Skaven Design and Ideas.

[Psychic_Llamas]

very good ideas there. i like the pilferers guild a lot. we could use the gypsy wagon mechanics from FfH to implement this.

 

[Arexack_heretic]

---
I'd like tomake it impossible to declare war on skaven, and have any peace offering be accepted.
This may sound strange, but skaven can dissapear and no one knows where they go to.
OK the above proposition wouldn't work, but something that allows skaven safety from prosecution.
hidden nationality and invisibility are nice...maybe if skaven can build boobytraps...they would be fairly safe from open agression?
---

How about automatic open-borders for all skaven units?(and invisibility)

Maybe as an effect of having a vermin-stronghold in a city of civ-X.

---
I say have the vermin sewers as an upgrade to a city with normal sewers.
(It 'd just be 'vermin-fested' )

---

The idea of building units in an enemy city sounds interesting, but where get the shields?
Just buy troops with stolen gold?

IMO an 'airlift' function would be more in line with skaven infiltration, moving in troops via underground tunnels. (bit quick though, can the range of airlifts be restricted?)

How would attacking the city work?
Infiltrated skaven units get the city defence bonus instead of the defenders? (minimally citydefence is lost and +50% cityattack)
You'd have to move the skaven ouside the city, then attack? That is weird.
Maybe have a spell 'overwhelm' 'ambush' 'gutter-stab' or something, that gets a skaven unit to attack the weakest unit available and then either die or return to invisible-status?

I'm not sure how the game-mechanics would work with capture-able units that are invisible and able to enter opponent-cities... the normal units able to move into opponent's cities (without open-borders) cannot capture (or battle).

---

anti-infestation:
It is very difficult to get rid of skaven once they are established.
An exterminators-guild or dwarven rat-slayers unit or inquisition/witchhunters may alleviate some effects though.

I like the slaves idea, skaven are notorious for taking human slaves, but I couldnt see any proper use for slave units.
Maybe they can be used to improve tile yields one is on. sacrifice or to produce a slave-specialperson +1shields.

Instead of causing +1, let skaven steal food (limiting city growth) this could symbolize skaven stealing food and abducting people. a -1 may also be likely for a city terrorized by random dissapearances and killings.

 

[Psychic_Llamas]

i think an automatic open borders with everyone would unbalance Skaven too much. some special units could have auto open borders but not all.

i agree that an ordinary sewer should be required for Vermin Sewers.

i wonder if building units in a rivals city is possible... it would be very interesting if it is

an exterminator unit could be generic for all civs, or roll extermination up into the role of inquisitors?

 

[Deon]

Well, my idea of vermin sewers was about building it in RIVAL's cities. And you can make it this way: the ratmen immigrants can build vermin sewers only if the rival already made the Sewers building there (so you should decide, to build sewers to make your city more clean but to get a danger of being spied on by the ratmen in it, or just don't build sewers at all).

Aitomatic open borders

are really unbalanced, but what is it in fact? In fact it is just an ability "can explore rival territory", and I agree that skaven should have a bunch of units with this ability.
An idea of exterminator like inquisitor gave me another idea - what is ratmen corporation? Can we imagine it like errr... some kind of ratmen population in other cities. So it loses its status as corporation but becomes something new - it's a Guild now, like in FFH. So spreading the skaven-type corporation "underground" (in the meaning of the "Illegal organization") may improve skaven cities influence(culture) and allow certain buildings and bonuses. But the main goal is to spread it to rivals' cities to gain special benefits, like listed above - for example stealing food or gold.

 

[Arexack_heretic]

if you make contact with a new civilization using a hidden unit-type,
what happens?

-You get a first contact message from that civ regardless.
-You get no first contact.

This regarding my concerns of skaven being secretive and maybe preferring to remain unknown.

--
ed: Trying to model a giantrat now. damn difficult.
changed ears, added bulging eyes. Now to get it 'boned'. sigh.

 

[Deon]

Nice model, add texture and animations, and your rat will be the best =))).

 

[Arexack_heretic]

don't know how to add animations, but I'll try.
(I think i could borrow animations from some of the animals)
In the meantime should anyone have appropriate squeeky sounds... PM me.

 

[Psychic_Llamas]

thats great AH!
whats the poly count like? dont look at me. i dont do units (but you could reuse the wolf animations, and for the squeek you could take the sounds from the Skaven units in 'Mark of Chaos' )

Well, my idea of vermin sewers was about building it in RIVAL's cities. And you can make it this way: the ratmen immigrants can build vermin sewers only if the rival already made the Sewers building there (so you should decide, to build sewers to make your city more clean but to get a danger of being spied on by the ratmen in it, or just don't build sewers at all).

yeh, i know the vermin sewers would be built in rival cities. thats why i suggested using the gypsy wagons mechanics from FfH

i was actually thinking about corporations and guilds nad i think Cults would fit better in the corporations for WH, seeeing as were making ordianery buildigns into guilds.

