Wall Encirclement in sieges

[Stoferr]

When talking about roman legionaries, you cant really ignore the fact theat they were great engineers, therefor, it would be cool if, when besieging a city, you would be given an option to encyrcle it, with temporary walls.

These should be made in one turn (unless the turn covers less that one week)
They should lower the number of turns untill starvation in the city
They should ofcourse be on the battle map, as they have great defensive value

There are several examples of these walls being built by the romans:

- Siege of Alesia - Caesar wanted to cut every supply line, and wanted protection against the relief armies.
- Third Servile War (spartacus) - To avoid any slaves fleeing, and to cut of their supply
- Siege of Jerusalem - Also to avoid supplies reaching the city defenders

So you can see there are examples of such walls being constructed, and those are just the ones I know about, and probably there's has been more than we know of today.

[Mausolos of Caria]

I agree that this would be a nice addition to the game. However it should be necessary to have a technician in your general's retinue or to make it expensive so we don't see this at every siege

Forts and fortifications in general should be much more useful than before. The forts you could build in Rome I were pretty much death traps for the defenders because the gates were very small and the whole camp was very narrow. There should be differences between normal camps and forts with the latter having proper towers and walls and much more space to deploy your troops.
Maybe at the beginning only Carthago and the hellenistic kingdoms should be able to build those forts (and maybe the Romans) and others like the Romans or Armenia or who ever could acquire it by researching a technology- or not be able to get it at all. For some Barbarian tribes that would be more realistic.

[alexanderswift]

It would be interesting and help spice up siege battles. Being able to set up defences in case the enemy sallies would be very cool.

[isa0005]

It would be interesting and help spice up siege battles. Being able to set up defences in case the enemy sallies would be very cool.

Or any army on the move for that matter, you know you could take a turn or something to make your differences stronger and stronger and the better your generals engineering skill the better the differences.

Edit:

AND you could have your soldiers forage the surrounding land or even raid it which could cause issues with the locals who could potentially rise up and attack you you could also get wild life picking of your soldiers, sickness spreading around camp and such and the camp it self could even turn into a permanent fort if the need arose!

[Shigawire]

200 years before the Romans, the Greeks built stone wall encirclements (periteichismos) in many sieges.

Romans came very late to the siege warfare game, but once they did it, they had the most efficient siege engineering regimen in the mediterranean. The earliest Roman construction of siege towers were around 200 BC (200-300 years after neighboring nations). The reason the Romans improved greatly in the art around this time was the Roman-Macedonian war, where they became very impressed by the Macedonian siege train. They also learned quickly about mechanized siege warfare during this time. Roman siege assaults up to this point was mostly ladders, embankments and pure brute force.

[Mausolos of Caria]

200 years before the Romans, the Greeks built stone wall encirclements (periteichismos) in many sieges.

Romans came very late to the siege warfare game, but once they did it, they had the most efficient siege engineering regimen in the mediterranean. The earliest Roman construction of siege towers were around 200 BC (200-300 years after neighboring nations). The reason the Romans improved greatly in the art around this time was the Roman-Macedonian war, where they became very impressed by the Macedonian siege train. They also learned quickly about mechanized siege warfare during this time. Roman siege assaults up to this point was mostly ladders, embankments and pure brute force.

Yeah exactly, that's why I said they should get it from a technology or art or something like that I think they also learned about it when fighting Pyrrhos and the Carthaginians before who had as professional armies as the Macedonians (although maybe Macedon was better at siege warfare).
It certainly shouldn't come as a script at some date, though.

[Shigawire]

Yeah exactly, that's why I said they should get it from a technology or art or something like that I think they also learned about it when fighting Pyrrhos and the Carthaginians before who had as professional armies as the Macedonians (although maybe Macedon was better at siege warfare).
It certainly shouldn't come as a script at some date, though.

Yes, either they should learn about it from capturing samples, plus having the engineering or schooling necessary. It should be tech tree and building tree based, with an added initial siege handicap for Rome.
Up until Vitruvius, the only time the Romans had access to artillery was when they captured it.
Perhaps capturing x amount of artillery, and capturing an engineer, plus setting up engineering to be taught in a form of school (most likely a form of 2-way patronage between a student and engineer)

[Mausolos of Caria]

Yes, either they should learn about it from capturing samples, plus having the engineering or schooling necessary. It should be tech tree and building tree based, with an added initial siege handicap for Rome.
Up until Vitruvius, the only time the Romans had access to artillery was when they captured it.
Perhaps capturing x amount of artillery, and capturing an engineer, plus setting up engineering to be taught in a form of school (most likely a form of 2-way patronage between a student and engineer)

Yeah that sounds like a good solution to combinate several factors.

For other factions like Germanic tribes or Dacians there should be certain restrictions to fortifications, though. Ammianus Marcellinus was shocked when the Huns actually got siege equipment to attack Naissus in 441 AD because he thought the Barbarians wouldn't be able to do so, and that's more than 500 years after the RTW campaign.

[Rorarii]

yes, seiges should have entrenchments around the settlement on the battlefield, troops being divided around the entrenchments.

R