Imperial Era

It's not easy creating an entire faction or era. Post your work and collaborate in this forum.

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Ravana
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Re: Imperial Era

Post by Ravana »

I intend to fix runelaying, and possibly already did so today. If your next version is planned later than 2 weeks from now I should have had sufficient testing. In any case the critical bug(globally disallow undo) will be gone.
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UnwiseOwl
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Re: Imperial Era

Post by UnwiseOwl »

Hey Ravana,
Thanks for doing this!
If I get organised I'm looking at a release at the end of the month, so you should have plenty of time for testing. If you need another tester, let me know.
Maintainer of the Imperial Era and the campaigns Dreams of Urduk, Epic of Vaniyera, Up from Slavery, Fall of Silvium, Alfhelm the Wise and Gali's Contract.
But perhaps 'maintainer' is too strong a word.
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Re: Imperial Era

Post by UnwiseOwl »

Looks great, Tem. I'll do a special release for these this week, shout out if there's anything else that you want in it.
Maintainer of the Imperial Era and the campaigns Dreams of Urduk, Epic of Vaniyera, Up from Slavery, Fall of Silvium, Alfhelm the Wise and Gali's Contract.
But perhaps 'maintainer' is too strong a word.
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Re: Imperial Era (10th Birthday Celebration!)

Post by UnwiseOwl »

Orbivm Wiki

On August 15, 2005, a multi-player era was published to the Wesnoth 0.8 addons server. This era contained two factions that you've never heard of called the Loyalists and the Rebels, and two factions that might look a little familiar to us, the Romans and the Barbarians, ancestors of today's Lavinians and Marauders. Yes, that's right, the Imperial Era, heart of the Orbivm Project, with its roots back in the Dark Days before Wesnoth version 1.0, is celebrating its tenth birthday today (as best as your correspondent can guess, anyway)!

I'd like to give a huge shout out everyone who has been a part of Orbivm up to this point. Those who dreamed up the factions; the artists who brought those ideas to life; the campaign designers who slaved away in a WML environment that was a lot more primitive than the one that I enjoy today; the Wesnoth developers, whose efforts we have taken advantage of now for a decade; and each and every person that played and gave feedback to the multiplayer eras or any of our campaigns. A particular thankyou to those who took on the role of maintaining the Project before my tenure, Peter the Great and Chefu; To Temuchin Khan, whose enthusiasm has kept me going and whose critical eye has kept me on the right path to an enjoyable result for all our players; And of course, to Turin, who I hope is a little proud of this little monster.

Well, that's enough soppy stuff. I'm not sick of Orbivm yet, so by way of celebration, I'd like to share with you all where the project is at the moment, where we'd like to be heading in the future, and how you can help us to get there. Whether you're a budding portrait artist, spriter or animator, an aspiring WML wizard, a writer, a speaker of a language other than English, or just an enthusiastic player, there are ways that you could help the project, and we'd love to help you do so.

In chronological order, then:

The Wild Era is on the 1.12 servers, useable as a stand-alone multiplayer era or as part of the Ageless II pack. The era features a faction of primitive orcs that is only (very) partially animated, and a faction of monsters that is in need of a clean-up, even to base sprites, and is very much open to changes by a creative person with a vision. Any artist that would like to have a go at spriting terrifying monsters, or players that would like to try their hand at balancing with a simple a two-faction era with some strange mechanics, could find what they're looking for here. Any monsters that were really good could probably work their way into IE campaigns in time, so there's a built-in audience for this work.

The Wild Era campaign, Dreams of Urduk, is in need of a maintainer and a port for 1.12. The campaign is short and has very little complex code at present (and what is does have is showing its age), so it would be perfect for someone starting out with WML. The campaign works fine as is, but has untapped potential, so there is a large scope for a maintainer to do just a straight port or to try for something more ambitious.

The Classical Era never got off the ground. Scattered around the internet are the basics for the factions that might have composed such an era, though. I'm content to let sleeping dogs lie, but if you're interested in building a multi-player era but don't have much in the way of theme ideas, like the style of Orbivm, and are wiling to make or scrouge sprites from somewhere, well, it's just sitting there, and we'd love to have you.

