Steampunk era?

[TL]

I know there have been some individual steampunk-type units made here and there (clockwork dwarves, etc.) but has anyone ever seriously thought about doing a full-fledged steampunk themed era? I've been thinking about this lately and mean to give it a try; I've started work on drawing a couple units over here.

I will confess right off the bat to being heavily inspired in this by Fantasy General, with its massively anachronistic mix in units in a largely fantasy setting. Currently I'm thinking along similar lines; my ideas for factions so far are:

Humans: Mostly relatively down-to-earth 18th to 19th century tech; basic musket infantry would be a staple unit, for example, supported by a couple more fanciful machines (such as the planes in the art thread above, which would give them a very dominant aerial presence)
Elves: Anti-technological faction; thematically would have a monopoly on magic, although that wouldn't mean much in-game as most other factions would be able to duplicate magic attacks/healing. In terms of game effects they would be heavily built around stealth and guerrilla warfare (if you were taking on giant mechs and tanks with bows, you'd want to be pretty stealthy about it too!)
Dwarves: Plenty of heavy mechanical units, with only a couple of unmechanized dwarves on foot (such as mechanics/repairdwarves, for example). As usual, typified by very sturdy units but not a lot of mobility; dwarven aircraft would be strictly limited to lighter-than-air craft (e.g. airships, zeppelins) which would be good platforms for bombardment but would be relatively mediocre in air-to-air combat.
Gremlins: Tiny, mischeivous creatures with excellent mechanical aptitude and an affinity for all things technologically driven. As a faction they would include mechanical units almost exclusively, generally tending towards wild, out-of-the-world impossible contraptions; a bit flimsy compared to dwarven mechs, but with lots of sabotage type abilities vs. enemy machines. Mostly here for the sake of having a chaotic presence.
"Horrors" (name needs work): Typical "mad science" faction, with all your Frankenstein monsters and the like. Would function as a mixed alignment faction, with a couple of regular human type grunts (lawful) fighting under the command of evil geniuses and their assorted creations (chaotic).

May possibly have an orc horde type faction with some limited technology (mostly of the blowing-things-up variety) but I'm not certain how much they'd actually add; I don't know if they'd really be distinct enough to warrant the extra work. I guess I could also consider a purely machine-driven "free robot" type faction, but this runs into the same issue--thematically they would be relatively unique but what would they really offer in terms of gameplay that other factions wouldn't?

Any thoughts or ideas for things that might be included here?

[Temuchin Khan]

I am intrigued by this idea. Some thoughts:

Humans: Mostly relatively down-to-earth 18th to 19th century tech; basic musket infantry would be a staple unit, for example, supported by a couple more fanciful machines (such as the planes in the art thread above, which would give them a very dominant aerial presence)

Casual User has done a Napoleonic Era, which could provide you with many of the graphics for the human faction.

Elves: Anti-technological faction; thematically would have a monopoly on magic, although that wouldn't mean much in-game as most other factions would be able to duplicate magic attacks/healing. In terms of game effects they would be heavily built around stealth and guerrilla warfare (if you were taking on giant mechs and tanks with bows, you'd want to be pretty stealthy about it too!)

I agree that the Elves should focus on stealth and guerilla warfare, but wouldn't it be a more interesting era if the other factions were not capable of replicating the effects of magic?

May possibly have an orc horde type faction with some limited technology (mostly of the blowing-things-up variety) but I'm not certain how much they'd actually add; I don't know if they'd really be distinct enough to warrant the extra work.

Here's an idea: Orcs could be real misfits -- anti-technological and anti-magical both. They have retreated to the few remaining wildernesses in an attempt to remain free from the encroachments of the other races.

Still, I see your point, and if they really wouldn't add to the era, leave them out.

I guess I could also consider a purely machine-driven "free robot" type faction, but this runs into the same issue--thematically they would be relatively unique but what would they really offer in terms of gameplay that other factions wouldn't?

