Antar, Son of Rheor [Development Thread]

[Adamant14]

@Gelphrad:
The staff is weird:

I think I have to do a complete revision of the code

@dialogue:
Don't really understand why you write about "betrayal" of the orcs. Is this supposed to be northern alliance area / time? Don't see how anyone can feel betrayed without a previous agreement.

what wikipedia says about that

Often betrayal is the act of supporting a rival group, or it is a complete break from previously decided upon or presumed norms by one party from the others.

Some animation near the throne hall was weird since a sentinel surrounded by undead in a village walked out to be honour guard for my unit reaching the throne hall first - which almost led to an undead breakthrough.

It was not intended that the enemies are that near when you reach the throne room.
The events in this scenario are very hard to time, there is so much that can slow the player ...
In all of my testplays I never had a problem reaching Gomdring, but I know exactly what to do.
Of course a player who plays this scenario first time has to discover the map.

Seems there is still a lot of work to do ...

Where do you find this lowitz guy?

Gomdring is the dwarf you have to find, the loyal Lowitz is in your team.

I've been stuck on the dwarfish caves for quite a while now. I have tried 4 different times but the dwarves always get killed to early leaving me massively outnumbered with no way to kill all the units in time. Does anyone have any suggestions?

You have to be quicker than the undead.

Spoiler:

Kill the western undead leader as soon as you are able. And then move Antar northwards into the mines. He is very fast, and with him you should be able to find Gomdring before the mines are filled with undead.
If you don't have enough troops to cope the western undead leader, then the game gives you a hint that tells you that there is a secret path into the mines. Using the secret path, you can move Antar into the mines without beating the undead leader.

[Zarkussell]

I ended up beating the rest of the campaign. The dwarf mission wasn't too hard once I used a pincer type formation and spammed heavy infantry.

I guess I got lowitz killed in the mission before lol because he wasn't in my team when I finished the elves in the cave. Nice campaign though. Can't wait until the rest is finished.

[Zarkussell]

I also didn't notice gelphrad being very overpowered even at level 4. Have you redone him?

[taptap]

I also didn't notice gelphrad being very overpowered even at level 4. Have you redone him?

He is overpowered at L0, not at L4.

[Adamant14]

Segurd:
I added resistance to impact, to make him more useful during the first scenario, where he only has to fight against WC's

Gelphrad:
I think about to give Gelphrad some protection in the scenario of his appearance, but only on the EASY level.
I will do this with the FORCE_CHANCE_TO_HIT macro.
This should help unexperienced players to keep him alive.
Somebody once called the little Gelphrad guy a pain in the ass


I've done a complete rework of Gelphrads attack values.
What do you think about it?

Original ( the values of the regular Wesnoth mage line )

Gelphrad without staff ( without the Staff of Kereathur )

Gelphrad with staff ( with the Staff of Kereathur, extra fire attack )

[taptap]

Gelphrad overhaul:

Whatever you do with Gelphrad please don't manipulate FORCE_CHANCE_TO_HIT unless it is a very obvious "story while making you click" element, I get paranoid when it is used in any less obvious ways, don't damage the trust in RNG, especially for beginners. You have enough gold in the second scenario and can easily shield Gelphrad and set him up for kills (with a reserve unit to kill when he fails), he even has a 91% chance on a single hit (if he still has magical attacks at L0a). If you still want it easier for beginners then give them a levelled L0b mage or L1 Gelphrad (and always give them the staff).

The original line you wrote down is mage -> mage of light and at L4 you wrote Arch Mage stats. This makes a weird comparison all around.

The new stats look better balanced, but still somewhat unconvincing. He has an additional fire attack slightly more powerful than the arcane attack, but against the main opponents throughout the campaign the ranged light will still be better. The melee looks weird, better without staff than with at L1, than a little more damage until evening out at L4?

