Population damage and repair

[Chenier]

Starving a realm, in most cases, is next to impossible unless they managed themselves really bad.

Also, you need to remember that the less damaging wars become, the less people will be motivated to initiate wars, and those initiated will more likely result in total destruction in order to prevent quick repair.

It's not that I want regions to take forever to recover, but rather that I want wars to matter.

And you don't need all of your cities to be at 100% production to be able to engage in warfare. Finally, if cities recovered too quickly, it'd be too easy to implode due to food demand growing faster than food production, as was seen in Darfix twice I believe.

[Marlboro]

And you don't need all of your cities to be at 100% production to be able to engage in warfare.

This really can't be said often enough. 100% is a reward for hard work, it should not be considered a natural state for the city. You carefully feed it and tax it at just the right rate, you do courtier work and over the course of a year or two it grows into this giant money tree. But in the mean time, your enemies will want to chop it down.

Just look at how cities in the middle ages were completely razed. Baghdad comes to mind. Population of 2 million in the 13th century, razed to the ground and turned into a barren wasteland for hundreds of years. The population didn't even reach six digits again until the 20th century.

[Zakilevo]

Stuff

People don't usually try to starve rural regions. They try to starve cities. With the new market system, it is even more difficult to starve cities now but once cities do starve, they lose their population super quickly.

Look at Krimml. The city has less than 300 people now and it was like that for a month. How long do you think that city will take to recover back to 80%? Unless it is surrounded by regions with full populations, the city will take at least 8 months or more.

[LilWolf]

Why fight if it doesn't hurt the enemy? Why even bother going to war in the first place?

We had plenty of wars back when population had zero effect on production and gold/food income. Why do you think that was? Oh, right, because fighting a war was fun. You were free to always grow one more region and that was the main way of damaging your enemy. The only reasons peasants started to affect things was to give looting some power and to bring realism to the game, but it has always been imbalanced in my opinion and made looting/starvation tactics too crippling for a game.

It's all this realism BS that's bringing the game down in general and making it less fun over all because it becomes less a game and more like real life, which to be honest, is not fun at all.

[Chenier]

People don't usually try to starve rural regions. They try to starve cities. With the new market system, it is even more difficult to starve cities now but once cities do starve, they lose their population super quickly.

Look at Krimml. The city has less than 300 people now and it was like that for a month. How long do you think that city will take to recover back to 80%? Unless it is surrounded by regions with full populations, the city will take at least 8 months or more.

Unless the realm has a natural deficit or the defenders really suck at food management, starving cities is extremely difficult and tenuous. It takes a long time to do this, and all they need to do is send one steward to foreign lands and he can continuously buy food with the bonds given to him, food that just teleports over the siege lines.

If you let your attackers starve you, you deserve to be crippled. The scheme I described above is so easy and effective it makes me feel filthy for mentioning it.

Do you think I don't know the impacts of starvation? I play in D'Hara, for god's sake, I can't even count then number of times our cities starved. Yet you don't see me whining about how long it takes to recuperate. Even if the last time was the result to a continental collapse of the markets due to number-playing from Tom.

We had plenty of wars back when population had zero effect on production and gold/food income. Why do you think that was? Oh, right, because fighting a war was fun. You were free to always grow one more region and that was the main way of damaging your enemy. The only reasons peasants started to affect things was to give looting some power and to bring realism to the game, but it has always been imbalanced in my opinion and made looting/starvation tactics too crippling for a game.

It's all this realism BS that's bringing the game down in general and making it less fun over all because it becomes less a game and more like real life, which to be honest, is not fun at all.

1) There are still plenty of wars in most realms.
2) You can't compare now with then. Back then, taxes were collected realm-wide, making region loss not that dramatic for anyone. The new allegiance system with its free-for-all mentality hadn't been pushed onto anyone. There was no such thing as estate efficiency or lack of control due to estates, realms could expand as far as their military allowed it and the returns were far from as diminishing as they are now. Realms were like ant colonies, where the general controlled the whole forces and not following his orders would usually put you in serious trouble.
3) Looting isn't overpowered. All of the damage achieved by it can be more effectively achieved by TOs, if you have the nobles for it. If you see more looting being done than 5 years ago, it's because tying tax efficiency (and previously control) over the number of nobles a realm has makes expansion for a lot of realms nonviable, not because looting somehow became overpowered.