In gameplay terms, they would seem to offer nothing that the Dwarves and Gremlins wouldn't. I'd say leave them out.

[Desire]

I like the idea of Orcs being the destructive mechanics, as with many games.
For example, In warhammer 40k (yes, its not quite steampunk, but its an example), the Goblins/Orcs have crude built machines which quite usually have guns just strapped to everything. Some Orc units even have jet engines with guns and seatbelts, but yes, the destructive tech.

Maybe the 100% mech faction could replace undead? Got some real cheap units to use as meat-sheilds, but some higher kickass ones, that cost a bit?

[TL]

I agree that the Elves should focus on stealth and guerilla warfare, but wouldn't it be a more interesting era if the other factions were not capable of replicating the effects of magic?

I think that the Elves here should be unique enough without needing a total monopoly on magical effects. They will still have a distinct advantage as regards healing: other factions will be split into mechanical and non-mechanical units requiring seperate healing (e.g. dwarven engineers can "heal" tanks etc., but can't heal dwarven footsoldiers; human medics can't repair airplanes), whereas elves just have healers for all their units and don't have to worry about any mechanical units.

I had planned on giving explosive type attacks a fixed hit rate similar to the way magic works, but maybe to give elves a bit of an edge there I should make explosive weapons fixed at 50% rather than 70% for magic. Then again, maybe I should just leave them with no modification to hit--it does make sense that bombing a unit in a village or castle would be less effective than bombing one in the open, for example.

Here's an idea: Orcs could be real misfits -- anti-technological and anti-magical both. They have retreated to the few remaining wildernesses in an attempt to remain free from the encroachments of the other races.

I guess it could work, but it does create something of a conceptual problem casting them as savages wielding swords and bows against tanks and planes (even somewhat goofy tanks and planes). I mean, granted, that's partly what the elves are doing, but elves are going to be getting lots of stealth and mobility-oriented specials to let them choose terms of engagement, plus some appreciable magic firepower. What exactly would orcs be getting?

I suppose there'd be room for them as a serious "strength in numbers" faction, since they'd certainly be considerably less expensive than the big machines. The five factions I was planning account for plenty of work to be done on their own so I don't know if I'll really have time enough to handle putting in orcs, but on the upshot doing them this way would mean most or all orcs would be reused artwork.

Maybe the 100% mech faction could replace undead? Got some real cheap units to use as meat-sheilds, but some higher kickass ones, that cost a bit?

That's kind of the way the gremlin faction is going, though; gremlins even keep the chaotic alignment and would have some of the same specials as undead, except oriented towards machines and mechanical units--cannibalizing enemy machines for parts (drain), building new units out of the scrap of destroyed machines (plague style), etc. I'm not trying to go for an exact duplication of undead with them but they are intended to fill roughly the same role.



Anyhow, here are my ideas for the human unit tree. I realize that an isolated faction doesn't necessarily mean much without knowing much about the factions it would be fighting, but then you have to start somewhere.

Musket line: L1 Fusilier -> L2 Musketman -> L3 Rifleman

Basic archer type line, heavy ranged pierce attack and a weak impact melee (rifle butt) attack. No bayonets; the "horror/mad science" faction is going to have a similar unit line and I want some way of distinguishing the two, and I think bayonet infantry would fit the others' character better. Relatively inexpensive, cheap staple grunt units.

Cavalry line: L1 Cavalryman -> L2 Dragoon

Saber cavalry with weak supplemental ranged attack. Using the same names as the standard era cavalry line, mostly because there are a limited number of names for cavalry which fit. No real armor here but better terrain movement than most cavalry; wouldn't really be able to go up against heavy units, but good at getting to and then chopping up weaker units around the enemy's flanks and rear. I kind of like the idea of ending the line at level 2 as kind of an obsolesence thing, as you would expect from old-fashioned horse cavalry in this sort of era.

