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Tales from Candlekeep - turn-based dungeon crawler based on D&D Adventure System board game

LESS T_T

Arcane
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Codex 2014

- "many of the elements of the original [board] game have been left untouched"
- "It is a single-player game at the moment although you do have control of four or five characters. So you follow the format where one hero plays first and events happen, then the next hero plays—the same as you would in the tabletop version, but as a single-player experience." (mutiplayer could be coming in future updates)
- They added crafting.
- "The first thing to know is that it is the player's profile which levels up, and not the hero's. The first level dictates when a new hero can be unlocked, but the player will also be rewarded for every five, ten, twenty-five and one hundred levels he or she reaches. There's no level cap, as we wanted players to be able to level up quickly and be rewarded very often."
- They decided to focus on PC first because mobile devices wouldn't handle "the modern graphics," but mobile versions are not out of question (of course).
- Of course they're thinking about releasing other campaigns beyond Tomb of Annihilation as DLCs.

Quite feels like singleplayer MMO.

Developer BKOM Studios shares the trials and the triumphs of transforming the Tomb of Annihilation Board Game into the digital version Tales from Candlekeep.

BY MATT CHAPMAN

On paper, it seems easy. With an existing Tomb of Annihilation Board Game in production and an Adventure System template that has been around since 2010, it should be a breeze to take a physical board game and create a digital version. Unfortunately, anyone who believes that process is a picnic is actually a few sandwiches short of that outdoor meal. As developer BKOM Studios can confirm, board games and video games are very different animals.

"It is similar but it is not exactly the same game," reveals game designer Olivier Latouche. " Tomb of Annihilation is the fifth iteration of the Adventure System but this is the first digital version," adds producer Paul Gadbois. "The gameplay rules and all the mechanics have been evolving through the years, so we had a lot of content to work with."

"Although we adapted the main mechanics, we tweaked things to take advantage of the digital medium," Latouche continues. "For example, we wanted the digital version to have a faster pace than the board game, so we chose to automate some actions, like dice throws and card shuffling. The game feels faster because players don't need to manage as many components as they do in the tabletop board game, and they can focus on their strategy rather than keeping track of everything."

If this sounds like a radical reworking, you'll be glad to hear that many of the elements of the original game have been left untouched. Case in point, Gadbois assures us that the tiles, which are placed randomly as players move around, operate in the same way.

"We have the same board feeling, so when players explore—inside or outside—the tiles appear and fit into place, just as would happen in the board game where you place the tile yourself to determine how the dungeon would be laid out," he says.

"It's about finding the right balance," confirms Latouche. "It's about keeping that board game experience, where you can feel that little puzzle notch where the tiles fit together. But we have added in fully animated characters, environments, sounds, special effects and elements that pop up from the board."

"Everything is animated, as you would expect in any 3D adventure," says Gadbois. "The digital version comes to life, with full lighting and visual effects, as well as custom animations for pretty much all the characters. Obviously, we are also adding in the kind of props you would expect to see in a dungeon, like coffins, lanterns, and torches."


Getting Started

With so many changes to the nature of the game to make it work as a digital entity, Dragon+ is keen to discover the first steps that need to be trodden when translating an existing board game.

"First you need to establish the core mechanics and the features of the game. Find out what makes the board game unique and what it's renowned for," Latouche says. "After that you have to prioritize these features, to find what works for a video game and what needs to be changed or removed completely."

Originally developed on the tabletop for a single-player or a co-operative group of two-to-five players, the video game will focus on that first option at launch.

"It is a single-player game at the moment," Latouche explains, "although you do have control of four or five characters. So you follow the format where one hero plays first and events happen, then the next hero plays—the same as you would in the tabletop version, but as a single-player experience.

"We still think the title should become multiplayer at some point. That would be a subsequent phase. We want to nail the single-player version and make that awesome, before introducing network play and multiplayer at a later date."

BKOM Studios also entertained the idea of making Tales from Candlekeep run on mobile and tablet devices, before settling on a PC and Mac version. Gadbois and his team felt that mobile devices wouldn't handle the modern graphics of a PC game without needing a lot of optimization.

"Mobile and tablets are currently not our focus. A mobile version hasn't been discarded, so we're not giving you a definitive answer that we're not going to do that. But currently our focus is on the PC experience," Gadbois says.



Game Plan

The need to appeal to a different type of gamer was in itself a driver of change. If you're lucky, a board game might see the light of day once every week, as friends gather around a tabletop. Yet a video game, especially a single-player game, might travel with you and make a much more regular appearance in your leisure time. BKOM Studios knew it had to design additional elements to keep those kind of gamers interested for longer.

"We designed new features with that in mind," Latouche says. "We added in crafting and upgrading your gear, which is considered more of an end-game goal for players. We wanted to bring that kind of replayability to the game, to keep people interested."

