Capped with a spartan 'helmet' dome instead of the more elaborate 'onion' style used for the Palace and so eagerly copied by other capital buildings, The Watchtower was a monumental fortress-spire at the outer rim of one of the city's middle tiers with a commanding view; not just of the entirety of the metropolis, but of Cloudsdale above and the surrounding countryside below. In effective vertical elevation, the structure was exceeded by several towers on the upper tier, most of them part of the Palace complex, but none of them exceeded it for sheer bulk. 