The Town Wall gives your city fifteen places for defences. They hit an attacking army without costing you a single troop, and they fight whether or not you are logged in. This guide covers what each piece does, what it costs and how far each study lets you take it.
The five pieces
Fifteen places, in three rows of five. Each holds one piece.
| Piece | Study needed | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Trap | Trap Craft 1 | Strikes troops as they march in. A trap that goes off is spent and has to be rebuilt. |
| Caltrops | Trap Craft 4 | A trap that does three times the damage to Riders and half to everything else. |
| Turret | Tower Craft 1 | Shoots from long range: 600 at level 1, 1,050 at level 10. |
| Boiling Oil | Tower Craft 4 | Shoots like a turret, but only 120 range and half the life. |
| Palisade | Tower Craft 4 | Has no attack. It takes hits: 450 life at level 1, the same as a turret. |
Traps work hardest on slow troops. The longer a unit spends inside a trap’s reach, the more of them die. Riders cross fastest, which is the gap caltrops fill. If your general has Persuasion, some of the troops your traps catch join your side instead of dying.
Turrets behave like Bowmen that never move. Once an enemy is within 25 of a turret, the turret deals a quarter of its damage, so it does most of its work before the enemy reaches the wall. Bowmen and Catapults only do a fifth of their usual damage to a turret, and Footmen and Riders do full damage. A turret’s strength comes from its level alone. Your general, your Weaponry and Armouring studies and your fortune don’t change it.
The study sets the ceiling
Each study level lets you raise its pieces one level higher, so Trap Craft 5 allows level 5 traps and caltrops. Both studies go up to level 10.
Level 1 of either costs 2,400 Gold. Level 10 costs 1,228,800 Gold and takes about 157 hours, plus a treasure from your bag, as the Academy guide explains. The studies are slow on purpose, and the wall can only be as strong as the research behind it.
What a piece costs
Each level of a piece costs Wood, Stone, Iron and Grain from the city you build in. The first level is cheap and the second is not: a level 2 trap costs twelve times as much Wood as a level 1.
| Piece and level | Wood | Stone | Iron | Grain | Build time |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Trap 1 | 150 | 200 | 100 | 50 | 45 seconds |
| Trap 5 | 10,475 | 13,950 | 6,975 | 3,490 | 21 minutes |
| Trap 10 | 110,840 | 95,940 | 47,975 | 36,950 | 12 hours 40 minutes |
| Turret 1 | 300 | 280 | 600 | 100 | 45 seconds |
| Turret 5 | 19,315 | 18,035 | 38,625 | 6,255 | 21 minutes |
| Turret 10 | 90,950 | 84,905 | 181,890 | 29,935 | 12 hours 40 minutes |
Caltrops cost the same as traps with the Stone and Iron figures swapped. Boiling Oil costs exactly what a turret does. A palisade costs the same as a turret without the Iron, and it builds in half the time.
The jump in strength matches the jump in price. A level 1 turret has 450 attack and a level 10 turret has 38,280. A level 10 trap has 18,000 attack against 200 at level 1.
Wall work has its own two build slots, or three with VIP, so it never competes with your buildings. Fifteen level 1 traps cost 2,250 Wood, 3,000 Stone, 1,500 Iron and 750 Grain, and two slots finish them in about six minutes.
Fifteen places on the wall. Tap an empty one to build.
How a wall wins a battle
A battle lasts at most twenty rounds of thirty seconds, and if both sides still stand after that, the defender wins. A wall doesn’t have to kill the whole army. If the wall slows an attacker enough that the fight is unfinished at ten minutes, you hold.
That gives the pieces separate jobs:
- Traps and caltrops thin the attackers while they cross the wall’s reach.
- Turrets hit the troops that stay back. A level 1 turret reaches 600, the same as Bowmen, and a level 10 turret reaches 1,050, further than a Catapult’s 800.
- Palisades soak up damage and have no attack of their own.
- Boiling Oil adds a turret’s damage at the wall itself.
Your wall takes part in barbarian raids as well as in attacks from other lords. The raid guide explains who sends raids and what they cost you.
Where to start
Build level 1 traps first. They need the least research and the least stock, and fifteen of them cost less than one level 5 turret. Move to Trap Craft 4 when Riders become your problem, because caltrops answer them. Put Iron into turrets once you can spare it: a level 1 turret takes 600 Iron, six times what a trap does.
The buildings guide covers the rest of the city, and the battle guide shows how rounds, range and orders fit together.