Brent (0.1.7) – for 1.9

[mich]

Hi melinath.
Good job with this campaign, the game mecanics is very interesting.
Some bugs.
Wose sapling standing image is missing (the correct path is units/wose/wose-sapling.png, and not units/wose-sapling.png).
You can end the first quest infinite times. After ending the quest, if you came back to the big tree you will receive the reward infinite times.
Now some questions. How many quest are completed? I have played througt the pixie one and the kill 5 flame beasts one (killing also the flame beast leader).

General Note:
If anyone wants to, you're now welcome to design your own heroes. They won't get their own quests lines, but if they're good, they might be made playable as an alternative to Brent. I'll post details at the beginning of this thread.

What kind of heroes do you want? Human or are others races good? Maybe in the future I can make one, if I have time.
Sorry for my bad english.

[melinath]

Hello, mich. Glad you like it!
Thanks for the bug reports. They've been fixed.

So far, only those two quests are completable. I have a volunteer doing the map for Port Meiran, which is where you would be able to complete the Skeleton Note quest, but it's taking him some time.

You killed the flame beast LEADER? I assume that I made the map too unbalanced in favor of the water faeries and they helped you? That's not supposed to happen, but I haven't gotten the tweaking quite right.

Heroes:
Right now, what I'd really like to have is a young female human hero, so that people can play either gender. This would be the easiest character for me to integrate.
More generally speaking, any hero that could fit into the "being sent into the forest by a (human) mother to hunt" quest would have a good chance of being accepted.
A hero that *doesn't* fit that quest (of any race or age) would be fairly easy to integrate, as long as it came with:
a) a semi-plausible reason to be in the forest hunting animals and a short text to be put in the storyboard
OR
b) a hand-crafted introductory quest, either in Alden Forest or in some other map.
Characters that are hard for me to integrate are unlikely to be accepted/used at this point, because my main focus for now is finishing Brent's quest network.

[mich]

You killed the flame beast LEADER? I assume that I made the map too unbalanced in favor of the water faeries and they helped you? That's not supposed to happen, but I haven't gotten the tweaking quite right.

The scenario is quite balanced. I have chosen the warrior line, probably the better against the flame beast, and yes, I have reloaded one time and was lucky. You have also to consider that I had all the advancements (thanks to the great tree bug). You can simply fix the problem adding some level 2 (or level 1) guards near the flame beasts encampement or reduce the leader movepoints (he tend to leave the keep unguarded a little too much, so if you play well you can block him from recruiting, but it can be really dangerous.

For the hero, now I'm a bit busy, but probably in the future (during next month) I will make one.

[lu_zero]

The magic missile is still not so magic at rank 2

[Darkaros]

The Faerie Battlefield was actually kind of unbalanced, with fire winning. The three units that the faeries use, the wisp, sapling, and water elemental, were all kind of weak:

The Wisp was a tank, but it costed 13 gold a pop- even more than the saplings. They weren't suited too well for their purpose, either. It would be better if the gold cost was decreased to 8 or 9.

The Sapling was meant to be the main infantry of the faeries, but it kind of failed. Heh... It had a weakness to fire attacks, but it did really weak impact damage in return. It might be better if you altogether replaced it with the Wose, or add in the level one Water Dryad instead: the fire elementals and sprites ripped them open.

The Water Elemental was actually the most useful unit the faeries used, and were balanced. However, the fact that it was only effective on water meant that it didn't get a lot of action.

Of course, we are talking about level 0 units versus level 1 units...

The defenses for both leaders worked pretty well: The Woses only stayed nearby and beat down anything that moved.
However, the Fire Wisps actually spent a lot of time attacking units that came into its range, such as a Wisp that was village stealing. I think you should change the units to Living Furnaces, if only because they are less likely to charge into battle.

You should probably add more villages to the Faerie side, too, and make the guard units on both sides loyal: The Faeries had signifigantly less income because of only 7 villages compared to 9, and because of level 3 guards instead of level 2 guards. By turn 37, I'd only killed 5 fire beasts before they overwhelmed their side of the map: A Fire Wisp with 50% XP to level up was patrolling the lake, with 5 other units clumped together ready to overwhelm anything that got close.

[melinath]

Bug fixes/minor changes: Guards on Flame side are closer to the leader. The battle line is farther north, so the fire wisps are less likely to interfere. All guards are now loyal.

@lu_zero: What exactly do you mean, "it's not so magic"? Are you referring to the fact that if you don't pursue the path of magic, the missile becomes a lot less powerful, reflecting the fact that you've chosen not to develop that area?

@Darkaros: The ai actually has access to other units as well, and both sides start with the same number of villages. I'll look into the balance when I have time.

[lu_zero]

@lu_zero: What exactly do you mean, "it's not so magic"? Are you referring to the fact that if you don't pursue the path of magic, the missile becomes a lot less powerful, reflecting the fact that you've chosen not to develop that area?

Looks like I hadn't updated to the latest version. If I pick a different path there the magic missile completely disappear and looks like there isn't a furtive+magic path even if other combos are available.

[melinath]

Ah, yes. In the old versions it vanished completely. There actually will be a furtive/magic path, but it'll be one of the hidden paths. i.e. you'll need to have researched magic missile in level one to get the magic furtive in level 3. (or was it level 2...) I had wanted to do more combinations, but the amount of work grows exponentially, so I stopped before I died.
...so... are you now okay with the magicness of the magic missile? I can't tell if your post (lu_zero) is a statement or a suggestion...

