I like thinking up things like this, so here's something for you to look at and possibly test/improve to add to your post, to help make the future of SMP Minecraft Wars a lot more fun, and interesting.
A quick idea for a type of defensive, TNT/Redstone Based Weapon.
Oh no, a small party of attackers! What ever will you do to stop them? One answer to this question, could be a secret tunnel underneath an area you believe that the enemy is pretty likely to travel through, and fill it with a bit of TNT, and then rig it up to explode via a lever in a near-by bunker. (Possibly a hidden bunker, dedicated to this defensive weapon itself.) (Don't just waste TNT placing these randomly, or in places that there's a near 0 chance of the enemy ever bothering to go through.)
Simply attach a lever in the bunker to a redstone wire heading down, into the tunnel, and when enemies are coming, pull the lever a second or two before they get over the tunnel's position.
Then, watch as your attackers are reduced to a cloud of pixels.
Although you would be defacing your own land in the process, (And possibly giving future attackers a nice trench to hide in and rain arrows down on your fortress, if not repaired afterwards.), it would probably make a good defense against a group of attackers foolishly traveling in a tight group, killing most, if not all of them, and taking a good chunk of hearts out of any attackers not killed.
A bonus, if there were any attackers running ahead of the group, that weren't killed, is now they have a pit separating them from a hasty retreat,
so they're forced to either attempt to hold their ground/Keep going, or run around the newly made pit, giving your own troops time to catch up to them, or more time for your archers to get some hits and possibly a kill or two.
EDIT:
Also, what about Caves? I don't remember seeing any mention of their Strategic value. They contain lots of ore, sometimes lava, and sometimes a mob spawner/Chest, for easy supplies and a possible mob farm.
One thing I didn't find mentioned much, was the use of lava or water.
Throwing down a water source on a elevated location in the battlefield is very useful. It will severely hamper enemy mobility, giving your archers more time to take them down.
You could do the same with lava, and completely block off part of the battlefield from attackers. You could use aqueducts to funnel water/lava from a location near your base so that you could turn the water/lava on if you couldn't get outside in time, trapping them.
With a lava aqueduct, you would also be able to set something on fire, farther away.
With Valerius_Maximus optimal castle position, you could have an aqueduct dump water onto the bridge from above, so as to push opponents backwards, or put out a fire if it were accidently or maliciously placed by an enemy.
In a castle position where enemies can attack from several positions, you could hastily dump a bucket of lava off the side of the castle, rendering that flank inacessible for a time.
I've read the whole thing, and came to the conclusion that most of the article is bunk. A TL;DR version woult prefered, please.
Should I just move everything that's not in the "Recommended weapons" section out of Practical Warfare? Would that make it an easier read?
Quote from Aninimous »
-snip- pitfall thing and caves -snip-
You have some good ideas. I've thought of the pitfall before, but using a different design that I think is more efficient, and uses less tnt to cover more area. I'll post it later today. I didn't even think about caves... it's hard to remember EVERYTHING when writing an all encompassing paper XD. Thanks.
Quote from Kromeh »
Water and Lava!
Your ideas are fantastic as well, I've considered them but didn't have time to implement anything like that into the text last night... I'll do something like them today. I don't want to copy anyone's ideas completely, so I'll inevitably end up with a different outcome. Something like water over the bridge however, I never would've considered.
Quote from Joe51498 »
Boats and food!
Food! I completely forgot about food and its rationing... I think I'll make a section about that, one that Sun Tzu didn't have. Thanks for reminding me about such an important gameplay dynamic.
You still haven't convinced me about boats... I feel like in a real battle they're EVEN LESS useful than actually swimming in the water... I don't know I'll have to think harder about it.
Well guys! I'm looking forward to performing my first mass edit tonight, and adding even more pictures to the already picture laden Recommended Weapons section. If you guys have any more things you want me to think about just let me know. Thanks for the support :smile.gif:
I'm not exactly sure how well known this little trick is, but, I'd say it's still worth a look...
It's looks like those pumpkin headed abominations are at it again, but this time they have a cannon!
Unfortunately, your wall is currently unprotected by archers, as they're off doing something else! Oh no!
They fire a (Badly aimed on my part) Shot at the wall, but what's this? No hole to get through?
Instead of wasting more TNT, they opt to attempt to just tunnel straight through the wall.
