This guide describes the tactics of finding and capturing an underwater fortress. To begin with, it is important to say that you will only be able to completely capture the fortress by draining it and blocking access to water, since the guards in the water remain full owners of the fortress.
Capture
Underwater fortresses are randomly generated deep in the ocean, so it can be difficult to find, but a blue map purchased from a cartographer can help a lot. List of items that you will need to find underwater fortresses:
- Potion of night vision and Potion of underwater breath in order to view the water through.
- Boat for ocean travel.
- Pearl of the Land, for travel by land or for instant movement under water.
- Trident
- And perhaps obsidian for portals. (For faster movement).
Capture
Guards and ancient guards spawn in underwater fortresses. To combat them, you must have diamond armor, a night vision / underwater breath potion, and food. You should not rely on a bow and arrow - in water they slow down faster than in air.
It’s hard to get inside the underwater fortress itself, as the guards spawn outside. It will be much easier for you to fend off the guards inside the fortress, the limited space prevents them from aiming at you.
In general, it is recommended to have the following things:
- Edge Pearls for teleportation,
- Potions:
- instant treatment
- invisibility
- night view
- underwater breathing
- Boots enchanted by the Conqueror of the Depths for faster movement through the depths of the sea,
- Helmet enchanted by Underwater Breathing Level 3 and Submariner. The first spell allows you to hold the air longer, the second allows you to get blocks faster,
- TNT and flint. Explosives in the water will not destroy the blocks, but the mobs will cause damage,
- A lot of signs, stairs or other blocks that leave “air pockets”,
- Milk to remove effects,
- A marine conductor built near the fortress to improve vision, breathing and increase the speed of breaking blocks under water.
Once you get inside the underwater fortress, your main task will be to kill the three ancient guards. They impose the effect of Fatigue III on the player, which practically deprives the player of the ability to destroy blocks. The effect of fatigue is applied almost immediately, when your previous effect ends and can be removed with milk for a few seconds. Find the sponges and drink milk, quickly get the sponges and use them to make an air pocket from one of the rooms (make the passage with signs so that the water does not leak). By placing a bed in such a room and sleeping on it, you get a spawn inside the fortress, which can come in handy if you are suddenly killed (unless the game is in Hardcore mode). The guards have the ability to recover part of the melee damage. If the guard's thorns are extended, then your next close blow to it (sword, ax, etc.) will also damage you. If the spikes are retracted, you will not be hit back. You can also use TNT against guards: if the explosive is in the water, the blocks will remain intact, but the damage to the mobs will still be inflicted.
The ancient guardians spawn once in three parts of the fortress: in the very center at the very top, in large long halls on one side and on the other. They do more damage, but move much slower than their counterparts, so you should use melee weapons against them. Good tactics: hide behind the blocks while the ancient guard charges his beam. Ordinary guards are also dangerous. Do not forget to monitor your air supply / duration of the potion of underwater breathing, so as not to suddenly drown. As soon as you kill all three guards, you can freely get prismarine, sea lanterns, sponges and gold blocks. You can also build a guard farm on the site of the fortress, for endless fishing in large quantities of fish, experience, prismarine fragments and crystals.
Tobacco selection
Raw materials are a fundamental factor. A strong hookah needs tobacco with a value of 0.5% nicotine. The classic hookah moassel contains about 0.05% - i.e. it is an order of magnitude smaller. This suggests that really strong tobacco blends in the hookah business are the destiny of the elite. But the nicotine content in tobacco is not the only factor. A significant role is played by driving and other nuances:
- % nicotine in tobacco (specialized additives, initial concentration),
- the amount of heat that affects the evaporation rate of syrup and nicotine,
- driving volume (amount of tobacco mixture),
- driving method (dense or airy),
- psychophysical factors (hookah on an empty stomach, jumps in blood pressure, lack of oxygen, smoking experience).
