OT Team: Defenses

Description: The Defenses Team continues and builds upon the work of WhereRmyDragons and Endymion, who have created the first renditions of the Oldtown defenses, viewable to the south and southeast of the city. These first approaches can be kept and used as a style guide directly, or they could be further developed - this is something the Defenses Team would have to explore and discuss with the community.

Estimated Collective Workload: medium - develop a style guide based on what we've already made. Review the planned city defenses with us. Build and organise the first thing a pilgrim or traveler approaching Oldtown sees: the city walls.
Objectives: Walls, Towers, organising and co-approving City Gates and City Guard Outpost applications

Team Lead: DutchGuard (temporarily not available), EStoop
Team Members: ContraBlonde, Homiesucc, InvertedWinger, IronGentleGiant, JJLyric, lounes, Sapper
Trello: https://trello.com/b/mxMYtjsU
 
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DutchGuard

Shadowbinder
Staff member
Pronouns
he/him
Hello all!

Now that Iwan, Stoop, and I have had a little chat about what is to be expected from the Defences team, we can start putting the team together.

To give you a better idea of the scope of the works, here are some of the things this team will be doing:
- Opening all gates which have not yet been built up for application by anyone, including anyone not in the defences team.
- Completing the primary and secondary curtain walls around the city perimeter in both old and new styles as seen near /warp otwallguide
- Completing key defensive support structures such as barracks, towers, and armouries around the city.
- Building small sections of internal old walls around the older parts of the city.
- Both the main harbour and shipyard will to be built as sub-projects within the team.

So if any of that sounds interesting to you, please do comment below! Once we get the team together I'll make sure everyone is set up to use Trello and we can have our first meeting where we will discuss how and where we can start working, wooo!
 

DutchGuard

Shadowbinder
Staff member
Pronouns
he/him
Can I join too?
Edit: I'm letting you join the team, it seems you've already shown to be very helpful. Please just be sure to post updates on Trello and Discord regularly. Communication is key!

At the moment I am going to hold off on anyone else joining the team as I feel like I'm close to the max number of people I can effectively lead.
That said, I'd like to leave this thread open for anyone to register their interest in case the opportunity for more people to join arises.
 
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DutchGuard

Shadowbinder
Staff member
Pronouns
he/him
Applications for the Quail Gate (/warp quailgate) are now open to anyone wanting to apply.

The gate should not just be a gatehouse, like the ones in KL, but almost like a small fort with a yard, barracks, and maybe multiple gates. Please refer to the other gates to get some ideas. Quail Gate should be relatively small as it's not on a very busy route. I have marked the rough size of the area you have to work with in purple wool.

You do not have to fully detail and furnish the gate. A good basic wool model (3D, not just a layout) would be enough. I will review the submission in one weeks time and whoever is approved will be responsible for the building of the gate, with the support of the Defences Team (if it is wanted). Good luck!
 

EStoop

Knight of Fairmarket
Hello defence team!

First of all, we’ve seen a lot of progress at the city’s defences and are quite impressed by the speed. However, as the first section of defences seem to come along we’d like to give some feedback before continuing further around the city.

We’ve noticed some common themes in the setup of the defences, and would like to comment on these. We also like to suggest a way to get the community involved in the defences of Oldtown.

Feedback​

We’ve taken a look at the city’s eastern defences, which seem to have come along quite a way. The feedback will mostly be based on this section of the defences.

Wall thickness
A lot of the defensive structures have very thin walls. Preferably any exterior wall in the fortifications of Oldtown should be at least 2 blocks thick, maybe even 3 or 4 blocks in formidable towers and gates. As long as a structure can fit a room in it of at least 3 blocks in any direction, the walls facing outside the city should be at least 2 blocks thick.

Crenellations, buttresses and arrow slits
We noticed parts of the walls have rather low crenellations, while other parts rely on a step to be able to look over it. The height of the crenellations should always have the same proportions in relation to the walkway.

The buttresses seem a bit narrow, and might benefit from being made 2 blocks wide. Some walls could also feature a talus instead.

There are a lot of arrow slits in the towers. Any opening in a defensive structure is a weak point, and as a result there should be a carefully considered amount of openings such as arrow slits. We also noticed some arrow slits and windows located within the same structure on the same level of each other are a different height. This gives a messy look to the structure.

Style & plotting
It seems the style of the walls and towers is mostly based on the plotting. You can have a lot more freedom in this, making sections of walls thicker or higher, making towers larger or a different shape or removing them altogether. You are the defense team after all ;-).

Make sure sections of defences are not interconnected. While this seems handy for any would-be defenders, attackers benefit from interconnected walls since once a section of the wall is conquered it will be easier to conquer the rest.

Uniformity & variation
The different sections of the defences were likely built as organised building projects. As a result, the walls should be somewhat uniform within a section of the defences. There is currently a lot of variation, which in itself isn’t bad, but we’d like the walls to have a somewhat more uniform appearance. Of course, variation should still occur, but this should be more of an exception rather than the rule.

In short
Most of the feedback can be addressed by the following guidelines:
  • Walls in any forticated structure in the defences facing out from the city should have at least a thickness of 2 blocks. Localised exceptions can be made to fit in stairs, arrow slits and related features.
  • Windows have no place in the defences facing out from the city. Windows on the city side of buildings, or on non defensive courtyards, are fine.
  • Arrow slits should be a consistent height within a building and storey.

Community involvement​

We’d like to include the community in the building process of the defences. The Oldtown document has promised that the garrisons (the forts in the defences) will be available for application. We think the main city gates could also benefit from community competition, as well as provide fun challenges to builders who are not part of the OT defences team. Of course members of the OT defence team can compete in these applications as well.

Inspiration​

The Oldtown document chapter 7; walls, towers & garrisons describes what we’d like to see in the defences of Oldtown.

There is inspiration available for the types of defences of the city, which can be found here.
You can also look for your own inspiration as long as it aligns with the inspiration already gathered for the project as is explained in chapter 2; Canon & inspiration.

It’s quite a read, but that’s all we have. We’d like to hear your thoughts about the feedback and the proposed community involvement and course of action for further progress.
 

EStoop

Knight of Fairmarket
Hey all,

As some might have noticed Dutchguard is a bit busy these days. Therefore I will temporarily step in as team leader.
In the coming few weeks I will come up with a plan for the walls north of the areas FFD and FFE. I have yet to look at the plotting ingame.
If you're part of the Defenses team make sure to subscribe to the Defenses discord channel to get the latest updates and for easy communication.

Partridge Gate
The Partridge Gate is now open for application. The gate is one of the more unique ones at Oldtown, featuring a watergate over one of the tributaries of the Honeywine.

The plotted outline of the gate is very conceptional and served to get a grasp of the space needed for the gate when making the layout of the city. It is not intended to portray the desired floorplan of the gate, so don't be afraid to disregard the plotting in place. Changes to the scale, shape and to a minor degree the exact location are open to interpretation. Overall, applicants have a large degree of autonomy over how they want the gate to look, and if neccesary the surrounding area as well.

Applications do not have to be entirely fleshed out tests; a wool test with roofs, doors, windows and arrow slits is enough to give us an idea of the end product. Rooms and courtyards part of the test should feature a sign with a short description what it is.

Let us know if you're interested in testing for the Partridge Gate in this thread.
 

EStoop

Knight of Fairmarket
Team update
Based on the reactions and the people who joined the discord channel of the team, we have the following members:
If you are not listed but were part of the team and still want to be a part of the team, let me know and join the discord channel. If you are listed and your immediate reaction is something along the lines of "Oh hell no", let me know as well and I will remove you from the team.