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[MDFification]

What I liked about Steelhold was that we were all playing complete and utter psychopaths; if we wanted to do something crazy and kill a ton of dwarves, it was justified and no-one would find it odd. Here, I feel like we've made the characters too heroic with not enough insanity; I certainly wouldn't pull off any elf-serum plot-lines here. Once Corley and Leopold are out of the picture, I'll be able to start almost entirely fresh should we decide to continue.

If we were to make another thread after this, I'd recommend the premise be a fortress that's a military base for the Dwarven Army, but its one of those bases that they send the crazy and misbehaving soldiers to. No heroic, last bastion of Dwarfkind this time, just an unfortunate base full of crazy soldiers and unlucky citizens who needed a new home.

Eh, it can still be the bastion. Just not necessarily a heroic one. A grimdark one.
Basically, who would have been able to make it to safety? Most desperate dwarven refugees wouldn't have made it. The only dwarves I can think about that are known to move about by sea and aren't tied by honor to defend their homes to death are mercenaries.

Tl:dr everyone who manages to make it to safety is a turncoat, a pirate, and a raider. They only made it this far because they didn't hesitate to abandon others, were willing to steal supplies from refugees, and abandoned their contracts.
[ETHIC:OATH_BREAKING:UNTHINKABLE]

[Rhaken]

I have some ideas there, actually. (I eagerly await the day that you all tremble at the sight of that sentence)

We could try running ourselves a proper penal colony, no magic users allowed. The problem there would be managing the logistics of the place. Chances are, it would be nothing like a prison by the time the second criminal overseer comes around, and that's even assuming that the guards don't all wind up dead. And prisons have tons of rules, most of which are virtually impossible to enforce on the players.

I've long fiddled about with the idea of building a surface fortress. Not a palisade, like we have here in Demongate, but an actual goddamned fortress. Basically, Castle Helgard. Or the headquarters of the Knights. I considered building the thing myself for exhibition purposes, but had neither the patience nor the free time. Especially the latter. If we're going for the Knights, factionalism isn't too far behind, and would serve to show that they aren't the paragons of virtue they claim to be. Among the good knights would be corrupt, arrogant assholes, entire splinter factions in disagreement with one another, and even the Masters themselves could all have their own agendas.

A dwarven shipyard could be fun, and even works in this universe. The dwarves travelled across the sea to reach the New World, after all. This could also fit in nicely with MDFI's idea. A coastal settlement that would basically be a dwarven Port Royal, with a waterfront district of pirates, drunks, whores and peddlers. So that's two hundred dwarves with no scruples in a place where scruples are detrimental to survival. The intrigue writes itself, almost like in Steelhold.

If we're up for a sequel, we could properly mod in the Bloodkin, generate a new world (preferably with the proper art symbols thrown in, like the Saints and the Lords of the Bloodkin), and get started on Steelhold III. It could run parallel to Demongate history-wise (there are probably other continents other than the Oracular Plane and whatever the hell this one is called), or it could be yet another few hundred years forward. Might even seque nicely from Demongate, if the ending goes as I've envisioned.

...Note to self: discuss the particulars of that ending. Dammit.

Either way, factionalism wouldn't be too hard to implement there. Ideas be a-brewin' in my thick skull as we speak. We could also mod pretty much every race in small ways for the sake of fun and flavor, to show that elves and goblins and humans on other continents have developed different cultures. Even additional races representing different cultures would work: nomadic human raiders, elven seafarers, even primitive-agricultural kobolds would be interesting. Adding custom tidbits to dwarves could work too, even if the dwarven presence in that world is comprised mostly of the descendants of immigrants from distant shores. Again.


As for what I'll be writing: a scene set in Saint Zane HQ is in the works. I'll try to write the damn thing fast, but there will be no progress today, as I have work that needs doing.

On another note. MDFI, don't go on work binges too often. Experience dictates that it never works as planned. Eventually, chances are you just wrote 20 pages of pure gibberish. Always plan some time for massive editing. That being said, best of luck to you, mate. 

[MDFification]

On another note. MDFI, don't go on work binges too often. Experience dictates that it never works as planned. Eventually, chances are you just wrote 20 pages of pure gibberish. Always plan some time for massive editing. That being said, best of luck to you, mate. 

Ain't no life like the student life. I'd try to relax, but I'm on far too many stimulants right now.



I'm thinking of getting back into modding in a desperate effort to distract myself from exams and overdue essays. Basically finally update Freehold to 40.xx, in name at least because I'd like to keep the impression its a big successful mod and that anyone plays mods that aren't masterwork  . This time around though I'd like to scale it back, and focus more on making thoroughly different human cultures to inhabit the various unused biomes. These should all have culturally unique equipment and languages, which I'll base loosely on existing languages from cultures living in a similar biome/social archetype. Which means I'll be doing some weird stuff. Seriously, I have plans to integrate archaic Russian, Norse, and Innuit into a single language file. May god have mercy on my easily distracted soul.
With that in mind, all the civs will be balanced to be at constant war with eachother ethics wise, which should lead to a lot of legendary people to kill, a lot of ruins to explore, and a ton of tombs. 2 of the civs I have planned are babysnatcher (though likely to war with goblins) so you can expect to see raids from them, which is really necessary because 40.xx has really infrequent warfare (at your fort- the gobbos still blitzkriege the entire known world in 2 years). But you're more likely to wind up in a war with other civs too. Other civs which are actually dangerous.

