Turnbased RPG Questable?!?

[TheNewSaint]

I have plans to do a D&D style mod:

1)Rather tightly scripted
2)A campaign that follows your heroes throughtout a war
3)Heroes (have special abilities, can cast spells, resurect on death)
4)A Weapon system
5)A special upgrade system
6)RPG style
7)"Items"
8)Plenty of dungeons and dragons
9)Some special adaptations
10)Anything else ya like



1)Quests: many scenarios that lead your character(s) through quests and give them items that can be used later at "Ye Ol' Magick Shoppe." Something you should know..... I have absolutely no skill whatsoever in python, XML and the works. I can come up with ideas though, and on some rare instances steal ideas that i think would help a just cause...

The heroes should be able to keep their promotions items weapons stats through each scenario. In the end i intend to have quite a few, "INCREDIBLY" long scenarios. Possibly with up to 80 hours of play (and the bad part is im very limited with what i can do).

2)This part, i have rather planned out, but my skills with scripting are between .001% and -50%. The campaign starts out with an easy to do scenario, that teaches you how to play while setting up the story at the same time. The basic scheme is that the enemy is at the city of Pothan and you are a soldier defending it. It is suprisingly easy to cut you way through the horde of orcs and you gain experience quite quickly. Then some stuff happens that i'd really like to explain only to the people who want to build the scenarios (and add in there own side quests here and there that add flavor to the game).

3)A yes, heroes. You start with one in the first scenario, but he is still relatively weak. Heroes (basicly who you get to play with) can be resurected sometimes if certain things happen. this is a hero thing only. There are "checkpoints" throughout each scenario, which are just cities that cant build anything. You capture them, and then upon the death of a hero he/she is resurected at the last city you captured.

Also, spells. These can be anywhere from summoning something to using buffs to doing damage at range to healing to a special effect (Freeze stops target in it's place, poison slows it and harms it and decreases its stats, unrest turns it into a skelatal minion for you to use upon its death...

Finally, special abilities. Im not sure how this will work, but i think it will be a promotion. Say there is a river (two squares wide) in your way. There will be an icon for one of your characters on a tile at a certain place. When they stand on it an action will happen, like raising a landbridge out of the riverbed.
It could be scripted as "WhenUnitWith> <PromotionOn" then the action happens. I dont mnow if that works though...

4)A weapon system. In civ4. Yes. Im thinking that a lot of these special things can be done through the promotion system, but some might have to be unit upgrades, like if you want to change your weapon from a sword to a bow, then in order to effectively lose the sword, you must upgrade the unit to a different one, eg.

Scenario Man (Sword), +50% bonus against leather armored and unnarmored units. Upgrades to Scenario Man (Bow) OR Scenario Man (Axe) OR Scenario Man (Staff) OR Scenario Man (Mace)... Then Each of those can be upgraded to either sword... everything but itself. I think this is possible if you have to have an improvement for the upgrade. My Idea of "Ye Ol' Magick Shoppe" is a collection of cities (with the city graphics changed to Be Blank And then once an improvement is added the Improvement is huge And takes up the whole tile, so it could be easy to change city graphics. The improvements would be Sword Smith, Bow Crafter, Axe Forger, Staff Carver and Mace Maker
and they would be built in different cities. All the cities would be close together, and perhaps new graphics for a hardwood floor could be added...

Also, there are other ways to get weapons, like the more powerful ones, by killing "Boss" units. They could, if they are humanoid, drop the weapon which could be picked up as a promotion... And if items can be gotten working, then creatures that are killed will drop them, and then they can be taken to a workbench or an albemic (more improvements) to be turned into Weapons, or to beef up weapons, or to make spells. It should also be noted that making/improving something uses the item.

5)While I think i explained this in #4, i will try to flesh it out some more. Upgrades can be used to give units new weapons, using the OR device explained above. However, they can also be used to improve upon the weapons at the workbench. At a cost of gold, you can improve your weapon somehow, like notched Axes or Iron Arrows, and can be extremely helpful if you want to stick with the same weapon. Two notes: buying the original weapon costs more than upgrading it, and Improved weapons can be upgraded only to the plain weapons, eg.

Axe--> Steel Blade or Iron Shaft or other weapons
Steel Blade: Gives regular axe improvement, plus an extra 20% attack
Iron Shaft: Gives regular axe improvement, plus an extra 20% defense
Steel Blade--> "Mithril Blade" or "Steel Blade and Iron shaft" or to unnimproved regular sword, mace, etc.
Steel Blade and Iron Shaft--> "Mithril blade and Iron shaft" or "Steel blade and Steel Shaft" or regular weapon.