TOP of the strongest tobacco blends:
Above we talked about specialized strong tobacco, but smoking light tobacco blends can be made stronger if you use specialized hookah additives. These include the famous Dokha - ultra-strong pipe tobacco. To this end, you can pay attention to the Nirvana brand and the D-Gastro Mini brand. Be prepared for the fact that Dokha will slightly change the taste of your hookah.
Fundamentals
Of course, the gate is the most important way to any fortress. Moreover, even the approaches to the fortress were usually supplied with, if not a full barbican, then at least a pair of gate towers protruding beyond the walls, from which arrows, stones and hot oil poured into the attackers. Protecting the main entrance has always been a priority, and therefore the defensive complex of the gates sometimes boasted a number of additional engineering tricks: here there are galleries with loopholes, and thick bars, and even the so-called “death cell” (lat. portcullis) - a stone box, divided by two pairs of gates, with a thick iron grate at the top. Through this bars of the attackers, breaking through the first gate and falling into an impromptu trap, the defenders showered with a hail of crossbow bolts and spears.
Casterly Cliff is a concentric castle: the fortress in the center is surrounded by numerous walls connected to each other by rows of protected gates
Before the era of modern mechanized warfare, there were only two main types of military aggression against fortifications: siege and storm. Of course, open-air battles were replete with tactics: flank maneuvers and ambushes were first massively used in the Battle of Marathon back in 490 BC, after which the Roman Empire seized the baton of field tactics, giving the world a whole set of wonderful fighting techniques. Already in the Middle Ages, the battle could consist of hours-long maneuvering of regiments relative to each other, which then developed into a very fast and incredibly bloody battle. Contrary to the Hollywood canons, the meat grinder itself took a quarter of an hour in force - the clash of huge masses of manpower was only the culmination, which was preceded by a long tactical preparation. This is clearly seen in the example of 4 episodes of the 7th season, released a couple of days ago: the horde of Dothraki, who came from the flank, literally crushed the protection of Lannister carts full of gold. Of course, in a real battle, a large army of horsemen would have been discovered on the way — but fire-breathing dragons never took part in the real battles of the Middle Ages.
A direct clash of hostile forces took a matter of minutes and resembled a slaughterhouse
Siege: Patience and Labor
The siege is a special tactic aimed at exhausting the enemy. The fortress is good in that it can be incredibly difficult to take it by storm: before the invention of artillery, wall-to-wall guns were far less effective, and even the largest trebuchet could not penetrate several meters of solid basalt, but limited itself to shooting down tower roofs and bombarding the courtyard with huge stones fired along a ballistic trajectory. But the fortress is both a carapace and a dungeon: stocks of water and especially food in an era when food preservation was not yet invented was rapidly coming to an end. While the besieging army could constantly receive an influx of fresh food resources from the outside (at least by robbing the neighboring peasant settlements), the soldiers locked inside their own castle often surrendered themselves to the mercy of the victors so as not to die from starvation. Since the first season of Game of Thrones, Robert Baratheon wisely noted that meeting with nomads in the wild is a form of suicide, while barbarians are simply not capable of a long siege.
Defensive construction helped to deter even superior enemy forces
So, what tricks can a conqueror resort to successfully conquer a castle? History knows many ingenious tactics, but none of them guarantees victory, and some involve considerable risk. One of the most popular methods was not a dangerous assault, but the notorious long and complete blockade of the fortress, but even it was not safe: the liberation army of the besieged allies could always hit in the back.
Sturm: go on a breakthrough!
Talk about the assault. Before throwing a soldier into a suicidal enterprise, wise generals most often tried to resort to diplomacy: threats, persuasions and attempts to find a compromise were used. Do not forget that on either side of the fortress gate there were ordinary people who could show both weakness and incredible fortitude. In the Middle Ages, especially in the era of feudal fragmentation, the concept of fidelity and loyalty was noticeably different from the modern one: the enemy commander could be turned to his side, promising him a prominent political post and solid land allotment in the future. However, sometimes a simple promise to leave the defenders of the fortress alive was more than enough.
