Contest Submission: Design a City

Good evening, cannon fodders. 

Recently GM Cerberus posted a Design-A-City contest on the Illyriad forums. While my personal artistic skills are quite limited, the contest got me thinking about city skins that I would actually buy. What sorts of appearance changes would benefit a PvP fighter? Behold, my answer:

City Skins: Warrior Edition

War Wagon Camo

A war wagon is a powerful PvP assault tool, but it suffers from one major limitation: the 5 day exodus cooldown. During that time period, your opponents can harass the city from close range, pelting you with elite division attacks, small sieges, blockades, scouts, thieves, assassins, and other more creative inconveniences. Wouldn't it be better if you could get that war wagon through cooldown without your soon-to-be victims taking notice? Behold, I present the new War Wagon Camo skin. Aside from the faint red halo of an enemy city, your weaponized town takes on the appearance of a common impassable square, indistinguishable from all the other inaccessible tiles littering the map. 99.9% of players would probably never notice that a new dormant volcano or ruined tower has appeared within 15 squares of their main city cluster. In its legendary form, your city will take on the appearance of plain grass, blending seamlessly into a large meadow or open plains area until you are ready to strike.

Just a N00b

The Illyriad Community™ has a reflexive dislike of anyone attacking a helpless little n00b. How better to exploit their misplaced coddling tendencies than by disguising all your cities as tiny settlements? That's right, my sneaky malicious friends, what you need is the Just a N00b city skin. When an opponent looks at your alliance member page, you will appear as a rickety little n00b, or possibly the victim of some cruel revenge from a prior opponent. They probably won't even bother with your worthless little cities. Sure, they could read your population stat... sorry, it took me a few minutes to stop laughing at the thought of muggles reading things carefully. Be sneaky, be smart, look just like a n00b. As an added bonus, think of all the GC trolling opportunities if you are actually attacked. "Look, he is sieging my tiny little settlement! Oh, the inhumanity!"

Invisible Wall

One of the biggest problems that I have in wars is that worthwhile opponents know they shouldn't hit cities with direct attacks. The combination of a wall and crafted equipment is just too potent. So, how to entice otherwise responsible players into hurling their troops into the tree chipper? I present the Invisible Wall city skin. No matter how big your wall gets, the map will always display nothing. For 50 prestige, you can enjoy hours of cavalry hilarity by baiting your enemies into a trap.

Reverse Elf

Sometimes, no matter how carefully you place your cities, you end up with an opponent who puts you in a genuine headlock. One of the biggest challenges to siege warfare is that the attacker gets almost no information from inside the city. While you can raise their blood pressure by scattering around 50 elite cavalry attacks, making it look like their sieges will be broken, some of us prefer a more refined approach to map treachery. Therefore, I offer you the Reverse Elf city skin. The smaller your city gets, the bigger it appears to grow, giving you the appearance of massive prestige building. Watch your opponents despair as their blockades seem to have no effect on your runaway city growth. This skin also works great for creating the illusion of power where none actually exists.

There you have it, cannon fodders. Four city skins that I would happily pay 50 prestige to buy.

Misbehave. Kill lots of stuff.

<^^^^^^^^||==O    Skint Jagblade