The Imperial Era is in pretty good shape, if I say so myself, and being "actively" developed by our somewhat lax standards. Our latest release features the core era and a duplicate version for development, allowing us to test ideas and balance without breaking the campaigns. Via this method, I hope to be able to release a version of the era that brings the power level of the era down to something approximating that of the mainline factions within the next few releases. Currently, all seven factions are playable, the core three are relatively balanced, and the ideas for the other four (Arendians, Issaelfr, Orcei and Cavernei) are flowing. Our team of artists has been updating the occasional sprite and I have hopes of seeing more, some even with animations, in the near future. Our greatest need here is playtesters to download and try out the dev version of the Era from the 1.12 server and give us feedback on what works and what you'd change, but there's also plenty of work for writers interested in world-building cleaning up the dated unit definitions and both sprite and portrait artists right across the era.

Tale of Vaniyera, the IE Sidhe Elf campaign, is on the 1.12 server and is by far the most polished of the campaigns. It could benefit from extensive playtesting at all difficulty levels, someone to tighten up the dialogue, and could be greatly enhanced by a few portraits of the main characters or at least their unit types (Faolan the Sidhe Thunderblade, Vaniyera the Sidhe Veiledbalde, and Optimus the Lavinian Imperator). We're also keen to hear from anyone interested in translating the campaign into languages other than English and supporting the maintainer in learning how to support translators!

Up From Slavery, the gladiator Orcei campaign, needs a port to the 1.12 server from 1.10. We're looking for a maintainer that is interested in doing this and then looking at adapting a version of it for use as a 2-player co-operative campaign. This would probably also involve working closely with Temuchin Khan, who created the Orcei, on fine-tuning the faction, and could be a good stepping-stone for a WML user interested in testing their skills with Wesnoth's every-improving MP scenario functionality.

Fall of Silvium, the Lavinian Empire campaign, is my current project, I'm trying to address most of the major issues that have been raised over the last eight years. It's taking a while, but I hope that when it's done it will retake it's position as the flagship IE campaign. When it's released onto 1.12, which I hope to be by the end of September, I'd love to hear from translators and artists to help kick it up a notch.

Alfhelm the Wise, the epic-length Marauder campaign, is also looking for a maintainer willing to take on the project of keeping it up to date and making improvements. The story is solid but the campaign is just a big job to keep up to date (it's as long as the other IE campaigns combined). Ideally, this campaign would suit someone with some experience (or who wants to develop some experience) with tools for map-editing, as many of scenario maps are just too big, causing the campaign to drag a little.

Gali's Contract, the Cavernei campaign, is the one that I've got bookmarked in 'to do next', whenever I get to it. I have plans for a complete revamp which will leave the campaign looking completely different (it won't even be a Cavernei campaign any more) that you can read about in the campaign thread. At this point, if there's anyone who has suggestions for the campaign of for changes to either the Cavernei (to make them less like the mainline) or the Clockworks, now would be a great time to share.

The Fedual Era is on the 1.12 servers, useable as a stand-alone multiplayer era or as part of the Ageless II pack. it was never completed, with one faction (the Droch Fae) almost completely missing, and a distinct lack of balancing and playtesting on the others. There's some cool ideas here, and it plays an important part in the canon and lore of Orbivm, so, I don't want to lose it, but I don't have time to maintain it as well as the IE, so we're looking for someone interested in taking it on as maintainer and giving it the love that it deserves with respect to the history that it has. I can offer advice and support, so this would be a good project for someone new to WML who wants to learn.

And of course, if you'd like to create a new Orbivm campaign or scenario, we'd love that too, and I can guarantee that you'll find an enthusiastic audience in the Orbivm project team.

Thanks for sharing the world of Orbivm with us, and here's to the next ten years. To track where the project is at any point in the future, why not check out the Orbivm page on the wiki?
Last edited by UnwiseOwl on August 15th, 2015, 7:03 am, edited 1 time in total.
Maintainer of the Imperial Era and the campaigns Dreams of Urduk, Epic of Vaniyera, Up from Slavery, Fall of Silvium, Alfhelm the Wise and Gali's Contract.
But perhaps 'maintainer' is too strong a word.
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Xara
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Re: Imperial Era (10th Birthday Celebration!)