Gravel?
Depending on How thick and tall the wall is, the more time having the inside filled with gravel will buy you, as whenever a piece is removed, a piece from above falls into it's place. Unless every one of the enemy's troops are equipped with iron or diamond shovels, a wall like this would buy you an incredibly valuable 6-12 seconds to get some defenses ready, and possibly even get an archer or two up on your wall. This would also work with sand, if you have no need for glass or more TNT. And of course, you'd probably end up collecting quite a bit of gravel down in your mines, instead of destroying some of it to attempt to harvest flint, it would probably be wise to invest a little on constructing some of these walls. They could very well save your fortress, and your life.
Plus if your walls get hit by a couple of cannons during an attack you manage on repelling, you won't HAVE to send everyone to repair the wall right away, seeing as the gravel would probably keep out any stray hostile mobs as they wander around outside.
(More layers, although meaning a bulkier wall, means more time bought with this defense.)
No Tools: 36 Seconds For Outer, Stone/Cobble Layers Then +3 Seconds per 2 Gravel going up.
Wooden Tools: 6 Seconds for Outer Layers, then +2 Seconds per 2 Gravel going up.
Stone Tools: (Most Likely To Be Used By Enemy imo) 4 Seconds for Outer Layers, then roughly +2 Seconds per 2 Gravel going up.
Iron Tools: about 3 Seconds for Outer Layers, then about +1 Second per 2 Gravel going up.
Diamond Tools: (Pretty Unlikely to be the case though, unless the enemy is on to your tricks and has diamonds to spare.) 2 Seconds for Outer Layers, then about +1 Second per 2 Gravel going up.
Your Basic wall, with 1 Layer of Gravel, going up 10 blocks high, would last roughly...
No Tools: 51 Seconds to break through.
Wooden Tools: 16 Seconds to break through
Stone Tools: 14 Seconds to Break Through
Iron Tools: About 8 Seconds to Break Through
Diamond Tools: About 7 Seconds to Break Through
But you can add a few seconds for the time it takes for them to realize what's going on.
You could also booby trap your walls as well. At the top layer of the Gravel, instead of placing a final layer of gravel blocks, pour lava down onto the tops of the gravel piles. Not only will this delay the enemy's advance into your fortress by a large amount of time, but you may get a kill, from any careless soldier tearing through the wall.
Once the wall has lava pouring down and out of the small 2x1 hole made by a tunneling soldier, the lava will flow out a bit, forcing the enemy to either find another way in, or if they have buckets, pour some water onto the lava and make cobble, then block the lava source block to get through.
Either way though, it's probably more than enough time to get some archers onto that wall to provide some covering fire for any guards to get out and repel the invaders.
With no consequences, the nature of it changes from "war" to sensless brawling. No personal injury, free respawning, no real consequences... PVP in Minecraft will often be mindless chaos. Fun, just mindless XD
TL;DR The original was much better. Poor poor Sun Tzu.
"If fighting is sure to result in victory then you must fight!" "Sun Tzu said that and I think he knows a little more about fighting than you do PAL! Because he invented it and then he perfected it so that no man could best him in the ring of honor!"
Aninimouse, Nice work! I'll include that in the OP along with a few of my own modifications [I had something similar drawn up but by merging our works I will create a very superior wall design indeed.] I can see you'll be a great general... and rival of mine in the days to come.
@DrNova
Order has a funny way of triumphing over Chaos. Despite the hold that entropy has over the universe. Being able to defend yourself to the best of your ability rather than just mindlessly fighting a war is surely the better option.
@FDragon
Whoah whoah whoah. Who said I was better than Sun Tzu. The man was a genius... how can I compete with someone with so many battles to his name when I have absolutely none? Surely he knows much more about fighting than I do or ever will. But I know more about minecraft than he ever did. And perhaps I know more about the Art of War in minecraft. I simply took his title because I admired his work. I'm sorry if I dishonored one of your heroes...
It is a good read. I like book form over forum form though. <__< And this is a good summary of some of Sun-Tzu's teachings, but I believe its more of a SMP topic.
I see people suggesting the use of cannons, and quite frankly, TNT is hard to come by. In my 2 months of playing, I only accumulated enough gunpowder to make 4 blocks of TNT. A real war is won though tactics, not firepower. Use some of the key Sun Tzu teaching to win a war:
1. Cut supply lines and destroy infrastructure. Find the mine where characters gather their resources, and attack it. Destroy minecart lines and raid their storage.
