Town Builder - 95 - Defensive Mindset

Chapter 95: Defensive Mindset

It turned out the admins had not been trying to screw me. As part of the update, we quickly learned that to make the game more challenging, cities and towns with high populations of players received greater threats from the Incursion portals.

The updates had overestimated the player’s flexibility in dealing with challenges. Mad Dog was in the forums, “Shit on a biscuit, mate. Half the battles are still going on, and two major cities have fallen!”

I brought up the forums and overlayed the world map and was relieved to see none of the cities that had fallen were anywhere near our Duchy. Watching ten-second clips of the attacks, it looked like every incursion portal had a giant ape general, but each one acted uniquely—probably seeded with an AI. It made me worry about Big Al’s escape. Would he return to seek vengeance, or would he wander the land and pull other ape warriors to his banner?

“Sorry, the ape escaped,” a voice echoed from the left. I turned to see a weary Titus, who had kept Big Al occupied while the players and defenses whittled down the ape army.

“You accomplished something no one else could, Titus.” I entered the interface intending to award him some gold for his contribution. I discovered that the update had also added a tab in my lord’s interface for awarding titles. Titles required NPCs and players to accumulate “favor” points with a faction. I skimmed through the available titles, and they were mostly unimpressive. There was a large page that was grayed out because he had not earned enough favor points with the Duchy. I selected “Defender of the Realm,” as it seemed like the best title available. It provided a 1% bonus to attributes when the player or NPC fought inside Duchy’s boundaries.

My relationship with Titus instantly improved, and the gnome hospitaller immediately cheered up. The short gnome bowed and said, “Thank you, Lord Tallis. I will endeavor to honor you on the field of battle.”

After Titus left happy, I showed Mad Dog the new title tab in my lord interface. I couldn’t issue any titles to myself, so we decided he would handle issuing any titles to members of the Silver Linings Playbook. He knew where they could be most effective. 

Mad Dog quickly figured out the new interface—probably by reading the help guide. Mad Dog pointed out that many titles could only be awarded once. Defender of the Realm was one such title. There was a pool of lesser titles that could be awarded multiple times. We decided to add these titles to the reward pool for quests issued in the Duchy. It would keep the players happy and cost me nothing.

When we finished, Mad Dog focused on cleaning up the battlefield. With so many players, it was difficult for our guild members to get our fair share for this clusterfuck. Bodies of the apes were spread on the field and throughout the buildings in town. I started reassigning NPCs reinforcing Goatyah and Plainsrider and was happy that no guilds had attacked when we pulled most of the defenses. Then I turned to the butcher’s bill of NPCs that would not respawn.

Seven city guards, fourteen giantkin warriors, two orc cavalry, and seventeen civilians.

Not a single one of these NPC had an upgraded AI core, so even if I resurrected them, they would lose their ‘personality’ and be a blank slate. It was disappointing, but it could have been far worse if we had lost at either Incursion portal. I was fortunate to have player healers working on the NPCs during the Incursion. I sent Mad Dog a note to figure out how to offer quests to healers for the next incursion.

As I returned to Malcum, I continued to follow the Armageddon happening in the world. Most lost guilds at this point in the game controlled at least one small area. Players had to anchor their personal belongings to a ‘home.’ They could access their personal room at any inn in the world. The problem was that the game recognized the ‘home’ anchor location for population purposes. So, guilds had screwed themselves if their players were not defending their territory town.

I was shocked to see that a number of smaller player settlements had been wiped out. Hundreds of thousands of real-world dollars and investments were simply gone. The forums were just beginning to show the players' anger. This also meant the ape world was currently releasing thousands of its citizens into the world. Most likely, they would regroup in the larger cities they had conquered and where they had not destroyed.

Someone even posted an interesting thread about how he completed a quest that rewarded positive reputation with the ape-world faction. If you could raise it to at least neutral, you would be able to trade in their cities without being attacked on sight.

“You seeing this, mate?” Mad Dog’s voice echoed in my chat as I reached my lord’s manor.

“It is crazy. The devs just turned the entire game upside down,” I said.

“Easy to see why no one attacked us during the Incursion. But look at this, mate,” Mad Dog said, slightly concerned.

Mad Dog had been busy digging through the updates and forums. Well, probably half the guild was helping him. A section of the updates dropped into my mailbox and I read the highlighted section. I was stunned, “Shit. People are going to be mad.”

“No, I don’t think so. It will probably make the Grand War a little more balanced with more factions. Still a lot to clean up over here, and I need to log off for some genuine sleep soon. Talk later, mate.” Mad Dog cut the connection.

