A New Order (ANO) campaign - version 1.1.6

[t3st3r]

May I have few suggestions? I know testers are annoying but that's for good
1) Uhm, why you're not marking heroes who are critical in certain scenario with silver crowns like other campaigns do?This could make decisions easier (so I may want to semi-protect them as well as leader).
2) AMLA for heroes not seems to work right now. Now I have "Gaumhaldric" and couple of other heroes with experience like something like 230 of 100. "That's not fair!" . It makes more sense to use ordinary solders since they at least have default AMLAs when max level reached. Heroes are completely lack AMLA at all so far... even if you're planning some custom AMLA I suggest to use default AMLA as stub at least. Or it's really unfair - hero is worse than ordinary soldier since does not gets AMLA at all, ever.
3) Balancing... scenario "The Woods of Okladia". I'm playing at normal difficulty level. Then I expect to walk with SOME challenge and maybe even lose if stupid or uncareful actions done. But since I'm not dummy this should cause only average troubles to me, not to be a true nightmare as "hard". That is it. So far I walked campaign reasonably successfully. Maybe I'd failed sometimes but in 2 or 3 attempts I can usually finish scenario. However mentioned scenario is not a case. It expects that I'm either kill both enemy leaders or pass to signpost in just 12 turns. AI given much more gold than I have, I have just 12 soldiers and too few gold (+time pressure added) to recall 'em all. And both leaders recruiting 2nd and even 3rd level units which are hard to kill even with upgraded soldiers and are inflicting heavy casualties to me. Virtually no unit can survive against bunch of level 3 wondermans recruited by AI since they're magic, even elves in forest can be killed easily by AI. And after all I should not lose my soldiers since there is no places to recruit. Does this really counted as "normal"? As for me, this scenario rather looks like it is somewhere between "hard" and "barely possible at all without ugly debug cheating". Maybe I have not perfect soldiers or I'm stupid or whatever of course but I had no such troubles in other scenarios. Maybe I missed something or should visit some other places before to raise gold or have better units ... but this far I have no good idea how to win this scenario without heavy losses.

[Mavr]

To Typhon Rhishisikk
In mission "Trapped", after i give 300 gold to Katiroff, i can't recruit new units.
I put saves here http://rapidshare.com/files/157300594/saves.zip.html , save 1 - before event, save 2 - after.
Also can you modify save, than i can continue testing?
Wesnoth 1.4.5 Win
ANO 1.1.0
Thanx.

[Rhishisikk]

Turuk:
Please let me know if you can find ANY errors.

T3st3r:
1) I've been busy with fixing terminal errors, but that's something I can do this weekend.
2) Argh. Okay, I know what I did that moxxed that up. I just need to figure out how to keep the good while fixing the bad.
[edit]
Found and fixed, will appear with 1.1.1 update
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Mavr:
I can't modify saves (not enough WML experience), but I'll take a look at Trapped and see what's up with that.
[edit]
Found and fixed, will appear with 1.1.1 update
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[edit]
Okay, my biggest concern is the silver crowns may disappear after a unit has served as a leader, or may appear with double crowns... Please let me know if either of these happens, or if I missed marking any heroes.

And let me know if anyone finishes the campaign without errors! It might even be possible, now.
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[Turuk]

Turuk:
Please let me know if you can find ANY errors.

Will do bud, it was a busy week but I'm playing through it again right now.

[Mavr]

In mission 25 recruits also unavailable.

[Rhishisikk]

Dang. Okay, I'll find, fix, and (if add-on server is back up) post before getting sleep tonight.

[edit]
Found (in 24, Fall of Freetown) and fixed. Due to add-on server being down, had time to check scenarios after that as well. Happens once to side 8 (NPC), not sure if that problem is fixed yet. Latest is on server, didn't change version numbers, it's still 1.1.1
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[Mavr]

Aragwaith sorceress (Female) have no image.

[erdbeerfrosch]

I have a problem with scenario 10, The Siege of Healtin, on easy.
The game crashes after heroic victory, while normal victory ends without problems. A replay from scratch with ANO 1.1.1 and cleared cache gave the same result. Wesnoth version is 1.4.4 on linux.

[Rhishisikk]

Great work, both of you! I've no time until Saturday, but I'll get on both of these issues then. I'm fairly certain sorceress has an image, but isn't seeing it.

The issue in scenario 10 eludes me for now. Again, I'll take a look at it soon.

Oh, and thank you to all who have assisted so far, in case I've forgotten to thank you individually.

[edit]
Okay, the sorcerer of both genders should now display a picture (no clue HOW the directory path in the sorcerer file got misdirected, but it was). And the problem with scenario 10 has been found and whacked. Since this is the third time that particular error has shown up, I need to crawl through all the scenarios and make sure it isn't anywhere else.

All fixes are in 1.1.2, which is out on the Add-On server.