Of course, if it is done this way, adding in the creature items improvements to any stage wouldnt be hard, it would just take time, cause you'd have to add the new thing to every upgrade, and then make it require the item, and then make it upgrade back to the other paths (attack and defense) and to regular weapons and to another item thing, so that if you wanted, you could use all the items in the game on one weapon, and upgrade it all the way... And, if you wanted to give yourself a challenge...

Find a way to store weapons once you upgrade to a different path, so that if you want you can change back to the old one at no cost, in the middle of a scenario, and then continue upgrading where you left off once you get back to "Ye Ol' Magick Shop." Or not .

6)By this i mean that it feels like an RPG, you advance and build character, a plot unrolls in front of you, and there are tasks to accopmlish, side quests, main quests, gold, magic, upgrades, fighting, and Fun!

7)Items... In the game and throughout the scenarios, your character can get items by accomplishing tasks, like helping an old man, or killing a giant, and then use the items at "YOMS" (Ye Ol' Magick Shoppe) to build spells, improve weapons, make armor possibly? I like this. I will Explain Armor Later as well. Anyway, items can also just be picked up off the ground, like special berries, flowers, roots, rocks, etc. I want them to work as units that are escorted, and when you, die, you drop them. However, i think it will be up to someone else on how to make them actually work. I hope to make it so items can also be sold... and bought. (some items can be used more than once, maybe even infinately...)

8)I need lots of scenarios, and lots of creatures to go with them. And, with this being D&D style, if it ever appeared anywhere in a fantasy game, it's fair game. Just try and make it fit together...

9)Here is where I will talk about some cool thing I think could be used in this Mod. The Civics:

I plan on turning civics into magic styles.

Government--> Element
Religion--> Summon
And on and on. I dont think there is a limit to the number of civic catagories, so i think that there should be 5 (this will probably change):

Elements
Summoning
Damaging
Buffs
Acadamy


Elements Has 6 civics

Earth
Fire
Water
Wind
Lighting
Life

Summoning has 0 civics

(secret)
(secret)
(secret)
(secret)
(secret)
(secret)

Damaging has 4 civics

Chaos
Poison
Desease
Frost
(secret)
(secret)

Buffs has 4 civics

Demons
Creatures
Undead
Humanoid
(secret)
(secret)

Acadamy Has 6 Civics

Antimagick
Restoration
Death
Life
Illusion
Combat



I wanna use religion somehow, but I'm not sure whatfor...

Also, there are special items that allow you to cat spells that dont require the civics, and are specific to that item. These Items should use up lots of mana.

Mana: This will be viewed as strength. Mage type players will have the same strength as warriors, but will have attack penalties and defense penalties (rather than strength penalties). Casting a spell reduces your strength, and you could eventually kill yourself this way. The best way to regain health is to rest. Other people can cast heal on you, and this will also regain health.
When you choose, your, Acadamy, you choose your penalties if any at all) and some special things you can do...

Tell Me if im forgetting something...

Oh, right, armor.

Armor basicly works like this. It is not an upgrade, it is a promotion. You can just keep adding to your armor.

Armor promotion, +10% defense --> Iron Curiass --> Steel Curiass
Armor promotion --> Iron Left Pauldron --> Steel Left Pauldron
Armor--> Wolfhide reinforcement
Armor--> Mithril underlay
etc.

Anyway, I need help. I need scripters, artists, codesigners, playtesters, and a vicepresident modder (who will be mostly in charge of this mod, for i have very limited tome and resources...)

Please come join the work effort, which right now is one man (me... )

Good times ahead,


The New Saint.

 

[Kael]

Very cool, I think this will will be a very different play experience than vanilla Civ (which is the point of a mod isn't it!). Good luck with this, I will be eager to try it out when you get it running.

 

[TheNewSaint]

Oh, kael. I hope you dont mind that i took some ideas from the FfH thread. Some you said you wouldnt use, and some you said you would, but either way, it's your thread...

 

[Kael]

Oh, kael. I hope you dont mind that i took some ideas from the FfH thread. Some you said you wouldnt use, and some you said you would, but either way, it's your thread...

The more good mods the better, help yourself to anything you'd like.

 

[TheNewSaint]

Ok, it's been about an hour and a half, so i think that in order to show people what this mod means for me.

Act One: The Fall of Dreaka.