2. Hit & Run. Use night tactics, and use darkness as a means of concealment. Strike quick and precise.
3. Never destroy what you can reuse. Always salvage something from your victory, and not just have the victory. Take a farm and leaves the fields intact. Repair any defenses you overcome.
4. Use what you got. (I believe Sun Tzu mentions this, but I first read it from Musashi.) Got a lot of wood and string, practice with bows. Iron, swords and armor.
5. Use what you opponent has against themselves. (Another Musashi.) They use TNT, raid from a water or keep water buckets with you to shield blasts. Them using bows, raid at night. They have wooden structures, use flint and steel. (Don't suggest, due to #3)
@Aninimouse: Gravel filler in a wall is a real good one to slow down an invader/griefer. Plus, falls more under real construction practice of fortifications: having a solid shell (rock or stone) filled with any form of morter (gravel, sand, dirt). Make the wall 2 or 3 thick with the filler, and it'll help defend.
Quote from DrNova »
With no consequences, the nature of it changes from "war" to sensless brawling. No personal injury, free respawning, no real consequences... PVP in Minecraft will often be mindless chaos. Fun, just mindless XD
In an RP server, I can see gentleman wars taking place. It would be seen as more of a contest with winners and losers, and have a timeout period for people whom died. A penalty box their the spawn-point I suppose. <_<
Your [goto=m] is broken. It's really annoying, and often doesn't allow punctuation (why I made a separate link on my FAQ/Guide). I think it's the parentheses ( ).
It is a good read. I like book form over forum form though. <__< And this is a good summary of some of Sun-Tzu's teachings, but I believe its more of a SMP topic.
I see people suggesting the use of cannons, and quite frankly, TNT is hard to come by. In my 2 months of playing, I only accumulated enough gunpowder to make 4 blocks of TNT. A real war is won though tactics, not firepower. Use some of the key Sun Tzu teaching to win a war: -snip-
I've never read The Art of War, so I wasn't really summarizing anything, but it's interesting that some people think so! :happy.gif: Oh and yes you're right, I put it in the wrong forum while rushing to get it posted.
TNT is nottttt hard to come by. If you build mob rooms, or just go on mob killing sprees you can easily get a few stacks of gunpowder every few days. In my legit vanilla world I have a few stacks of TNT for a rainy day.
I'm going to incorporate those teachings that you listed into the theoretical section when I get the chance. Some of them look like familiar things I have stated but never went into detail about.
@Kris18 - Thanks again, I'll fix that.
@Joe51498 - What you're giving me are very limited uses, in very limited situations. I WILL admit that boat travel on a downward flowing stream is faster than land travel. However, you will be unable to retreat in this situation, seeing as boats are terrible at going upstream. Contrary to what you say it's actually easier to hit people in boats with things like arrows than if they were on land, this is because on land you can simply place a few blocks in front of yourself as a shield, whereas in water you are surrounded by no terrain but completely flat water. You are left in the open and must abandon ship to be able to dodge arrows. NOW! After reading your post however... there is one very legitimate and powerful use for boats that I did not consider... and that is the preparation and holding of Naval Bases. Gosh... think of the possibilities. Perhaps I underestimated boats a little bit. I'm going to go in depth into Naval Bases eventually. Thank you for the inspiration.
@Sergeant Shrooms - Well, that's ok...
@Avus - That would be hilarious... but definitely isn't something I would do. Plus he didn't really say these things... he said his own, much better, things.
Another thing you may want to add to the Terrain section if you aren't already adding it now is The Nether, although, at the moment it has no great uses, in the future Notch may add more useful resources there. Fighting in the Nether with such bad lighting conditions, all the lava, along cliffs? That would make for some interesting battles.
Of course, now I just realized there is a great strategic value to the Nether, even now.
Fast Travel over long distances right outside the enemy's base, (Or possibly INTO). Now I'd say that's a very powerful weapon, so it would be smart of the leader/general of either side to make a Portal somewhere inside his own base, and use extra building resources to build up a smaller fortress down in Hell, to help prevent any sneak attacks. If they don't, *POW*, that could be the end of the war right there.
Quote from DrNova »
Bleh, nice OP, but waste of time.