[Uzamaki]

Unless the realm has a natural deficit or the defenders really suck at food management, starving cities is extremely difficult and tenuous. It takes a long time to do this, and all they need to do is send one steward to foreign lands and he can continuously buy food with the bonds given to him, food that just teleports over the siege lines.

If you let your attackers starve you, you deserve to be crippled. The scheme I described above is so easy and effective it makes me feel filthy for mentioning it.

Do you think I don't know the impacts of starvation? I play in D'Hara, for god's sake, I can't even count then number of times our cities starved. Yet you don't see me whining about how long it takes to recuperate. Even if the last time was the result to a continental collapse of the markets due to number-playing from Tom.

1) There are still plenty of wars in most realms.
2) You can't compare now with then. Back then, taxes were collected realm-wide, making region loss not that dramatic for anyone. The new allegiance system with its free-for-all mentality hadn't been pushed onto anyone. There was no such thing as estate efficiency or lack of control due to estates, realms could expand as far as their military allowed it and the returns were far from as diminishing as they are now. Realms were like ant colonies, where the general controlled the whole forces and not following his orders would usually put you in serious trouble.
3) Looting isn't overpowered. All of the damage achieved by it can be more effectively achieved by TOs, if you have the nobles for it. If you see more looting being done than 5 years ago, it's because tying tax efficiency (and previously control) over the number of nobles a realm has makes expansion for a lot of realms nonviable, not because looting somehow became overpowered.

Starving cities is difficult? Just send it rogue for a week. See how quickly that bitch can spiral out of control.

Congratulations, however, it is also fundamentally different for D'Hara because everybody was starving in Dwilight, just at different degrees. On places like the East Continent, we have completely decimated cities by war in realms who just started, have few diplomatic ties to speak of, and are just generally not very well off. Then, we have the monsters: Sirion, Perdan, Caligus. They have a crap ton of cities, so if one was bad it would effect them less(I'm looking at you, Perdan). But, for the most past, they are either relatively unscathed cities or have several other producers to turn to. Nivemus doesn't have that luxury. Eponllyn doesn't have that luxury. OI doesn't have that luxury. Armonia doesn't have that luxury. Dunnera wouldn't have that luxury(if they had been allowed to take Krimml).

The wars BM has now: Dunnera-Caligus, a terribly one sided affair that is more of a beat down than a war. The Atamaran chronicles continued, which most everyone hates with a passion. Aurvandil vs. Terran, once again, beat down, although it is at least somewhat more fun. D'Hara vs. Solaria and Nova. And then the Far East Island war. A good number of those are one-sided and boring, and only two of them are large scale wars. Of those large scale wars, I know at least one of them is an abomination that needs to be stopped.

[Anaris]

On places like the East Continent, we have completely decimated cities by war in realms who just started, have few diplomatic ties to speak of, and are just generally not very well off.

Then that is a failure of the people who started those realms.

If you are creating a new realm, and don't line up allies, you're pretty dumb.

If you are creating a new realm with a lot of depopulated regions, and don't line up allies, you're a good candidate for the Darwin Awards.

[Uzamaki]

Then that is a failure of the people who started those realms.

If you are creating a new realm, and don't line up allies, you're pretty dumb.

If you are creating a new realm with a lot of depopulated regions, and don't line up allies, you're a good candidate for the Darwin Awards.

As a ruler, I have attempted to increase diplomatic relations across the continent as a whole regarding my realm. While I agree with you that those who don't line up allies are foolish to do so, there are some realms that they do not have options, created by the diplomatic climate(e. g. Armonia, Eponllyn, Dunnera).

[Chenier]

As a ruler, I have attempted to increase diplomatic relations across the continent as a whole regarding my realm. While I agree with you that those who don't line up allies are foolish to do so, there are some realms that they do not have options, created by the diplomatic climate(e. g. Armonia, Eponllyn, Dunnera).

Don't blame the game, then. You tried, you failed. The problem isn't starvation, it's diplomacy.

