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[Gatleos]

This isn't a "let's make a game" thread. It's a "help me expand on this idea" thread. I will neither confirm nor deny the possibility that I am currently working on a game engine, and it's not the focus here. I (and a few others) made the suggestion for a game like this at various points, and there was a thread about it a while back. I still like the concept, but I want to hear what you guys would have to say about it.

The way I envision it currently is something like this:

• You are a necromancer, and your powers are growing slowly.
• You must gather undead servants (who are unquestioningly loyal and immortal) and slaves (who have the fine motor control to do things that aren't biting at faces).
• To accomplish this, you attack villages and castles across the countryside using an amassed undead army.
• Using necromancy and slave labor, you construct one or more strongholds with which to stage invasions and defend yourself.
• Things get interesting when you start dealing with surrounding entities diplomatically. Evil-aligned creatures may want to join you as servants or enlist the services of your army, and villages may curry your favor with offers of sacrifices. You will have an ever-changing reputation.
• You may make deals with demonic entities to expand your powers and influence, but to summon them you may need rare materials (the blood of lords, pure maiden sacrifices, vials of children's tears, etc.). There will most likely be a catch as well.

You should take a look at AlleeCat's thread (linked above) too, she had a couple of good ideas I didn't mention. Anyway, a few questions remain unanswered, and I'd like you guys' opinions on them. Namely:

• How would this game be structured? I'm thinking Dungeon Keeper style base management, much more abstracted than something like DF but still plenty of room for creative design.
• What would combat be like? RTS might be a bit ambitious, but turn-based strategy (wesnoth, ff tactics, etc.) could be doable.
• What would drive the game? What makes the player expand rather than just turtling up and building one fortress? What would slaves provide in the long term, once you've received enough stone to build a tower or something?

Beyond those questions, what would you like to see in a game like this? I need your imagination.

[IndigoFenix]

Are you sure about making multiple fortresses?  It seems to me that the necromancer/archmage archetype (as opposed to, say, an emperor or warlord) prefers to build upward rather than spread out, creating a single ominous palace whose influence spreads out like a dark cloud of notoriety (or a literal dark cloud) that covers and corrupts the land around them.  It suits their standard issue ego much better.  Who needs tax collectors and local provinces when you have mastery over the fabric of reality itself?  Villages who fear you should come and offer you tribute themselves in exchange for not killing them.

Perhaps distant battles could be abstracted (You send X zombies/monsters/slaves to make an attack on a village with Y defenses, roll for success, gain some fresh corpses and prisoners, lose some zombies, build summoning circles to build magic power, use magic to turn corpses into zombies or summon demons, and so on), while armies who attack your stronghold directly could play out in real-time like cross between a tower defense game and an action RPG (you could have zombies, monsters, archers, etc defend your tower automatically, while you stand at the top of the tower and cast long-range spells to fend off stronger enemies).  It would also be cool to have some long-term notice about heroes or teams of heroes approaching before they actually reach you, and you could send out bands to try and intercept them before they reach the tower.  Unlike standard 'defense' games, though, who attacks you would be based on how you treat the surrounding area, who you start wars with, etc., instead of just sending stronger and stronger waves at you constantly.

I'd say the ultimate driving force of the game, once you have built up a strong zombie army and have achieved high enough notoriety among the surrounding villages, should be attaining more and more power from more and more powerful demons.  Perhaps you can choose to either cut deals with demons, or when you get strong enough, actually capture them and force them to do your bidding (which would be a very dangerous endeavor that could potentially backfire severely).  Maybe an endgame goal could be building a tower to heaven and waging war on the gods of the setting.

Also, maybe you don't like this idea, but what about a 'benevolent archmage' option?

[Nirur Torir]

1. How would this game be structured? I'm thinking Dungeon Keeper style base management, much more abstracted than something like DF but still plenty of room for creative design.

I have one evil archmage, maybe a few apprentices, some slaves/laborers, and hordes of undead. What infrastructure do I really need? If enemies are frequently getting to my stronghold(s), I need to re-think my life.

I think some sort of cross between Civ and Crusader Kings II could work for the strategic layer. Have provinces with multiple towns/villages/castles/ancient_ruins in them. They can be razed, micromanaged, or just taken and then mostly ignored.

3. What would drive the game? What makes the player expand rather than just turtling up and building one fortress? What would slaves provide in the long term, once you've received enough stone to build a tower or something?

Desire for artifacts, knowledge, and to put an end to constant anti-necromancer crusades.
It might be interesting to add in pantheons of gods. Light gods would really like for their worshipers to stop us, while the dark gods will give us quests. It could also add in more of an end game - The light gods are getting desperate as their power wanes, and are more willing to risk the world's destruction as the dark gods are in danger of winning. Live people could then provide worship.
Slaves could be sifted through to look for potential apprentices, sent into battle to hurt enemy morale, magically sacrificed, or kept as a breeding population for more undead.

Also, maybe you don't like this idea, but what about a 'benevolent archmage' option?

I would prefer that.
Instead of "Pillage everything. Kill resistors and enslave the rest," I would like an option to leave towns un-razed. Mechanics-wise, I expect I would need to spend more resources on laborers than on slaves, and probably need to keep the towns happy despite being guarded by rotting corpses, but there would be less of a diplomatic penalty.

