Warbands

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Alaknar
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Joined: July 26th, 2006, 3:29 pm

Warbands

Post by Alaknar »

It's really sad to have a great army, extremely experienced just vanish after one multiplayer battle, don't you think? All the warriors have their own names, so one could get emotional with them :)

Anyway - could it be possible to save armies? You could then load them in multiplayer games. The experienced units would be available in the Recall menu. As far as I could figure it out (but maybe I'm wrong...) it's already happening with computer players in campaigns when they recruit 2nd and higher level units.
Why not in multiplayer?

Cheers!
YbeRn00b
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Post by YbeRn00b »

Different eras let you recruit lvl2 units.
As for recall in multiplayer you should hope for some multiplayer campains. Recalling in most multiplayer games would completely ruin the balance.
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JW
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Re: Warbands

Post by JW »

Alaknar wrote:it's already happening with computer players in campaigns when they recruit 2nd and higher level units.
Actually, in campaigns the AI is allowed to recruit higher level units based on their recruit lists.
Why not in multiplayer?
This simply wouldn't be very fun. You'd eventually have a crapton of level 3 and 4 units running around at the beginning of every MP game because everyone would have stores of high level units from previous games. It would simply ruin Wesnoth's gameplay.
Cheers!
Thanks! Already had 2 this morning (last night for me but I'm still up :wink: ).

ps, welcome to Wesnoth.
Ragwortshire
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Post by Ragwortshire »

Potentially, I think it could work in multiplayer, if it was handled correctly. Basically, you could create an option on the scenario, specifying how much gold's worth of troops are allowed on the recall list. The default would be 0, i.e. recruiting only. Then have a mechanism for saving an army list, adding to it after each scenario and drawing from it at the start of recall-capable scenarios. Of course, you would also have an option to just modify your army list any way you like.

Perhaps some sensible limitations should be imposed, e.g. capping a unit's XP at half the total (to stop people bringing them in as level 2 and instantly levelling up).

Obviously all this would probably be too much work for too little gain, but what you'd get is:

- An extra gametype, where you create your army in advance and then try it out on the field. This might be fun.
- It could work well in a tournament format. 8 players, say, could agree to start a new army each from scratch. The winners of each match in the first round would get to keep their recalls (possibly even gold as well, to prevent abuse) for the second, and so on.
- People who wanted to build a multiplayer army could do so, keeping the same one from scenario to scenario and never modifying it (either by using the option or by playing against a dummy opponent for more XP etc.). They'd be at a disadvantage, since their opponents could just pick whatever recalls they wanted, but who cares; it's their choice to take on the constraint.

Clearly this ties quite a bit into the idea of "Multiplayer Campaigns" (which is BWH or FPI, I think). But I think it's viable at a basic self-consistency level at least.
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tsr
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Post by tsr »

I have been thinking of a somewhat similiar idea:

BfW - Multiplayer League Edition

The concept is a league system with 6 teams in each league and 3 times the leagues in the level under (etc, so that the three worst teams in each league get relegated and the top team gets promoted to a higher league level).

All teams play eachother home and away (playing at home, means having some bonus like +10% on dmg or something). After 10 rounds there is a winner and of to the next season. The home team selects wich map (and what faction s/he use) to play and the away team gets to pick starting position and faction afterwards (both knowing wich faction the opponent has at game-start. Random?) and also selecting time of day for the first turn.

I'm envisioning a set-up with a league game (at 100% exp) and a training game (at 500% exp) once a week (with the possibility to plug in your own AI if you can't make it yourself - great for AI development :D).

At each game you can either pick a faction and leader as the current system does or pick an experienced leader from a previous game (and thus having a recall list).

Units can only appear in the faction that they belong to (but as some units are part of multiple factions - I think - these units might become more important). You can also level up a unit so that you can pick him/her as leader for a later game (like a mage that becomes a WM can later serve as a leader in another game where you want to play Rebels).

Gold carry over? I think not, but it would be nice to be able to do something with the gold. (maybe you start with one random map - of a given set of proven well-balanced maps) and with the gold you can build a bigger stadium and thus haaving more available maps? I've also never really liked the automatic healing between scenarios, maybe you can start with a small club-house (eg one village) and later you can upgrade it for gold to be able to heal more each day (each real life day being like a turn) and only allow units to heal between games this way?

Draws? Well it would be possible to set the number of turns to something like 18-24 (for whole time-cycles) and thus allowing draws.

I also think it should be possible to just play for fun games (where no-one really dies and experience isn't really gained, etc), maybe even being able to mix factions (eg gaining access to all your recall lists) to battle it out with only lvl3 against your friends.

