The game need a rethink of how castles/forts work in warfare.

[ray243]

I think more generally, Castles just need to do something. Right now, it feels like they do nothing beyond being "Type of holding you can own directly" and they're just parking places for gold generating buildings. All the walls/fort level, garrison size and other stats just don't feel particularly relevant.

No matter how much you build them up they'll barely slow down (and certainly never stop), any army from a leader remotely relevant to you. When I'm the one attacking, I never feel the need to check the garrison/fort level of enemy territory.

They can halt the odd peasant rebellion army, but they can do that with 0 investment and no need to focus on making Fort Level/Garrision buildings traits or whatever. Not that there's any real need to hold off a peasant army in the couple of seconds it takes to spawn in your army and vaporize them.


I don't particularly care if what castles do is terribly historically accurate, so long as it feels basically plausible enough to be vaguely of thematic. The more important thing is that whatever defensive stats do should feel less like filler and more like actual content.

I feel they don't even stop raiders. Raiders going to attack your castles and you can't stop them because your AI vassals don't raise their armies to deal with raiders raiding their own lands!

 

[MummyMonk]

I feel they don't even stop raiders. Raiders going to attack your castles and you can't stop them because your AI vassals don't raise their armies to deal with raiders raiding their own lands!

Vassals do do that, actually: at least when their forces are of comparable size. I think they don't bother to raise forces and fight when they have like 300 levies and 100 skirmishers and 10 gold (after the player in their infinite wisdom taxed the hell out of them) against 2000 angry vikings – there is no point, really.
What they should have been doing when raiders are too strong is ask the liege to fight off the invaders, with serious penalties for refusing or failing to – but this is a game about feudal relations, we don't do that here.

 

[Apocal]

I don't particularly care if what castles do is terribly historically accurate, so long as it feels basically plausible enough to be vaguely of thematic. The more important thing is that whatever defensive stats do should feel less like filler and more like actual content.

Then you already have that in CK3: center of administration and some rich dude's house.

As direct defenses, they already seem fine with fort levels slowing down besieging armies for years and large garrisons stopping small forces from besieging at all.