Era of Mystery

[Aura]

Hi,

Here is the thread for development for the Era of Mystery. This Era will contain 4 factions, the Kiaris (Amazonian women with a Greek influence), the Kalibaar (fire elves with monster allies), the Myorians (a nation of proud barbarians that ride bulls into battle) and one undecided faction.

I will supply the art, and statistics, but am currently looking for some coders to help me with this project. There shouldn't be too much hard WML involved, but I do have a few ideas which may be complicated. These are a Kalibaar trait that adds damage to all attacks that are fire type, a Kiaris trait that adds a weak ranged arcane attack to the unit, a Myorian trait that adds extra damage to attacks with charge, a Burn ability which is poison that tints units red, undead can suffer from it, and only does 4 damage, an ability which lets the unit rebirth at one level lower than it is when it dies, an ability where a unit gains +1 xp per turn for free, and possibly a handful of other things.

[fog_of_gold]

[...]and one undecided faction.

Am I allowed to ask what you are talking about if you are talking about an 'undecided faction'? Are you talking about a faction you didn't finished having ideas or about one having everything being bad and good, being might-focused and magic-focused being very much but weak and very less but strong?

I will supply the art, and statistics, but am currently looking for some coders to help me with this project. There shouldn't be too much hard WML involved, but I do have a few ideas which may be complicated.

I may help you if you show me all your ideas and by the time I've got time.

These are a Kalibaar trait that adds damage to all attacks that are fire type, a Kiaris trait that adds a weak ranged arcane attack to the unit, a Myorian trait that adds extra damage to attacks with charge

All possible very easy with the default trait-making; [effect].

, a Burn ability which is poison that tints units red, undead can suffer from it, and only does 4 damage

Shouldn't be possible without events but with it should. If you can go away from turning units red, it's even possible without.

, an ability which lets the unit rebirth at one level lower than it is when it dies

Something near is already in the Path of elementist so make sure, that your ability is named in another way than this one. Also you can include this code and change it into your version.

, an ability where a unit gains +1 xp per turn for free

Also already done in The Arathropiae Faction.

, and possibly a handful of other things.

I'm always very interested in what abilities humans think of sometimes.

[Aura]

By an undecided faction I mean I don't have the ideas for it yet. I'm leaning towards an evil faction (Kiari being Lawful and Good, Myorians being Neutral and Good, and Kalibaar being Chaotic but Good). I might add a fifth faction later but since I currently have no coders I'm sticking to 4 for now. You can see art and unit concepts in the link in my signature, and I will post more in-depth faction info (some in this post). I would like to make this era more RPG-like, so it would be cool if each faction had it's own AMLA that allowed you to increase stats.

The Myorians are basically a hit-and-run melee faction, only the Knights can stand up to much punishment. They live on the plains and their warriors train with the foot skirmishers (that are their main ranged unit). When they have enough battle experiance they are sent to tame a bull for their mount. The rider and his mount form a powerful bond over time (with the mages this bond is actually spiritual too). They live in tribal nomad camps. Their wizards act as shamans, advisors and seers, and each tribe often picks a champion to act as their best fighter (but not always their leader). This may be able to translate into the game by nominating a non-leader certain unit as your champion who gains a stat bonus (but an increased XP cap to offset somewhat). I might even have it so that you can only recruit Lv 0 Skirmishers that after 1 kill level into any of the Lv 1 mounted units but this wouldn't be very good in game terms I think.

The Kalibaar are elves that use fire as their main source of weaponry, food, and much of their lifestyle. They are chaotic but not evil, and have a decent mix of melee axe fighters (some with beserk) and ranged fire magic users. These units would have the hypothetical burn ability that could be removed by entering a water tile. They, being somewhat few in number, also have the support of other races that dwell in their mountain homelands (centaurs being the main one), and of flame elementals like phoenixes (expensive, relatively frail units that, when killed, rebirth a level below their current, and Lv 1s become Lv 0 eggs that gain 1 XP per turn and level back into Lv 1 phoenixes). Their higher level wizards may have some kind of Burn aura that inflicts all non-Kalibaar units that end a turn next to them with Burn. They are on relatively good terms with the Myorians and Kiaris but are hot-headed and rash so may enter conflicts with them over petty things. Their units may also lose their fire attacks when in water terrian but this may make them too weak.

