Campaign Concept

[Osnil]

I've had this narrative in mind for a D&D game for some time, but after getting back into Wesnoth, it might fit here better as a campaign. It's about a newly coronated queen breaking the yoke of dwarven oppression over her kingdom, and avenging her father's death at their hands. I have roughly three acts in mind for it - the initial revolt, gathering allies and preparing for siege, and the final act being a long list of small scenarios playing into a grander siege. I find siege battles that are orchestrated in Wesnoth to be a little dull in campaigns overall (siege maps as defender or attacker make me cry because of how long they take for the guy on the wall to get attacked fifty times and dodge forty-seven of them for thirty turns in a row), so splitting it up narratively feels more fun and dynamic to keep the player invested in both the story and the siege.

I'm choosing dwarves to be the antagonists of this campaign concept because firstly I rarely ever see them as antagonists when you are playing the "good guys" in most mainline campaigns. I can think of maybe once in Rise of Wesnoth, and once in An Orcish Incursion (RIP my beloved) where it was pretty much "STAY OFF OUR ROCKS!" that I recall the heroes facing off against dwarves, and some in Hammer of Thursagan. Secondly, dwarves are really fun anyway, so I want to use them out of love. Thirdly, few races are as vindictive as dwarves when it comes to grudges, so their right to retribution for being wronged might be taken a bit far since they're a bit cranky.

In case you're wondering, yes, Heir to the Throne and Liberty are my favorite narratives in the mainline campaigns.

I'd like each act to have more or less a different gimmick to it. The initial revolt arc is supposed to be more spontaneous, so having recruits seems odd. One of my favorite concepts from Legend of the Invincibles was the campaign section where you didn't have upkeep and started with your whole army on the field, so I like the idea of the initial arc being built on minimal recruiting and loyal units.

The second arc is planned to be geared towards recruiting allies to aid in the defense of the city and fending off the dwarven advance guard marching on the city. That one will feel more like a standard campaign with recruitment.

The third arc is planned to be built on a whole lot more scenarios that are shorter in length and scope than the first two, to make it feel more like a siege. Because sieges should be fun, and not waiting 10 hours for 100+ guys to finish attacking and moving. So having smaller timed missions where maybe you have to destroy siege equipment, collapse tunnels, put out fires, defend specific buildings and locations, or repel an assault on the walls seems way more fun.

If you have any thoughts or suggestions, I'm happy to hear them. I'm excited to do this as a summer project and hobby.

[Refumee]

Sounds like an interesting idea, what faction will the player play?