This scenario is kind of like a string of tutorials. It is to teach you about the new system of play that this mod offers. For this scenario, somebody will need to make mountains into walls,it would be cool if there was a way to get up on the walls from the inside, but i dont think that terrain can be entered from only one side, so no need to try (it would just add a whole 'nother openning way to play the story and be extremely useful for all the seiges i have planned... perhaps it could be made a unit? no...then it could kill Holy Crap Ive Got IT!!! Turn the hills into walls, and ill mut a moat around it! And once the wood floor tile gets made, i can use it to make the bridge! Now you can get on the walls from the inside, but not the outside. Sweet!!! Ok... so, considering that this happens, i now have three ways to do this scenario. Each with a different starting character. For an elf hero, it starts like this.

"Quickly men! A horde of orcs is approaching Dreakano City! Get up on the walls!"

Now i need someone to bring back civ3 bombard style (im a very needy person and will asking for big tasks as if they were nothing. But believe me, the people who complete these tasks will be honored in the
"Really huge thanks to" section of the credits, and it will give you great status as being the type of person who can do things that are really huge. And give the Elven Archer unit and the Eldeni (hero) unit a range of five. The elven archer should have 7 strength and Eldeni 10.

Here is what the castle walls will look like. ^ are walls, M is moat and the C's are cities. The cities will periodically send out troops to reinforce the battle. You cannot control the troops, only the Hero.

M____MMMMMMMMMM
M_____^^^^^^^^ M
M^______________^M
M^____C___C_____^M___*And Some
M^__U_R_Here-->_^M______Orcs
M^______________^M___Here Too*
M_^^^^___^^^^^ M
MMMMMM___MMMMMM

*Horde of Orcs Here*


You are up on the wall. For the moment you cannot move. All You can do is bombard. Upon the killing of your third orc, a voice is heard,

"Quickly men, to the gates! The orcs are breaking through our defenses!" So you move to this spot where thiere is a flashing circle, *

M___MMMMMMMMMM
M____^^^^^^^^ M
M^_____________^M
M^____C___C____^M____*And Some
M^_____________^M_______Orcs
M^_______*_____^M_____Here Too*
M ^^^^__^^^^^ M
MMMMMM__MMMMMM

Upon doing so, the defenders in the gate here "*" gain the mage promotion, which weakens attack and defense.

M____MMMMMMMMMM
M_____^^^^^^^^ M
M^______________^M
M^______________^M___*And Some
M^______________^M_____Orcs
M^______________^M____Here Too*
M_^^^^**^^^^^M
MMMMMM__MMMMMM

Subsequently, they die. You now must kill five orcs. Upon doing that, another voice is heard,

"They have filled in the east side of the moat!"

The castle now looks like this

M___MMMMMMMMMM
M____^^^^^^^^ M
M^_____________^M
M^_____________^______*And Some
M^_____________^M_______Orcs
M^________*____^M_____Here Too*
M_^^^^___^^^^^M
MMMMMM__MMMMMM

You then to the wall, where there is another flashing circle. There, you can cast the boiling oil spell, which has a range of one and a strength of 20. You right click on the flashing circle, now just to your right. This casts the "spell". You see an action that looks like a pot of boiling oil being tipped over from the wall to the adjacent square. There is another voice,

"Back to the Gate!" You go to the same place as before. Upon arriving,

"The Trolls have knocked down the wall, and are entering the city! Defend The Lord Dreaka!"

The lord is up on in the northwest corner of the castle and you can see him. He is surrounded by orcs. I will have to do some calculations but i think that upon being within one tile of Dreaka, he gets the mage promotion and is killed before you can defend him.

"The Lord Has Fallen! Retreat! You fight your way through the last of the orcs and exit the castle. The road leads north, and you are made to follow the road, so you go until you reach the town of Mirkwood. It is surrounded by swamps and such and is underdeveloped. Once you reach a cetain point on the road, right in the center of the "City," you

1) Can move freely
2) Are confronted by a man who needs your help.

"The Bandits Took My Wife and Kids!"

This ends the scenario. I also have plans for a human and dwarf starting scenario that lead down seperate paths but eventualy they all meet at a little town called Entromont.

I must see, but i think that Kael has found a way to switch between maps, and if he has, then this whole campaign will never stop, it will just lead you through the war... And also, if he has done this, then I want a way that you have to level all three of you characters and lead them down the path to Entromont, which is a "YOMS" and in order to change to a new map, you must have all three characters at their locations.

Im guessing that most of this mod will require the SDK, so in the meantime i plan on recruting people and building ideas. I hope that SDK come with an interface that will make it much easier to script, mod and the works.