I'm also planning a civ which is intended to die out as early as possible so you can explore and loot the ruins that uses a material between adamantine and steel. And as a way to generate more tombs and abandoned forts to reclaim.

I like tombs.

EDIT: Aaaaand the past 4 hours have just been wasted bringing version 0.1 prerelease almost online. Just have to test it now... gonna go reboot the old Freehold thread.

[jrrocks05]

Honestly I like the Port Royale idea a place filled with pirates,sailors,politicians,soldiers,traders and just general scum. A place where a great plot can develop. If we want we can set up a kind of race for the new world kind of idea with every civ sending colonists to try to get as much land as possible. Also we could have lots of Megabeasts and animals after all it is a "New World". If their is a competition for land there could be characters who work for a different Civ's trying to sabotage the colony. It just seems like a great idea for a story and with the Elfs(Native Americans/Indians) trying to kill the colonists it seems like a great idea. It could even by a Penal colony just a Civ throwing as many people they can to claim as much land as possible.

[Gnorm]

I like the idea of a port city, though I'm not sure how we would justify building one at this point story-wise unless unless we were to make an interquel.

[jrrocks05]

I don't think a new story should be any kind of sequel or have any connection with this story or Steelhold. We should create an entirely new storyline new ideas,new characters and a New World.

[Deus Asmoth]

Yeah, an entirely new plot would be for the best.

[FallenAngel]

However, I think it'd be a good idea if we do off-handed mentions to bits of Steelhold and Demongate, mostly for sake of Continuity Nod.
It doesn't have to be in-story, although said nods usually are in-story.
"Is that a magic machine?"
"Yes."
"It reminds me of a certain fellows."

Still rambling.

[jrrocks05]

That would be fine but no St.Zane or other stuff. Let's do something new.

[Gnorm]

I think that if we are to do another fort, it should be a part of the current story because Demongate failed to be what it was meant to be. We started this game with the intention of fighting off bloodkin hordes, and not a single one came.

[danmanthedog]

Maybe you should change the birth rate to about 20 kids per batch.

[jrrocks05]

I don't know..... A new story line sounds a lot better to me.

[4maskwolf]

I don't know..... A new story line sounds a lot better to me.

+1.

I'll update tomorrow.

[MDFification]

I think that if we are to do another fort, it should be a part of the current story because Demongate failed to be what it was meant to be. We started this game with the intention of fighting off bloodkin hordes, and not a single one came.

It's kind of ironic since you feel that way, because if I remember correctly you were opposed to that sequel idea of mine.  But I understand trying to see it through, considering how much effort we put towards it.

Changes to the bloodkin to ensure they survive are rather simple. We can try to up their birth rate for starters, though if I remember correctly they are immortal, which should help quite a bit. They'd need to be upgraded to 40.xxx as well.
I'd say we should make them settle marginal regions like deserts and gen a large world to ensure other civs don't attack them during worldgen, but in the new version armies physically move during play, so that'd mean Bloodkin attacks would take forever to happen anyway (and we're not safe from them showing up with a single squad that runs away because we didn't make their discipline skill innately high enough) which would create another Demongate.

Of course we could just replace them with Elves being the new challenge race. I've got ideas to make them more dangerous - see this thread. But I have exams in a week + 3 essays I have to finish (oh god why) so its really not possible for me to be working on it ATM. I'd ask 4mask as our other local resident modder of course - but he seems pretty busy finishing Demongate, and I roped him into finishing/fixing the Bloodkin for me last time. So you guys'll just have to wait for me to flex my modding muscles in this case, and pray that albatross don't become a civilization and the challenge race doesn't accidentally light itself on fire.

EDIT:
I like the Port-Royale idea, but building a port serves no in-game purpose (we won't ever, ever receive a ship) and I feel like we should avoid setting up plot points that won't ever deliver (case in point: Bloodkin). Perhaps a refugee camp would be a good alternative? You've got refugees, bandits, gangs, conniving entrepreneurs and elements of now-disbanded organizations. Add some lawlessness and crushing poverty and we've got ourselves a nice settlement (though not for the residents).
 
RP-wise, we can set up dwarves important to factions (represented in-game by the various fort institutions and military squads) in very good accommodations, and leave the rest of the dwarves in bad ones (unless they're legendary). This'll create tension; things start to go badly, and we could end up with riots, which'll make a good realistic challenge since invaders are kind of rare in the new versions. We'll have a baron/count/duke, but they'll be a neutral npc dwarf who's not involved in in-fort politics, and we can compete over the available positions opened up by them. No monarch - that'd make things weird.

I personally don't feel certain I want the bloodkin back - I'm cool with starting fresh. But if you guys want to keep this thing going, I'll participate.

[Gnorm]

It's kind of ironic since you feel that way, because if I remember correctly you were opposed to that sequel idea of mine.  But I understand trying to see it through, considering how much effort we put towards it.

It's mostly this. I don't believe that we can even emulate what we had going with Steelhold through a sequel, and Demongate stands as proof of that. Still, I feel that we ought finish what we have started regarding the bloodkin.