Significant penalty for intentionally starving a region

[Chenier]

    Title: Significant penalty for intentionally starving a region
    Summary: As it is, realms often take all the food away from a region when the enemy is about to take it over. It's a very gamey/meta strategy.
    Details: There are absolutely no downsides to taking all the food out of a region that is being taken over. Enemy troops will start to wear out their provisions, but the region will not suffer any significant penalties until after the region is lost. The result is that the peasants stay very happy with the realm that intentionally brought starvation upon them, and quite angry with the realm that immediately gives them food. Thus, the request is that when someone takes out food and leaves less than the region needs to continue for a week, it immediately gets an important morale, loyalty, and control debuff. If you take *all* of the food away, the debuff is much stronger. Furthermore, when regions are starving, takeovers should take less time to accomplish, maybe half as much.
    Benefits: Starving a region you are about to lose is extremely gamey, lame, and offers a no-lose strategy that makes no RP sense whatsoever. It's akin to "screen units" that were recently removed.
    Possible Downsides or Exploits: It's an exploit fix on its own, imo, but care should be taken with the limits and penalties in order to take into consideration legitimate food transfers across a realm. I don't think that's a big issue, though, and it's fairly logical that if you starve one region to feed another, the region starved shouldn't like you.

[Vita`]

This is already an almost-thing and has been for years.

[Chenier]

Perhaps a new takeover action could be added. Like "free ale", but "free bread", which is twice as effective, but only works when the region is starving?

[Anaris]

Perhaps a new takeover action could be added. Like "free ale", but "free bread", which is twice as effective, but only works when the region is starving?

Where are you getting the bread from?

[Zakky]

Thought there was a plan to prevent this. I think it hasn't been implemented because the devs haven't had the chance to work on TO system?

[Chenier]

Where are you getting the bread from?

Where are we getting the ale from?

That said, with the current mechanics for food, I'd say either from your own rations, or from your regions' warehouses.

I mean, where does food go when we loot for food? To do the reverse road would seem logical to me. Unless you just make it magic food as we've already got magic ale. The food is not in enough quantities to actually stop the starvation, but enough to get the locals' hopes up. Like the ale, but, better?

[Chenier]

Honestly I think having the food "poof" in from nowhere, as the ale does, would be the simplest solution. Don't have it have an actual impact on starvation, just make it be a more effective takeover action that's only available when the region is starving. Combined with the mechanic to penalize those who intentionally starve their regions, should be plenty to deter this systematic tactic.

[Gildre]

If they have no bread, just let them eat cake.

[Azerax]

if a region is being taken over,  I would be inclined to believe the aggressors have control over the infrastructure.  most of the food should not be available to transfer out of the region

[Chenier]

Denying access to the granaries, just as recruitment centers are barred during TOs, would probably be a fairly straightforward fix to greatly reduce the incidence of such a strategy.

I must say I've always hated how intentional starvation is used in such meta ways. Reminds me too of how Giask was managed back then with the repetitive intentional starvation in order to make the realm live on far less food than it could have with less gamey tactics.

[Eduardo Almighty]

What's the problem with some scorched earth strategy? Thinking like a hopeless Lord losing his region, I certainly would not leave food for my enemies... or gold in the temples... I would go to the extremes of destroying the fortifications and recruitment centers, rocket-launch the taxes to the heights and cause as much damage as possible.

It is not as if historically this has never been done before...

[Stabbity]

What's the problem with some scorched earth strategy? Thinking like a hopeless Lord losing his region, I certainly would not leave food for my enemies... or gold in the temples... I would go to the extremes of destroying the fortifications and recruitment centers, rocket-launch the taxes to the heights and cause as much damage as possible.

It is not as if historically this has never been done before...

However, if a takeover is already under way, you definitely don't have control of the region enough to empty the granaries.

[Anaris]

What's the problem with some scorched earth strategy? Thinking like a hopeless Lord losing his region, I certainly would not leave food for my enemies... or gold in the temples... I would go to the extremes of destroying the fortifications and recruitment centers, rocket-launch the taxes to the heights and cause as much damage as possible.

It is not as if historically this has never been done before...

The problem is simply that the game doesn't reasonably account for either the access to implement, nor the reaction of the peasants to such a strategy.

[Eduardo Almighty]

However, if a takeover is already under way, you definitely don't have control of the region enough to empty the granaries.

My fault. If the TO is under way, yes... I agree.

[Chenier]

I wouldn't mind scorched earth if it had sensible consequences. But it doesn't. It's a no-lose strategy, because it takes days without food before penalties really kick in, and by then you probably already lost the region or are about to. Then, once the conqueror finally gives food, it takes many days before the penalties stop. It just doesn't make sense that the locals love those who starve them and hate those who feed them, which is what the current system is. You'd be stupid *not* to drain the region of food, as it is.

Checks would be needed to avoid this gamey no-lose strategy. Either deny access when there are hostile troops in the region, or when there's a takeover. But if it's the latter, then I think the invading army should be able to know the region has no food before starting the takeover. This way, if the defended starves the region, the invader always just has the option of going "oh yea? fine, we'll go take that OTHER region, thanks for starving yourselves for nothing".