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That's a universal sign of weakness. You see it in novels where the author doesn't really know what to do in a spot and drags things out with meaningless scenes. You see it in movies for the same reason. You see it in on-line games where they make something arbitrarily hard or require some...

Without user created content to entertain the masses, the MMO guys are forced to make things take time. There's your running part (although personally I never had issue with that) but there's also the reputation grinds (go kill x,000 of this or that) and the dungeon grinds (we're making the odds...

I assumed from previous experience that there was a 9 entry limit on the poll. Given that constraint, and my desire to span time more than geography although I did get one non-European one in there. Feel free to post specific examples you have in mind. As we've discussed elsewhere, it depends...

Very cool- no wall towers though. As an attacker, I'd be tempted to come in at one of the corners on the upper left or lower right. Wouldn't take much fire from the walls there ;)

The difference is that one is constructed with quarters suitable for a lord or other civilian (regardless of who actually lives in it) and one would have barracks. In the former case, this might include a large hall with (in some periods) elaborate apartments, a large chapel, etc. In both the...

Not advocating you try them again (they have other faults these days) but one reason WoW succeeded was it addressed some of the shortfalls of the earlier systems. I tried EQ about the same time and after four hours of killing bats so I could get to a level where I could do something useful, I...

I would agree with you in general. I think a castle must have some additional purpose beyond being a military fortification, otherwise the two words would be essentially synonyms. Requiring it to be a residence (and not just a barracks) seems to be both reasonable and a common definition. Maybe...

:lol: Probably a case of "fat fingers"

Those are in fact the charts I was thinking of as an extreme case:). Some folks love them but I always found them way over done. And you spelled the game system wrong. It's Rollmaster :p

Ultimately, that is my only point although I would observe that many people would not be so happy with the aesthetic of the resulting change. IIRC I started this subthread off with something like "add gunpowder and castles go away." I will rephrase that to "add gunpowder and fortifications...

There's several issues regarding the progression of castles to fortifications. The classic castle definition I have been able to find is basically a fortification used as a residence for a local lord. By this definition, it would rule out the Edwardian Welsh castles that I think most people are...

The coloring simply comes through from the cut-and-paste from wikipedia. The articles provide plenty of references if you want to research them, some included in the cut-and-paste and the rest available on the page links provided. These quotes and the overall articles are in-line with...

The coloring simply comes through from the cut-and-paste from wikipedia. The articles provide plenty of references if you want to research them, some included in the cut-and-paste and the rest available on the page links provided. These quotes and the overall articles are in-line with...

Early cannons were anti-personal. Once they got large enough to be used against castles, they changed fortifications: From wikipedia on siege craft: The introduction of gunpowder and the use of cannons brought about a new age in siege warfare. Cannons were first used in Song Dynasty China...

LOL true. I don't think the young-uns realize how easy it is to pick them out, either :)

As someone whose gaming group was entirely distracted by WOW for several years before we returned to gaming a few years ago, I can speak from personal experience. WOW is not roleplaying. Even on an RPG server its a real stretch but basically, inter-player chat is almost never in character and...

Hmmm I love Dark Ages settings. Running one right now (although it is Dark Age in the sense of post-decline in civilization, not Dark Ages Europe). Yeah, it's a matter of aesthetics for me. Thinking through my knee-jerk opposition to gunpowder, there's more to it though. I like to world...

Most refs are trying to capture a particular mood or feeling and aren't evolving their setting over a long period of time. This is mostly because it isn't relevant to the game and also because it isn't exactly easy. I do agree that given time, technology ought to change. For reasons of...

:p I'm saying gunpowder causes fortifications to change to the point where most gamers wouldn't really consider them castles any more. Deal was a transitional fortification, one of the last castle-ish ones I can recall. Let me try this another way. People seem to like the high-middle ages...

Early firearms were not very big or easy to move. By the mid-1400s they were affecting castle design. But even so, in most FRPs with gunpowder, has the gunpowder weapon only been around for 300 years? Are you saying such weapons won't affect fortification design? Do you think it won't affect...