How To Play Stronghold: Special Constructions in The Castle Building Category

Stronghold is about more than just how thick your walls are. In the game, you can add other constructions to your castle to help further defend your town against enemies. You may have spent big on building your walls, but bear in mind that if you have resources outside the walls then you will need to provide access for your workforce to come and go.

Towers and gatehouses are particularly useful to build in Stronghold, although the ones that are available vary from mission to mission. Not only will they provide the necessary access to your workers, Towers and gatehouses can also accomodate troops and in some cases, siege equipment; they offer additional advantages to your army when under siege.

There are five types of tower which can be built. They are:

• Wooden Platform – Used on wooden fences to allow troops to stand on. Costs 10 wood to build. Has a strength of 200 before it is destroyed.
• Perimeter Turret – Small stone tower which costs 10 stone to build. Has a strength of 1000 before it is destroyed.
• Defence Turret – Mid-sized tower which costs 15 stone to build. Has a strength of 1200 before it is destroyed.
• Square Tower – Large tower which costs 35 stone to build. Has a strength of 1600 before it is destroyed. Its large size can also accommodate a siege weapon
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• Round Tower – Large tower which costs 40 stone to build. Has a strength of 2000 before it is detroyed. Its large size allows for a siege weapon to be built.

Turrets are smaller and cheaper to build than towers, but hold less troops and can be destroyed by tunnelers. They are not big enough to hold siege machinery but can be directly accessed from the ground by troops.

Towers are immune to ladder and tunnelling attacks and are stronger to breach than walls. They also provide missile units with greater firing range and a defensive bonus against enemy missile troops. Towers cannot be accessed directly but must be placed alongside a wall for troops to enter/leave.

Stone towers can be repaired if they are damaged in battle, but there is no going back once a repair has been made. Be careful when choosing what to repair or rebuild as you cannot undo a repair.

There are three types of gatehouse which can be built. They are:

• Wooden Gatehouse – Costs 10 wood to create and has platforms for troops to climb onto. It has a strength of 200 before it is destroyed and is required to allow access through wooden walls.
• Inner Gatehouse – Costs 10 stone to create and can accommodate troops to climb onto. They are required to allow workers access to the castle through stone walls. Inner gatehouses have a strength of 1000 before they are destroyed.
• Main Gatehouse – Costs 20 stone to create and allows troops to climb onto the top. They give workers access to the castle through stone walls and have a strength of 2000 before they are destroyed.

There are also some specialised buildings and items you can build from the gatehouse sub-menu.

• Drawbridge – Costs 10 wood to build and is required for access to the castle if a moat is present.
• War Dogs – Savage dogs which attack enemies (and your own troops!). Costs 10 wood and 100gold to build.
• Spike Pit Traps – These are pit-traps filled with spikes and cost 6 wood to build. An enemy falling into the pit is killed, but each pit can only be used once.
• Pitch Ditch – Requires the pitch resource. Allows for ditches filled with flammable pitch to be dug. Archers, by way of a brazier, can ignite these ditches when enemies attack. Each square of ditch costs 1 pitch resource.
• Brazier – Used to ignite pitch ditches. There is no resource cost for this item.

Also in the gatehouse tab is the toggle control to dig/fill in a moat. Moats are only available on certain missions.

Gatehouses can be repaired, providing there are enough resources available to do so. The 'undo' limitation also applies to gatehouses as it does to towers.

There are six buildings and items available in the siege equipment tab. They are:

• Engineers Guild – Costs 10 wood and 100gold to build, these are necessary to train engineers. Engineers are used to man siege engines, such as battering rams and to create laddermen.
• Mangonel – Costs 50gp to build. This is a mounted siege-engine for use on towers to defend your castle.
• Ballista – Costs 50gp to build. Like the Mangonel this can be mounted on towers.
• Stable – Costs 20 wood and 400 gold to build; the stable is required to build Knights. One stable holds 4 horses.
• Tunneler’s Guild – Costs 10 wood and 100 gold to build; a tunneler’s guild is required to create tunnelers. Tunnelers can burrow underground to weaken or destroy walls and turrets.
• Oil Smelter – Costs 10 iron and 100 gold to build. Oil Smelters are used in castle defences to create boiling oil. They require engineers to use.

Siege equipment and how to use it will be covered later in the guide.