Ok, there it is, an idea!

/tsr

ps. I've also been thinking that this could be a great way to gain income for the BfW project (say either by requiring a small monthly fee - like $0.5-1 for all players or a larger fee for somee nice extra functions that don't really matter - like the idea of being able to play for fun games with all reacll lists - and others like that - like possibility to create guilds, topic-clubs and having an own - as in closed - forum/chat)
Alaknar
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Post by Alaknar »

YbeRn00b wrote:Recalling in most multiplayer games would completely ruin the balance.
JW wrote:This simply wouldn't be very fun. You'd eventually have a crapton of level 3 and 4 units running around at the beginning of every MP game because everyone would have stores of high level units from previous games. It would simply ruin Wesnoth's gameplay.
I've been playing Strategy Battle Games (and I mean 'table and models' games) for a couple of years now and always I thought they lack the experience element. Some people too, told me that it would ruin the balance :) But then, Games Workshop came out with Mordheim and - after a while - Battle Companies (for the Lord of the Rings).
Now - the idea is that your Warbands (in Mordheim) or Companies (in LotR) gain experience through the battles they fight, thanks to this experience thay may advance, and - eventually - kick some serious arse ;-) It doesn't ruin the ballance, because your adversairy also gains experience, right?
So - it's exactly something like you get in Wesnoth's Campaigns, ain't it?

As for the level 3 and 4 units running at the beginning of every MP game - yes, there would be that. BUT - it would be the players' choice whether or not load their armies. They would know if the enemy's doing the same, or not. Or even better - ther could be an option for allowing/disallowing that.
Game ballance would be saved, because everone would start at aproximately the same level.
Hmm... I just had another idea :)
One player COULD play with weaker units, in wich case, he'd get a bonus. I think the best would be lowering the xp needed for his units to advance (e.g. each 20 points of xp difference would lower the needed xp by 10%)

Again - I don't think that something like that would lower the balance or ruin gameplay. Gameplay is measured by the players' fun. Those who don't like the idea, simply wouldn't do it.
FleshPeeler
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Post by FleshPeeler »

(Posts editted for clarity. This post contains my alternate suggestion.)

I can think of an alternate suggestion. Rather than ripping the Recall list code straight from campaign, create a new option for MP where you get a maximum of 10 Hero slots (. . . OK, 10 per faction). This 10 slot list works just like the Recall list except that units are manually added to it rather than automatically, and there is a maximum of ten heroes which you can save. The option to save units is given at the end of a game if this option is being used. I envision a window with two scroll boxes; on the left, you see all of your current units, and on the right is your stored heroes. You can "Add->" or "Remove."

Upon re-reading I found a possible flaw to my own suggestion. People really, really like their heroes. If something like this were to be implemented we'd have more users quitting early. They would end the game early if a hero of theirs was almost dead just to be able to save it in their Hero list, enter another game, sit him/her on a town to regenerate, then quit that game.

Unless . . . if you quit the game, you forfeit the chance to store units, even the ones that you brought from your list! Quitting is essentially leaving your troops behind on the battle field, so if you quit early you leave your heroes to their fates. This would actually be pretty cool because then the next person to take over would have a chance to gain the units they the quitter left behind. This actually starts to create some backstory for the units!

Now, the only problem is people taking Host control over another player in order to steal their Heroes . . .
What if nobody ever asked "What if?"

FleshPeeler . . . Editting 5 times per every 1 post.
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Sorrow
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Post by Sorrow »

This is a strategy game... You both start the same. If you want big units play with low xp.
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Temuchin Khan
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Post by Temuchin Khan »

This idea reminds me of an idea I toyed with several months ago but never developed.

The idea was that at the end of a 1-player human vs. AI game, you would would be given the option, if you had been victorious, of setting up another game with the same soldiers you had been using, including those who had levelled.

I suppose such a thing might end up being somewhat like the mystery campaign, except that any faction available in multiplayer could be used. I realize this would only partially alleviate the problem being discussed here, but I thought I'd mention it.
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Sorrow
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Post by Sorrow »

Temuchin Khan wrote:This idea reminds me of an idea I toyed with several months ago but never developed.

The idea was that at the end of a 1-player human vs. AI game, you would would be given the option, if you had been victorious, of setting up another game with the same soldiers you had been using, including those who had levelled.

I suppose such a thing might end up being somewhat like the mystery campaign, except that any faction available in multiplayer could be used. I realize this would only partially alleviate the problem being discussed here, but I thought I'd mention it.
That is kind of cool, although if you get too strong a basic AI isn't going to stand much chance.
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