The paragraph he highlighted stated that the cities conquered by Incursion factions would be eligible for the Grand Game, a massive instance world that all large NPC populations were required to participate in. Death was still permanent, but it was also an avenue for NPCs to get player-like rewards and jump in level and power quickly. I shuddered, thinking what might happen if NPCs like Big Al suddenly got bonus abilities.

It was time to review my own gains from the Incursion. I had reached level 42, which meant I gained levels for the first time in a very long time. Most importantly, my skill cap jumped to 42. My profession skills were capped at 5 levels above that, so my drafting skill was now level 47! I couldn’t wait to sit back down, update old plans, and draw up new ones. I needed better defenses for Incursions, and now I had the skill to draft and build them.

Since I had reached level 40, I could select a new talent. Normally, I would call over Simba for advice on which one to choose, but he was slowly grinding my adventurer's card up. Although Simba had never steered me wrong, I intended to make this selection myself. I already knew I wanted to choose something to empower my Duchy.

I scanned through the traits that would enhance my use of the NPC auction. I looked at some of the options before discarding them.

Empathy (NPC Auction Only), show NPC personality temperament

Expanded Resume (NPC Auction Only), show NPC secondary skills

Family Ties (NPC Auction Only), show how large an NPC family is

Potent Potential (NPC Auction Only), shows NPCs that have a quicker learning curve

During testing, the NPC auction info included many details that now required talents to be spent on them. The only intriguing talent was Potent Potential. This used some type of system to indicate if an NPC acquired skills faster than usual. NPCs of Malcum already had numerous bonuses for learning skills. 

Maybe this was not the right direction for me. I was already feeling overwhelmed in the auction by guilds with more money than sense. I needed something to help defend the Duchy from the Incursion. I sorted all talents for rulers and looked at a few.

Incursion Foresight, know the invading realm eight hours before an incursion starts

Unstable Portal I (Incursion), reduce an Incursion by 5% strength

Not on My Watch I (Incursion), 5% melee attack and defense if an Incursion portal is within five miles

Bend But Don’t Break I (Incursion), +1% healing aura for allies if Incursion portal is within five miles

Retreat Is An Option (Affects One General per Incursion), a lord may duel a general in one-on-one combat. If the lord wins, the incursion army retreats

How Do You Like Them Apples? I (Incursion Only), increase incursion loot by 5%

Counterattack I (Incursion), after an incursion force is defeated or retreats, the rift will remain open for 24 hours

All of these were ruler talents exclusive to those who could access portals. Most of these talents impacted my allies within my borders only during an incursion. Before too long, I anticipated that Goatyah and Plainsrider would obtain their own portals as well, so this was likely the list I would choose from. I did look at some personal boons as well.

Adding more skills without a penalty, raising a skill cap, experience bonuses, attribute bonuses, pool recovery bonuses, and many other things could improve aspects of my avatar. Increasing the cap on my drafting skill was appealing, but I could do that by gaining more levels and I was gaining levels quickly with every Incursion. I returned to that list to select my level 40 talent.

Unstable Portal was my first choice since it had tiers, I assumed the higher tiers would reduce the Incursion strength further. I was able to pose questions to the system and get responses on the extent of the effect. The 5% reduction would either be a 5% reduction in the number of invaders, or a 5% reduction in their attributes as a debuff. It depended on which world was invading.

The other side of this was Not On My Watch, which increased the strength of my defenders—encompassing all my NPCs and any players who took a quest to defend my duchy. The only problem was that the 5% increase only affected melee attacks and defense. There was another talent called Mage’s Bulwark, which was a 5% bonus to spells, both offensive and defensive. That would help my bunny mage tremendously.

It was not an easy choice, but I finally decided on Unstable Portal since it affected all portals in my duchy. After selecting it, I was happy to see that Unstable Portal II doubled its effectiveness to 10%. It had taken me four hours of searching and sorting to make my selection, and I hated to admit it, but Simba’s filtering of my choices was actually helpful. I wouldn’t need him for the next talent selection, as I was definitely selecting Unstable Portal II—unless the admins added new talents, as they likely would.

Jaesmin and Joy had been waiting for me to finish, and we had a family dinner together. She was happy for me about my level gains but sad because she was working so hard to catch me so we could adventure together. She looked so devastated that I told her I would adventure with her anyway—when I had some free time, we would pick out a quest and do it together. Joy was not going to be left out, so I agreed we would take her.

I needed some in-game rest, so I retired with Jaesmin and set an alarm. When I woke up, it was straight to the drafting table. With my drafting skill back over the master rank, I could hopefully design more buildings to assist with the next Incursion. It would not be feasible to build walls around all three settlements. Malcum’s wall was still only 75% finished as we had expanded the city to the other side of the crescent lake. That meant I would be focusing on towers.