What I believe a good achievement artefact could be in this campain:

- an additional melee attack throughout (maybe one point less damage per hit)
- maybe a healthy trait given by the staff on top
- no changes on ranged, where changes are either overpowered (hard to top increased Mage of Light damage vs. undead) or useless

[tribes55]

Not reporting much about the campaign suggestion wise, but I would like to give some feedback.
This is a great campaign. If you haven't played it yet, I highly suggest that you do. This is a rare jewel that you hardly see anymore within the add-ons.
I've definitely come to respect Adamant14 and his work on this campaign any many others. He's an iconic member of the Wesnoth community, and I'm glad to see that you're still kicking, updating your great campaigns.

[Adamant14]

@ Taptap:

OK, no FORCE_CHANCE_TO_HIT for Gelphrad.
But the staff should stay as a price for cope levelling Gelphrad.
The staff should get earned.

About the comparison:
Because there is no level 4 Mage of Light in mainline I used the Arch Mages stats.

I would like to keep the additional fire attack.
Gelphrad, the mighty master of light and fire - sounds good, right?
Gelphrad is not an ordinary mage, he will become one of the mightiest mages ever,
and for that reason he must have very powerfull attacks.

An additional melee attack sound good,
but I am not sure about the healthy trait ( this sounds like a superpower )



@ tribes55:
Thank you for you kind words.
Really glad you are still around too.
The campaign is not abandoned, not yet,
although I wish I had more time, more support, and more will to work on that campaign.

[taptap]

Hello again. It will be an improvement to current state where he is good at different things on each level regardless of what exactly you do. Imo, fire and light is roleplay working only for people with high emotional investment into Gelphrad (not me, he is a bit flat and there is only so much story time) - unless his fire damage is truly overpowered it will be overshadowed by arcane damage vs. undead, which is supposed to be the most common enemy afaik. (My example was just an example of what I believe a good artefact-staff may look like.) I am more invested in Segurd, the beefy peasant of Stegwyn, my little dwarf group or Sir Muddrullyn (Mud rollin'?), who can't be a particularly good rider, but catched that arcane damage amulet in the mud. For the story, it would probably work even better if Gelphrad only levels to L2 (too young for L3 ) instead of making him into an instant most powerful mage in the world (can't he wait a few years before becoming that?), he would still be an asset as a prestige L2 spellcaster-healer with bonus abilities.

I am not fond of the Hagtamorg scenario, not only is Hagtamorg dead, it is 3 or more scenarios welded onto each other and no way to tell how much is ahead of you by the turn count. It isn't really the map, which is not bad after all, but when you made it through most of the map and suddenly it is "bonus objective unlocked, 20 adepts are waiting for you" time --- ah, come on, and this is just the beginning from reading the file. (I have a distinct feeling my elven force looks very different than what you do field in playthroughs. Sharpshooters end up my main damage dealer, had one enchantress, one druid and one shyde as well. Melee elves: prowler, plenty of L2 + 2 marshals.) Is it even possible to use your trees and still beat the time limit? Anyway, I lost that one to suiciding adepts as I tried to cut through them faster than possible under time pressure. Wonder if you can cut this scenario into 2 or 3 - maybe let the elves (for once in Wesnoth hesitate) in front of the cave and then let a selected party from Antar (who made it there through a plain and not a mountain pass for change) and the elves topple the government. I smiled reading the names in the final scenario, but I guess you keep more integrity for your story if you avoid that.

[Adamant14]

Gelphrad:
Limiting Gelphrad to level to sound good, but only story wise. I'm pretty sure I will disappoint most of the players if I do that.
About the unit itself, and its background, you are completely right. There is still a lot of work ahead.

The Staff:
Arcane (light) is the natural power of Gelphrad.
The fire is the staffs power, the staff is a bonus.
Some kind of extra power, not more.