While heroes can still collect items and treasures throughout their explorations, that crafting system now allows video game players to create new gear for their characters. A global inventory system called The Collection stores all the crafting materials players find in chests and tombs. These are then used to generate items of equipment in four categories: primary and secondary weapons; armor; and accessories. For example, crafting a stronger dagger adds its increased bonus to all of a hero's applicable powers, like throws and damage, while stronger armor means higher HP and Armor Class.

"As for achievements, all modern video games now have those, so it's no different in ours. We added difficulties to our quests, which is also different from the board game, so players can complete them all up to 'Horrific' difficulty. The game's achievement list might also ask a player to repeat the last quest only using the most basic equipment, or with only a single hero on the hardest difficulty," says Latouche.



Leveling Up

Those who have played an Adventure System board game will know that these tabletop adventures mimic a D&D roleplaying experience, by tracking a player's progress as they develop. According to Latouche, that progression system has also been greatly changed in Tales from Candlekeep.

"The first thing to know is that it is the player's profile which levels up, and not the hero's," he says. "The first level dictates when a new hero can be unlocked, but the player will also be rewarded for every five, ten, twenty-five and one hundred levels he or she reaches. There's no level cap, as we wanted players to be able to level up quickly and be rewarded very often."

With this being the first ever digital version of an Adventure System title, it naturally lacks another element of its tabletop predecessors: the ability for all of the board games to be linked up. Players enjoying the physical games can mix and match elements of Castle Ravenloft, Wrath of Ashardalon, The Legend of Drizzt, and Temple of Elemental Evil. However, BKOM Studios ends our discussion with the exciting news that other adventures may make an appearance at some point.

"The current approach is that we're building a 'Digital Adventure System', with the first campaign being Tomb of Annihilation," Latouche adds, revealing that the team plans to go back and introduce other campaigns as DLC expansion packs.

"This is still very early in the planning phase and we're currently focusing on the first release. But as a good developer we want to support the community by offering some free content and patches, as well as some additional campaigns that can be purchased. And we do plan to support the game for a very long time."

Tales from Candlekeep is scheduled for release for Mac and Windows this Fall and will be available on Steam.
 

LESS T_T

Arcane
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Codex 2014
:roll::roll::roll:: https://www.theworkprint.com/pax-west-2017-tales-candlekeep-tomb-annihilation/123

[...]

Developed by BKOM Studios, Candlekeep takes care of all the minute details of the RPG campaign for you, allowing you, the player, to simply focus on exploring the dungeons and fighting the enemies in turn-based fashion. With Candlekeep, you don’t have to worry about how to best level your character based on his or her class. Experience is even across the board for all four characters. Skills are automatically added to your hotbar and the loot is automatically placed in your inventory. And the game even auto-equips the best items. All you really have to worry about while playing the game is exploring and fighting enemies.

This simplicity does come at a cost. Because the four main characters are pre-generated and the game handles so much of the number intensive mechanics, Candlekeep suffers from a lack of individuality. Role-playing isn’t where a game like Candlekeep is going to excel. Sure, the dungeons are procedurally generated and that makes every quest unique in its execution, but the goals and the characters remain the same, so if you want an RPG to immerse yourself in, Candlekeep isn’t it. You’d be better off with something like Divinity: Original Sin or even Dragon Age Origins.

But if you want a Dungeons and Dragons virtual board game experience to play with your friends, Candlekeep looks solid and at a price point of $15, it’s significantly cheaper than any other alternative. And who knows? Maybe it’s the gateway drug your friends need to get into the harder D&D games.

Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation is slated to release sometime in October of 2017 on PC.
 

Iznaliu

Arbiter
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Apr 28, 2016
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3,686
:roll::roll::roll:: https://www.theworkprint.com/pax-west-2017-tales-candlekeep-tomb-annihilation/123

[...]

Developed by BKOM Studios, Candlekeep takes care of all the minute details of the RPG campaign for you, allowing you, the player, to simply focus on exploring the dungeons and fighting the enemies in turn-based fashion. With Candlekeep, you don’t have to worry about how to best level your character based on his or her class. Experience is even across the board for all four characters. Skills are automatically added to your hotbar and the loot is automatically placed in your inventory. And the game even auto-equips the best items. All you really have to worry about while playing the game is exploring and fighting enemies.

This simplicity does come at a cost. Because the four main characters are pre-generated and the game handles so much of the number intensive mechanics, Candlekeep suffers from a lack of individuality. Role-playing isn’t where a game like Candlekeep is going to excel. Sure, the dungeons are procedurally generated and that makes every quest unique in its execution, but the goals and the characters remain the same, so if you want an RPG to immerse yourself in, Candlekeep isn’t it. You’d be better off with something like Divinity: Original Sin or even Dragon Age Origins.