Post by Xara »

Pray put a link to Orbivm wiki at someplace noticeable.
It pronounces Sha'ha, not Zara.

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UnwiseOwl
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Re: Imperial Era (10th Birthday Celebration!)

Post by UnwiseOwl »

I knew that I'd forgotten something! :)
Maintainer of the Imperial Era and the campaigns Dreams of Urduk, Epic of Vaniyera, Up from Slavery, Fall of Silvium, Alfhelm the Wise and Gali's Contract.
But perhaps 'maintainer' is too strong a word.
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Re: Imperial Era (10th Birthday Celebration!)

Post by Temuchin Khan »

Nice write-up, Owl! As for Orbivm resources, there's also this old wiki: http://orbivm.pbworks.com/w/page/8503227/FrontPage
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Re: Imperial Era (10th Birthday Celebration!)

Post by Ravana »

There has now been some time for runelaying testing and in the games where I observed it everything gameplay-related seemed to work. In creep war I noticed it will remove shop label and image though, but that is interface only.

Just like last time, https://github.com/ProditorMagnus/Agele ... /abilities , remember prefix and check that you have some images to use, like https://github.com/ProditorMagnus/Agele ... _2.cfg#L32 , or just removing image= works too.
Mars
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Re: Imperial Era (10th Birthday Celebration!)

Post by Mars »

Just a quick note, the Pugnator line (Orcei) is currently broken, the game doesn't recognize its level-ups.
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Temuchin Khan
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Re: Imperial Era (10th Birthday Celebration!)

Post by Temuchin Khan »

Mars wrote:Just a quick note, the Pugnator line (Orcei) is currently broken, the game doesn't recognize its level-ups.
It's been a while since I played, but I think that problem might only affect the normal version and not the development version. Try out both, and let me know.
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Re: Imperial Era (10th Birthday Celebration!)

Post by Gyra_Solune »

Hello! This is likely my favorite add-on era, it paints quite an effective picture and I like its overall setting! I sort of like the angle Feudal is going for too, even if it's incomplete (I cannot help but like the boat mages who are actually more powerful at melee ^^)

A few notes on oddities I find!

-What exactly is the purpose of the 'energy' attack type? I can't seem to find the attribute defining if a unit resists it or not - or is its entire deal how it is consistently neither resisted nor exceptionally effective?

-The Signifer line of units has the 'inspires' ability, which is slightly confusing: there is already an 'inspires' ability in the base game that's totally different, where it is basically Leadership affecting units of the same level as well, whereas the Signifer's usage is seemingly identical to Illuminates. Why not simply change that ability to Illuminate? Maybe justify it by way of the staff being topped off with a very big lantern of sorts.

-The Tracker probably shouldn't be allowed as a hero for the Sidhe - normal conventions are that heroes are 4-6 MP land units without abilities like Berserk, while the Tracker has 8 MP (those conventions exist, after all, so that heroes cannot just run around freely over the map and there's significant risk in moving to a new keep). Similarly the Marauder Raider and Ice Roamer are too fast, while on the other hand I don't see why the Journeymann, level 2 Mistral Magi, Yak Knight, and perhaps the level 2 Gladiator goblins are barred from being heroes.

-Not sure why the Dwarves here seem to use older, less animated sprites when they, in all other respects, appear to be completely identical to the Default Era's dwarves aside from the name.

-XP costs are a little off to me in a lot of places - the Arendians seem to have very very high XP costs given their very basic, nothing special archer takes 48, on par with a lot of the more powerful mage-types, and most of their other units are around 38 where everyone else hovers closer to 30. Meanwhile the Sidhe's Forefather is one of the most offensively devastating units in the game with the extremely useful defensive type of the default Ghost - and it only takes 30 XP to level.
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UnwiseOwl
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Re: Imperial Era

Post by UnwiseOwl »

Hi all, it's been a while since I posted here for some reason, even though I've made a number of IE version updates in the last few months.

