Complete Guide to Invasion Settings

By Planewalker

I have years of detailed user map experience in Stronghold Legends, and I'm here to give you a rundown on every component of a SHL invasion.

Basics

The basics of an invasion are quite straightforward. You pick what troops, how many, and what color. Below that you can choose which map marker the army will appear from. If you do have any questions about this section, I will answer those in the comments. Let's get into the meat of the settings by going into the Advanced menu. I'll explain these features from top to bottom.

Repeat Time

A simple setting to create repeating invasions. The first invasion will occur on the date set for this trigger. Every repeating invasion will occur at the interval of months you put here. You can choose how often you want it to repeat as well, to a maximum of either 10 or infinite repeats. This is useful for lengthy scenarios with a objective that is not related to the invasions.

AI Deployment

Determines where the invasion moves upon entering the map. A normal invasion will seek to immediately perform its Orders (next setting), choosing its own deployment site as it sees fit. A siege point invasion will ignore all AI helpers (and its own plans) and move its units to the indicated map marker, immediately placing its siege camp there. A target point invasion will simply move the entire army to the indicated map marker before it does anything else. Depending on its Orders, it may move very far away from the target point.

AI Orders

Determines what the invasion does once it has finished deploying. A free AI will do whatever it thinks it must do to execute its Plan (explained later) and chooses targets based on its own calculation. Attack Player will cause the invasion to focus its attack on the listed player color, emphasizing the main castle if one exists. Reinforce Player, by contrast, will bring in troops who change to the chosen player's color after deployment and are then placed under their control. Note that reinforcement troops are under the chosen player's control before they arrive at their deployment site, if the player is human.

Include Lord

Does what it says. Includes the correct Lord for that color's player and faction, or does not. Note that lords spawned this way do not seem to count toward the All Enemy Lords Dead script condition.

Warnings

Indicates what messages the player will receive about the coming invasion. Early Warnings are the classic "A large force of the enemy's men are marching towards us" messages. These will alert the player 3 months (1 minute at game speed 40) in advance of an incoming invasion. Normal Warnings occur when the invasion enters the map, with the "We are under attack!" or "An ally has sent us some reinforcements." messages. The Full Warnings setting (preferred for normal circumstances) will use both types. No Warnings will, of course, include none.

Some notes about this. First, regardless of the settings, a minimap marker will always flash when an army enters the map -- red for enemy armies and green for ally or reinforcement armies. Second, reinforcements do not have Early Warnings, only a message on entering the map (Normal Warning). Lastly, allied troops generate no messages whatsoever, regardless of settings.

Leave Map

If an invasion's Plan (explained next) is Movement, has a set map marker as a target point, and the invasion is set to Leave Map, the units in the army will disappear from the map when they stop moving upon reaching the specified location. This has no effect on other kinds of invasions.

AI Plan

Determines the main purpose of this invasion once it has deployed and how it will decide to carry out its Orders. Also affects how siege equipment appears and behaves.

• Siege: This classic invasion enters the map with its troops and places a siege camp on the map after all troops have arrived at the deployment site. The siege equipment chosen for this invasion will then be built from the siege camp.
• Attacking Army: These troops spawn into the map and attack from the deployment site. They will target troops and estates. They will attack the main castle if there is a path to the lord or if there are exposed buildings and troops. Missile units tend to be aggressive about this. This invasion cannot have siege equipment.
• Defensive Army: These troops move to the deployment site and stay there. They will attack anyone who comes close. This invasion cannot have siege equipment.
• Vandalize: These troops move to the deployment site and then attack exposed buildings and estates in raids. This invasion can only bring limited types of siege equipment with it.
• Movement: These troops will appear, with all their siege equipment, and do absolutely nothing. However, if you set them to a Target Point, they will move to it and then sit there. As mentioned earlier, this pairs well with the Leave map setting.

AI Helpers

These are the little flags that can be accessed and placed by clicking on an estate's keep in the map editor. The AI will do what it needs to do without any of these. They're just here to let you shape how the AI performs. It is particularly useful if you have some unusual map design or terrain, or if you have the AI attack a prebuilt castle where you can guarantee the layout.

• (Tent) Siege camp position: These indicators recommend where the AI should place siege camps during deployment. The AI will generally choose this over its own recommendation. If multiple siege camp helpers are placed they will choose one based on how they want to attack and where they are attacking from.
• (Arrow) Missile unit attack position: These flags help the AI choose where to send archers and crossbowmen. The AI doesn't always take these recommendations, but they do influence their decision-making process.
• (Broken wall) Siege camp position: This indicator is misnamed. It should be called "Siege attack position". The AI will take this as a recommendation of where to send its mobile ranged siege equipment (catapults, ballistae, stake hurlers, etc.). Note that this flag is for where the units will move, not where they will attack. Placing one of these next to the player's wall will influence the AI to move catapults right up to the walls instead of firing at a distance. Trebuchets will tend to ignore this and fire from the siege camp or the first available location in range. Likewise, rams and siege towers will ignore this and move into position.