ENGINES

Cannons, ballistae and trebuchets for the siege. Wagons, ships and trains for the haul. Every one is built by a town's artisan, flies its nation's flag, and is worth fighting over.

Built by Artisans

Nobody crafts an engine. Each one is a town's work: four parts, made one order at a time by its artisan, from materials other towns make. A Locomotive is made the same way, in one piece.

HEAVY: every part, and every Locomotive, is a heavy good. Carrying one slows you down, you cannot jump, and you cannot ride anything with it in your pockets. Getting parts to a battlefield or a railhead takes a wagon, a ship or a train.
  1. 1Set the first part down where you want it.
  2. 2Right-click it with the next part, and the next, in order.
  3. 3Sneak + right-click to take the top part off again.
  • A siege engine needs all four parts. A wagon or a ship works with three, and its fourth is an extra worth having.
  • What each part is made from is in the artisan's book.
IMAGE · An artisan's book open at its engine pages
VIDEO · A trebuchet throwing at a town wall

Siege Engines

Three engines, each with its own look and its own job: the cannon, the ballista and the trebuchet. Find out which suits yours.

  • Right-click to man one. Look to aim, punch to fire. Each needs its own ammunition.
  • Set one down anywhere in a battle zone. Damage wears it down part by part, and each part shows its condition.
  • Cannons roll. Push one while you man it, and steer by where you aim.
  • During a siege, engines break the besieged town's walls. Every block goes back when the siege ends.

Wagons

The haul by road. A covered wagon pulled by a horse, a donkey or a mule, with a bed full of goods and room for two in the back.

  1. 1Ride a saddled horse, donkey or mule and back it into the shafts to hitch it.
  2. 2Right-click the wagon to open its bed. Sneak + right-click to unhitch.
  • Wagons are heavy: slow to get going, slower on turns and up hills, and slower again with a full bed.
  • Roads win. On paths, stairs and slabs a wagon goes faster, and climbs as if the ground were flat.
  • The Cover puts canvas over the bed, and over the heads of whoever rides in it.
VIDEO · A covered wagon on a road
VIDEO · A ship under sail

Ships

The haul by sea, and the fight on it. A small open hull with one mast and a square sail, a helmsman at the stern and a bolt thrower at the bow.

  • The helmsman sails it with the movement keys. Faster than a rowing boat at sea, slower on rivers and lakes.
  • Its hull is cover. Shots that meet it stop there, while its crew shoot out over it.
  • Ram a boat at speed and it breaks.
  • The Scorpion, its fourth part, is the bolt thrower. A ship sails without it.
  • Right-click the middle of the hull to open its hold.

Trains

A train is a chain of minecarts pulled by an engine: a plain furnace cart, or a Locomotive built by a town's artisan. Couple them with chains, in order, behind the engine.

  1. 1Place a Furnace Minecart or a Locomotive on the rails as your engine. Every train must start with one.
  2. 2Place the next minecart (regular, chest, or hopper) directly behind it on the same rails.
  3. 3Holding a chain, sneak + right-click the front cart (start with the engine). You'll grab a lead from it.
  4. 4Still holding the lead, sneak + right-click the cart behind it. The two are now coupled.
  5. 5Add more cars by chaining onto the last car you coupled, then the next one behind. A furnace cart pulls 4 cars, a Locomotive 10. Each link uses up a chain.

Example: Locomotive → Cart → Cart → Cart

  • A furnace cart burns coal and pulls at a minecart's own pace. It's where a railway starts.
  • A Locomotive burns Black Powder from a powder town, runs twice as fast, and its chest carts carry twice the goods. Its smoke can be seen from far away.
VIDEO · Coupling minecarts behind a Locomotive
VIDEO · A train autonomously crossing unloaded chunks

Running a Line

A Locomotive loads and unloads chunks as it moves. Its trains can cross the world without anyone there to keep the chunks awake. A furnace cart's train only runs where somebody is, and waits at the edge until they come.

  • Chunk loading is automatic while the Locomotive has fuel, and until the train rolls to a stop once it runs out. A parked, cold engine loads nothing.
  • Break a train's engine and its laden carts can't be moved until they're coupled again, so the cargo stays where it stopped.

Rails

Laying track is no longer an iron-mine money pit.

  • The standard rail recipe now yields 64 rails per craft instead of 16.
IMAGE · The new rail crafting recipe (64 output)
IMAGE · A wagon bed stacked with crates

Heavy Goods

Artisan materials, engine parts and Locomotives are heavy. You walk slowly carrying them, and nobody rides anything with them in their pockets. They travel in storage.

  • A pack animal or a chest boat carries a little. A wagon or a ship carries a good deal more. A train carries the most, and a Locomotive's most of all.
  • Every carrier has a limit, and more is refused.
  • A chest minecart on its own carries next to nothing. Coupled into a train, it carries plenty.
  • Everything else about carrying them is in the towns guide.

Flags and Sabotage

Every siege engine, wagon and ship belongs to the nation of whoever set it down, and flies its flag in that nation's colour.

  • Grey for an independent town, white for someone with no town.
  • Inside a town's borders, only that town and the owner's side can man it, ride it, open it, hitch it or take it apart.
  • Anyone can still damage one outside spawn. In peacetime it costs alignment, and gives the owner's nation a Sabotage Casus Belli.
  • Trains are not protected this way. Guard your line.
IMAGE · Nation flags flying over a line of siege engines