My ritual magic was at level 17, so hopefully, with more advanced plans and a higher level, I could quickly enhance that skill and gain greater benefits from new strategies. The game did have some restrictions: there was no gunpowder, so I was not going to be building cannon towers. Ballistae, catapults, trebuchets, and repeating crossbows were all in play. Using magic to enhance their effects would be the largest benefit of my skill.

I didn’t have the engineering skills or know-how for the weapons, but I could design the weapon emplacement to enhance any weapon installed. I sent a message to Golden Storm to search the player auctions for the best weapon we could purchase for a tower. I was working on the tower for about two hours when Golden Storm sent me what he found.

Large repeating crossbows and small ballistae were the best tower weapons currently produced by the players. The damage ranges were not particularly impressive, but I could enhance that with my eternal architect skill. The ballistae dealt more damage and had a greater range but a slower firing rate. The repeating crossbow had a shorter range and lower damage but a very fast firing rate if you had the ammunition.

My greatest concern was the NPC generals from the incursion portals, so I focused on the ballista. I had already drafted plans that I had discarded as worthless.

Rare Stone Round Wall Tower, 250,000 Health, Requires Masonry Foundations 23, Enchanting Ritual 23, Masonry Structures 43, Spawns one Elite Commander Archer Level 50 (respawn 72 hours) Generates two epic ballista bolts daily, Special Effect: Structure recovers 1% health/day

I released gold to Golden Storm to purchase as many ballista as he could. Maybe they could be used on the steam-powered skyships as well. I had not checked on how far our engineers were on manufacturing the weapons for the skyships yet.

When I originally drafted these plans, ballista were not available. Now, I could modify these plans and make use of the ballista bolts. The ballista bolts were like spawning NPC guards. They could not be sold, and once used, they became useless, which suited my purpose. I made the tower larger and focused the weapon emplacement for a ballista.

I hadn’t realized an entire day had passed until Mad Dog sent me a message asking where I was. The game world was in turmoil, and the admins and devs were facing a lot of angry players after the last incursion. It wasn’t the difficulty that bothered most people, just the massive jump in difficulty without any real warning. One of the forums showed that one player guild had taken out loans against their houses to establish a town in the game, and now it was all gone.

Mad Dog explained, “One nasty side effect for us, mate, is that players are flocking to cities that successfully repealed the Incursion. It is going to be much worse next time. Phoenix’s Rest is now one of the most popular places in the region for independent players.”

“I am working on some new tower plans, and my new talent will hopefully help alleviate some of the pressure.” I sent him information about the Unstable Portal. “The next level of the talent doubles the effectiveness.”

“Tallis, Mate. This is bloody phenomenal. I think we need to do everything we can to get you to level fifty before the next Incursion!” Mad Dog said good-humoredly.

“We both know that is not going to happen. Level grinding is too slow. We need to focus on surviving the Incursion. Make sure Goatyah and Plainsrider don’t get large to attract their our rifts,” I said.

“Already working on that, mate,” Mad Dog said mischievously. “Finish up those towers so we have a chance.”

It took a few more hours before the plans were finished and I was certain my recovered skill had helped significantly. My experience bar even ticked up slightly, and my enchanting skill went from 17 to 18.

Epic Eternal Clockwork Ballista Tower, 300,000 Health, Requires Masonry Foundations 43, Enchanting Ritual 23, Masonry Structures 43, Spawns one Elite Battery Commander Level 50, (respawn 72 hours), Spawns Level 20 Ballista Crew (respawn 24 hours), Generates two epic ballista bolts daily, Special Effect: Rapid Fire,  Structure recovers 1% health/day

I thought I had adjusted the runes to enable unlimited ballista bolts. Instead, I ended up with something called rapid fire, which rendered the ballista crew NPCs useless, as all you needed to do was cock the ballista, and the next bolt would be automatically loaded. Keeping the spawning epic bolts was a blessing because they had three effects: a damage multiplier based on distance, the ability to ignore a percentage of armor, and a chance to stun a target. The length of the stun depended on the level differential.

I hadn’t given much consideration to the essence cost when drafting the plans and winced when I read it. We only had enough warehoused for two of the towers. I drafted the second set of plans, and both would be built at Phoenix’s Rest. I had been secluded for two days in lord’s manor with messages turned off. Only the inner members of the Silver Linings Playbook had been able to contact me. A rush of notifications inundated me as I stepped onto the bustling streets of Malcom.

After setting the new tower plans in the build queue, I thought I would start my day getting reacquainted with the NPCs that made the city run…

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