A note: This first part of the scenario will be one of the most scripted parts of the entire campaign, so do not think, o, wow, i get to follow the instructions and press the tile with the blue circle, it's just that i cannot allow the general public to see all the inner workings of the scenarios, because this would mean you knew exactly what to do. I can tell you that there will be some battles out on a feild with many positions that are key to success, and that you will need to level your character at the coloseum (oops.... was that an information leak? ) to be able to keep up with the ever strengthening enemy...

 

[TheNewSaint]

Curse YOU FORUMS!!! you messed up my diagrams!!!

 

[IamSid]

Sounds pretty awesome and very hard to implement.. You might need a mod team to do this.

 

[TheNewSaint]

Sounds pretty awesome and very hard to implement.. You might need a mod team to do this.

The idea was to assemble a mod team, and get SDK released, and get the new expansion pack for civ4 that is rumered to include an interface like civ3, but it's just a rumor...

And then the mod could be started.

 

[TheNewSaint]

Perhaps another random leak will help...

It is called Dungeons & Dragons for a reason. Once Mr. Crack Modder Kael gets some of his ideas working, i will be stealing them without any shame, for he is getting his own heading in the mod credits if this ever gets finished.

And a Ginormous Thanks to Kael for His Ideas and Support

--If you havent already, check out his Fall from Heaven Mod.

Anyway, one of the ideas is to be able to switch between maps freely, so you can basicly wander the world and do some random side quests. I hope that if I (being the only current subscribed modder, hint hint) get this finished then I (nudge nudge) can add more lands and quests that will work with old save games. Otherwise, I (winkady wink wink winkle) will have to just use all my energy on something that will have almost no use after about 80 hours of play.

Dungeons:

These dungeons can be anywhere, but are usually hidden from your view. Once you discover them, by being right next to them, you can either go in the tile or go around. In is usually a good choice though, since there is almost always something valuable inside of a dungeon... I actually think that, far far away, like Phase 13, this could become an awsome multiplayer thing, where you take your character to the multiplayer land where you can meet up with other players, chat, and try to kill higher level monsters and bosses together, by buffing each other, trading (if possible) "techs" that you discover upon doing something, like trading the tech could allow for more possible actions, or new spells, or different weapon upgrades, but this is a whole new game im talking about, and it would seem rather difficult (if not impossible) to implement. Oh well...

Also, long term, i hope to be on a stamp.

Some dungeons have more than one exit, and can lead you to far away lands... Some haw two exits, are very narrow, and can be used to go under certain obstacles (like a mountain range or a horde of dragons) on the same map. I like to call these, tunnels...

 

[Sildo]

Something you should know..... I have absolutely no skill whatsoever in python, XML and the works. I can come up with ideas though, and on some rare instances steal ideas that i think would help a just cause...

You shouldn't limit yourself, there are many tutorials out thier for learning Python, XML, ect. The tutorial by GBM is especialy good. If you get half as commited to learning the programs as you are to making ideas (that are very good, by the way) you'll be able to make the mods mechanics too.

 

[TheNewSaint]

oh. Thank you. i thought that it was something that rquired background in programming or was very complex with many 1's and 0's... But if its not...

 

[TheNewSaint]

Since it is only two o'clock and i have been trained not to require sleep, i will post some Stuff you will be seeing in the mod (just random tidbits, here and there)

Note: SPOILER!!!

Spell: Unrest. requires the death "civic" and Death III to cast. Gives the selected unit the unrest promotion, which turns it into a skelatal minion upon death.

Item: Arcanus's Spellbook. Allows for some badass spells!!!

Script Tidbit: "And upon the death of the liche king, the snow melted, and the clouds disappeared. The rivers unfroze, and the animals wandered out of hiding. The Reign of Seldor had ended, and a new king took his place. His name was..."

Ha Ha!

Game Concept: Colloseum: while i would love to tell you all about it i will tell you only this for now: The Colloseum is its own map, where you can gain Exp. I hope to ge ta multiplayer colloseum working (or maybe someone else could do that?) Where to players face off one on one, and the single player version where you fight animals that you have captured.

 

[TheNewSaint]

I have just read through the python tutorial, and it makes sense, its just math. However, before i can use it, i have to download it and wait for my
"Aura of Extreme Incompetence" to cool down...