With no consequences, the nature of it changes from "war" to sensless brawling. No personal injury, free respawning, no real consequences... PVP in Minecraft will often be mindless chaos. Fun, just mindless XD
As defiler86, this sort of thing may happen on RP servers. But after reading through this thread and having it fill my head with ideas, I personally want to see servers dedicated to tactical, Minecraft Wars.
EDIT:
A trap that needs a bit of improvement in my opinion, because it is a bit costly to construct, but none-the-less...
Here come some enemy troops along this cliffside!
You, a lone archer, are up on the cliffside. You have no chance of defeating them, and attacking them would probably be fatal to yourself. You can't just run though.
But not if your army had boobytrapped this cliff like so!;
POW! The explosions may not have affected them, (Although they now may be slightly confused, or running for cover.)
But the troops below were just peppered with a barrage of arrows!
Although me, being me, accidentally placed the dummies too far ahead of the trap for the demonstration...
You probably get the point.
This trap would work best against larger groups, as I believe the hit delay thing (Once a player is hit, there's a brief period where they can't be hit again.) also applies for Players. But this would have a very high chance of hitting the enemy if you time it right. This defense may be better constructed on a small, "Dummy" bridge, going over one cliff to another, seeing as it would probably look less suspicous to the smarter soldier.
Using this trap against 1 or 2 soldiers would be a waste of arrows and TNT though. Less troops = Less Damage.
I'm currently working on one. It's 12:03 AM where I am right now, so I might just have to contiue tests into tomorrow, but I'll post what I have in a bit. It's mostly going to be on building an effective wall.
Edit: Alright, I posted about Water Walling. I'm kind of exhausted [it's been a long day]... I wrote about a lot of stuff I wanted to update today but I don't have the energy any longer. Tomorrow is the weekend so there will definitely be a lot more time in the day. Sorry if anyone was really looking forward to a larger update.
A really important thing is the element of surprise. It can buy you a few seconds.
You can actually learn a thing or two from Modern Warfare 2 when thinking of tactics. As they showed, with stealth, two men can infiltrate and destroy a base.
A method I will consider if I ever get into PvP kinds of things is the Breach&Clear method. When the enemy least expects it, stick TNT on one of their walls and blow it wide open. If the enemy used the gravel technique, this would obliterate a bit of it. If not, then their defenses are wide open. shoot down nearby soldiers and progress through each room, systematically ducking and shooting your way through each part. An added benefit is that each time you take a room, you get its materials. So if you stumble upon their armory, then you have brand new armor and more ammo for the bow.
Another method is air assault. You said this would be hard with no flying machines, but you are forgetting that this is Minecraft. Just jump-stack up to a height where you are confident the enemy will not see you. Then again, no one looks up these days. anyway, once you have reached a desirable height, just crouch and walk backwards, planting blocks and essentially making yourself a skybridge and a vantage point. And to get down? bring a bucket of water, pour it down onto the roof of the castle, and use it to, in a sense, rappel down. This immediately gives you the stealth advantage, and a chance to perform many assassinations. Slice down the bowmen and you have gotten your footsoldiers through the first defense.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Quote from spaz102 »
Actually, that's the best mental image ever. A dying, drowning man stuffing his face from a massive wall of cake, and carving out a monstrous underwater cake picture. I'd pay to watch that irl.
[quote=Rotten194][quote=mcnugget] "Love cabin"[;/quote][quote=mcnugget]creepers.!
A quick idea for a type of defensive, TNT/Redstone Based Weapon.
Oh no, a small party of attackers! What ever will you do to stop them? One answer to this question, could be a secret tunnel underneath an area you believe that the enemy is pretty likely to travel through, and fill it with a bit of TNT, and then rig it up to explode via a lever in a near-by bunker. (Possibly a hidden bunker, dedicated to this defensive weapon itself.) (Don't just waste TNT placing these randomly, or in places that there's a near 0 chance of the enemy ever bothering to go through.)
Simply attach a lever in the bunker to a redstone wire heading down, into the tunnel, and when enemies are coming, pull the lever a second or two before they get over the tunnel's position.
Then, watch as your attackers are reduced to a cloud of pixels.
