Submod Request: improve the Elf City/Large City on the battle map
Hi everyone. My request is a simple one. We all of course love the original models made by King Kong & Co., plus the updated custom settlements by Leo.Civil.Uefs for his Alternative Patch submod (now incorporated into DAC and MOS). However, there is one battle map settlement model that could really use some sprucing up if anyone is up to the challenge. I speak only about the Elf City/Large City. The Elven town and large town models by Leo are fantastic (example pic below) and give a real sense of a packed urban environment, with buildings in close quarters, narrow streets leading to the town square and flag capture point, and little room for enemy cavalry to maneuver. In essence, you must fight with the regular tactics of urban combat in the Elven town and large town, just like Gondor towns and cities, Easterling towns and cities, Middlemen towns and cities, etc. That excludes the Orc factions, though, which just have a bunch of lousy camps and rightly so, since they are vile Orcs who deserve nothing more.Dwarves don't count either, since their towns are already highly defensible, fortified mining settlements.
Now compare this large town model with the city/large city model. The latter, although protected by an awesome-looking stone wall with plenty of towers, has an inner city with quite a bit of open space. Mind you, this might be representative of the aesthetic appeal of the Elves and their desire to harmonize their settlements with nature and natural surroundings. However, when it comes down to in-game battle-map tactics, it lacks the appeal of the Elven town and large town models by Leo. When your army takes to the offensive, it is all too easy for your troops to reach the central plaza of the city (i.e. the flag capture point to win the siege). That's because your troops can simply weave through the small maze of buildings to get there, not even having to march along the paved street paths. Although urban buildings are present, it basically feels no different than fighting an open field battle that has some randomly generated farmhouses and rocks obstructing your path in getting to the enemy army. Likewise, when defending such a settlement, the enemy army can do the exact same thing. Ironically, the wooden-walled large town suddenly becomes far more defensible than the stone-walled city when you have this discrepancy!
My proposal: add some more buildings! For an experienced terrain editor this probably shouldn't be a big deal, especially since making new unique buildings from scratch is totally unnecessary given the cookie-cutter nature of some of these buildings being duplicated in the same settlement and across different settlement levels of town, large town, and city. However, it's more than just adding buildings; it's about providing "island" barriers that your army should be forced to march around, just like any other city. Is anyone able to do this or devote any time to this? I considered doing something similar for EB II and their battle map models (i.e. adding temples to the city centers), but I am not a real modder in any sense, despite the release of my MOS Gondor barded horses submod. Kudos to anyone who takes up this idea, though, and makes it compatible for both DAC and MOS, TATW's most prominent submods.
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Oh well, it was worth a shot. Hopefully one of these days someone will see the wisdom of my words and implement them wisely, since nothing would be wiser. In fact, whoever improves these Elvish cities will definitely be a wise guy. 
Originally Posted by TheEldarion