Starving cities is difficult? Just send it rogue for a week. See how quickly that bitch can spiral out of control.
(...)
On places like the East Continent, we have completely decimated cities by war in realms who just started, have few diplomatic ties to speak of, and are just generally not very well off.

"Send it rogue for a week". There's your half problem. Why did you let it go rogue? And why did you let it go rogue with empty warehouses...?

"Sending cities rogue" is no easy task. Cities usually have significant fortifications (lvl 5, or 4 was it sieged often) and lots of militia. And if it's a capital, then all of the recruitment centres are there, and odds are many of the inactive nobles are as well.

If you colonized a ravaged city and didn't line up allies, don't expect to have it all handed over to you. You reap what you sow.

[Uzamaki]

Don't blame the game, then. You tried, you failed. The problem isn't starvation, it's diplomacy.

"Send it rogue for a week". There's your half problem. Why did you let it go rogue? And why did you let it go rogue with empty warehouses...?

"Sending cities rogue" is no easy task. Cities usually have significant fortifications (lvl 5, or 4 was it sieged often) and lots of militia. And if it's a capital, then all of the recruitment centres are there, and odds are many of the inactive nobles are as well.

If you colonized a ravaged city and didn't line up allies, don't expect to have it all handed over to you. You reap what you sow.

Sending cities rogue is much easier than you think. Now, it's no easy thing to do, but it's not nearly as hard as you are making it out to be. Inactive nobles are there only if it's the capital. Otherwise, it may have militia and walls. 'Lots' is a hell of a subjective term.

That's actually just the problem. I didn't reap anything. I am the second King, I am building off of the job of the first. Also, I did not ravage the city, in fact, I explicitly asked them not to completely destroy the city while I was in Sirion. Obviously, that was to no avail. My realm was put at the mercy of military strategists who would not have to deal with these consequences later down the line. That, indeed is part of the problem.

[Anaris]

That's actually just the problem. I didn't reap anything. I am the second King, I am building off of the job of the first. Also, I did not ravage the city, in fact, I explicitly asked them not to completely destroy the city while I was in Sirion. Obviously, that was to no avail. My realm was put at the mercy of military strategists who would not have to deal with these consequences later down the line. That, indeed is part of the problem.

So, you think you're the only one in BM who's ever been screwed over due to the actions of others he cannot control?

It can be incredibly aggravating sometimes, but it is all part of the game.

[Chenier]

Sending cities rogue is much easier than you think. Now, it's no easy thing to do, but it's not nearly as hard as you are making it out to be. Inactive nobles are there only if it's the capital. Otherwise, it may have militia and walls. 'Lots' is a hell of a subjective term.

That's actually just the problem. I didn't reap anything. I am the second King, I am building off of the job of the first. Also, I did not ravage the city, in fact, I explicitly asked them not to completely destroy the city while I was in Sirion. Obviously, that was to no avail. My realm was put at the mercy of military strategists who would not have to deal with these consequences later down the line. That, indeed is part of the problem.

1) Walls and militia... and your army? If you don't defend your cities, you deserve losing them.
2) Assuming that cities have walls, militia, and a mobile army defending them, you need a lot more troops and a lot of siege engines to penetrate their defenses. Unless your realm is many times the size of the other, this is usually quite difficult to achieve.
3) You reap what your predecessor sowed, then. You can't expect to have it all handed to you just because you weren't the one in charge back then. That's just not how politics work.
4) So your realm could have not destroyed it, but decided to anyways? Your collective fault. You failed to sway them into not doing this.
5) Bad strategists? Again, your collective fault for putting them there and listening to them.

Sure, a city is easy to cripple, if you leave it undefended, made no allies, have rulers that ruin relations with your neighbors, made sure to claim it in a bad state yourselves to begin with, and didn't plan on eventually wanting to hold it and profit from its economy.

But then again, if you do all of that wring, it SHOULD be easy to cripple. Otherwise, in normal circumstances, it would become impossible.

You guys did everything wrong. Population growth isn't the source of the problem here.

