New NESes, ideas, development, etc

It's very cliche.

Also, how can dwarven language be both uncommon outside of dwarven territories and a requisite for traders?
 
Pretty cliché... but I guess that's not as bad as making up uninteresting unique races, for the sake of being unique. Familiarity isn't that bad I guess, but some spin might help, just my two cents.

Well, I generally maintain that the only thing that makes a fantasy species interesting is how it acts. The background, politics, history, sociology, physicality et cetera of a world have a larger effect on how interesting it is, much larger than what inhabits it. At least in my opinion, and in my experience. As an example, I'd much rather play an RPG that had stereotypical fantasy races with a unique or at least interesting element to it, than an RPG with flying dinosaur reindeer.

EDIT ADDITION: As far as Dwarven language goes, as I would put it, it is a common commercial language among the upper class and thus desirable for someone who was interested in doing major commercial work, but is not spoken outside of Dwarven territories for any reason otherwise. Kind of a language of the financial elite.
 
Well, I generally maintain that the only thing that makes a fantasy species interesting is how it acts. The background, politics, history, sociology, physicality et cetera of a world have a larger effect on how interesting it is, much larger than what inhabits it. At least in my opinion, and in my experience. As an example, I'd much rather play an RPG that had stereotypical fantasy races with a unique or at least interesting element to it, than an RPG with flying dinosaur reindeer.

I would disagree. In my opinion, nothing else will be interesting if the races aren't.
 
It's kind of boring. If you're going to do the stereotypical man/elf/dwarf trope, at least make the setting somewhat compelling.

Indeed. Well, this is purely on a theoretical basis, just showing the foundation of what a player might be working with. I may add a background later, but I wouldn't be undertaking such a project until Dawn over a New World croaked or reached its natural conclusion.

I do have plenty of ideas for a background, however...

EDIT: If people are indeed interested in a fantasy NES, I might undertake to field some lore. If not for an NES, then for the sake of theory. Were it to be a conventional stats-based NES, the game would probably field a military/economic power reminiscent of that of the Cyrodiilic Empire in the Elder Scrolls universe, or the Victorian British Empire. But more inclined to senseless slaughter.
 
“And despite the complex apparatus of religion and law which this people had erected, they were forever at odds, waging countless wars over whether their meat should be rare or dark.”

-Magnus Jarlsrike, The Melodious Eastern Isles, c. 1543

“We must confront our faith’s true irony: The Lord calls upon man to love his neighbor without cease, and yet never does the mind cease to devise new and more infernal engines with which to kill his fellow. But we kill to save, and destroy to remake, for without death, can there be no eternal life, and without destruction, no remaking of the world in God’s own image.”

-Pope Eustus I, Triumphantis Ecclesiae, 1537

Preliminary work on a reboot of TNESI: The Glorious Mysteries has begun. As you may or may not remember, it was an alternate history NES that a lot of the past couple generations of players enjoyed. The NES ended in an alternate 1535, and will pick up in 1550, after I have eliminated some not-so-historically-accurate elements and developed some new, interesting nations!

I'm developing a new ruleset system that's easy to interact with for players, easy to update for me, and also accurately models the difficulties of focusing on everything at once for 16th century nations. I'm indebted to the DaftNES 2 ruleset.

Conditional Action™ System [ROUGH DRAFT]

Action Points – Major, allows areas of focus to be designated for that turn. Most great nations have 2, minor nations have 1.

Military: Found one army /+3 condition
Colonial: Found/expand one colony (chance of failure modified by distance, stories)
Domestic: +2 condition
Religious: Possible bonuses to domestic condition, military condition, or other intangible benefits
Administrative: +1 Action Point for next turn (reform explanation required, failure chance possible)
???

Military Overview:

Every nation has at least 1 army, which is composed of multiple divisions, battalions, companies, etc. Each army has two attributes, size, and condition. A larger size and a better condition both contribute to an army’s chance of winning a battle. Condition is generally harder to improve and more important than size, however. Professional or noble troops have a disproportionately higher condition as compared to levies. An army can be divided into more than one army, though this will lower the size of both forces significantly.

Every nation has an army limit. This is the number of armies which can be safely raised, and it is determined by a variety of factors. The army limit assumes an army of average size, so presumably one could “bend” the limit if they are using smaller armies.

While professional armies cost action points to raise, levy armies can be raised for free. They are poorer in quality however.

Levy forces can be mixed with professional armies, though the condition of the mixed force will take a hit. I will keep track of how many army points you have used, even if levies are mixed in with other troops.