Although you would be defacing your own land in the process, (And possibly giving future attackers a nice trench to hide in and rain arrows down on your fortress, if not repaired afterwards.), it would probably make a good defense against a group of attackers foolishly traveling in a tight group, killing most, if not all of them, and taking a good chunk of hearts out of any attackers not killed.
A bonus, if there were any attackers running ahead of the group, that weren't killed, is now they have a pit separating them from a hasty retreat,
so they're forced to either attempt to hold their ground/Keep going, or run around the newly made pit, giving your own troops time to catch up to them, or more time for your archers to get some hits and possibly a kill or two.
EDIT:
Also, what about Caves? I don't remember seeing any mention of their Strategic value. They contain lots of ore, sometimes lava, and sometimes a mob spawner/Chest, for easy supplies and a possible mob farm.
Throwing down a water source on a elevated location in the battlefield is very useful. It will severely hamper enemy mobility, giving your archers more time to take them down.
You could do the same with lava, and completely block off part of the battlefield from attackers. You could use aqueducts to funnel water/lava from a location near your base so that you could turn the water/lava on if you couldn't get outside in time, trapping them.
With a lava aqueduct, you would also be able to set something on fire, farther away.
With Valerius_Maximus optimal castle position, you could have an aqueduct dump water onto the bridge from above, so as to push opponents backwards, or put out a fire if it were accidently or maliciously placed by an enemy.
In a castle position where enemies can attack from several positions, you could hastily dump a bucket of lava off the side of the castle, rendering that flank inacessible for a time.
Lava and water are very powerful tools.
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Should I just move everything that's not in the "Recommended weapons" section out of Practical Warfare? Would that make it an easier read?
You have some good ideas. I've thought of the pitfall before, but using a different design that I think is more efficient, and uses less tnt to cover more area. I'll post it later today. I didn't even think about caves... it's hard to remember EVERYTHING when writing an all encompassing paper XD. Thanks.
Your ideas are fantastic as well, I've considered them but didn't have time to implement anything like that into the text last night... I'll do something like them today. I don't want to copy anyone's ideas completely, so I'll inevitably end up with a different outcome. Something like water over the bridge however, I never would've considered.
Food! I completely forgot about food and its rationing... I think I'll make a section about that, one that Sun Tzu didn't have. Thanks for reminding me about such an important gameplay dynamic.
You still haven't convinced me about boats... I feel like in a real battle they're EVEN LESS useful than actually swimming in the water... I don't know I'll have to think harder about it.
Well guys! I'm looking forward to performing my first mass edit tonight, and adding even more pictures to the already picture laden Recommended Weapons section. If you guys have any more things you want me to think about just let me know. Thanks for the support :smile.gif:
It's looks like those pumpkin headed abominations are at it again, but this time they have a cannon!
Unfortunately, your wall is currently unprotected by archers, as they're off doing something else! Oh no!
They fire a (Badly aimed on my part) Shot at the wall, but what's this? No hole to get through?
Instead of wasting more TNT, they opt to attempt to just tunnel straight through the wall.
Gravel?
Depending on How thick and tall the wall is, the more time having the inside filled with gravel will buy you, as whenever a piece is removed, a piece from above falls into it's place. Unless every one of the enemy's troops are equipped with iron or diamond shovels, a wall like this would buy you an incredibly valuable 6-12 seconds to get some defenses ready, and possibly even get an archer or two up on your wall. This would also work with sand, if you have no need for glass or more TNT. And of course, you'd probably end up collecting quite a bit of gravel down in your mines, instead of destroying some of it to attempt to harvest flint, it would probably be wise to invest a little on constructing some of these walls. They could very well save your fortress, and your life.
Plus if your walls get hit by a couple of cannons during an attack you manage on repelling, you won't HAVE to send everyone to repair the wall right away, seeing as the gravel would probably keep out any stray hostile mobs as they wander around outside.
(More layers, although meaning a bulkier wall, means more time bought with this defense.)
No Tools: 36 Seconds For Outer, Stone/Cobble Layers Then +3 Seconds per 2 Gravel going up.
Wooden Tools: 6 Seconds for Outer Layers, then +2 Seconds per 2 Gravel going up.
Stone Tools: (Most Likely To Be Used By Enemy imo) 4 Seconds for Outer Layers, then roughly +2 Seconds per 2 Gravel going up.
Iron Tools: about 3 Seconds for Outer Layers, then about +1 Second per 2 Gravel going up.
