Post/Author/DateTime	Post
killedquickly 07-27-03, 02:16 AM	i am a pretty new dm who is trying to design a good sized campaign. i want to have a general idea of what i am doing in the future so that i dont screw myself inadvertantly. i know that my players will eventually build their own castles and that the kingdom they belong to will go to war and as a result the players will go to war. i have already tried building what i think is a reasonable castle so i know ruffly how much money they will need. what i am not sure on are the tactics used in defending/attacking a castle. from what i have read ballistas would be the best defense for a castle and catapults would work best for attacking a castle. what i am usure of is 1. how do i deal with a moat? where does the water come from and how would an attacking force deal with this 2. how do i run warfare in an open environment? are there any good books i could read on ancient battle formations and tactics and what about the composition of archers, spearmen, and swordsmen 3. general tactics on defending or attacking a castle i am open to any advice or suggestions
MinusInnocence 07-27-03, 03:31 AM	Well, ideally, you place your castle on a small island in the middle of a lake or what have you; then, your moat is already there and ready for you to build within. Of course, places like this are few and far between. So, you have two options. You can either cart in huge air-tight wagons filled with water from the nearest source, or you can actually divert that source and set up some sort of irrigation to fill your little moat (be sure to dig it before you set up this bit of engineering, otherwise you'll flood all of the potential peasant-land while waiting for the moat to be prepared!). The first option is absolutely ludicrous, but I'm sure it's been done before and in a fantasy setting it probably wouldn't be too hard. Then again, considering we ARE in a fantasy setting, you may just want to create a Gate to the Plane of Water, then when the moat tops off, seal the Gate. This serves two purposes: You get the water you need and it took next to no effort, and you could try to work out some sort of deal with the Elementals that will inevitably come pouring through the Gate to see what you're up to with all of their water. Sometimes, people dealt with a moat by simply building an incredibly long bridge to traverse it. Other people dug their own little trench and let the water drain out through it and on down to the ocean, or a nearby river if that was available. When attacking a castle brimming with troops who want to storm out and kill you, you need to remember that time is on your side. If you have them surrounded, you can cut off any trade routes that ever brought anything to the fortress, and just wait. They probably don't have an underground river to access for fresh water or anything. Then again, we are in a fantasy setting, as was already discussed. Nothing to keep people from Gating in food or whatever with spells like Heroes' Feast. So, you have to up the ante: magic is your friend. Use things like targeted Antimagic Shells: you could probably research a version of the spell that covers an enormous area, but only blocks casting of a handful of related spells. The Summon Monster or Nature's Ally series would be popular choices, because this prohibits the spell-slingers inside the keep from sending out reinforcements every day. But more importantly, you have to keep the people inside from getting any more food. Ideally, defenders of a castle have enough food for several years, but they may or may not have thought about needing to take in all of the peasants who live nearby (peasants who should always be protected, since they probably pay taxes. If they're not paying you yearly taxes, they probably would have gone to another castle, where they DO pay). This dramatically reduces how much they have stored up. Burning fields and causing other such havoc to get people to sally forth out of their little castle is an excellent tactic. You have to sow fear in the peasantry, too: wild tales of bloodthirsty savages that whisk away the women and sexually ravage the livestock are always good for publicity. A) People you terrify into leaving their homes and belongings behind can be looted for all they're worth. B) They will probably run directly to your target, if it is relatively accessible: in this case, if you don't already know where the castle is, you do now. Beyond that, as mentioned before, food and water becomes a precious commodity when the fortress is suddenly inundated with new people. C) The defenders of the besieged stronghold will be shaking in their boots by the time you get there, the more people you can let survive and tell their horror stories. Anyone you don't let run away should definitely be cut down and Animated. You can catapult these Undead individuals over the walls; if they "survive", you now have a lot of zombies and skeletons swarming around inside the castle. No one likes zombies or skeletons, that's gotta scare these people (especially since they probably knew them before you killed them!) If they don't quite make it, well.. at least now the corpses are on THAT side of the wall, Filth Fever or whatever other nasty disease you let substitute for the Black Plague, and all. Once the moat has been taken care of, you need to figure out how to get past the walls. One simple tactic is to dig under one wall and try to collapse it while catapulting the bejeezus out of the opposite wall. This diverts their attention from what you're really doing; so as they slowly monitor the damage you're doing with blast after blast from your siege engines, suddenly the wall at the other side of the structure just.. falls over. They can go ahead and try to seal the breach if they want, it doesn't really matter. At this point, time is on your side, as it always was. Walls are as much a psychological barrier as they are physical. People look at the walls when they wake up in the morning and say to themselves, "Well, I'm still alive! It's a good thing we have twenty foot thick, fifty feet sheets of stone all around us to guard against the bloodthirty savages who are raping our goats and selling our women." But what if they wake up in the morning and the walls AREN'T there? People start getting upset, and the chance someone will snap and either fly a flag of surrender or blatantly open the gates for you goes up by the minute. Ah well. I've been talking for too long. I have more to say, but I hope this helps.
krichaiushii 07-27-03, 01:49 PM	If magic is very, very common, your castle building and attacking strategies will diverge greatly from historical examples. If magic is rare enough that its use is the exception, not the rule, you might consider reading up on historical examples in: Castles: Their Construction and History by Sidney Toy (ISBN 0-486-24898-4) is an excellent book, covering all aspects of castle building. Dragon magazine has featured a variety of articles on castle building and sieging - many of the earlier ones based on historical examples. Check out this index to find out which issues. Its organized by article topic, and is excellent! http://www.prespos.crosswinds.net/dragonindex.htm WotC has also released the Stronghold Builder's Guidebook, which covers lots of magical defenses and offenses. There is a Dragon issue that supports the whole book, with more crunchy bits. Be prepared for you party to cook up nontraditional extradimensional fortresses, protected by any number of unorthodox and highly magical defenses. Just a warning. ;)
Xalxika 07-27-03, 03:31 PM	Read page 158 "War and Other Calamities" in the 3.0 DMG. It explains the most common tactical maneuvers of the attacking army, and so the PC's could use that as a guideline for defensive maneuvers.