[lu_zero]

Ah, yes. In the old versions it vanished completely. There actually will be a furtive/magic path, but it'll be one of the hidden paths. i.e. you'll need to have researched magic missile in level one to get the magic furtive in level 3. (or was it level 2...) I had wanted to do more combinations, but the amount of work grows exponentially, so I stopped before I died.

I see now =) Looks interesting

...so... are you now okay with the magicness of the magic missile? I can't tell if your post (lu_zero) is a statement or a suggestion...

I had the older version even if I was sure I had updated ^^; Sorry, the missile seems fixed now =)

[melinath]

Version 0.1.4 is out! Apologies for the delay. I got caught up in graphical details and real life. There will be some minor fixes over the next few days.

EDIT: The minor fixes are done. If you get to a blank map - that quest will be finished for 0.1.5. Also, Brent is available on the 1.7 add-on server.

EDIT EDIT:: Due to technical difficulties... erm... I accidentally deleted Brent of the 1.6 add-on server. I will reupload it as soon as the server stops breaking my connection when I try. For now, though, it's available for 1.7!

[Darkaros]

Err, when I counted the villages in the Faerie Battleground, I accidently skipped the Underwater ones... Hehe, whoops...

Anyway, I think I like the Forest Hunter advancement the most... Especially when I got Druid Initiate Though, admitingly... The Dryad kept on respawning to give me a reward everytime I moved on her tree. Got disappointed when Forest Hunter to Druid Intiate means losing Ambush.

Also, it got a bit weird when the Dryad respawned two times to ask conversation. It mostly had to do with the Dryad giving you constant rewards and then popping up a clone asking annoying questions like, "Would you like the to help us by finding the dwarves?" followed by "Have you found the dwarves yet?"

By the way, what are the four Faerie quests? I can only get to "Find the Water Sprites" "Get Da Dwarves" and "Faerie Battleground", which I'm not even sure is part of the series.

Edit: Oh yes, speaking of the Dryad popping up and cloning multiple times, the Snippets of Conversation are heard multiple times too. 3 lines of "I think we should wipe them out!" "No." were heard in one turn, which was really... Annoying.

[melinath]

The Dryad kept on respawning to give me a reward everytime I moved on her tree.

Fixed.

Also, it got a bit weird when the Dryad respawned two times to ask conversation. It mostly had to do with the Dryad giving you constant rewards and then popping up a clone asking annoying questions like, "Would you like the to help us by finding the dwarves?" followed by "Have you found the dwarves yet?"

I can't reproduce this at the moment. It may have been fixed as a side effect, but it could still be a problem.

By the way, what are the four Faerie quests? I can only get to "Find the Water Sprites" "Get Da Dwarves" and "Faerie Battleground", which I'm not even sure is part of the series.

The fourth quest is not really much of a quest. As far as the current line is concerned, returning to Ylliana after fetching the Water Sprites is a quest.

Edit: Oh yes, speaking of the Dryad popping up and cloning multiple times, the Snippets of Conversation are heard multiple times too. 3 lines of "I think we should wipe them out!" "No." were heard in one turn, which was really... Annoying.

Should now be fixed.

Thanks for the detailed bug report! I'm glad that you seem to be enjoying the game. I'll go upload the fixes now.

[Captain_Wrathbow]

I know I'm a new name in this topic, but even though nobody knows who I am, I've still got a suggestion.
I think that the campaign is really in need of a much more catchy name. Many times, I had browsed the add-on server, and I clearly remember noticing Brent, but it sounded so boring that I ended up going for other things. I had no idea how cool it was until I found this forum topic, then I downloaded it right away. I bet a lot of people are missing out on this great project just because they think it sounds boring.

Second, was there a bug of some kind when I played it, or did you intentionally leave out music in the campaign?

[melinath]

I know I'm a new name in this topic, but even though nobody knows who I am, I've still got a suggestion.
I think that the campaign is really in need of a much more catchy name. Many times, I had browsed the add-on server, and I clearly remember noticing Brent, but it sounded so boring that I ended up going for other things. I had no idea how cool it was until I found this forum topic, then I downloaded it right away. I bet a lot of people are missing out on this great project just because they think it sounds boring.

Second, was there a bug of some kind when I played it, or did you intentionally leave out music in the campaign?

I'm glad you like it! I probably should think up a better name... music is missing because I never got around to getting 1.6 to play nice with my soundcard. However, in 1.7 the sound works just fine, so I may start experimenting... once I have some time.

[zoggop]

Hey, I'm playing Brent in 1.7.1 ... it's really addictive (the traditional xp advancement hook). I'm having some issues with the Dwarf quest(s)... I got the quest to find and contact the dwarves, and talked to the dwarven king, who told me to go north to find caves & the previous messenger who never returned... but the quest to do so disappeared, along with the original dwarven quest. when i return to the forest and find the faery she simply asks if i've found the dwarves yet. also my character keeps on regressing back to a level 0 peasant (from a level 2 dryad initiate) when i move into a new map (this has happened when exiting the dwarven cave into the world map and when entering alden forest from the world map. i just reload the previous save of course... but it seemed like a bug one should know about.