[LilWolf]

1) There are still plenty of wars in most realms.
2) You can't compare now with then. Back then, taxes were collected realm-wide, making region loss not that dramatic for anyone. The new allegiance system with its free-for-all mentality hadn't been pushed onto anyone. There was no such thing as estate efficiency or lack of control due to estates, realms could expand as far as their military allowed it and the returns were far from as diminishing as they are now. Realms were like ant colonies, where the general controlled the whole forces and not following his orders would usually put you in serious trouble.
3) Looting isn't overpowered. All of the damage achieved by it can be more effectively achieved by TOs, if you have the nobles for it. If you see more looting being done than 5 years ago, it's because tying tax efficiency (and previously control) over the number of nobles a realm has makes expansion for a lot of realms nonviable, not because looting somehow became overpowered.

1. Sure, but they're far more destructive than they used to be. Just look at the regions near Coria that have seen the most battle and you'll see regions that have lost 6000 peasants out of an 8000 total. That's just the effects of normal, prolonged war these days and recovery of those regions will take months.

2. Yes, the game was more a game back then and less the cumbersome social simulator it has become. Many of the things you listed there are things the realism craze has brought on and made the game less fun, less dynamic, slower and all around a worse experience.

3. Perhaps so, but when the prevailing tactic in the game boils down to killing the enemy regions for months to come, there's something extremely wrong with the way the game works. Waiting for the peasants to return to a region is like watching paint dry. It's not fun in any way and should not be an element of the game that lasts months at a time.

[Chenier]

1. Sure, but they're far more destructive than they used to be. Just look at the regions near Coria that have seen the most battle and you'll see regions that have lost 6000 peasants out of an 8000 total. That's just the effects of normal, prolonged war these days and recovery of those regions will take months.

2. Yes, the game was more a game back then and less the cumbersome social simulator it has become. Many of the things you listed there are things the realism craze has brought on and made the game less fun, less dynamic, slower and all around a worse experience.

3. Perhaps so, but when the prevailing tactic in the game boils down to killing the enemy regions for months to come, there's something extremely wrong with the way the game works. Waiting for the peasants to return to a region is like watching paint dry. It's not fun in any way and should not be an element of the game that lasts months at a time.

Making regions recover faster won't bring back the old style of play, it'll just make wars meaningless.

[Uzamaki]

1) Walls and militia... and your army? If you don't defend your cities, you deserve losing them.
2) Assuming that cities have walls, militia, and a mobile army defending them, you need a lot more troops and a lot of siege engines to penetrate their defenses. Unless your realm is many times the size of the other, this is usually quite difficult to achieve.
3) You reap what your predecessor sowed, then. You can't expect to have it all handed to you just because you weren't the one in charge back then. That's just not how politics work.
4) So your realm could have not destroyed it, but decided to anyways? Your collective fault. You failed to sway them into not doing this.
5) Bad strategists? Again, your collective fault for putting them there and listening to them.

Sure, a city is easy to cripple, if you leave it undefended, made no allies, have rulers that ruin relations with your neighbors, made sure to claim it in a bad state yourselves to begin with, and didn't plan on eventually wanting to hold it and profit from its economy.

But then again, if you do all of that wring, it SHOULD be easy to cripple. Otherwise, in normal circumstances, it would become impossible.

You guys did everything wrong. Population growth isn't the source of the problem here.

I don't think you understand what happened. I didn't put anyone, anywhere. My realm didn't take any actions that caused Oroya to become a wreckage of epic proportions. We have been screwed over by the realm's society, the same realm society you propose holds the answer to this predicament. You think if people just act this specific way, this problem will be solved. People do not act that way. Therefore, the game must take that into account.

While I can say there is some truth to 'you reap what your predecessor sowed', many of these realms, if they have alliances, are at the mercy of a single more powerful realm. In Nivemus' case, it's Sirion. In Dunnera's it was Caligus. And even though they don't have relations: In Eponllyn, it's Perdan and in Armonia, it's Caligus. The only thing not crushing those realms on some arbitrary whim is because they don't have a reason, or just simply don't want to.

Nivemus has done exactly this: take devastated region, surround with well fed regions to help immigration possibilities, and put time and money into the city. Please explain to me how THAT is wrong!