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So the empire is based on the Holy Roman Empire from about the 16th century.
Yet all the fortifications are medieval.
The first star forts appeared in the mid 15th century.
Granted that was a response to cannons. Which aren’t largely used against the empire by other factions…but as the age of three emperors period TOW is currently set in shows there’s plenty of need for the empire to have bastion/star forts to resist cannons. Even without cannons in the armies of other factions their designs will still be very effective against traditional projectile artillery.

I guess the simple explanation is rule of cool. While old school castles are super cool, I’d argue that star forts are even cooler, especially when viewed from the air.

And what did you want to tell/ask ??

johnpjones1775 wrote:


1. So the empire is based on the Holy Roman Empire from about the 16th century....

...
2. I guess the simple explanation is rule of cool.

Your answers
1) Sort of. It's better not to try and link any Warhammer unit/faction/etc to any specific historical setting. It's even sillier to try and justify any aspect of Warhammer based on it's effectiveness in real-world historical settings.

As for the preference for medieval fortifications, I can only speculate that it looks good, and a square castle is much easier to scratchbuild and to produce as a plastic kit.

2) You answered your own question.

I respect your historical knowledge, but you'll probably be more content if you consider actual history as source of minis (you can do a pretty sweet empire or brettonnian force via historical minis), transferable stories and paint schemes rather than a template for accuracy.