is really defensive game! Many players build as many towers as it possible and wait when someone will attack them.

Chris you still got rushers, but I guess most people play defensive indeed.

If you're attacking you must be prepared to have higher loses than your enemy due to him having more time to shoot, positioning (formation vs scattered troops, pathways blocked by buildings), finally towers, longer supply lines. I can't see anything wrong with it nor reason to change it. On the other hand you can use it to your advantage on some maps, you can split your forces and use small army to siege your enemy, blocking him inside while the rest of your troops can help your allies crush the others.

In the end it's all about player's preferences, some like to camp behind the towers, some like to attack right away. A few days ago I played a game on Cursed Ravine where we camped in our bases (north), why ? Well, initially I sent my troops but one of my allies decided to stay in base, other one had noting (same with one of the enemies) so we ended up in 2v3 situation, we had to run for it but after a long (4h) game we were able to win, in the meantime we received all sorts of BM/whine/etc. I can see why they were angry with us but truth to be told if they were paying more attention to their troops they could've easily win.

Try rush to player who has 5 lines of towers (~40). It's impossible to win this.

I think there could be a few balance issues encouraging defensive gameplay so I would be interested to hear a discussion, but I don't think it's too bad overall. In my opinion the attacker should need more troops (and/or better tactics) in order to beat the defender, but there should be advantages to being the attacker such as claiming more territory/resources. I think right now there are too few advantages and so being defensive is often more effective.

I think a lot of the maps encourage defensive behaviour, I can't think of many maps that strongly encourage you to expand to hold more resources. I think more maps like that would be better, so if you want extra gold/iron/coal you must expand into dangerous territory where it is not possible to build tower walls because it's too open. This would make defensive tactics a bit less effective which I think would be a good thing (without removing defensive tactics of course). If anybody has other suggestions to achieve this I'd be interested to hear them.

Of course in free for all or matches like 1vs1vs1 or 2vs2vs2vs2 defensive tactics are quite effective, but there's not much you can do about that (except maybe making maps that encourage expansion like The Valley of Dangers 2)
If somebody had time to build 40 towers and enough troops to stop you walking through them then it's not a rush any more, you've waited too long. Unless you're playing on a map with one narrow entrance.

Just play with less peacetime, so you avoid mass towers. You'll never build 40 within pt + a nice army.

If he build 40 towers his eco must be pretty screwed at this point, not only this required a lot of resources/time to build, he also need a lot of stone and don't forget you have to feed those 40 recruits..

I agree that a lot depends on a map but I don't think that placing resources in the "danger zone" is the right choice, because if you lose a battle and you'll get pushed back, your economy will get hit and that's basically a game over.

builders and militia do wonders on emptying towers, and with 40 towers he cannot have a good army to defend himself, so you can just walk in.

40 towers = 200 stone. The time your serfs brought that.

Well yeah, but i have seen also one player, building 30 towers and if i had won against him, he had only about 8 stonemen a few forester and winefarms LOOL. So he couldnt win in each time, but he has given his team really big time bonus, because they made normal army and i have lost really huge amount of troops.

But if only he built a lot of towers (not his allies), then couldn't you attack his allies' villages first and ignore his towers?

He probably means, this guy made towers for everyone. But still, then they had 1 player less, shouldn't really be THAT difficult...

30 towers, just use your builders then place some archers before them and you'll get free serfs.