 

[LoopyLewis]

Hey Saint, nice idea! But it sounds like a huge undertaking. Why don't you start off with something a little simpler and work your way up to this? May I suggest that you try creating a classic DnD adventure in a dungeon and keep it simple for now so you can learn from your mistakes, limit the numbers and types of units so that you can see where to go from there

Heres an idea which is plausible: turn mountains (impassible terrain) into dungeon walls and fill in the world. Then use tundra as a pathway through the dungeon and create rooms and things. Then create a couple of cities and have them churn out (a few) adventurers/badies so that they can face each other in the dungeon. Have two sides (one good, one bad) and make a third civ that churns out "lost treasure" units for your adventurers to grab.

You can then create an outside world and so on, but with this idea you can still implement your other ideas, like the weapon scheme and the promotions - it'll just make things easier.

How does that sound? Sorry if I totally messed with your idea, but I just wanted to help (and throw some ideas around)

 

[Haarbal]

well, if you're stealing anyway, you can steal my fantasy civs
they will need some modification for this, but that can be done

haarbal

 

[TheNewSaint]

Loopy,

i wrote a really long reply to this, but the forum gods banished it to the underworld. Basicly, thankyou for throwing out your ideas. They are always appreciated. If you or anyone wnats to just throw their two cents in, feel free to do so.(i will probably be using peaks for dungeon walls and hills for castle, if anybody wants to start changing the 1000+ files needed for one terrain, please go right ahead).

If anybody would like to take up this mod and become a designer/scripter/modder/graphics man/unit reskinner (or any combination of those) i will send you some basic outlines and some secrets in the scenarios (if requested).

Haarbal,


I also wrote a long and comprehensive reply for you, but once again, the forum gods...

Basicly, youre leaderheads will most likely be used, but not in every scenario. If anybody out there wants to try to do a random map thing once most of this game's basics are done (i believe it will not take many graphics, or units, or buildings, it will just require that certain stuff become part of the mod's structure, and then scenarios can be built from there), then your civs could get more use. Right now i intend to use them mostly in the "Extermination" part of the campaign, where you play as a crazed lord hell bent on the destruction of the lower races...

I am actually pleased with how this thread is doing. It is but a few days old and already five people have posted here.

 

[TheNewSaint]

If anyone has any ideas that you think would be cool for this mod, then please post. Or, could anyone give me a, umm, version of how to get python to work within civ4 for dummies? (i can make python work, and wrtie programs with loops, variabe, lists, etc., but after that, im at a loss as to how i should implement stuff. E.g.

If i want something to happen on the 40th turn, then i can do the loop thing, but does the program run down the line once each turn, or does it keep going in the one turn until it gets to 40, defeating the purpose?)

 

[TheNewSaint]

right now i am posting quite frequently because i cant really start this mod yet... I understand basic python, but i wasnt sure how to get it to work with civ4. I assume it has to do with this OnUnitAttack stuff. Where can i find a tutorial for this (please dont think im a noob or anything for this. I created a huge mod for civ3, just for me, but that had a rules editor and a pediaicons... and i thought that was hard...

Also, once more people know about this thread (and have posted in it) i intend to release more information about my ideas (i will not give away everything though...). So, if you want to learn more, you could put a link to this thread in your signature. If not, then oh well. Like i have said many times now, i really need somebody (or somebodies) who are quite advanced with python and scripting to either

A)Make me their apprenticce and teach me everything they know
B)Help me out by writing programs to do what i ask (more likely than A)

 

[Sildo]

Ask questions and get a tutorial at this thread, I think it even has a mini tutorial about XML on it.

Edit: I re-looked at the tutorial's website and it has a list of a Python functions in CIV


The one thing I would be carful with when trying this mod is not making it too scripted. Some events are good, alot may be better, but too many and the game with involve very little stratagy, just alot of clicking where the computer tells you.

Once again good luck.

 

[TheNewSaint]

At Loopy (again),

I hope to find a way to get multiple characters from multiple scenarios at different times to be able to go to a main campaign together (as well as their own race/local campaigns). I think I may do a starting scenario (you chose your character by which scenario you chose) in the sewers. This will be for a *secret* who will have her own *secret* campaign which has to do with *secret* (are you really interested now? I may undo some of those secrets once a certain number of people

A)Join the work effort (currently at one, but probably because this is such a huge undertaking and it would not even be that person's own mod (unless they wanted to "rent" it from me and gain control, ask me for some of the basic stuff, a bunch of the scenarios, but they would probably get to put the most stuff in to this mod. Character promotions (yes, i have even more), weapons, special quests, items, maps, worlds, maybe even a bonus campaign done in their style...)

B)Post in the thread some ideas, and/or helpful tips