I feel like if there’s a implementation too use thrall to man ballistas, that can only fire regular bolts. Only damage NPCs and hostile players, not one shot obviously but 100 dmg per hit. Leaving trebuchets for walls, no more just walking up and place bombs getting peppered by arrows that barely do damage. Doing this would actually require a real siege, even if spammed they could be destroyed but it would require time. Also could defend against gods, no more farming straight too god bubbles that mark you on the map, (plus adds to the sandbox of pvp crom followers) do the regular damage per hit that bombs do 10 secs per hit. So before they pop the god token. They have to clear the walls from a distance.
Also to limit spam limit the amount you can build per clan
I have archers that do more than that.
They could have a greater range to balance it out.
Yup, I’m all for things like ballistas, portcullis, siege towers, etc being added to the game.
How do you get your archers to engage properly from crenelated walls? Mine get aggroed by enemies, but instead of shooting at them they either back up and lose line of sight (LoS) or they just don’t shoot even though the target is in range.
Is this a bug or am I doing something wrong?
I’d love to have a ballista that could be player manned or thrall manned.
I had the same issues… it’s the “Stand and Defend” option you want along with the smallest “Chase Distance” possible, and something more than 1 tile in size to stand on - two squares is enough tho.
After that, they only seem to fall off about once every 3 or 4 months - unless knocked off.
Be careful to set them right when you take them out as a follower tho - or they’ll just stand there trying to shoot their bow like their feet are cemented in place. 
As soon as they’re alerted to an enemy, they freeze and start shooting - never moving till someone dies. 
I would say that ballistas would auto engage the location of the base attack. That way trebs and stationary archers would get hit while the weakness is mobile attacks. Base damage would be explosive arrow. Also I would say it attacks avatars and does 10 arrows worth of damage per hit (IE 10 seconds reduced from the avatar).
Thanks. I currently have my archers on “Stand and Defend” with the shortest chase distance and they don’t shoot at anything even though they get alerted to enemies within range. When I change them to “Attack All Enemies” they move backwards, lose LoS and end up outside my walls on the ground when I log in lol. They’re set on turrets made of 3 triangle ceiling pieces that hang over the side of my main wall that is 4 tiles high. I’ll post a screen shot when I get home tonight
Interesting… I had mine set to:
- Stand And Defend
- Attack All Enemies
- Chase Distance 5m
- Attack Distance 50m
- And gave them nothing but a powerful bow with 200 starmetal arrows each.
About 40 of them set all along walls and building on platforms like this:
They went through a purge and never moved. I can kite lynx and gaters to them and watch - they never move. I can take them out in the field and watch them take a beating and never pick up their feet.
I’ve since realized that they are FAR more affective on the ground changing the chase distance to 15 or 30m, the priority to Ranged, and also handing them a 76 dmg sword along with the bow - so I’m no longer using the platforms - but they worked perfectly!
BTW, Triangles are where mine would fall off - but only once in a blue moon - and those ones never saw battle so I dunno how they did.
Yeah they work fine on the ground for me too, but that defeats their main base defense purpose imo. Funcom should add a “Tower Mode” or something to keep them from being stupid lol.
Yeah, I was convinced it didn’t work too. For a bit… Then I tried those settings and it worked. In my case it was likely pilot error… I thought I was setting them right, but with so many thralls I was likely not. Making certain of the settings and placing them on something 2 tiles wide (like in the image) solved everything. You’re on PC right? Consoles might be different, I dunno.
Yeah, I’m on PC. Even if they do work with those specific settings and tile placements, it still seems broken if they only work under those conditions.
Likely so… Others have brought this up as well. People even doing some fairly elaborate tests… So, you’re not alone… When I had my thread there were people on either side as well.
archers and fighters with bow to stay on top of a foundation block, how?
Maybe, have better bolts that can do more damage, and let a thrall accuracy bonuses help with damage.
So here’s the issue with that idea. You can go into one shot territory quickly. Right now I can already put out nearly 300 damage with a bow (under very specific conditions). Of course this is against 0 armor. Still impressive damage against even heavy armor depending on arrows used.
So I would suggest a base damage of 100-150 but with armor pen of 20-25% (no more than 30-35%). With accuracy affecting engagement range (perhaps half a percent per point). Then couple this with something that blocks multiple ballistae being used in close proximity.
Now you have a weapon that can deal decent damage, to a decent range, but won’t simply obliterate passerbys that don’t see them.
I actually like using them as a turret when on follow. Especially with blunted bow and blunted arrows. this way I can kill off the T3 and lowers and eventually let it ping the T4. I usually kite then out 2 or at most 3 at a time to achieve this.
Oh, that’s a good idea. I’m stealing it! 
So far my only success at nabbing named purge thralls has been to get them to follow me into a walled off room just for that purpose, then shut the doors (plural) on them. Then beat them unconscious, drag to the wheel nearby, rinse and repeat. Only tried it one so far but it worked OK.
A stationary thrall as a pin-point around which to operate and manipulate a purge crowd sounds interesting and maybe more fun too - at least if I’m understanding you right.
yeah, but I do it at camps. use the quick command stop run and kite, quick command attack, voila.
Also, because the NPCs aggro the thing doing most damage they never really even go at the “turret”. If they do, just have truncation on them for CQC.
100% have a radios thats 2/3 times larger than the thrall limit. If they do almost become 1 shot, make the reloading phase long obviously. But the biggest thing If it did become a thing, I would let it balance out with trebuchet. Don’t let the accuracy of ballista overtake the trebuchet.
I don’t disagree with the treb suggestion there.