imayb1 07-28-03, 01:41 AM	1. how do i deal with a moat? where does the water come from and how would an attacking force deal with this The water could be natural-- springs, pond, lake-- or it could be man-made-- dug out and artificially filled. If natural, it would be self-sustaining. If man-made, it may dry out (depending upon climate) and need periodic re-filling. Just as you have seen hollywood movies where an attacking force lays ladders against the castle walls, so can they lay temporary bridges to cross a moat. Another fun tactic is to have a traitor on the inside who drops the "official" castle bridge for the invaders. 2. how do i run warfare in an open environment? are there any good books i could read on ancient battle formations and tactics and what about the composition of archers, spearmen, and swordsmen Battle formation and tactics are largely dependant upon culture and terrain. I reccomend practicing chess. :D For movies, you can look at The Two Towers and Braveheart for a couple of good examples. 3. general tactics on defending or attacking a castle I would definately have spell-casters on both sides, if only to cancel each other out with counter-spells. Magics can wreak a huge amount of destruction on either side. Do yourself a favor and make them moot. If you decide to keep them in.... it's a whole new thread topic. :twitch: It is always easier to defend a castle than to attack it. Defenders are on their own territory and have lots of planning-time. They also have shelter, food and water (even if sustance may be limited). They can use boiling oil or tar to pour over the walls, arrows to rain down on the enemy, pitch and fire, secret doors to sneak out of and conduct guerilla warfare, traps across the ground approaching the castle, and sometimes defenders in the village to strike the enemy from behind. Attackers can use seige towers (enclosed rolling wooden towers to put them directly onto the walls), ladders, seige engines (like catapults) to toss boulders or burning manure or trash, battering rams, sheild walls to protect them from arrows, and they could always torture unfortunates who didn't get into the castle walls in time. Attackers can also look for back doors into the castle-- secret doors or sewers are favorites.
lostinadream 07-28-03, 01:28 PM	For the moat liquid? Sewage from the castle's inhabitants is at least a part of the mixture... Also, moats were not always filled with water. Sharpened wooden spikes pointing out worked pretty well to slow down the attackers too. But just a 20' deep and 30' wide empty trench (for example) would slow down oncomming people carrying ladders or whatnot badly enough for your archers to mow them down pretty nicely.
Vahenir 07-28-03, 01:46 PM	Sewage is definitely part of the mixture for a moat, yes. However, history has shown that it's best not to put flammable objets in the moat. The last thing your castle inhabitants need is to be downwind (and a circular moat means they're always downwind) of a towering inferno caused by the attackers lighting their moat on fire. This happened, to great detriment, I believe in Northern Italy - where a moat filled with heavily oily water was ignited, suffocating many of the defenders and forcing the rest to retreat out of the fortress - to be slaughtered or to surrender.. I don't remember which.
Zepherdragon 07-28-03, 02:55 PM	Well first off you need to stop worrying about the trivial aspects about a castle. Where the water comes from or how it got there should be the least of your worries. Sence there is little about castle seiges in any D&D book I've seen you need to concentrate your efforts on the rules. Concern yourself with the walls and how cattapults damage a wall in the DMG. If the wall is 5 ft thick and made of stone you need to write up its hit points because a huge rock might be hurled at it. There's a lot of rules you going to want to know and by knowing the rules you can probably figure things out on your own. If you want a reference to a castle seige rent Joan of Ark and look at how they take over. Also resort to more exotic tactics imploying golems and the such. You are the DM, let your players decided how they want to do things and then rule if it's something you can handle. But don't just stick to a thousand men on the field using catapults and balistas, it may be easy to manage but it's boring compared to what you can do.
Dungeon_Master 07-28-03, 04:31 PM	This is just an idea, but if you have Warcraft III, you can change the rate of fire, damage, and HP of the units to make a good quick simulation. It would be real time, but it could work. This may not be to your tastes though. I don't know if anyone mentioned this yet (I didn't read all the posts), but a popular seige tactic is flinging dead animals over the walls. The undead idea was excellent, too.
Vahenir 07-29-03, 04:27 PM	Well first off you need to stop worrying about the trivial aspects about a castle. Where the water comes from or how it got there should be the least of your worries. Not necessarily. Trying to find the water to fill a moat near a desert could be an adventure all its own. By thinking about the "trivial" things - he could come up with enough adventures to last his group for another 2 years..... you never know.. But don't just stick to a thousand men on the field using catapults and balistas, it may be easy to manage but it's boring compared to what you can do. THAT is a matter of personal opinion. I would find a realistic siege ALOT more interesting than a bunch of golems or other supernatural attack methods. REAL siege warfare is -very- interesting and can be extremely fun. I've run and played in over 20 semi-realistic sieges and they were all some of the highpoints of their respective games.
Voran 07-29-03, 06:37 PM	Once upon a time, in the days of 1st edition, one of my characters had a fortress inspired by the floating citadel things from Dragonlance. Basically a huge fortress on a big rock, and the rock was partially submerged in a big lake with a small town on the water connecting to the floating fortress. In most dire events, you could just lift off.
Sid_Patterson 07-29-03, 06:54 PM	Check out War by AEG. It's got a lot of info on sieging and large scale combat.