Light infantry line: L1 Scout -> L2 Outdoorsman -> L3 Trailblazer
Alternate advancement: -> L2 Medic

Mixed mediocre-average melee blade/ranged pierce unit, good movement. Possibly with skirmisher, I'm not fully decided there. Come to think of it I'd say probably yes with skirmisher, otherwise they just end up being too much of a weaker, cheaper variant on the cavalry above. Medic would of course get heal/cure, at the expense of less movement and less powerful attacks than the outdoorsman branch.

Heavy gun line: L1 Gatling Gun -> L2 Chaingun -> L3 Vulcan Cannon

Huge ranged pierce attack with high number of attacks, but slow moving and lacking in defense; defensive retaliation would be limited to a crappy pistol attack (these would be manned guns).

Flamethrower line: L1 Flamer -> L2 Pyrotechnician

Heavy fire attack, but not a lot of defense--huge vulnerability to fire, for obvious reasons. I'm thinking the flamethrower attack ought to be classed as melee--in reality flamethrowers kind of fall between swords and guns/bows in terms of range, but it would probably be more interesting to call these shorter range and have them fight in melee, as humans are somewhat lacking there. L3 left out to reinforce the idea of expendability (and because I couldn't think of a good name).

Gadgeteer line: L1 Tinker -> L2 Inventor -> L3 Gadgeteer
Alternate advancement: -> L2 Sapper -> L3 Demolitionist

Melee attack would be a weakish impact attack (wrench) with a "sabotage" special: double damage and slow vs. mechanical units (although double damage still wouldn't amount to a whole huge lot, since most mechanical units would have some impact resistance). Ranged attack would be a moderate-strong grenade/bomb attack. Also would have "repair" ability, which would function as healing for friendly mechanical units.

Inventor line gets better repair (from +4 to +8 healing for mechs) and balanced melee/ranged attack growth; sapper line loses repair and has slower growth in the wrench sabotage attack, in exchange for bigger bombs.

Fighter plane line: L1 Flier -> L2 Fighter -> L3 Ace

I plan on making a dinstinction between ground/flying units here (cribbed in part from Fantasy General), using a hidden special attached to the melee attacks of ground units to prevent ground-based melee attacks from hitting fliers when used offensively. Also possibly give ground-based ranged attacks half their normal chance to hit when used offensively, although both cases would be able to retaliate defensively against flying attacks at full accuracy.

It would be neat if it were possible to set up a system where ground/flying units have distinct ZOC, where flying units ignore ground ZOC and vice versa, but this doesn't seem to be feasible at present. I think I might just give flying units skirmisher and call it good enough, although that may be hard to balance.

Anyhow, these would be relatively fragile but very mobile units, decent ranged pierce attack with a special attached that would function as charge vs. flying units only (call it "dogfight", maybe?) Since most flying units would be based around ground bombardment with limited air-to-air retaliatory capability, these would be very dominant against other aerial units but less effective against ground targets, and would always be fairly vulnerable.

Steam engine line (names need work here): Iron Horse -> Steam Carriage -> Rolling Fortress

Picture a locomotive engine with no rails, and with a giant spike on the front. That's the idea here. These would have very solid armor, a single heavy melee charge attack, but not a lot of mobility in rough terrain; kind of comparable to Heavy Infantry but somewhat more offensively oriented.
This does give the humans two unit lines built around charge-type mechanics, which hopefully should help give the faction kind of a reckless, dashing sort of feel to it without getting too monotonous. I don't think there should be too much blurring between the fighter planes and these things, as aside from the charge-type abilities they are quite different: the planes are mobile, fragile, and ranged-based, these would be mostly limited to flat terrain, heavily armored, and melee-based.



Any ideas for things to add/drop? I realize this is rather a lot of units to fill, so I could definitely afford to lose a few if they don't seem necessary.