One action point can produce an army of professional (or mercenary) troops and Unsteady condition. One action point can raise the Condition of an army by 3 points, or you can spread out those points across multiple armies. Levy armies do not require action points to be produced, but they can only be produced up to the levy limit. The size of an army produced by one action point is determined by a nation’s Population, which ranges from 1 to 7.

Routed – Breaking – Unsteady – Tolerable –Steady – Strong – Impeccable
Tiny – Small – Medium Small – Average – Medium Large – Large – Huge

When considering campaign successes, an advantage in size and an advantage in condition modify one’s chance of success upwards.

Domestic Condition:

This modifies your chances of waging (and winning) wars unopposed, getting potential bonus action points, and preventing domestic rebellions. If your domestic condition sinks low, you will have problems, including the aforementioned rebellions, loss of action points, army condition losses, and colonial troubles. Spending an action point on domestic condition may manifest in the form of lowering taxes, building public improvements, patronizing arts and entertainment, etc.

Rebelling – Rioting – Disdainful – Muttering – Neutral – Content – Happy – Celebratory – Worshipful

Well written stories can grant military or domestic condition bonuses, increased colonial expansion, or possibly even bonus action points! You just have to impress me.

Template Draft:

Nation Name/Capital
Ruler/Player:
Action Points:
Population:
Army Listing: [Army Name/Location/Size/Condition]
Army Limit:
Domestic Condition:
Description:

---

I still need to figure out how colonies work into the mechanics, and probably duplicate the army mechanics for fleets with slight alterations.
 
Well, I've done a bit of playing around and made a map of Tamriel based off of another map (I'll link the other one later, am kind of tired right now) for a possible Elder Scrolls NES. It's not completely finished, has a lot of minor editing left to it, but tell me what you guys think anyways.

Spoiler :
 
Does anyone know where I could find resource icons for a map? Preferably the kind of resources found in the bronze age. Bronze, Olive Oil, Opium, Saffron... that kind of thing.
 
civ3 creation and customisation.
 
That looks like a pretty faithful projection, except for Black Marsh which looks just a little deformed.
 
gimp.
 
Preliminary work on a reboot of TNESI: The Glorious Mysteries has begun. As you may or may not remember, it was an alternate history NES that a lot of the past couple generations of players enjoyed. The NES ended in an alternate 1535, and will pick up in 1550, after I have eliminated some not-so-historically-accurate elements and developed some new, interesting nations!

I'm developing a new ruleset system that's easy to interact with for players, easy to update for me, and also accurately models the difficulties of focusing on everything at once for 16th century nations. I'm indebted to the DaftNES 2 ruleset.

Conditional Action™ System [ROUGH DRAFT]

Action Points – Major, allows areas of focus to be designated for that turn. Most great nations have 2, minor nations have 1.

Military: Found one army /+3 condition
Colonial: Found/expand one colony (chance of failure modified by distance, stories)
Domestic: +2 condition
Religious: Possible bonuses to domestic condition, military condition, or other intangible benefits
Administrative: +1 Action Point for next turn (reform explanation required, failure chance possible)
???

Military Overview:

Every nation has at least 1 army, which is composed of multiple divisions, battalions, companies, etc. Each army has two attributes, size, and condition. A larger size and a better condition both contribute to an army’s chance of winning a battle. Condition is generally harder to improve and more important than size, however. Professional or noble troops have a disproportionately higher condition as compared to levies. An army can be divided into more than one army, though this will lower the size of both forces significantly.

Every nation has an army limit. This is the number of armies which can be safely raised, and it is determined by a variety of factors. The army limit assumes an army of average size, so presumably one could “bend” the limit if they are using smaller armies.

While professional armies cost action points to raise, levy armies can be raised for free. They are poorer in quality however.

Levy forces can be mixed with professional armies, though the condition of the mixed force will take a hit. I will keep track of how many army points you have used, even if levies are mixed in with other troops.

One action point can produce an army of professional (or mercenary) troops and Unsteady condition. One action point can raise the Condition of an army by 3 points, or you can spread out those points across multiple armies. Levy armies do not require action points to be produced, but they can only be produced up to the levy limit. The size of an army produced by one action point is determined by a nation’s Population, which ranges from 1 to 7.

Routed – Breaking – Unsteady – Tolerable –Steady – Strong – Impeccable
Tiny – Small – Medium Small – Average – Medium Large – Large – Huge

When considering campaign successes, an advantage in size and an advantage in condition modify one’s chance of success upwards.