But if you want a Dungeons and Dragons virtual board game experience to play with your friends, Candlekeep looks solid and at a price point of $15, it’s significantly cheaper than any other alternative. And who knows? Maybe it’s the gateway drug your friends need to get into the harder D&D games.

Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation is slated to release sometime in October of 2017 on PC.

$15 is too high; they might find out that they'll have to drop the price.
 

LESS T_T

Arcane
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Codex 2014
"Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation - Gameplay Live Stream" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE8e1DoLpwM&t=5m13s (what's the point of making it unembedable?)

(9:10) Gameplay starts
(11:14) Character selection screen
(16:28) Dungeon exploration
(20:49) First combat
(1:00:24) Another quest/location

I just skimmed it.
 

Infinitron

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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
From the Codex inbox:



Hello!

I'm pleased to share the very first Dungeons & Dragons Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation gameplay teaser video!

You are free to share this trailer right now with your audience! We will wait 48h before we share it to the public on our platforms, giving you enough time to benefit from this exclusivity.

GAME’S KEY FEATURES

Unique Quests: The procedural map generation allows every quest to remain unique even when replaying them multiple times.
Over 40 Quests: The game features a mix of Main Story quests and Side quests.
A board game experience brought to life: The game highlights most of the features from the popular board game, combined with features unique to the digital version.
Craft your way to Victory: Collect rare crafting materials. Craft powerful weapons and armors to strengthen your heroes.

If you think the game would be a good fit for your audience, it would be amazing if you could cover the upcoming release news or the release itself (due for October).

Our team is available to assist you in any way, by providing demos, assets, interviews or even organize a streamed gameplay session before the official game release.
 

vonAchdorf

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Reminds me of Obsidian's Pathfinder game. I'm shocked that it's not already on the iOS app store.

What's with the pointless teaser? Show us some combat.

I think after developers, who initially followed the mobile hype, found out that Steam is the much bigger market for this type of games, they now do an inverse launch and go Steam -> Mobile instead of the originally planed Mobile -> Steam.
 

Infinitron

I post news
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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Reminds me of Obsidian's Pathfinder game. I'm shocked that it's not already on the iOS app store.

What's with the pointless teaser? Show us some combat.

I think after developers, who initially followed the mobile hype, found out that Steam is the much bigger market for this type of games, they now do an inverse launch and go Steam -> Mobile instead of the originally planed Mobile -> Steam.

More than the size of the market, it's also a better look to be a "premium" game that went from PC to mobile than vice versa.
 

LESS T_T

Arcane
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Codex 2014
Coming in October 11th:

e8c06b7f9dd3597aa51a21df5db24c8d879f83c8.jpg



They had four livestreams since the first one: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMpXhaannisCH8PYJGRPzcA/videos

Also dev blog on Steam:

Dev Blog - Tales from Candlekeep's Game Design

8bc48289fa028542c8ffa24616ebe30da8b056ef.jpg


Since the level design displayed in Tales from Candlekeep was inspired directly by the Adventure System Board Games, we decided that the dimensions of each tile would remain 4 by 4. In addition, we felt the need to add 8 by 8 tiles for the majority of the Villain (bosses) fights. In doing so, the visual aspect of the tiles feel larger and more appealing.

We wanted to keep a balanced level of difficulty similar to the board game in terms of monster spawners and gameplay ingredients.

In Tales from Candlekeep, the procedural map generation also allows every quest to remain unique even when replaying them multiple times.

69a37ce53a5725372656a893d99eefd0ead98dd1.jpg

Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation - The Phases

69a37ce53a5725372656a893d99eefd0ead98dd1.jpg


In Tales from Candlekeep, there are four phases. The Hero Phase, the Exploration Phase and the Villain Phase are taken from the Adventure System board games. Then we've added an Encounter Phase to the digital version.

In the Hero Phase, players can make their moves and actions in any desired order. For example, during each Hero phase you may move and then take an action next, or take an action first and move next, or simply move twice without taking any action. Each hero has different movement speed influencing the number of squares they can move.

The Exploration Phase will spawn new dungeon tiles in the right circumstances. For instance, if you are on an unexplored edge of a tile during the Exploration Phase, the next adjacent tile will be revealed.

The Encounter Phase represents random events occurring during quests, such as negative effects or attack damage. Note that some encounters can also be positive or neutral. An Encounter will also occur if you did not discover a new tile during the Exploration Phase.

Finally, the Villain phase is when monsters and villains activate and take their turn. Note that monsters only activate on the player’s turn that drew them. But be wary, if there is more than one monster in play with the same name, those monsters will activate each time someone who controls them takes a turn.

And forum Q&A:

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. You are correct, just like in the Adventure System Board Games, the characters in Tales from Candlekeep are pre-made. However, we are not closed to the idea of custom characters in a future update. Stay tuned!
 