[Temuchin Khan]

I think that the Elves here should be unique enough without needing a total monopoly on magical effects. They will still have a distinct advantage as regards healing: other factions will be split into mechanical and non-mechanical units requiring seperate healing (e.g. dwarven engineers can "heal" tanks etc., but can't heal dwarven footsoldiers; human medics can't repair airplanes), whereas elves just have healers for all their units and don't have to worry about any mechanical units.

I like that.

I can't think of anything else at the moment. I'll get back to you if I do.

[Valenwood]

Hi!
I really like this idea of yours, and if you feel like you are in need of help regarding coming up with units for all of these factions, and their unit advancements, I could try and help you out! I have been thinking about your "horror" faction a bit, and I could let you know what's on my mind if you would like?

Besides that, I think the human faction is missing some kind of naval unit? Like a steamboat of sorts? Maybe I just missed it in your unit list, if so I apologize.

Valenwood

[Keiju]

You know, I'd like to see most of the units that aren't machines have the swarm ability =]. It would make tanks a lot more scarier, since they could take much more beating and still be useful. Then you ought to have every faction have some kind of healing ability.

Why should the mg-line have weak counter attack? I'd much rather see it very weak melee or no melee attack at all. I mean, can you imagine someone trying to take the machine gun head on with guns/bows? Nice thing would be if they couldn't use the machine gun if you have moved them. That way you couldnt really use them to assault (move next to an unit and attack) places(you could still attack with them, it'd just take a lot more effort to get any other use out of them than the fear factor).

Does the flame thrower have to be on its own line? I think it would be more fitting if it was an advancement in the gadgeteer line. Even in that case, you'd have 7 recruitable units in the beginning. Are that many really needed? I might have understood wrong, but your cavalry line and scout line are kind of similar. I don't think the skirmish is something that makes them different enough. Not too sure if skirmish would fit the theme well (of the faction), either. Maybe turn them into medic line right away.

Gremlins and dwarves seem to have the same relation between each other as skaven and dwarves have in warhammer technologywise =]

Hope I said something helpful. I kind of like the idea, I can try to offer my opinions later, too, if you want.

[TL]

Besides that, I think the human faction is missing some kind of naval unit? Like a steamboat of sorts? Maybe I just missed it in your unit list, if so I apologize.

Humans do have a flying unit, which fills the necessity of having a unit that can cross water. All mainline factions have either water units, or air units, but I don't really think any have both; a lot of maps seem to be built with the assumption that each faction has some kind of unit capable of crossing water, so that's the guideline I've been following.

A steamboat would be interesting. I haven't really given much thought to heavy naval ships because of the problem of overland travel--it makes sense for mermen to be able to flop around between bodies of water, but how exactly does that work for a steamboat? I know there's portage etc. but that doesn't make much sense for heavy ships, although then again heavy ships in general don't fit the idiom of the human faction.

Hee hee. I just had a mental picture of a guy sitting in a tiny little speedboat with a coal stove mounted in back. That would solve the issue of overland travel and fit the theme of the humans a bit better. It is kind of pushing the number of units, but given enough time, why not?

It might be interesting to put in a full-size river monitor type unit, perhaps for say the dwarves, and just declare that it can't move overland at all. That would probably rule out an awful lot of maps for it, though.

You know, I'd like to see most of the units that aren't machines have the swarm ability =].

This would definitely be interesting; it's essentially how Fantasy General worked, which I certainly have no complaint with. I'm not sure what kind of impact it would have on balance assumptions, though. Has anyone ever experimented with this kind of system and what it means for Wesnoth gameplay?

Why should the mg-line have weak counter attack? I'd much rather see it very weak melee or no melee attack at all. I mean, can you imagine someone trying to take the machine gun head on with guns/bows? Nice thing would be if they couldn't use the machine gun if you have moved them. That way you couldnt really use them to assault (move next to an unit and attack) places(you could still attack with them, it'd just take a lot more effort to get any other use out of them than the fear factor).