Good example unsuccessful psychological warfare serves as a siege of the castle in Crema, in Italy. In the XII century, the besieging army captured several enemy units and immediately executed them by cutting off their heads. These heads were later thrown with throwing machines over the fortress walls, in order to intimidate and coerce the castle. But this had the exact opposite effect: the besieged in anger pulled their captives out of the dungeons, brought them to the walls and literally tore the living people to pieces - all this in front of a stunned army of conquerors.
The castle on a rocky hill does not need high walls at all
If hunger, negotiations and threats were ineffective, one thing remains - the assault. How does the right assault begin? From siege weapons, which we told you in great detail (here and here). A long shelling by catapults could leave significant gaps in the lime wall, but locks made of more durable stone, alas, can not be broken so easily. In addition, even during the time of the Roman Empire, a rare fortification did without its own military machines, which no less zealously attacked the attackers with arrows and cobbles.
Escalade and digging: for a soldier, the walls are not a barrier
If the gate could not be taken, boarding stairs with hooks were used, which the attackers could throw on relatively low walls (and, contrary to popular belief, the height of the fortress walls rarely exceeded ten meters - the builders relied on thickness rather than height). As a special measure, the commander could launch siege towers, which made it possible to deliver large detachments directly to enemy walls. It was the so-called escalade: the fighters, lifting their shields above their heads, climbed the walls, conquering every meter of space with great difficulty. Being under constant fire, showered with stones and sprinkled with boiling water, only disciplined and hard-willed troops could not flinch. However, the risk was justified: a successful escalade almost always guaranteed the capture of the fortress.
Most often, however, manpower did not climb onto the walls, but contributed to the widening of the breaches in the fortifications left by throwing guns: the soldiers famously wielded hammers and picks to clear their passage. When the job was done, the attackers and defenders converged in a short, but, as already mentioned, very bloody battle, which decided the fate of the castle.
Another tactic worth mentioning is digging. Of course, to quietly dig a tunnel under the walls of the fortress, through which an entire army or at least several heavily armed detachments can get into it, it takes a lot of time, labor and banal luck, which no good strategist will rely on. Instead, already dug back passages and underground gallery systems were often used, as is well shown in Series 3 of the new season of Game of Thrones.
In the same case, if the troops besieging the castle started digging, most often they dug up the ground precisely under the walls of the fortress. Masonry, devoid of support, quickly collapsed under its own weight. Thus, it was possible to bring down the fortress wall without resorting to the help of throwing machines.
End of an era
Some fantasy castles are completely impossible to besiege - unless, of course, you have an army of fire-breathing dragons
The golden era of the siege war ended around 1500 A.D., although some of its elements still exist. Artillery and military aviation nullified the advantages of thick walls and ramparts. Now sieges have become the lot of fantastic and historical films, but who knows: maybe in the future space stations surrounded by a continuous protective shell will give rise to a new type of siege and take this concept to a new level?
Pick selection
There are a number of popular driving methods for maximum hookah strength:
- The overpack or halfpack method is driving a bowl with a slide. Pre chilli warms up well. It is advisable to avoid non-heat-resistant tobacco. The classic for this scoring is Nakhla.
- Spin - Nicotine evaporates more intensively from dry and maximally squeezed moassel. But it should be remembered that when pressed, the taste is greatly lost.
- Clogging density - the more airborne the moassel is, the stronger it is. Accordingly, the denser the easier.
Heat control and other nuances
The intense evaporation temperature of the syrup and nicotine, as well as the impressive volume of moassel in the bowl, determines the high concentration of alkaloid in the smoke. It is important to observe a fine line between maximum heating and the moment when the tobacco begins to burn. The method of smoking, when the temperature is maintained at the borderline level, is called “overheating”.
Today we talked about how to make a strong hookah. We summarize the main points: choose specialized varieties of tobacco blends. Use the overpack or halfpack method, and also experiment with air clogging. Press extra syrup. Control the heat.