Beware the Haunted Castles in the Valley of the Caves of Chaos. Grab a castle, brave the Caves for treasure and eliminate all your rivals.
Castles
Castles are made up of 4 components, the gate, the base courtyard, the walls and the central tower. Each component of the castle generates +1 factory bonus to the base, so a potential of +3 in all if a player owned all 3. There is a downside to owning a castle. It generates a -5 bonus from the standard income, but this can be offset by obtaining magic items that associate to the particular castle (see magic items below).Castle Tower - affords a view (radius 3) of the area surrounding the castle. Unit max 3.
Castle walls - Ability to barrage territories with range 2 from the castle and it's moat. Artillery attacks are d6 vs d4, so being close with a large army to a castle owned by another player can be brutal for your army.Castle walls can also attack other castle bases (d8 vs d10) and the hill plateau (d10 vs d8). Max unit count on the walls is 10.Each Castle also has 4 'sally-forth' locations to which they can send sappers to open tunnels for their troops. These can be used in case of siege and also to cleverly deploy forces for other causes.Castle gates, unit cap 8, defends at +2.Castle moats - gain a +2 bonus for owning all locations surrounding the moat.Castle bases can fortify to/from controlled towers and magic kingdoms.Finally, castle bases function as capitals. If you take one and later lose it (before taking another castle), you will be eliminated (30% assimilation).
Magic Items and the Caves of Chaos
Magical items are located within the Caves of Chaos. These items associate to a specific colored castle and if the owner of said castle (specifically the castle base) can obtain these items, the player can dramatically bolster their income as each item is worth +10 in income. Magic item are bordered in the color of their associated castle and associated as follows:
red castle - magic ringsorange castle - magic keyspurple castle - magic amuletsgreen castle - magic crystal balls
Furthermore, all magic items are worth +1 regardless of castle ownership. (ie - +11 if you own the castle, +1 if you don't)
Special note on the caves - all locations are placement-disabled, so be sure to bring a large group of followers into the caves when exploring. Furthermore, border from the magic center spots to magic items is attack-only, so be sure to fortify with enough force to retain the item.
Marsh Towers
These are towers which generate a line of sight radius of 3 territories. Towers can also view ownership of adjacent Castle towers (and vice-versa for castle towers) and other nearby Marsh Towers and the nearby Magic Kingdom.Each tower generates a bonus of +3 and also defends at +1.Max unit count per tower is 8 units.All Towers bonus - additional bonus of 8 units for owning all 8 towers.
Summit Hill and Top
Summit Hill top is worth a bonus of +5 and view all the castles and towers as well as a radius 3 from the base of the hill.The hilltop has a maximum unit count of 10. The plateau cap is 20 units. Placement is disabled on both of them.The hilltop defends at +2.The hill plateau defends at +1 from locations below.
Other Pertinent Rules:
Regular income bonus is 1 per each 8 territories, minimum territory bonus is 5.Fortify is accross owned territores.Return to attack from fortify is on, 5 fortifies allowed.Card sets are an even 8 units each set.Elimination bonus is 20 unitsOwning both sides of a bridge also is worth a +1 bonus.Owning all surrounding territories of the small pond is worth a +3 bonus.Owning the surrounding territories of a fisherman is worth a +2 bonus.Owning one of the Magic Kingdom castles (3 of them) is worth a +2 bonus. These castles have a max unit count of 8 units and defend at +1.