Good point. I had originally been kind of thinking of them more in the line of a variant artillery piece than a modern-style machine gun, something capable of bombarding with limited salvos. I could see it going either way, really.

Maybe I should just give humans more typical artillery and move the machineguns over to dwarves (who I had been planning on giving cannons/artillery to), as in terms of usage that fits their respective factions better: humans have a hard-hitting unit that can't take attacks well, dwarves have a defensive unit that hits back hard. Then again, I'm always in favor of mixing things up a bit, too; a faction gets boring if it follows a theme too rigidly.

Does the flame thrower have to be on its own line? I think it would be more fitting if it was an advancement in the gadgeteer line. Even in that case, you'd have 7 recruitable units in the beginning. Are that many really needed?

Not really, but I don't see what it hurts to have them, or how pushing flamethrowers back to level 2 is a particular improvement. I'm not attacking the idea, just wondering what the impetus is here.

I might have understood wrong, but your cavalry line and scout line are kind of similar. I don't think the skirmish is something that makes them different enough. Not too sure if skirmish would fit the theme well (of the faction), either. Maybe turn them into medic line right away.

Here, on the other hand, I do understand where you're coming from. Conceptually I like having the idea of having inexpensive foot scouts as well as a more expensive mounted unit with some fighting power, but I agree that there's quite a bit of overlap there even assuming a hefty price difference. Maybe I should do away with the idea of having the human cavalry be better-than-normal in rough terrain and keep movement/defense along the line of mainline cavalry. i.e., cavalry sucks in rough terrain, whereas scouts would still excel (or, at least, do better than cavalry does).



I haven't had time to do a lot of brainstorming or drawing these past few days due to a couple of new night classes I'm taking, but I'll try to flesh out some of my ideas for the "horrors" faction so far. The general concept is to have a couple types of regular, normal, lawful humans such as conscript infantry etc., with the bulk of the faction given over to chaotic evil geniuses and their similarly chaotic creatures. Possible thoughts here include typical Frankenstein-style creations (either recruitable and/or created by mad doctors as a plague special, although unlike walking corpses they would not themselves have plague), Dr. Moreau type beastmen (powerful melee units for rough terrain types), some kind of poison slime monster maybe.

There would of course be plenty of mechanical creations too: death rays, walker-type mechs with big guns, flying saucers, etc. I'm kind of undecided as to whether piloted things like these should be seperate unit lines or branches of the mad scientist line. I'm starting to think perhaps there should be a L0 "Evil Genius" that would include these kinds of weapons among their upgrades; I'm not a huge fan of pushing lots of key abilities back far in the upgrade tree, but having them as L1 branches of an L0 unit wouldn't make them too inaccessible, and I think this faction is probably going to be characterized by a number of L0 units (though certainly not everything should be L0 to start with).

[Keiju]

the point behind the the flame trooper suggestion is that the flame troopers could be really tough sharpshooting melee attacking unit. I think it would fit better the idea of the flame thrower (pretty good at attacking entreched enemies). This way the unit could really be tough, rather than weak. I cant really imagine relatively untrained people with flame throwers, especially in the steam punk theme, where the troopers would have to take care of their (probably unreliable) weapons. Other than that, theres no real point, except that having lots of lvl 1 unit lines is probably not the best way to go, at least not if you cant imagine a good justification.

With the swarm attack, medics wouldnt just be useful, theyd be a necessity. Thats why itd be nice to have them right from the beginnin. Even if just +4 hps.

With the swarm attacks, tanks (mechanical things) would be used to eat away enemies attacks. It would make this very different from the regular wesnoth. Something I see as a good thing for an user made addition. You might want to ask Lunar. I think he has been toying around with the swarm ability a bit. I'd suggest 100hps (or 50[40], something like this) for every unith with swarm attack just to make calculations easier. Toughness would be represented with resistances.

About the machine gun suggestion, i actually liked it when i read it again. Hopefully you could do something like that for something in this era.