YES!

Hi, I'm Roqua
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So it has no character generation and forces you to play as a pregenerated piece of shit. How is the combat? For kids or aimed at adults with brains?
 

Jaesun

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While Turn-based, apparently it's baby's first turn based D&D game. We make all the decisions for you in character development! Because that's what D&D is all about! Oh wait...

Really sad.
 

Agesilaus

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Grab the Codex by the pussy Codex USB, 2014 Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Apparently this came out on the 11th:

http://store.steampowered.com/app/663380/Tales_from_Candlekeep_Tomb_of_Annihilation/


(random "let's play" of game)

Looks pretty solid, especially if you're a fun of old board games like Hero's Quest. I purchased it about five minutes ago after watching a youtube video and am going to test it out later today when I get back home. A lot of positive reviews on Steam, and a reasonable pricetag ($16).

Anyone else hear about this game/have any opinions to share?
 

Abu Antar

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Enjoy the Revolution! Another revolution around the sun that is. Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
I want to want it, but some of the design decisions have been discussed in other threads, and they do not compel me to buy the game. Looking forward to hear your impressions.
 

SophosTheWise

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I clicked through the video and what I saw wasn't very inspiring, to be honest. But I'm willing to change my mind. But why wasn't this advertised a lot more? I haven't even seen it on Steam's new releases.
 

Agesilaus

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Grab the Codex by the pussy Codex USB, 2014 Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
I played it just now for an hour and a half, pretty fun. I don't think I'll spend a whole lot of time on it, but it is enjoyable. My main issue is that the characters are pregenerated and there's apparently no character development beyond "crafting" (really just trading in resources for a +1 here or a +1 there, no new abilities). Apparently the only way to learn a new spell or ability is to find an item.

I'd say it does get pretty difficult. It's fast paced, and sometimes the RNG can screw you and you'll be drowning in enemies. There's definitely a few tactical decisions to make, kind of reminds me of the mobile tablet game warhammer quest. If you liked Warhammer Quest, you will definitely enjoy this. The graphics and animations are nice, some of the enemies are pretty creative (four armed yeti gorilla thing?), and there appears to be a good number of missions.
 

vonAchdorf

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It seems to punish loitering even more than WHQ. In WHQ, you stumbled across wandering monsters on a 1 out of 6, here you get a negative event every round in which you don't explore a new tile (while out of combat I think).
 

Agesilaus

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Grab the Codex by the pussy Codex USB, 2014 Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
It seems to punish loitering even more than WHQ. In WHQ, you stumbled across wandering monsters on a 1 out of 6, here you get a negative event every round in which you don't explore a new tile (while out of combat I think).

Yep, loitering is definitely punished, which makes things even more fast paced in terms of how quickly you try to progress through the level.

However, if memory serves, WHQ didn't give you many options to avoid bad events. In this game, you have a good number of ways to skip bad encounters and events. I found that I could generally avoid the worst of the RNG.
 

ProphetSword

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I own all the D&D board games, and they're great fun with three or four other D&D players sitting around a table. In fact, the games can screw you so hard sometimes, playing with guys who are really good at being tactical in their decisions is actually important. I've seen whole scenarios lost because someone made a bad tactical decision and I've seen scenarios that looked like a lost cause turn into a win because someone did the smart thing at the right time.

The board game comes with pregenerated characters based upon well-known D&D characters. So, that's not surprising. Anyone complaining about that has never played the board games.

As far as this game, it's a pretty good representation of the board games. If you're a fan of those or you think you might like to learn how to play one, then you should buy. If you're looking for an RPG, this ain't it. It wasn't meant to be that and you should look elsewhere.
 
Last edited:

J1M

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I played it just now for an hour and a half, pretty fun. I don't think I'll spend a whole lot of time on it, but it is enjoyable. My main issue is that the characters are pregenerated and there's apparently no character development beyond "crafting" (really just trading in resources for a +1 here or a +1 there, no new abilities). Apparently the only way to learn a new spell or ability is to find an item.

I'd say it does get pretty difficult. It's fast paced, and sometimes the RNG can screw you and you'll be drowning in enemies. There's definitely a few tactical decisions to make, kind of reminds me of the mobile tablet game warhammer quest. If you liked Warhammer Quest, you will definitely enjoy this. The graphics and animations are nice, some of the enemies are pretty creative (four armed yeti gorilla thing?), and there appears to be a good number of missions.
It's more like a guild wars situation where your character has more abilities than they can equip. Never understood the "character development" requests. I'd rather have my options unlocked at the start so I can use interesting combinations before the end of the game.

As for the game itself, it didn't hook me the way Pathfinder Adventures did, which feels like it is in the same genre of "tabletop approximation". Do all of the D&D board games have this forced random exploration element?
 

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