A siege is organised warfare over a fortified location — a nation castle or a guild province. It's the largest, most coordinated thing a warband does, and the one place where combined arms, logistics and a shieldwall holding a breach all matter at once.

Siege points & engines

You can't axe your way through a gate — you need siege equipment, paid for with siege points. Standing in an active siege earns a flat 50 points per minute (there's no way to earn faster), and each player banks their own. Spend them at a siege camp (fixed, on both sides of every nation location), a siege tent (carried in and deployed by attackers), or a siege engineer NPC (defenders, inside the walls).

• One piece per player at a time — spawn a second and your first despawns. Whoever spawns it doesn't have to crew it; anyone can take it.
• Unattended siege despawns in 5 minutes, and the points are not refunded — don't let engines sit idle.
• There's a free ram and catapult at every siege camp that cost no points (they respawn 5 minutes after being destroyed or abandoned).
• Engines spawn on a shared timer — the more you have out, the longer until the next, so ask the party what's actually needed first.

• Small battering ram — fits through gatehouses; breaks doors, portcullises, walls and towers.
• Large battering ram — high health but too big for gatehouses; the opening gatehouse push.
• Catapult — stone or flame shots at range; breaks walls, gates and ballistas.
• Mantlet — movable cover, horizontal or vertical, to shield players and engines.

Ballistas

Ballistas are the defender's automatic answer to incoming engines. They appear for free on level-2-or-higher towers, gatehouses and bastion buildings — no points, no spawning. Each does 300 damage to players and hits up to three at once, and against cavalry it's brutal: 600 to the horse, 300 to the rider, plus a rear that stops the mount dead.

• Ballistas are shielded against arrows until they drop to 40% health — attackers must bring them down with a catapult or trebuchet first.
• Destroyed ballistas respawn automatically every 8 minutes, so suppressing them is a constant job, not a one-time clear.

Splash damage

When a wall, gatehouse or tower is broken to 0 HP, it doesn't just fall — it deals splash damage worth 50% of its full HP to every structure touching it. Chained right, one collapse cascades into several, which is how attackers crack a fortress fast — and why defenders must never stack walls, towers and gates flush together.

Holding the breach

Once a gate or wall is down, the fight becomes a choke: a shieldwall in the breach, spears thrusting from the second rank, archers and ballistas raking the approach, and medics keeping the line on its feet. A breach the defenders can hold is worth more than any number of kills in the open.

Attacking a castle

• Have a plan before you arrive — who crews siege, where tents go, who leads, and whether everyone is fed and buffed.
• Scout first. A careful scout reads the defenders' numbers without 'lighting' the location and giving the attack away.
• Control the small flags (mines, farms, lumbermills) around an enemy castle so they can't teleport reinforcements straight in.
• Suppress the guards — destroy guardhouses to stop them respawning. Holy Temple and capital-adjacent guards are far tougher than frontier ones.

Defending a castle

• Get there early — when the small flags start lighting up, ride for the keep; arriving late to a siege is usually wasted effort.
• Work your ballistas and trebuchets to kill engines before they pile up; letting siege accumulate is how a defence collapses fast.
• Hit their back line. A small squad wrecking the attackers' siege camp and tents can end a siege before it starts.
• Don't over-turtle. Rushing out to push attackers back can buy the breathing room to repair — you can rebuild at the Architect's Table three minutes after the flag stops burning.