This is a project I've been working on for a year or so and I am at the point where I have the engine mostly ready. I started with the open source Glest Advanced Engine, itself a fork of the Glest engine. I have so far heavily modified several aspects to suit my needs. I'll be continuing to modify it going forward but mainly for later projects.
The first actual game I am working on is the one named in the title. This game is going to be a kingdom simulation system loosely inspired by Majesty, CK2, Vicky2, Dominions 3, Academagia, and Emperor: Rise of the Middle Kingdom.
The game is in a genre I term exploratory strategy. What this means is that it is an RTSish game but has no place for real time tactics or competitive or even currently multiplayer features. It's primary focus is on managing your economy and using that economy to protect yourself from other societies of various kinds.
Your economy plays something like an Impressions city builder with houses and needs that you must meet to advance the quality and size of your populace. However unlike those games this is not the end condition. You will also be using the economy to produce the materials for the items that will empower your sovereign and your heroes.
Heroes are where Majesty comes in. Heroes are generally automated defenders of the kingdom. Some heroes and their Orders will contribute to magical and technological advancement as well as economic productions and goods.
In this game, and its sequels, heroes are part of Orders. These Orders may be Militant, Magical, Mechanical, or Mystical.
Orders have a common structure. There is one Motherhouse and a number of Chapterhouses that you want. Motherhouses do most of the research and have powerful leadership units. They also control the treasury of the Order. Order treasuries are special. You cannot purchase things for the Order from the kingdom treasury. You can only spend what the Order has. The Order gets half its build cost to treasury to start out. It can then tax its members and collect from Chapterhouses or use its economic functions to generate income. There may be a base income per day to avoid stalling out.
Motherhouses can add new production or research facilities, have a leader of the order and special champion units, and also build various buildings to fulfill the goals of the Order. It also has upgradable living quarters. Chapterhouses have separate living quarters which can be upgraded. Costs rise per building so Chapterhouses are usually cheaper than increasing Motherhouse quarters infinitely. Because Ordermembers use the building they were created in as a home and have a sort of general range of operation, Chapterhouses will extend the influence of a given Order. That and new housing are their primary purpose.
Guilds are the economic version of Orders. They can produce guard units and perhaps middling defense towers but have no heroes. They do not provide a powerful military presence. Guilds are a major part of your economic engine and operate financially in a way similar to Orders with a separate treasury. They produce various goods and services that you need like cutting wood or quarrying stone. Orders can produce related buildings, for example the agricultural guilds, sort of farming cooperatives, will make livestock and crop farms and create warehouses to move their products around. They can also add sheds to farms for milking, shearing, slaughtering and so forth. Some guilds produce living staples while others make weapons or traps or what have you.
Mystical Orders follow a particular deities or systems of thought. They may be able to branch into limited magical or militant schools of knowledge but their focus is on their holy gifts. These tend to be skills and knowledge that other kinds of Orders can't access.
The goal of Militant Orders is pretty obvious. They have an intense focus on combat. Militant Orders will be strong combatants of some kinds as well as have a few special powers. They can multi-class but like Mystical Orders their added classes are really just ways to empower their regular skills.
Mechanical Orders are sort of the opposite of Mystical ones although its not a rivalry in most cases. These groups focus on science and technology to a degree that your normal citizens are unable to. They can improve economical production and create special combat items and some special units.
Magical orders are special as they are not based on classes as much. They start with a specific school of magic and can branch out to related magical disciplines. Their dual or tri classing choices have a much greater affect on their capabilities. There are also a lot more Magical Orders than the others.
Multi-classing is a complex but rewarding process. It can open up new magic, water/fire mages can use steam magic, and so forth.
Now we get to the part where Emperor interacts with Majesty. Orders require a large number of educated citizens to staff. So that high quality population you create will be quite valuable to you. Certain types of orders require more educated citizens or citizens of a higher level of education. For instance Militant Orders require the fewest and lowest quality of educated citizens. Educated citizens are not one size fits all. Each educated citizen has unique stats and traits, as in CK2. These can be trained and increased and also boosted by items and events. Particular citizens will be better at different things.
High level non-Order based structures and groups also require these citizens. These tend to follow more of the crafting side of educated citizens than magical or technical or physical strains. Some Orders of course also can do crafting.
There are also special alignments that affect your kingdom. Certain actions and event options allow you to influence where you stand on these scales. Currently there are Death vs Life, Technological vs Natural, Order vs Chaos, and Righteous vs Nefarious scales. These scales are important and will significant effect your options. Certain Orders are only available at certain points on these scales. Certain events only trigger for say, Nefarious, Technological, Chaotic, Death kingdoms. NPCs on the map will align with or against you based on these scales. Gods will hand out blessing and curses.
There are also some implicit polarities in the game. You can choose to focus on industrial magitech nations or more ancient individually powerful mages. And some you can figure out for yourself.
The game possesses a research system pretty similar to Dominions 3 in depth and breadth. Well, not quite as extensive perhaps. But spiritually similar. Your sovereign, basically a special character that is the only one totally controllable by you rather than automated to some degree, has several customizable capabilities besides the core stats of:
conception;-bonus to all research and learning
might;-bonus to all physical attacks
potency;-bonus to all offensive magic
spirit;-bonus to all support magic
awareness;-bonus discovery
acumen;-bonus to all finance and trade
authority;-bonus to military control
finesse;-bonus to all crafting
mettle;-bonus to all physical resistance
fortitude;-bonus to all magical resistance
Knowledge is the first major aspect of a character. Knowledge includes historical, linguistic, and cultural understanding of various societies. Knowledge mainly gives you lots of bonus options in events. A knowledge of some language may allow you to decipher some runes to find a secret chamber in a tomb or ancient library or palace or w/e. History may help you find special sites, sorta like the ones in Dominions 3 or make a smarter political move when interacting with say, dragons. Language may also help in diplomacy. Customs tends to focus mainly on diplomacy while history is mainly about finding ancient sites. Language helps you read books/scrolls/tablets, which is an important skill for learning new spells and such.
Crafting is also a major part of the game. Educated citizens with high crafting stats can create much better items. Items are not static like in most games, as this part was adapted from some of my early plans for an MMO. Both your special character and educated citizens are good for crafting. There are several kinds of resources in the world to gather for items, and they are capable of being processed. Special processes, high quality additives, high processing skills/stats, high quality processing equipment and various magical things serve to increase the base quality of crafting materials before actually crafting an item. Then processes, magic, and crafting skills plus crafting knowledge again provide a boost to the final project followed by the final step, enchanting and infusing with magical power and properties. Most of these steps are optional and not even available early on. For instance the basic flow is gather metal and wood, smelt and carve it, craft a weapon or armor. At least for weapons. Anything else is an optional boost.
Resources aren't the only important part of the environment. There are many natural features that can do things. Many Motherhouses gain benefits from being built next to the proper terrain feature, as do some crafting buildings. A Pyromancy Motherhouse next to a volcano will see new spells, new summons, superior ritual spells and so forth. A blacksmith may find special metals, have higher production rates, and create improved products. Casting a ritual weather spell targeting and ice cave and a volcano may create a temperature variance that can summon a storm which could block a pass from enemy units and so forth.
Because of the important of resources and terrain features, territory control is very important. Both to protect your gatherers from marauding animals and to prevent an enemy from attacking and controlling a valuable metal deposit. Maps will be generated randomly so you will have to adapt to a situation.
There is actually a lot of other stuff but this post is super long.
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Topic: The Unaligned Mandate: Kingdoms of the Morning (Read 6019 times)