The Kiaris are an all-female faction that are the chosen of one of the Goddesses of their world. Girls appear overnight at the dwellings of their leaders, taken from other lands who have been chosen by the Goddess. There are several warrior paths the chosen may follow, archery and close combat among them but also wizardry, mind manipulation (some kind of Charm ability that allows you to control a unit for a turn perhaps) and beast taming. The specially favoured ones can heal themselves (perhaps a trait that allows the unit a free +2 or +4 heal a turn) and can conjure blasts of pure heavenly energy to smite their foes (the arcane attack trait). They fight in their Goddesses name, and are inclined to be wrathful when wronged or cheated.

Fourth or fifth factions may include Mongolian/Oriental Goblins, Desert Arab-style warriors, a faction of beastmen, or some kind of undead that have been imprisoned for years and are more Egyptian/Aztec-influenced than mainline undead.

A mutant faction where the units start off as relatively normal but evil troops (a wolf, a cultist etc) and slowly up their trees get more and more mutated until the level 3s and 4s are like wolves with poison spines, tentacles and fire breath and the humans have claws for hands, metal grafted to their faces, and can conjure flames in their hands. If they had traits that determined their level paths (not sure if this is possible) that'd be extra cool (i.e a wolf could have the afflicted trait that unlocked a posion spine wolf upgrade path, the seared trait that unlocked a fire breathing wolf upgrade path, the misshapen trait which unlocks a tentacle-mutant wolf type path, and then if a unit has trait combos one of the level threes available has that combo, so a fire-breathing poison spined wolf, or a bigger spined wolf, or a bigger fire wolf). If that sort of thing is doable this will almost certainly become my main evil faction.

[fog_of_gold]

I would like to make this era more RPG-like, so it would be cool if each faction had it's own AMLA that allowed you to increase stats.

Do you'd like have it together with the default/hero era? -If yes, making it too RPG might give a bad balancing, depending on what you are thinking about. Just increasing stats in AMLA isn't very difficult.

flame elementals like phoenixes (expensive, relatively frail units that, when killed, rebirth a level below their current, and Lv 1s become Lv 0 eggs that gain 1 XP per turn and level back into Lv 1 phoenixes).

I'd really suggest to just include the phoenix from the Path of elements era because of being nearly the same: If a firebird/phoenix die, there'll remain ashes having only 2 hitpoints of 20 left and having regenerate. If they got full health, they'll return fullhealed to their form before.

[...]and beast taming.

And what are you thinking about?

The specially favoured ones can heal themselves (perhaps a trait that allows the unit a free +2 or +4 heal a turn) and can conjure blasts of pure heavenly energy to smite their foes (the arcane attack trait). They fight in their Goddesses name, and are inclined to be wrathful when wronged or cheated.

I think a nice thing could be, to make the healing cumulative and only +1. That would make you able to heal very wounded units very well while more worse the not wounded.

A mutant faction where the units start off as relatively normal but evil troops (a wolf, a cultist etc) and slowly up their trees get more and more mutated until the level 3s and 4s are like wolves with poison spines, tentacles and fire breath and the humans have claws for hands, metal grafted to their faces, and can conjure flames in their hands. If they had traits that determined their level paths (not sure if this is possible) that'd be extra cool (i.e a wolf could have the afflicted trait that unlocked a posion spine wolf upgrade path, the seared trait that unlocked a fire breathing wolf upgrade path, the misshapen trait which unlocks a tentacle-mutant wolf type path, and then if a unit has trait combos one of the level threes available has that combo, so a fire-breathing poison spined wolf, or a bigger spined wolf, or a bigger fire wolf). If that sort of thing is doable this will almost certainly become my main evil faction.

Hmm, that might get a real difficult faction. I'll gues will need to do something with the event advance. Then, I'm thinking of just changing the advance_to into your paths and then, it should work. Unfortunatly, I'm not able to ask for traits a unit have got so I can't help you here.

[Aura]

This era would be seperate so the AMLA would be fine if it was more RPG orientated. I mean like you can pick between gaining extra damage, or HP, or resistances, or a balanced path whenever a fully-levelled troop advances.

Not sure on the beast taming, but a nice thing to do would be to have neutral beasts roaming each map that can be killed for XP, but the Kiaris can tame them to ride (and so can the Myorians if it is bulls).

A +1 free cumulative heal is quite nice as a trait, maybe that could be added.

If you are interested I can provide you with basic stats for each of my Lv 1 units and their transparent image and you could use your forumlae to see if they are a good, equal power level and then code them if they are.

[fog_of_gold]

Not sure on the beast taming, but a nice thing to do would be to have neutral beasts roaming each map that can be killed for XP, but the Kiaris can tame them to ride (and so can the Myorians if it is bulls).