I can only imagine what all is going to go wrong with 1.5, but ANO is actually shaping up to be almost stable. (Having almost gotten to Barnon's orcs - AGAIN - and restarting is getting old, though. Thanks for keeping me going, guys.)
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[Draciron]

Just finished the campaign for the first time. Enjoyed it. I figured most of the grammar errors were attempts at giving players accents. I would like to see the campaign go on and to get some of those troops I worked so hard at leveling back LOL. That spot where it makes me choose only 12 of my men left me with some hard choices. Especially not knowing what I could recruit in the future. So each scenario I'm carefully guarding troops I feel I cannot replace like Elves and Alkadians. Turns out I should have kept only the Loyal Alkadians, Elves and kept some of the strongbows I had.

One suggestion for the Alkadians. The Wisemen are very weak critters. Shamans advance into some very useful units. The Wiseman foolishly kept and leveled only to find it a pretty worthless unit once I leveled up a Shamen and especially after I got White mages.

The lack of a scout/calvary type unit also made building gold levels for the next scenario a bit more difficult. If I'd taken a scout when offered he'd gotten killed. The Elves were very vulnerable to Alkadian attacks. I was constantly watching my Elvish Marshal obliterated by even 2nd level Alkadians. I could not put him up front as a single 3rd level Alkadian could kill him or the 2 Avengers I carried without breaking a sweat.

I did very much enjoy the ability to have both Lawful and Chaotic units in the Alkadians. The scenario would have been much easier if I'd converted more clanspeople into Sturmknights. Those critters were vicious. The Light Infantry were also. I had more losses to those two units than all the others combined. Had to restart the scenario more than a few times when one of those two units snuck up and with a single attack killed one of the main characters.

I'd ease up on the first scenario though. On impossible it damn near is impossible to beat. The rest of the scenarios are more reasonable. Several were quite challenging.

Oh, speaking of which. I've got a pretty much complete campaign. Just lacks a bit of polish like cleaning up dialog, putting it in the boxes, intros and stuff. If anybody is interested in teaming up with me on campaigns I'm quite happy to create maps, storylines, dialogs, music an such. I'm worthless with graphics though. I've also not gotten the hang of the moving units around. Anyway if you are good at graphics or just like moving the characters around and spiffing up the dialog send me a shout at draciron@gmail.com I've had this campaign sitting around for about a year now but it's just a few fixes short of release.

[Turuk]

Draciron, if you happened to note down any of the grammar or sentence errors, let me know. I've been helping Rhishisikk with this, and one of our goals is to correct some of the dialogue as well. It's taken a back seat to making sure all of the code is okay and that the scenarios function as they should, but not all of the mistakes in the grammar by the creator were intentional. Happens to the best, not to mention that for many people English is not their first language.

[Rhishisikk]

WOOHOO! Someone finished the game WITHOUT a critical error!

ANO was written by someone who had poor Czech-English translators; correcting the dialogue is an ongoing process.

Flavor:
Akladians should not use contractions; they are formal, almost to the point of being stiff - especially Reme Carenemoe. I'm trying to put a Hannibal Lecter feel to Lorin's dialogue.

Aragwaithe call 'honour' and other ancient sounding mis-spellings. They aren't STUPID (Although Andrey MIGHT be - hit on head with mace too many times...), but they don't follow the same rules of grammar as Akladians do.

Wesnothians clearly don't speak 'Akladian' well. They use contractions, sometimes forget words, and generally abuse the language in a way that only rural folks can. (I'm considering throwing in Wesnothian dialogue that shows they speak their own language quite fluidly - but that's something to add in the future).


BALANCE ISSUES
General Disclaimer: YES, there are numerous problems with ANO balance and play; up until now, the issues with campaign crashing have prevented all but the most obvious of fixes.

Wiseman: The Akladian wiseman is supposed to be an old crank with some mystical powers. He IS frail, and inferior to White Mages. I'm just not certain he was meant to be as inferior as he IS, especially given his high cost. I'm not about to turn him into a whirlwind of destruction, but I agree they are currently not worth their gold.

Gold-rippers: There are a number of scenarios designed to hammer down the player. The only reason I can find for these is to prevent the 'Konrad and his legendary band of heroes' complex. ANO is a long campaign, and does need several of these. I'm not sure that all of them were adequately playtested, though.

Non-recruiting: For thematic reasons, there are SEVERAL scenarios where you cannot recruit new units. These need to be documented.

Clansmen: When ANO was made, all units had a chance to be LOYAL. I'm thinking of restoring this ability to Clansmen; it won't have any effect if they die, and it allows a prudent player to build a stable of dependable no-maintenance units. HOWEVER, I am also wary of a horde of 'free' L3s stomping across the board. OTOH, the possibility of this was one of the balancing issues of the original campaign, and the fact that Akladians have only a single trait helps to balance it somewhat.