[Temuchin Khan]

Hee hee. I just had a mental picture of a guy sitting in a tiny little speedboat with a coal stove mounted in back.

Are you saying it would be a steamboat at sea and a locomotive on land? That would be interesting, though odd.

[TL]

the point behind the the flame trooper suggestion is that the flame troopers could be really tough sharpshooting melee attacking unit. I think it would fit better the idea of the flame thrower (pretty good at attacking entreched enemies). This way the unit could really be tough, rather than weak.

I don't see how this is really that much different from what I had originally posted. Either way, the two purposes behind the flame troops would be 1. hitting entrenched positions and 2. providing a melee counterattack deterrent. I hadn't envisioned the flamethrower unit as being "weak" in either of these roles, merely vulnerable outside of such roles--something you don't leave unsupported on the front lines when the enemy has ranged attackers swarming about.

While a level 2 unit is naturally going to be tougher than a level 1 unit, the inventor types aren't exactly intended to be tanks, either, so I'm not sure that branching them off would really make that much of a difference.

I cant really imagine relatively untrained people with flame throwers, especially in the steam punk theme, where the troopers would have to take care of their (probably unreliable) weapons.

That's a good point, but if there are level 1 units with their own flying machines I don't think it's really a stretch to have level 1 units armed with flamethrowers.

Truthfully, I did originally have the flamethrower as an alternate advancement from the tinker (in place of the sapper/demolitionist); I moved it down to L1 mostly because the faction looked a little too light in melee attacks (even by the standards of a ranged-oriented faction) and figured they could use some help when it comes to hitting heavy defensive positions. The faction is intended to be offensively-oriented with a lot of units that can hit hard but can't take attacks well, so momentum is of prime importance. If it's too easy to break their momentum then they're kind of screwed.

With the swarm attack, medics wouldnt just be useful, theyd be a necessity. Thats why itd be nice to have them right from the beginnin. Even if just +4 hps.

True. I am starting to warm up to the idea a bit, but I'm still not quite sure about the balance prospects; I had already planned on the heavier machines falling high in the upper end of the cost range, and this would be giving them another significant bonus. I mean say a good horse cavalry unit costs 18 gold and has swarm and a tank (or more likely, a sort of proto-tank unit) costs 24 gold and doesn't. That to me suggests that at full health, the cavalry unit ought to be just as powerful or better than the more expensive tank, because it's got the burden of swarm on it. That seems a bit off to me.

Of course it would be fully possible to widen the cost gap (for that matter even without the swarm idea I may have bumped up the really high-end things like tanks a bit higher) but then stretching the gold range for recruitable units too far would threaten to screw with the calibration of village income/upkeep/etc.

I'd suggest 100hps (or 50[40], something like this) for every unith with swarm attack just to make calculations easier. Toughness would be represented with resistances.

My feeling is that adding more resistances than necessary complicates damage calculations more than having to deal with fractions of variable denomination for HP; HP levels are more convenient to check than resistances.

About the machine gun suggestion, i actually liked it when i read it again. Hopefully you could do something like that for something in this era.

Are you talking about the original suggestion or one of the ideas that's been floated in response?

Hee hee. I just had a mental picture of a guy sitting in a tiny little speedboat with a coal stove mounted in back.

Are you saying it would be a steamboat at sea and a locomotive on land? That would be interesting, though odd.

No, I simply meant a boat with what would essentially be a steam-powered outboard motor, because it's kind of a funny mental image. I mentioned it in reference to overland travel simply because it would be more reasonable to drag a small boat like that around than it would a full-sized steamboat.

I was kind of thinking of doing a dual-use land/water vehicle for gremlins, like a submarine with wheels or something odd like that.

Anyhow, with the weekend coming it's time for me to get some more drawing done. Anyone have anything in particular they'd like to see done first (either things that have been discussed so far, or another idea that hasn't been brought up yet)?