I’ve been considering the types of buildings we might find in Tier 5, and to me with the current state of the game and the way a city can be built at Tier 4 already having some kind of monument structures in Tier 5 would be the icing on the cake for that Tier.
My concept behind monuments is that these would be unique buildings (can only place one copy) and each gives a unique benefit. For instance, building some kind of fort or castle will make soldiers more efficient or buff damage in the operating area.
There could be a Blacksmith type building that could even reference Grim Dawn, and this would make all items produce from Blacksmiths in the AoE come out as ‘improved’. This mechanic could be potentially limitless in the types of Monument buildings and their end game effects.
Additionally, it would be nice to get a Tier 3/4 building that functions similarly to the Town Centre. The footprint would be much smaller (3x3 or 3x4) and have a reduced capacity and slightly reduced damage comparatively. These buildings would also be limited to X amount of copies per Y population. So you’d need somewhere between 350-500 for the first Gathering Hall and 800+ for the second.
This adds in a design element that allows players to build distant settlements without having to rely entirely on guards/soldiers. This is not meant to replace guards and soldiers in this instance, but lessen the dependability the player has on spamming guard towers en masse or a new barracks just to defend a secondary or tertiary fledgling settlement.