The Great Dwarves Escape - 3P

[DEATH_is_undead]

I am releasing my current project in a while. It is incomplete, with only 3 levels complete (And I have plans to improve them).

For Both Stable Version (1.8.X) and Development (1.9.X)

Story Line:

A long while ago, the Dwarves accidentally helped some thieves escape with a large sum of the king's gold. The Dwarvish kingdoms were eliminated by the king, or so he thought. A band of dwarves went into hiding in a cave, in which battles outside forced rocks to block the entrance. Generations passed, and they soon lost all connections with the outside world. The myths of the outside world have circulated with-in the small community, but then they find a way to put the myths to the test, and break the walls of their world, and see test themselves outside world. Will they make it, or fall in the face of the unknown outside world?

Currently (as of Version 0.4):

Levels 1, 2, and 3 currently work, but need to be refined. Level 3 works, but needs more balancing.

Check Plans spoiler for more details.

Plans (as of Version 0.4):

Fix Minor Problems With AI. Possible solution being to trigger the event once you enter the area of the attack.
Refine messages in Level 1.
Fine-tune Balancing in Level 2 (Already did a little balancing, waiting for more time), refine messages.
Balance Level 3
Finish Transition Between Level 3 and Level 4.
Make other levels. (As the levels come out, I will update the map, currently I do have all Map levels done, just not posted]

Until it is playable to the last level, I will NOT be releasing to the Addons Server.
Currently, I am debating on a shop system or not. Comments would be nice.
Feedback on the level design, story lines, or in general, or reporting bugs, would be greatly appreciated, In this forum topic.

Edit: Updated to Version 0.2

Edit:Updated to Version 0.3

Edit: Updating to Version 0.4

Dwarvish Escape Version04.zip

Put this directly in your userdata folder. Currently, I have not finished the 3rd level messages.

(6.64 KiB) Downloaded 404 times

[Lord-Knightmare]

Which version is it for? 1.9.x or 1.8.x?

[Shinobody]

What.
Could you try to put storyline more coherently, and less stylised? What you described contains only few words about storyline: Dwarves, Thieves, King, Cave, Rocks, Lost... And possibly, Myths and Test, although I don't get what sentences with them mean.
What you have here, would make quite decent campaign description, since they aren't supposed to be very informative, rather climatic.
See, I'm downloading it now, but I've got no idea about the actual story...
EDIT: Reread it twice. I think I get it...? Ah, small group of dwarves has set up... A colony...?
And then we have classical "Underground Village which inhabitants don't believe in Surface anymore" trope.
I say we put dwarf Simonsonn the Digger (with hand-drill as weapon) as main character, and it's gonna be cool.

[DEATH_is_undead]

What.
Could you try to put storyline more coherently, and less stylised? What you described contains only few words about storyline: Dwarves, Thieves, King, Cave, Rocks, Lost... And possibly, Myths and Test, although I don't get what sentences with them mean.

Does that not want you to check what the MP Scenario is about more?
On a more serious note, I'm debating on what to leave out of the story, and what to add into it, as only the first and second levels are currently in working order. I did a little more balancing on the second area, but am thinking of more dramatic sequences for the beginning then what we have. (and also more individualized messages for each unit)

What you have here, would make quite decent campaign description, since they aren't supposed to be very informative, rather climatic.
See, I'm downloading it now, but I've got no idea about the actual story...
EDIT: Reread it twice. I think I get it...? Ah, small group of dwarves has set up... A colony...?

More or less, it is suppose to be a MP Campaign, without the switch in scenarios. Meaning it is basically a scrolling campaign of wonder and such.

Edit: Quoted Shinobody but not Lord-Knightmare.
It is for 1.8.X, but would most likely work (Without too many problems) on 1.9. Problems on 1.9 may be answered here as well.

[Shinobody]

Actually, what's critical to understanding "what this is about" are first 4 sentences:

A long while ago, the Dwarves accidentally helped some thieves escape with a large sum of gold. The Dwarves were eliminated by the king, or so he thought. A band of dwarves went into hiding in a cave, in which battles outside forced rocks to block the entrance. Generations passed, and they soon got lost with the outside world.

There is not a WORD about the fact:
-that king decided to attack dwarves;
-and that king razed the dwarven city
-and small group refugees escaped
We have to fill these gaps themselves.
Small thing: Lack of dwarven women usually wasn't so terribly visible, as it is here...
I mean... At least add some text about that women should pack up and follow them? It's getting to ridiculous extremes ... It's a dwarven CITY, for (put your beliefs here) sake...

Story (the one IN scenario) was quite good, caught one small typo (drawf? What's that )
Writing too, but fighting...
If I may say something: You generally don't put one-hex bottleneck corridor, because it slows gameplay down. Here, if one of the player won't get his/her units into the cave with good timing, ALL of them end up in 3bats-1dwarf BORING bottleneck. Yes, that's boring. In fact, I was doing it myself using "self-hotseat", so it wasn't that bad, but when I imagine copious amount of messaging (and being bored, since when one player does the fighting, you do nothing...) that'd have to be done to coordinate it... Megods..
Please, remove it. Why bomb can't uncover 3 hex wide corridor behind it, or at least 2 hex?
Really, this isn't greatest trick in campaign maker's arsenal (unless played right), and it just does. not. belong. To multiplayer scenarios. Just... Not.