 

[Arexack_heretic]

It was actually converted from a wolf unit obj file.
currently trying to get the texture file to wrap around the expanded parts (tail/ears) beter.
Also trying to copy the bones from the model.nif to the effects.nif
(don't want to copy the coordinates one at the time...it is like 20bones!*3 coords)
(I may have to go over to 3dsmax and try via that suite iso NifSkope)

 

[kairob]

Hey an Idea on the food in hills, If its easier you could just give a skaven only tech +1 food from mines? This could work for Orcs and Dwarves too

 

[Arexack_heretic]

better to give it as a racial-bonus
...which I thnk is a promotion and not a tech..or is it both?

anyhow, it would be cool to have (bonuses like mushrooms and blackcorn) that only these civs can use for food.
while the others may get negative bonus from it.

fungus : (forest/hills)
goblinoid: +happy, +2 food in tile, goblin-worker can build squig-farm.
human: -health in nearby city. -1food (herbalist-shop give one extra + for mushrooms, but can that be made local only?)
maybe req. tech-naturelore to make possible poisoned-weapon equipment/promotion.

Maybe this sort of thing is already in...haven't played with orks yet.

 

[kairob]

I do like that idea...

You could do the same to make lustria and the southlands really good land for Lizardmen and skaven but naff for everyone else.

 

[Arexack_heretic]

the bonus need to be able to be cleared though, when the terrain is altered by spell or somesuch.

 

[kairob]

Here is an idea for skaven city growth. How about when they invade a city they get an option to instead of raizing or capturing it enslaving some people, the city looses one pop and all skaven cities gain X food for X turns? Then if you defeated all the defenders of a large city you could move lots of units 'into' it and gain lots of food, to help those mountain dwelling cities?

 

[Psychic_Llamas]

better to give it as a racial-bonus
...which I thnk is a promotion and not a tech..or is it both?

anyhow, it would be cool to have (bonuses like mushrooms and blackcorn) that only these civs can use for food.
while the others may get negative bonus from it.

fungus : (forest/hills)
goblinoid: +happy, +2 food in tile, goblin-worker can build squig-farm.
human: -health in nearby city. -1food (herbalist-shop give one extra + for mushrooms, but can that be made local only?)
maybe req. tech-naturelore to make possible poisoned-weapon equipment/promotion.

Maybe this sort of thing is already in...haven't played with orks yet.

i have made Mushroom graphics, im just waiting for dragonia 2 to release thier next patch so i can steal the code for it i agree that gobbos, dwarves and skaven should get unique bonuses from them

black corn is also a must (well, its planned i hope )

Here is an idea for skaven city growth. How about when they invade a city they get an option to instead of raizing or capturing it enslaving some people, the city looses one pop and all skaven cities gain X food for X turns? Then if you defeated all the defenders of a large city you could move lots of units 'into' it and gain lots of food, to help those mountain dwelling cities?

im not sure about this. is stealing people a very skavenny thing to do? and then to eat them? (i dont see skaven as a race that enslave people. im probably wrong here though)

 

[kairob]

From the army book skaven are very much enslavers and every good mod needs at least one team that eats people...

 

[Psychic_Llamas]

ok, so skaven are slavers.

so now we have darkelves, amazonians and skaven who enslave... i quite like the idea of needing to take slaves to skaven cities to let them grow (ie sacrificing slaves to boost pop.) this would also encourage them to be agressive like rela skaven. but then this is becoming similar to my idea for undead (using skellies to boost pop)

 

[kairob]

Kewl, although I have a few idea's for the vamps, fancy a chat on msn? or should a start a new thread?

 

[Arexack_heretic]

yeah skaven enslave. it is their main industry.

they eat people, but not solely. (they ate the entire pop of Kazvar, now only known to few as Skavenblight, and they can sometimes consume entire villages)
But I don't think limiting citygrowth is very skaveny. they are RODENTS. multiplication comes naturally to them.

I kinda like the idea of using slaves to (temporariliy) boost the food yield of a tile or production of a city.

I thought civ's could have different yields from various terrain-types?
(give skaven +food from swamps.)
link to fluff and slaves:
"skaven use slavegang in coracles to harvest the blackgrain that grows in the swamps surrounding Skavenblight"

 

[kairob]

You know if none of them die 2 rats after a year of breading can turn into over 1,000,000 rats, so yeah I agree on the fast breading thing.

P.S. I did assume they were two rats of different genders otherwise you just have two slightly older rats