Diamond Tools: (Pretty Unlikely to be the case though, unless the enemy is on to your tricks and has diamonds to spare.) 2 Seconds for Outer Layers, then about +1 Second per 2 Gravel going up.
Your Basic wall, with 1 Layer of Gravel, going up 10 blocks high, would last roughly...
No Tools: 51 Seconds to break through.
Wooden Tools: 16 Seconds to break through
Stone Tools: 14 Seconds to Break Through
Iron Tools: About 8 Seconds to Break Through
Diamond Tools: About 7 Seconds to Break Through
But you can add a few seconds for the time it takes for them to realize what's going on.
You could also booby trap your walls as well. At the top layer of the Gravel, instead of placing a final layer of gravel blocks, pour lava down onto the tops of the gravel piles. Not only will this delay the enemy's advance into your fortress by a large amount of time, but you may get a kill, from any careless soldier tearing through the wall.
Once the wall has lava pouring down and out of the small 2x1 hole made by a tunneling soldier, the lava will flow out a bit, forcing the enemy to either find another way in, or if they have buckets, pour some water onto the lava and make cobble, then block the lava source block to get through.
Either way though, it's probably more than enough time to get some archers onto that wall to provide some covering fire for any guards to get out and repel the invaders.
With no consequences, the nature of it changes from "war" to sensless brawling. No personal injury, free respawning, no real consequences... PVP in Minecraft will often be mindless chaos. Fun, just mindless XD
"If fighting is sure to result in victory then you must fight!" "Sun Tzu said that and I think he knows a little more about fighting than you do PAL! Because he invented it and then he perfected it so that no man could best him in the ring of honor!"
@DrNova
Order has a funny way of triumphing over Chaos. Despite the hold that entropy has over the universe. Being able to defend yourself to the best of your ability rather than just mindlessly fighting a war is surely the better option.
@FDragon
Whoah whoah whoah. Who said I was better than Sun Tzu. The man was a genius... how can I compete with someone with so many battles to his name when I have absolutely none? Surely he knows much more about fighting than I do or ever will. But I know more about minecraft than he ever did. And perhaps I know more about the Art of War in minecraft. I simply took his title because I admired his work. I'm sorry if I dishonored one of your heroes...
I see people suggesting the use of cannons, and quite frankly, TNT is hard to come by. In my 2 months of playing, I only accumulated enough gunpowder to make 4 blocks of TNT. A real war is won though tactics, not firepower. Use some of the key Sun Tzu teaching to win a war:
1. Cut supply lines and destroy infrastructure. Find the mine where characters gather their resources, and attack it. Destroy minecart lines and raid their storage.
2. Hit & Run. Use night tactics, and use darkness as a means of concealment. Strike quick and precise.
3. Never destroy what you can reuse. Always salvage something from your victory, and not just have the victory. Take a farm and leaves the fields intact. Repair any defenses you overcome.
4. Use what you got. (I believe Sun Tzu mentions this, but I first read it from Musashi.) Got a lot of wood and string, practice with bows. Iron, swords and armor.
5. Use what you opponent has against themselves. (Another Musashi.) They use TNT, raid from a water or keep water buckets with you to shield blasts. Them using bows, raid at night. They have wooden structures, use flint and steel. (Don't suggest, due to #3)
@Aninimouse: Gravel filler in a wall is a real good one to slow down an invader/griefer. Plus, falls more under real construction practice of fortifications: having a solid shell (rock or stone) filled with any form of morter (gravel, sand, dirt). Make the wall 2 or 3 thick with the filler, and it'll help defend.
In an RP server, I can see gentleman wars taking place. It would be seen as more of a contest with winners and losers, and have a timeout period for people whom died. A penalty box their the spawn-point I suppose. <_<
Wait what are we doing again?
to long never going to read but cool story bro
I've never read The Art of War, so I wasn't really summarizing anything, but it's interesting that some people think so! :happy.gif: Oh and yes you're right, I put it in the wrong forum while rushing to get it posted.
TNT is nottttt hard to come by. If you build mob rooms, or just go on mob killing sprees you can easily get a few stacks of gunpowder every few days. In my legit vanilla world I have a few stacks of TNT for a rainy day.
I'm going to incorporate those teachings that you listed into the theoretical section when I get the chance. Some of them look like familiar things I have stated but never went into detail about.
