Menhir
Menhire oder Menhirsteine sind Reservierungen bestimmter Feld für einen fremden Statthalter, die von einem König platziert werden können. Der Statthalter kann den Menhir für sich beanspruchen, um sein Dorf zu dem Menhir umzusiedeln, verliert dabei allerdings seine ausgebauten Rohstofffelder. Das Feature ist dazu gedacht, dass Spieler, die gemeinsam starten, einfacher zusammen starten können.
Grundlegendes
Menhire können von Königen platziert werden, indem der entsprechende Button im Radmenü der Karte geklickt wird. Sie sind für jeden sichtbar und verhindern, dass irgendein anderer Spieler das Feld besiedeln kann. Es müssen einige Bedingungen erfüllt sein, um einen Menhir zu platzieren:
- Der Spieler, für den der Menhir platziert wird, darf nur ein Dorf (oder Stadt) haben.
- Das Zielfeld muss besiedelbar sein (d.h. es darf nicht von einer Oase, Wildnis oder Dorf belegt sein).
- Das Zielfeld darf kein 3-3-3-9er oder 1-1-1-15er sein.
- Das Dorf des Spielers darf nicht innerhalb der Königreichsgrenzen liegen.
- Der Spieler ist nicht Teil des |politischen Königreichs und war es auch nicht in den letzten 72 Stunden.
Due to general kingdom join conditions, there are two additional requirements:
- The player must not be inactive (gray).
- The highest wonder of the world must not be at level 50 or higher.
If a king places a menhir for a player, he will send a kingdom invitation to the player automatically and nobody will be able to settle on the reserved field. The king can remove the menhir after placing it. The player can claim the menhir and thereby accepting the invitation, triggering the following effects:
- The village of the governor is teleported to the reserved field.
- The village's resource field distribution adapts to the reserved field.
- The player will join the kingdom.
- All resource fields of the village will be destroyed.
- All buildings, troops and everything else will stay.
- At least 80% of the cost of the fields will be refunded in form of resource piles in the hero's inventory.
Refund Calculation
If a player claims a menhir, his resource fields get destroyed, but he will receive resource piles in his hero inventory as refund. Resource piles are consumable items, compareable to ointments. They come in four sizes: Small (500 resources per pile), medium (2000 resources per pile) and large (8000 resources per pile). One can combine four piles to receive a larget pile or split a pile into four smaller piles, but this is purely for convenience. Upon consuming, the amount of used piles disappear and the corresponding amount of resources is added to the current village's warehouse or granary.
The amount of resource piles is calculated for each resource type seperately (i.e. one might for example receive small piles for wood, but medium piles for clay). At first, the resource cost of all destroyed resource fields is added together. Then the size of the piles is determined:
| Total Cost | Pile Size |
|---|---|
| < 10k | Small Piles |
| 10k to 40k | Medium Piles |
| > 40k | Large Piles |
Lastly, one receives piles of the previously determined size for that resource.
This algorithm implies, that one always receives between 80% and 100% of the originally invested costs.
Usage
The intention of menhirs is to allow premade teams to start together more easily. There are two other uses cases, the latter one being often seen as bad play style:
- Menhir Settling - Using menhirs to quickly settle the second village
- Stripping an off account down to one village to teleport its hammer close to an enemy target, to reduce travel time