Hagtamorg scenario:
I am not satisfied with this scenario. I resized and changed the map many times, and the enemies too.
First the map was twice as large, and the caves full of Trolls, with lots of tightly, narrow tunnels.
More than 100 turn were needed to play thru the scenario.
After about five complete reworks, I am still not satisfied. The first part is not bad, but the cave part lacks.
Maybe you are right, splitting the scenario into two scenarios is a good idea.
Only thing that stops me from splitting is that the second part is too poor for its own scenario.
This means a lot of rework.

I'm still hoping for a good story-writer, who is willing to carry the campaign on.

[white_haired_uncle]

Start with the autosave. Kill the NW with the Sylph. Observe the attacks of the unit at 23.7. Move that unit to the keep, and take the item. Observe the unchanged attacks.

Now that I think about it, I'm not sure adding the extra save file adds anything, but typing this disclaimer is a lot more work than just deleting the extra file, so I'm gonna go that route.


EDIT: BFW 14.4.5

[Adamant14]

Thank you for the bug report.
I fixed the problem, and a new update is available.

I would be happy to watch some replays, I am always interested how other players handle the challenges in this campaign.

[white_haired_uncle]

I got to Volcano Mountain, and I noticed that my humans were substantially weaker than my elves. And I seemed to be missing a bunch of units, including a general and a couple of paladins.

Turns out that's not all I was missing. When I came to the end of the campaign, I was also missing a critical unit.

I didn't catch this in time to have access to all of the autosaves, but I've attached what I can. I don't think I even lost one unit in Dwarven Pass, but when we catch up with Antar again at Volcano Mountain, none of his units from DP are available for recall, including the one I'd need to finish the campaign.

[white_haired_uncle]

Thank you for the bug report.
I fixed the problem, and a new update is available.

I would be happy to watch some replays, I am always interested how other players handle the challenges in this campaign.

I don't save replays, but I can share one experience. There's a level with a prisoner, necromancer or something similar. I cheated my backside off. Maybe I started off in the wrong direction, or needed to save up a bunch of gold in the previous scenario, or whatever, but I don't see any way that scenario can be completed honestly.

Spoiler:

I took the "back way" in, met the dwarf, recalled the few units I could afford, and then got crushed right there. Surrounded, outnumbered at least 10 to 1, and with a virtually infinite number of walking dead being spawned, I wouldn't have lasted long even if I could make it to a location that had a village or two.

I just remembered I got an error during that level as well. Unfortunately the save is long gone, but I have the log file -- search for "warden" to see the error.

Other than that scenario, and kind of losing interest on the last one, I found the campaign to be pretty solid and quite fun.

At some point, I stumbled on the help menu. I would point that out at the beginning (unless I missed it?), and maybe add a spoiler warning because some of the hints might be "too helpful" for some players.

[Adamant14]

I got to Volcano Mountain, and I noticed that my humans were substantially weaker than my elves. And I seemed to be missing a bunch of units, including a general and a couple of paladins.

Turns out that's not all I was missing. When I came to the end of the campaign, I was also missing a critical unit.
... including the one I'd need to finish the campaign.

After a look, there are indeed a lot of critical units not there, some main characters included, Dagor, Gelphrad and many others. Without Gelphrad it makes no sense to go further, because you need Gelphrad to finish the last scenario. In many many playtests I have never seen that before. Maybe something happens while you used debug-mode, or maybe updating the campaign had broke something. I have noticed problems before, when I started playing the campaign with older saveloads. That is sad, but I have no solution for that issue. I am really sorry, but I see no other way than to go back to the Dwarven Pass scenario, and to start from there again.

I just remembered I got an error during that level as well. Unfortunately the save is long gone, but I have the log file -- search for "warden" to see the error.

Seems the undead were too superior, and killed all wardens. I have to include some code for that possibility.

At some point, I stumbled on the help menu. I would point that out at the beginning (unless I missed it?), and maybe add a spoiler warning because some of the hints might be "too helpful" for some players.

Oh, I did not expect that the Help Menu is so hard to find. Thank you, I will think about a way to make it easier to find.