I've just added a new version to the 1.13 add-ons server, which fixes a number of missing units (thanks Mars) as well as making further tweaks to the development version of the MP factions, as well as quite a bit of back-end stuff to keep up-to-date with the changes in Wesnoth in the last little while. Please check it out and report back. The full changelog for the era is below.
Spoiler:
I've also started a git repository, so if you'd like to join in helping out, that might be place to go.https://github.com/UnwiseOwl/Imperial_Era

Gyra, thanks for your questions
1) IIRC, 'energy' attacks were the result of a philosophical battle that was happening amongst the orbivm devs at a time in the long lost past, the result of which was an additional damage type. It was only used for the raindancers, though, so in the last release, I've reverted it.
2) Our 'inspires' ability predates the mainline one. I may rename it in the near future, but you may note that it only effects lavinian units, so it's actually different to illuminates, too, as it has no effect on an loyal but non-lavinian allies, if they existed.
3) Good point on the tracker and ice roamer, I've removed it from my dev version now and it will be removed as a leader from the next update. I'd already done the raider.
4) Well, the cavernei are a WIP, a very old WIP, from when those were the current sprites. I'll get around to fixing them eventually.
5) Yeah, XP costs are a mess. I'd liek to fix that one day, but if you'd like to help, feel free!
Maintainer of the Imperial Era and the campaigns Dreams of Urduk, Epic of Vaniyera, Up from Slavery, Fall of Silvium, Alfhelm the Wise and Gali's Contract.
But perhaps 'maintainer' is too strong a word.
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Re: Imperial Era

Post by Temuchin Khan »

Nice to see a new version out! I'll check it out when I can, but I don't have as much time as I used to these days. Law school, after all.
UnwiseOwl wrote:1) IIRC, 'energy' attacks were the result of a philosophical battle that was happening amongst the orbivm devs at a time in the long lost past, the result of which was an additional damage type. It was only used for the raindancers, though, so in the last release, I've reverted it.
Yes. As far as I can remember, it had something to do with whether lightning is really the same as fire.

@Gyra: And as a member of the original IE design team (I designed the Orcei, though someone else did the art), I wanted to say thank you, Gyra, for your affirmations!
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Re: Imperial Era

Post by IPS »

Hi! after really much effort and some time, here I have a balance proposal for all factions in the era. Basically lowered Issaelelf stats a bit due their powerful 50% flat terrain defense (commonly -10% blade and fire resistance for them) and made Arendians a little more competent againist the other factions of the same era. Apart of a revision of all units in the faction.

Take your time, balacing certain cases considering the other factions in the era is a really hard task and I'm not sure if it's an exact sense of balance, but I'm sure that with my changes balance might improve considerably (and massively in the angle of the prices and XP of each unit).

Editions were done from Imperial Era itself, not the ageless version because I guessed that there some stuff could be still diferent, apart that probably I might work in diferent balance considerations on ageless version considering that in ageless Energy atack type and resistances were changed to fire because most eras don't use that atack type.

It's just a first hand edition, but some cases seemed rare to me so I wasn't sure in few specific cases what to do on there.

But commonly in terms of damages and some other stats I feel sure about the changes I proposed except in the cases of those mentionated units.

Well, took me some days looking at all factions. Hope you like it.
Attachments
Imperial changes.txt
Imperial Era balance feedback
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Creator of: Deathmatch new in 1.12 server.
Co-creator of: Era of Magic in 1.16 server
Developer of: Empires in 1.12 server, Ageless Era in 1.10 to 1.16 servers (but innactive recently)
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UnwiseOwl
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Re: Imperial Era

Post by UnwiseOwl »

Thanks very much, IPS. I'll have a good look and let you know what I'll be incorporating to test.
This is very much appreciated.
Maintainer of the Imperial Era and the campaigns Dreams of Urduk, Epic of Vaniyera, Up from Slavery, Fall of Silvium, Alfhelm the Wise and Gali's Contract.
But perhaps 'maintainer' is too strong a word.
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