you can't downgrade castles??

[bb82]

"You cannot demolish castles, ports and roads, or speciality buildings at their base level." - In game message.

WHAT??? Why can't we at least downgrade castles to their base level? This makes no sense to me considering most AI cities that you conquer have relatively high castle upgrades. Since they are so tied to rice, which can cause huge issues for an empire, why couldn't you downgrade them?

Is this a bug or "feature"? Anyone know the rationale for it if it is a feature?

edit - That in-game message is sort of confusing, especially since you can demolish upgraded ports.

[Hunter_X22]

You can't demolish castles and why would you want to? Except to reduce food shortages. But I would think it would be better to upgrade the farms rather than downgrade the castles.

[bb82]

You can't demolish castles and why would you want to? Except to reduce food shortages. But I would think it would be better to upgrade the farms rather than downgrade the castles.

There are many possible reasons. But mainly the more control a player has the better, especially when such a key element as rice is concerned.

To name a few: Reducing food is a huge factor depending on one's strategy. I'm sure many might like a bigger surplus than to be so close to zero. From purely a roleplaying perspective you might want to design your kingdom in a certain way with upgraded castles only in key areas. Tactically in the game you wouldn't want upgraded high-maintenance castles in unimportant areas. Even on a huge front you wouldn't want castles all over it since it implies you would want to defend that entire line or be in fear of losing a hard to retake upgraded castle. Strategically the front line could be better as a buffer with 1 hugely upgraded castle slightly behind the lines covering multiple provinces.

[Catma]

Agree, not being able to downgrade castles is dumb. I remember in one of my early games I was upgrading castles and markets left and right, keeping the food surplus at zero (on a side note, holding a large food surplus is too advantageous and easy to do, once you realize how stupid it is to upgrade markets or too many castles.)

Anyway I was in this situation and I took a province with a castle one level higher than its farm. BAM! Food shortage. And I was dozens of turns away from the next farm research. There was absolutely NOTHING I could do about it. I was committed to sitting for many, many turns with as many troops as I could spare, just to prevent rebellions. I was literally unable to do anything for 10+ turns.

Should I have had a larger food surplus? Yes. Does this mean the food system is working just fine? No. It is a poor system that limits play choices and occasionally penalizes unwary new players. The fact that you can't downgrade castles, giving the player even LESS control over the whole food situation, is just one aspect that is bad.

[HerrDoktor]

You can't demolish castles and why would you want to? Except to reduce food shortages. But I would think it would be better to upgrade the farms rather than downgrade the castles.

And do you think this is a small factor? Sometimes, when conquering cities early on, you may end up with famine if the castle was supported by farms on other enemy cities. Also, I would prefer to have bigger fortifications at my front, and the front changes during the campaign - you end up with citadels where there's no danger, and meager forts do defend against 3-stack armies.

[Afijaka]

Would be great if we could downgrade castles...

[Kensai]

No, it would be boring. If you don't have enough rice production then DO NOT attack that castle. It adds to the difficulty.

[yoshisuke]

I agree with Kensai, it's a strategy game so plan your strategy right. It's not that hard, and the problems of food shortage you all seem to have never happened to me.
Choose wisely what castle to attack and always upgrade your farms first.

[HerrDoktor]

No, it would be boring. If you don't have enough rice production then DO NOT attack that castle. It adds to the difficulty.

This could well be your FIRST castle (aside from the usual free first clan). Happens to Date, if you attack to the North.

[reverie7]

The castle vs food system is flawed, and it's not just the players, even the AI regularly have trouble with food shortages since they don't know when to stop upgrading their castles.