Werthead Posted January 14, 2007 Share Posted January 14, 2007 Perhaps it is possible to make it a requirement that a character has to be in a settlement to allow building I hate that option in the game and always switch it off. It should still be an option, at least. Each lord leaves the person in charge of the stronghold - whether it's his son or wife or a maester or a castellan - with instructions on what to do whilst he's away, and usually enough leeway for them to make decisions if, for example, it looks like the stronghold is going to come under attack. So only allowing building if a character is present is deeply unrealistic. Whilst we want to keep the game true to the spirit of the books, we also want it fun to play. Anything that makes it harder for the players to do what they did straightforwardly in vanilla Medieval 2 is a bad idea, IMO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curiousepic Posted January 14, 2007 Share Posted January 14, 2007 I hate that option in the game and always switch it off. It should still be an option, at least. I agree to a certain extent, I play with the ability to build without governors present as well... but the times required to recruit and build in this mod will be longer, and the ideas I'm suggesting make it easier to give orders to settlements in general with the messengers. I think it will give the game more character with more and more varied agents, as well as making giving orders a gameplay mechanic itself. Each lord leaves the person in charge of the stronghold - whether it's his son or wife or a maester or a castellan - with instructions on what to do whilst he's away, and usually enough leeway for them to make decisions if, for example, it looks like the stronghold is going to come under attack. So only allowing building if a character is present is deeply unrealistic. That is precisely what I intend to simulate in more depth and hence increase the realism of. I don't intend to make it more difficult to give orders, (the governing agents will be readily available) but rather to make special units more special but requiring certain agents, and enhance gameplay by allowing things like cutting off an imposing general's ability to send out orders for reinforcements, etc. I don't want to make it "harder" to play, but perhaps more involved. Which, surely for some people may translate into difficulty, but there is always, as I said, the option to allow any build orders for any settlements at any time when you begin the campaign, it's hardcoded. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chewietobbacca Posted January 14, 2007 Share Posted January 14, 2007 Updated the list of cities and fixed a few errors I had not caught when I c/pd it to the board. On that note, however, I do want to throw out some ideas right now: In M2TW, General's Bodyguards have 2 hit points per horsemen. This is meant to keep the general unit alive - in turn, however, that tends to make the generals bodyguard knights extremely strong. Because this game will allow for a huge number of generals units (entire families etc.), I was thinking about setting general's bodygaurd generals to 1 hit point, as other knights. Thus generals will be easier to kill. In turn, however, we will use ancilliaries and traits to boost the hitpoints of actual family members and will make the general bodyguards require more itnelligence at use rather than throwing them into the fray. For instance, given the trait Squire, that particular character will gain +1 hp and +1 command. If they bear the trait Knighted, they will gain another +2hp/+2command/+2 chivalry. This in turn makes the actual general himself harder to kill on battlefield though the rest of the knights are still easy to kill. This, however, forces people to think twice before committing a general into the fray and will also create some interesting situations. For instance, generals such as Tywin may be great battlefield commanders (a high +command) bonus, but he himself doesn't prefer to fight on the front and if committed may die a sure death (as represented by the lower hit points). Whereas Gregor Clegane can be given a huge amount of hitpoints, dread, command, etc. and be not only a monster at fighting but at commanding and scaring the living crap out of the enemy. Oh and I cannot wait until we get to do and make character traits and ancilliaries... By the way, I also need a bit of insight into how I should handle how a charater is named. For instance, in game, the Byzantine leader is titled Emperor while the German one is Kaiser and so on. Currently I have these thought out. Please note that leader denotes teh individual leader, princess represents the female members of the actual family line, and the heirs represent the males in the actual family line. Also, one can leave a title blank if so deemed necessary. The Starks Faction Leader: King Faction Princess: Princess Faction Heirs: Prince The Lannisters, Arryns, Tullys, Tyrells Faction Leader: Lord Faction Princess: Lady Faction Heirs: ? (Ser perhaps? but not all are knighted...) The Martells Faction Leader: Prince Faction Princess: Princess Faction Heirs: Prince Joffrey Baratheon Faction Leader: King Faction Princess: Princess Faction Heirs: Prince Stannis Baratheon Faction Leader: King Faction Princess: Princess Faction Heirs: Prince Renly Baratheon Faction Leader: King