Having units are walking arround the map would mean that you can't include the default/heros era. Is that the point you want? -If not you could do something like in the era of future.
Edit: And that are units getting a unit every time they level up. What you could do, too, is, to have a plague working randomly.

If you are interested I can provide you with basic stats for each of my Lv 1 units and their transparent image and you could use your forumlae to see if they are a good, equal power level and then code them if they are.

Yes, your era looks like having much good ideas but unfortunatly, even if it don't sound like this, I'm still busy with the era of magic. It's got more errors than I guessed. So it might be, that you have to wait for the stats especially because some eras need that, too. So at first, make your stats on your own until I've got time.

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About your fire elves, I don't know, if need units, but I think, there could be a unit with a special called 'magical chain' makes your damage of the attack with this special by a special amount of %s bigger for every adjacent unit is backstabbing. I'd suggest something between 50%-75%. From that I heard of them, it should fit.

[Aura]

I want this era to be standalone so not including the default era is fine by me.

That's no problem, the stats are the least important thing for now, the most important is actually getting the era working on the add-on server.

Here's some stats (pre-playtested obviously) for the 4 Lv 1 Myorian units (all have 50% defence on
plains/grassland, 40% on hills and desert, and 20%-30% everywhere else).

---
Myor Spellsword 17g
Lv 1
Lawful
30 HP
6 MP
41 XP to advance

Horn 5-2 melee impact charge (attack only)
Dagger 4-1 melee pierce
Magical Blast 5-3 ranged magical arcane

---

Myor Scout 14g
Lv 1
33 HP
8 MP
Lawful
34 XP to advance

Horn 5-3 melee impact charge (attack only)
Spear 6-3 melee pierce first-strike

---

Myor Skirmisher 12g
Lv 1
27 HP
6 MP
Lawful
30 XP to advance

skirmisher ability

Javelin 5-3 ranged pierce
Sling 6-2 ranged impact

---

Myor Knight 17g
Lv 1
39 HP
6 MP
Lawful
39 XP to advance

Horn 8-2 melee impact charge (attack only)
Axe 7-3 melee blade

10% blade resistance
10% pierce resistance

[fog_of_gold]

About your stats, they looks like being very strong expect the skirmisher.

[Aura]

Well as all these units will have as similar power (as it will be a standalone era) that shouldn't be a problem.

[PeterPorty]

I don't think they're overpowered, the only unit with both, ranged and meele attacks ais the spellsword, and with a very poor meele attack...

[fog_of_gold]

@Aura:
But if they are too far away from the default era, people won't have it easy to get in this era. There'll be another power of villages and so on. They should get at least nearly to the default era to avoid changing the gameplay too much. I'd suggest to finish your era at first, don't caring about balancing, and find enough coder and units.

@PeterPorty:
Let's compare the first one with the mage:

good differents
+6 hitpoints
+charge (if you use it bad, it'll do nothing, if you use it great, it'll double your damage so in average, it makes your attack 50% stronger)
+1 beats
+1 attack: 4-1
-19 experience
-5 gold
+1 movement

bad differents
-2 damage => -6/21=~-1/3 damage for the whole attack


...and that's balanced?

[Aura]

They can't use their charge attacks on defence so that tones them down a bit. To be fair they will never be matched up against default era units, but I put the costs up some. What does the skirmisher need to make it a fair power level ?

I am looking for someone who can get the era working (even with just this faction and these 4 units for now) on the add-on server the most, balance etc can come later.

[fog_of_gold]

They can't use their charge attacks on defence so that tones them down a bit. To be fair they will never be matched up against default era units, but I put the costs up some. What does the skirmisher need to make it a fair power level ?

About the charge attack; you are right, that makes your attack 25% stronger.

Just like I said, it'll be difficult to switch. For example, you'll need to get used to have less retreat possibilities (because villages are less good).

The skirmisher could have more hitpoints.

I am looking for someone who can get the era working (even with just this faction and these 4 units for now) on the add-on server the most, balance etc can come later.

I thought so, so let's freeze the balancing discusion and start WML code discussions/development.

[Aura]

Are you willing to become a coder ? If so, here are the images for the 4 first units I posted stats for here transparentised. The quicker people are able to play, even with a small unit selection, the better.

[fog_of_gold]

Are you willing to become a coder ?

Well, generall: Yes, but unfortuantly I haven't time and I'm not able to do any animations so find another one and I'll try to squash time to code. My best skills are in abilities so I think, it would be the best, if I do the traits, abilities and maybe the unit stats which isn't very dificult.