I think it would need a limiter, something to keep us from playing necromancer-king world conquest. We should be able to hire some living mercenaries, but levying armies that can stand and win against our rivals seems like it would distract from the necromancy simulation.

[Gatleos]

Are you sure about making multiple fortresses?  It seems to me that the necromancer/archmage archetype (as opposed to, say, an emperor or warlord) prefers to build upward rather than spread out, creating a single ominous palace whose influence spreads out like a dark cloud of notoriety (or a literal dark cloud) that covers and corrupts the land around them.

I think some sort of cross between Civ and Crusader Kings II could work for the strategic layer. Have provinces with multiple towns/villages/castles/ancient_ruins in them. They can be razed, micromanaged, or just taken and then mostly ignored.

Yeah, a single tower would fit the genre/archetype the best. The main reason I mentioned multiple fortresses was that it makes more sense realistically. A place to fall back to if your main base is compromised, where you can rebuild your forces and prepare to strike back. As for Crusader Kings II management of fiefdoms and whatnot, that's actually a good way to abstract it out.

Also, maybe you don't like this idea, but what about a 'benevolent archmage' option?

I would prefer that.
Instead of "Pillage everything. Kill resistors and enslave the rest," I would like an option to leave towns un-razed. Mechanics-wise, I expect I would need to spend more resources on laborers than on slaves, and probably need to keep the towns happy despite being guarded by rotting corpses, but there would be less of a diplomatic penalty.

I think it would need a limiter, something to keep us from playing necromancer-king world conquest. We should be able to hire some living mercenaries, but levying armies that can stand and win against our rivals seems like it would distract from the necromancy simulation.

It could be a good idea to extend the concept from "necromancer" to "evil wizard overlord". Though necromancy was the original impetus, the main idea here is that you're the kind of evil wizard BBEG that would field armies of goblins or kidnap princesses to steal their lifeforce and power some magical doomsday weapon. You wouldn't necessarily have to be the grimdarkwicked mustache-twirling baby murdering psychopath, you're just a megalomaniacal magical overlord. That said, it could be interesting to hide your more sinister activities from the masses. Semi-benevolently ruling over a few towns doesn't preclude you from having a few undead-spawning necropolises powered by the pain of innocents tucked away somewhere.

That said, the danger in this is overextending. Trying to include too many different roles could lead to significant feature creep.

Perhaps distant battles could be abstracted (You send X zombies/monsters/slaves to make an attack on a village with Y defenses, roll for success, gain some fresh corpses and prisoners, lose some zombies, build summoning circles to build magic power, use magic to turn corpses into zombies or summon demons, and so on), while armies who attack your stronghold directly could play out in real-time like cross between a tower defense game and an action RPG (you could have zombies, monsters, archers, etc defend your tower automatically, while you stand at the top of the tower and cast long-range spells to fend off stronger enemies).

This brings up the biggest concern I have, which is determining the level of abstraction. This is one area where I feel DF has struggled in the past; it's hard to care about the big picture of what's going on in your fort when you have to worry about the logistics of transporting stone and making wooden bins. It's ultimately a tradeoff between customizability and efficiency: it's hard to make a satisfying combat system when you have to worry about pathfinding around arbitrary collision maps, and the more the player can customize their tower the more likely it is that they can circumvent the invader AI and make the game into a joke.

The specifics of the combat and how it relates to base customization is very important, and could easily soak up a ton of time if made too intricate.

I'd say the ultimate driving force of the game, once you have built up a strong zombie army and have achieved high enough notoriety among the surrounding villages, should be attaining more and more power from more and more powerful demons.  Perhaps you can choose to either cut deals with demons, or when you get strong enough, actually capture them and force them to do your bidding (which would be a very dangerous endeavor that could potentially backfire severely).  Maybe an endgame goal could be building a tower to heaven and waging war on the gods of the setting.

It might be interesting to add in pantheons of gods. Light gods would really like for their worshipers to stop us, while the dark gods will give us quests. It could also add in more of an end game - The light gods are getting desperate as their power wanes, and are more willing to risk the world's destruction as the dark gods are in danger of winning. Live people could then provide worship.
Slaves could be sifted through to look for potential apprentices, sent into battle to hurt enemy morale, magically sacrificed, or kept as a breeding population for more undead.

A lot of potential with these. Making deals with supernatural beings is something more games need to include.

[Nirur Torir]

Making deals with supernatural beings is something more games need to include.

Oh yes, that gives me an idea:

Make the demons characters, and give them agency.

Some would be straightforward: Summon with a 10-person blood sacrifice, send off to pillage alone or stick with your army and hope they get into enough fights to satiate it. More subtle demons might try to start cults under your nose or slowly corrupt the local leaders and create their own faction (but would otherwise make amazing spies!)
It would be an interesting mechanic to need to discover (Ruin exploration, barter with other demons, studying books) specific demon names, and decide based on possibly-true information whether or not you actually want to summon Gorgoth the Supreme Obliterator, Devourer of Ten Thousand Stars, who's loyalty your books say can be bought with a small offering of tea each day.

I like the idea of summoning demons to serve as landed vassals. There is much Fun to be had there.