Domestic Condition:

This modifies your chances of waging (and winning) wars unopposed, getting potential bonus action points, and preventing domestic rebellions. If your domestic condition sinks low, you will have problems, including the aforementioned rebellions, loss of action points, army condition losses, and colonial troubles. Spending an action point on domestic condition may manifest in the form of lowering taxes, building public improvements, patronizing arts and entertainment, etc.

Rebelling – Rioting – Disdainful – Muttering – Neutral – Content – Happy – Celebratory – Worshipful

Well written stories can grant military or domestic condition bonuses, increased colonial expansion, or possibly even bonus action points! You just have to impress me.

Template Draft:

Nation Name/Capital
Ruler/Player:
Action Points:
Population:
Army Listing: [Army Name/Location/Size/Condition]
Army Limit:
Domestic Condition:
Description:

---

I still need to figure out how colonies work into the mechanics, and probably duplicate the army mechanics for fleets with slight alterations.


@Thlayli I like this! In future I may be indebted to your ruleset which is endebted to my ruleset :)

Well, I've done a bit of playing around and made a map of Tamriel based off of another map (I'll link the other one later, am kind of tired right now) for a possible Elder Scrolls NES. It's not completely finished, has a lot of minor editing left to it, but tell me what you guys think anyways.

Spoiler :

@bestshot obviously the snobs will snob about the variable border width around some of your smaller islands. I can't comment on the Elder Scrolls world (I think I played one of the games a bit) but I think it looks good, if a little small. I take it there will not be fiddly little nations appearing on the map?

Does anyone know where I could find resource icons for a map? Preferably the kind of resources found in the bronze age. Bronze, Olive Oil, Opium, Saffron... that kind of thing.

Yeah I steal from games I have installed :) The Civ2:ToT terrain and resources can be found here in PNG format. Maybe search that site for random icons too, I found stuff for my space NES idea there.
 
Yeah I was gonna clear up the boarders when I went back to finish editing it later as well as some other minor fixes. I didn't make this from scratch, merely traced another map of Tamriel that was more detailed, to make it easier to modify should someone invade someone else or what not.

Blackmarsh probably looks odd because I didn't bother to show the various lakes and such, everything that was within the confines of the continent I just colored in as this is mostly just a political map, not one to show geographic features.

And yeah, there were some islands that looked to be "neutral" like the islands south of High Rock and the island of Solstheim, but for the sake of simplicity I just put them under a different province's control.
 
So a little theoretical political information.

Humans: A people who have shown themselves adapt at changing their ways as technology or physicality requires, humans have spread themselves across the world, colonizing and "humanizing", nearly every patch of land known to cartographers. Though their society is subject to violent and chaotic periods of change and turmoil, in recent history humans have shown themselves to be businessmen, strategists and philosophers, as well as mages. The spread of human culture, and human language, is a testament to the virulence of mankind, not to mention the colonial and imperial achievements of the various human nations of past and present.

Elves: a troubled people, the Elves long for the past. Disunited, rifted, Elven nations seem doomed to experience constant upheaval and conflict. In recent history, the Elves have warred against each other almost without stop. A caste-driven society obsessed with hereditary ownership and leadership, Elven nations are controlled and subject to an inter-weaving network of familial organizations known as Houses, which maintain a strangle-hold over everything from custom to commerce. As well as having their own militias, these entities have their fingers in everything Elven, making any type of political or domestic change staggered, oftentimes violent, and always slow. Invasion by various human nations has served only to light more kinder for the ever-burning fire of Elven discontent.

Dwarves: Industrialists to the core, the business of Dwarves is the business of empires. Maintaining a vast multi-national corporate monopoly on multifarious products from precious ores to plants, the Dwarves have been a driving force behind nearly every major political, national, or religious movement within the past Era. It is said that the Dwarves engineered the rise of the various human colonial empires, and that their manipulation of markets perpetuate human dominance, and through reliance on Dwarven goods, Dwarven commercial superiority.

Halflings: A people as deeply religious as their are diminuitive (or as they insist around humans and Elves, small-boned), the Halflings are the victims of human colonialism, if nothing else. Since being "discovered", by human colonists and voyeurs, the Halflings have been enslaved, sold, exported or any other manner of unpleasant things. Held mostly under the yoke of various human nations, the Halflings ironically take solace in human religion. Having a large church presence in their lands, the Halflings are always ready to give life and limb for the gods, if not for their own freedom.
 
I wouldn't bother.

Let anyone pick any race they like, and describe them themselves.

Personally, i wouldn't have other races. It just makes balancing issues. Keep it strictly human, just on a random map.
 
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