Even on EASY, the campaign is meant to be harder than most; it is supposed to be tough on its normal mode, and on hard it is dang near abusive. HOWEVER, as noted, many of the balancing issues have changed from when ANO was made. Many scenarios need to be re-made.


Artwork: I don't need to tell anyone that the artwork in ANO is from the dark ages. We need animations and portraits for all units. Portraits and Story Backdrops could use a serious going-over. Again, this is beyond MY ability, and has taken back-burner to fixing crashing issues.


Other stuff: There's probably even more, stuff that just slips my mind. This is why I need to write all this stuff down and prioritize it.

[szopen]

ANO was written by someone who had poor Czech-English translators

Polish, actually
Wiseman can't be good unit. It's only healing unit, period. Akladians hate mages. Mages are devils, you know. Only good steel is what good Akladian is supposed to value.

[Draciron]

Yup, played it all the way through twice. I really like this campaign.

Wisemen being weak is one thing. Especially at first level. In a way I guess it does balance as the 3rd level troops except Akladians are way tougher than 3rd or 4th level anything else. One on one a Halbardier or Royal Guard or Elvish Marshal or Avenger has zero chance against Sturm knights or Infantry depending on day/night. I lost a few Royal guard when they wound up matched up one on one with one of those critters. Usually screening a unit I couldn't afford to lose or a mage.

My most effective units were arch mages, they always seemed to get killed right after or before I got them to great mage, Fugitives and Akladians. The protectors and Dark knights were awesome units. This time around I didn't even bother leveling a Wiseman. I let him get killed soon as I got an Elivish shamen and used the shamen for healing until I got White mages. One scenario I just skipped healing all together as the Wiseman wasn't worth the gold needed to bring them in. At only 4 pts healing at 1st level they are not even good healers. Unlike the shaman there is no redeeming value in battle. They don't handle a staff well. No ranged attack until 3rd level. I would think they handled the staff better if no magic attacks. Not like a warrior type but at least something close to damage.

Ok, did see one minor bug this time through. First time I ran through it on medium. This time took it on hard. When I get to the last scenario I get 3 new enemies to kill I think. Don't remember having to kill those guys when going through on medium. Did add some difficulty to the last scenario. I realized it was the last one and wasn't so worried about sacraficing loyal units and such. So when I get close to killing what I think is the last enemy leader I get 3 new ones and some of my best units are dead already LOL. I'm now taking on the Orcs and Undead with mostly 1st level units. I won anyway. Just took a bit longer than otherwise. Especially if I'd known to leave troops behind down south. I might replay that scenario sometime and see what happens if I leave some troops to the south.

Ok on grammar. Heres an example. If y'all like my changes I'd be happy to do a run through on the dialog in the scenario editor. These were ones that I grabbed from saves.

Woods of Okloadia

Ruvio lets hurry before the reinforcements
Should be before reinforcements arrive.

Village leader
It's a whole story, You see, my lord, my daughter is most beatiful girl in whole neighbourhood. I knew this will bring disaster for us, Akladian lord wanted to marry her, and she foolishy refused.

Corrected version.
This is the whole story. You see, my lord, my daughter is the most beautiful girl in the whole region. I knew this would bring disaster for us. An Akladian lord wanted to marry her and she foolishly refused.

beautiful was misspelled. dropped a comma or two. It's whole story doesn't make sense in English. Added the and changed word to region as a village wouldn't have neighborhoods Will was wrong tense of the word.


Next paragraph is mostl fine except for "was so enraged by this so he abducted" should be so enraged by this that he abducted her. The other was "her in cage" should be keep her in a cage.

Lady Lorin "We will release her, isn't it, Gawen?" Isn't what? I am guessing it should be won't we, Gawen?"

Abducted forrest intro. Last line is "girl came natural for Gawen" should be came naturally for Gawen.

Rurk - "Are the gossip" should be "Is the gossip".

Bark "invading the castles" invading castles
"thought you are a reasonable" thought you were a reasonable
"King Buffin is making this gossip" king Buffin is creating these rumors
or creating these fairy tales
or creating these wild stories

[Rhishisikk]

Looking for the Forest of Oakladia scenario. I hope your quotes are in the order they appear in. I'll fix them when I find them.

[edit]
Found the lines in scenarios 19 and 20, as well as other stuff I thought I'd already fixed. I'm starting to realize the same text appears in multiple scenarios.

I'm sure there will be enough minor fixes and balance issues to work the translations out. Oh, and your fixes will show up in version 1.1.4 (1.1.3 is out on the web as of this morning, I forgot to update the PBL file)

But I'm glad I decided to maintain a campaign before making my own, though. As much of a pain as this is, it HAS been educational.

Keep telling me stuff as you find it, folks.
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