From minor things:

• If I were you, I'd put more varied recruiting messages. Maybe base them on side of joining unit? (You could then also ask some dwarves to bring their wives, like "we're leaving the cave. If you want to come with us, tell your family to pack and follow.")
• Also, it isn't very obvious, what player is supposed to do. How about telling players to "gather dwarves from villages", and objectives should specifically mention Powdersmith reaching the bomb?
• And very small one: "Powdersmith"... I mean, you don't smith powder, do you? People who make cannons, siege weapons, thundersticks and gunpowder were usually called "Engineers" in other UMCs... Alternately, Gunsmith, Sapper, Powderer (according to spellchecker, it's actual word?), Powdermaker, Powdermiller, and so on. (Although the name sounds pretty cool and dwarven, I think people are going to complain on that one...)

OVERALL: Not bad, for a start. Put little more content into it, then we'll talk.

EDIT: Apparently, powderer is someone who "powders" whatever it means, so better don't use this one...

[DEATH_is_undead]

Actually, what's critical to understanding "what this is about" are first 4 sentences:

A long while ago, the Dwarves accidentally helped some thieves escape with a large sum of gold. The Dwarves were eliminated by the king, or so he thought. A band of dwarves went into hiding in a cave, in which battles outside forced rocks to block the entrance. Generations passed, and they soon got lost with the outside world.

There is not a WORD about the fact:
-that king decided to attack dwarves;
-and that king razed the dwarven city
-and small group refugees escaped
We have to fill these gaps themselves.
Small thing: Lack of dwarven women usually wasn't so terribly visible, as it is here...
I mean... At least add some text about that women should pack up and follow them? It's getting to ridiculous extremes ... It's a dwarven CITY, for (put your beliefs here) sake...

The story DOES state the king attacked the Dwarves.
It states the dwarves were eliminated by the king. Which, in my opinion, states the cities were attacked.
And it does state that a band of Dwarves went into hiding from the king.

Story (the one IN scenario) was quite good, caught one small typo (drawf? What's that )
Writing too, but fighting...
If I may say something: You generally don't put one-hex bottleneck corridor, because it slows gameplay down. Here, if one of the player won't get his/her units into the cave with good timing, ALL of them end up in 3bats-1dwarf BORING bottleneck. Yes, that's boring. In fact, I was doing it myself using "self-hotseat", so it wasn't that bad, but when I imagine copious amount of messaging (and being bored, since when one player does the fighting, you do nothing...) that'd have to be done to coordinate it... Megods..
Please, remove it. Why bomb can't uncover 3 hex wide corridor behind it, or at least 2 hex?
Really, this isn't greatest trick in campaign maker's arsenal (unless played right), and it just does. not. belong. To multiplayer scenarios. Just... Not.

Thanks for the feedback on the story, next release will contain the fixes suggested; I do have plans on fixing the areas up a little more.

If I were you, I'd put more varied recruiting messages. Maybe base them on side of joining unit? (You could then also ask some dwarves to bring their wives, like "we're leaving the cave. If you want to come with us, tell your family to pack and follow.")

That is already suggested. I am wishing to find better ideas for messages.

[Shinobody]

Glad I could be helpful.
As for your story summary... Let's don't get into unneeded fight for something that is not even part of the add-on, shall we?
I thought that add-on summary should give as much description as possible, but on the other hand - most people anyway will download it after seeing that it is 3player coop MP campaign for Dwarves;
Also, it's your campaign.
And sorry, I think I've been too harsh in my first post.

[DEATH_is_undead]

And sorry, I think I've been too harsh in my first post.

No, I'm sorry if unintentional harshness came across from me. Looking back, mine does seem harsher then I meant it to be; I meant it to be merely informative.

Anyways, next post will include your suggestions, but it's hard to decide weather or not to make the doorways bigger, or not to just spawn some units in the first area (Bats whom do not want to take villages, of course!)

[DEATH_is_undead]

Updated first post to Version 0.2. Updated change log to include some of the changes, some of which suggested, some just for balancing/refining reasons.

Any problems, please tell me.

Edit: Changed the storyline (In forum storyline) as suggested.

[Shinobody]

After playing new version, I've got some questions.
What is that whole army for?
So far, first skirmish is with lev0 bats, second is with single spearman/archer. In fact, just leaders (RPG style) would be enough to beat it. I've also ran across some strange bugs about recruiting.
Replay from local "hotseat" game attached.

3P-_The_Great_Dwarvish_Es..._replay.gz

Played on 1.8.6

(10.56 KiB) Downloaded 483 times

It illustrates TWO things: Scenario is too easy (I nearly managed to win it with just ONE of leaders, and a Thunderguard to add - and I only lost because I'm idiot) and also in last turn there's already mentioned recruiting bug.
After watching it again, I think I know what's the problem - it is village of 7,11. It gives a blue player a Thunderer, and I managed to replicate the bug by putting unit south-east of to "top left" village (the one nearest Steelclad keep, I think it is 3,10) - and hex SE of it happens to be in the same column as village at 7,11.
Ah, and you wrote this village event coordinates differently than the others.

[DEATH_is_undead]

After playing new version, I've got some questions.
What is that whole army for?
So far, first skirmish is with lev0 bats, second is with single spearman/archer. In fact, just leaders (RPG style) would be enough to beat it.

I'm debating on how to balance the first area, because it does force the second area. And obviously the second area still needs more units (As mentioned in the first post)

I've also ran across some strange bugs about recruiting..

I'll fix this later today, I think I know what I did wrong here... I found the bug a while ago but forgot about it, and it never got fixed. Thanks for reminding me.

Edit: Fixed

[DEATH_is_undead]

Updated to Version 0.3. Currently am working on making the 3rd level (After the Cave).