@Kris18 - Thanks again, I'll fix that.
@Joe51498 - What you're giving me are very limited uses, in very limited situations. I WILL admit that boat travel on a downward flowing stream is faster than land travel. However, you will be unable to retreat in this situation, seeing as boats are terrible at going upstream. Contrary to what you say it's actually easier to hit people in boats with things like arrows than if they were on land, this is because on land you can simply place a few blocks in front of yourself as a shield, whereas in water you are surrounded by no terrain but completely flat water. You are left in the open and must abandon ship to be able to dodge arrows. NOW! After reading your post however... there is one very legitimate and powerful use for boats that I did not consider... and that is the preparation and holding of Naval Bases. Gosh... think of the possibilities. Perhaps I underestimated boats a little bit. I'm going to go in depth into Naval Bases eventually. Thank you for the inspiration.
@Sergeant Shrooms - Well, that's ok...
@Avus - That would be hilarious... but definitely isn't something I would do. Plus he didn't really say these things... he said his own, much better, things.
Of course, now I just realized there is a great strategic value to the Nether, even now.
Fast Travel over long distances right outside the enemy's base, (Or possibly INTO). Now I'd say that's a very powerful weapon, so it would be smart of the leader/general of either side to make a Portal somewhere inside his own base, and use extra building resources to build up a smaller fortress down in Hell, to help prevent any sneak attacks. If they don't, *POW*, that could be the end of the war right there.
As defiler86, this sort of thing may happen on RP servers. But after reading through this thread and having it fill my head with ideas, I personally want to see servers dedicated to tactical, Minecraft Wars.
EDIT:
A trap that needs a bit of improvement in my opinion, because it is a bit costly to construct, but none-the-less...
Here come some enemy troops along this cliffside!
You, a lone archer, are up on the cliffside. You have no chance of defeating them, and attacking them would probably be fatal to yourself. You can't just run though.
But not if your army had boobytrapped this cliff like so!;
POW! The explosions may not have affected them, (Although they now may be slightly confused, or running for cover.)
But the troops below were just peppered with a barrage of arrows!
Although me, being me, accidentally placed the dummies too far ahead of the trap for the demonstration...
You probably get the point.
This trap would work best against larger groups, as I believe the hit delay thing (Once a player is hit, there's a brief period where they can't be hit again.) also applies for Players. But this would have a very high chance of hitting the enemy if you time it right. This defense may be better constructed on a small, "Dummy" bridge, going over one cliff to another, seeing as it would probably look less suspicous to the smarter soldier.
Using this trap against 1 or 2 soldiers would be a waste of arrows and TNT though. Less troops = Less Damage.
Edit: Alright, I posted about Water Walling. I'm kind of exhausted [it's been a long day]... I wrote about a lot of stuff I wanted to update today but I don't have the energy any longer. Tomorrow is the weekend so there will definitely be a lot more time in the day. Sorry if anyone was really looking forward to a larger update.
You can actually learn a thing or two from Modern Warfare 2 when thinking of tactics. As they showed, with stealth, two men can infiltrate and destroy a base.
A method I will consider if I ever get into PvP kinds of things is the Breach&Clear method. When the enemy least expects it, stick TNT on one of their walls and blow it wide open. If the enemy used the gravel technique, this would obliterate a bit of it. If not, then their defenses are wide open. shoot down nearby soldiers and progress through each room, systematically ducking and shooting your way through each part. An added benefit is that each time you take a room, you get its materials. So if you stumble upon their armory, then you have brand new armor and more ammo for the bow.
Another method is air assault. You said this would be hard with no flying machines, but you are forgetting that this is Minecraft. Just jump-stack up to a height where you are confident the enemy will not see you. Then again, no one looks up these days. anyway, once you have reached a desirable height, just crouch and walk backwards, planting blocks and essentially making yourself a skybridge and a vantage point. And to get down? bring a bucket of water, pour it down onto the roof of the castle, and use it to, in a sense, rappel down. This immediately gives you the stealth advantage, and a chance to perform many assassinations. Slice down the bowmen and you have gotten your footsoldiers through the first defense.
I don't want to know.
Another one is if Lava can replace water in my water walling technique... and if that is a viable replacement.
Testing is in progress right now...
Water walling might become lava walling very shortly... or should I keep both?