Faction Princess: Princess Faction Heirs: Prince The Wildlings Faction Leader: King (? for Mance) Faction Princess: Princess (? they do mention 'Wildling Prince' as a nickname) Faction Heirs: Prince (?) The Greyjoys Faction Leader: King Faction Princess: ? (they don't exactly use a title either) Faction Heirs: ? (they don't exactly use one either) The Night's Watch Faction Leader: Lord Commander Faction Princess: None Faction Heirs: None Also, Vintown == the Arbor in game and can be renamed as thus. Not too sure which is moer appropriate for House Redwyne though.. the Arbor or Vintown as the name of the settlement? Also, I want to throw out another thought that came to my mind. The fact that in the book, small groups of men such as Gregor Clegane's outriders have the ability to raze a settlement such as Stone Hedge down leads me to believe that a lot of these strongholds are nothing more than wooden walls around a keep. After all, if it were a minor stone castle such as Darry, it would still be hard to besiege stone walls with limited siege equipment and men. Hence I believe that a lot of the more minor settlements and so on had nothing but wooden palisades or walls.... hmm.. Another thing I forgot to mention is that we can make castles have slots for free upkeep units. In turn, I had a thought that perhaps castles can produce one free upkeep (if garrisoned in a castle or city) unit: Household Knights. They would be considerably weaker than the professional knights but would make good garrisoned units for a castle... (can come in mounted and dismounted flavors) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Werthead Posted January 14, 2007 Share Posted January 14, 2007 Your ideas are pretty good. Unless Ran can find out for us (or knows otherwise), I believe that all we know about Vinetown (sorry, I was wrong with my spelling, it has the 'e' in it) is that it is a location on the Arbor. We don't know if it is the capital town, main port, the Redwyne castle or what. So it may be safer, from a canonical point of view, just to call it 'The Arbor'. I was hoping we could call the province 'The Arbor' and the town either 'Vinetown', 'Ryamsport' or 'Starfish Harbour' (as these are the three locations on the Arbor mentioned in AFFC) but we don't know which is the most important settlement. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Hetz Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 I don't recall, but did they keep the 'devastation' feature from RTW? I don't remember seeing it M2TW. Whenever you walked through enemy territory, your men automatically despoiled the countryside, damaging that province's productivity, and leaving a blackened trail in their wake. Over time, the province would 'heal'. This would of course be ideal for the mod, as half of Arya's chapters are Gregor Clegane and Amory Lorch razing villages. I always pictured Gregor Clegane as leading a couple units of Mounted Sergeants and generally just wandering around crippling Tully economy, occasionally sieging a castle here and there. So is devestation still in? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Merentha Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 Having troops in enemy territory blocks land trade, but I don't know if it damages farms and other agricultural output. I'm never under attack. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chewietobbacca Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 Yes devastation is defenitely in. Im looking to find if it can be tuned. In fact, if land trade values can be increased, it would provide for interesting situations... land trade will be very important and thus the positioning of your troops and the devastation can make entire provinces unproductive... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bazzlebane Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 In M2TW, General's Bodyguards have 2 hit points per horsemen. This is meant to keep the general unit alive - in turn, however, that tends to make the generals bodyguard knights extremely strong. Because this game will allow for a huge number of generals units (entire families etc.), I was thinking about setting general's bodygaurd generals to 1 hit point, as other knights. Thus generals will be easier to kill. In turn, however, we will use ancilliaries and traits to boost the hitpoints of actual family members and will make the general bodyguards require more itnelligence at use rather than throwing them into the fray. I'd be pretty leary of having the generals have only 1 hp, mainly because of the behavior of the AI. Most players are careful in the combat use of their generals, but the AI often flings them into combat when they shouldn't. If Tywin Lannister, Jaime Lannister and Kevan Lannister all die within the first 6 turns the mod will lose a lot of its oomph. While characters can and should die (they certainly do in the series), silly and throwaway deaths of major characters because they only have 1 hp and the AI mangles their actions, that'll suck. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chewietobbacca Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 I'd be pretty leary of having the generals have only 1 hp, mainly because of the behavior of the AI. Most players are careful in the combat use of their generals, but the AI often flings them into combat when they shouldn't. If Tywin Lannister, Jaime Lannister and Kevan Lannister all die within the first 6 turns the mod will lose a lot of its oomph. While characters can and should die (they certainly do in the series), silly and throwaway deaths of major characters because they only have 1 hp and the AI mangles their actions, that'll suck. It will certainly require a lot of testing and playbalancing to figure out. As far as generals go, the individual character themselves can be given more than 1hp. It's more to balance the rest of the knights in the unit, as there may be potentially lots of general unit in game. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gorn Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 The Wildlings Faction Leader: King (? for Mance) Faction Princess: Princess (? they do mention 'Wildling Prince' as a nickname) Faction Heirs: Prince (?) I don't think wildlings should have any faction heirs. Timespan of the campaign will be too short for his son to grow up. If other factions manage to eliminate Mance, Wildlings will cease to exist as a unified faction (as per books). That way, Stark player or Night's Watch player can secure his northern border by sending a capable assasin north of the Wall. The alternative would be to make Tormund his heir. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maester Yobjascz Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 How do generals work in game? Is it possible to have a 'command from the rear' option in the AI for them? Some generals clearly command the reserves, like Tywin, while others command from the front, like Robb... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Werthead Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 This should help in spreading the word about the mod. Although they could change links so they work. Sigh. Btw, I had an idea which I forgot to mention earlier: change the faction name for 'The Wildlings' to 'The Free Folk' (their name for themselves, IIRC). If they're a playable faction it would be odd for them to be known as a derogatory term. If they were an AI-only faction, then continuing to call them 'Wildlings' makes more sense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marcus Posted January 15, 2007 Author Share Posted January 15, 2007 Spelling would've been nice. The Wildings are a thread beyond the wall? NOOOOOO, we're doomed. /sarcasm *sigh* Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maester Yobjascz Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 On Ser Bazz's concerns over 1hp generals, I suppose it depends on our roster list. If we've got a short list of generals, looking at only the main leaders of a faction (Starks : Robb, Bran, Bolton, Blackfish), then I'd beef up the hp, to keep them around. On the other hand, if we're more faithful to the books, and keep a large roster of active generals (though I don't know how well this is suited to the game mechanic (Starks : Robb, Bran, Roose Bolton, Greatjon, Smalljon, Mormont (Maege, Dacey), Manderly, Stevron Frey, Patrek Mallister, Tully (Brynden, Edmure), Jonos Bracken, Blackwoods, Tallharts, etc.), then I'd keep most of the generals with 1hp (though some might have 2hp, and a few (like the Greatjon), might have more)... since leaders in the books fall like flies. ------- And the 'Devastation' concept works for me... there should be a reason to send Clegane and Lorch out to cause economic difficulties... force the Tullys to split forces to try and hunt down the raiders... Seems like it might work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Werthead Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 Spelling would've been nice. The Wildings are a thread beyond the wall? NOOOOOO, we're doomed. /sarcasm *sigh* (hurriedly alters Word document) Yep, those guys at totalwar.com suck don't they? The details I sent were completely and properly spelled from the start. OTOH, I did a post over there featuring the working links. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rufats Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 I'm not sure, we can call Smalljohn, Daece Mormont generals. Bolton, Tarly, or Kevan Lannister are. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maester Yobjascz Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 I'm not sure, we can call Smalljohn, Daece Mormont generals. No, I suppose not... though if we can name Robb's bodyguard units, they'd fit there. I'm still not quite clear on how non-family generals work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rufats Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 Maybe, we should leave General Bodyguards unit as it is, with 2hp. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bazzlebane Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 Personally, I don't think 2 hp generals are overpowered in MII. I've killed plenty of enemy generals. . Unfortuntately, I've also lost a fair number of mine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rufats Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 Ironically, I'm losing my generals more to inquisitors and assassins. Still, I find AI generals in MII:TW way less suicidal than in RTW. They're, even, trying to outflank me sometimes. Desperate romantics. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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