Codex Interview RPG Codex Interview: Legends of Eisenwald, Turn Based Strategy/RPG

[zeitgeist]

I haven't played King's Bounty but it sounds like it would be my kind of thing.

I loved the original at the time, and actually preferred the "roaming knight with his army" concept to the later HoMM games, but was disappointed that it wasn't more of an RPG. The recent sequels expanded upon that concept rather well, yet were still lacking in character customization and general RPG features (though not as much as the original). Today I would probably lump a game like the original together with various "coffee break" roguelikes, and even the sequels are treading very close to that territory (although I fully admit to playing them).

Assuming we are talking about the singleplayer here, HoMM is weak in that respect anyway, in that you normally can go for one really powerful army to take over the map, and territory and secondary heroes are often meaningless as a result.

Yep, that's pretty much what KB is - HoMM with a single army.

I would be very skeptical towards a game built on the same premise that doesn't even have basic features like terrain bonuses/effects, which is why I predict my reaction to the final result of this project will be "if only..." Hope I'm wrong.

 

[Excommunicator]

Excommunicator - what do you men by greater tactical complexity? You mean gameplay on a global map or combat?

I would like both, but I was referring to combat. At the moment there does not seem to be a lot to consider in combat. I would like to see more significance on things like terrain, direction, line of sight, significance of adjacent occupied hexes (I believe you have a little of this at the moment), attack types, morale, injury/damage types, things like that. For the future, hopefully. Getting a basic functional game is the only thing that matters at this point

 

[Johannes]

A lot of those things don't seem to fit so well with the existing system (terrain, direction, and LOS mainly). Giving varied attacks and abilities seems to be the best way to deepen this system.

 

[Aterdux Entertainment]

Hmm, we will have some terrain bonuses and effects. And for combat, I wish we could show everything right now how it would look like - but not everything is ready yet for that. And Kickstarter also takes quite a bit of time and effort. If we go through the list:
terrain - yes (to some extent), direction - yes, (attack from the side and the back it is different than from the front), attack types are also different depending on weapons, injury/damage types - yes, depending on weapons. All of this is planned not for the future but for this release. I don't know the number of unique combat bonuses that we have but it's quite a bit. Also, passive abilities are there too. For that reason I believe that our combat is pretty complex tactically but it's OK if you disagree.

 

[DwarvenFood]

Have you played Kings Bounty?
You simply gain gold/xp/equipment by killing stuff and you open up new pathways by removing meat-shields. You (mostly) hire troops from merchants. There is no need to run back and forth to protect mines/cities from enemy armies. No upgrading cities, only your troops. THe reasons you run back and forth in KB is to stock up on troops or
because you're finally powerful enough to fight your way past certain points.

Well you can only take a certain amount of armies with you, and you can garrison troops in castles that you conquered (which needs to be done in order to get bounties and map pieces) so you do go back here and there but since there is also a time limit, one is required to push forward as much as possible. Sadly I was never able to complete the game, always came a couple of turns short or not enough map pieces to make sense of it. I'm talking about the original KB here.

EDIT: I think we are talking about the same thing though, I agree that you do not travel around in order to protect the cities from enemy armies - although your cities could get conquered. It's not that much as an objective as it is in the HoMM games.

 

[Aterdux Entertainment]

We posted yet another update, this time about global map gameplay. Here is a link to Kickstarter: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1684781151/legends-of-eisenwald/posts/222571 but the full article is anyway here: http://aterdux.com/archives/249

 

[zeitgeist]

Is this indicative of there being only three possible main characters, or is it just for this test scenario/presentation?

Also, I've noticed that the hero doesn't appear to be in the actual party roster, is that correct? Is the hero character physically present on the battlefield or is he an unseen leader that isn't a real character but more of a collection of skills and party buffs and such instead?

 

[Aterdux Entertainment]

Yes, there are three possible main heroes, like in many other games, we only have three.

And a hero is in the army, it is a special unit - with upgrades he or she doesn't change appearance but gets upgrades to stats plus selection of special skills.

 

[DwarvenFood]

Hmm a female main character that is not fapfan-service.

 

[Jarpie]

Yes, there are three possible main heroes, like in many other games, we only have three.

And a hero is in the army, it is a special unit - with upgrades he or she doesn't change appearance but gets upgrades to stats plus selection of special skills.

Are the heroes/classes gender specific, or can they be mixed?

 

[Aterdux Entertainment]

Hmm, I don't know how I would mix a knight and a baroness Knight and Mystic are male heroes, Baroness is a female hero.

 

[zeitgeist]

Yes, there are three possible main heroes, like in many other games, we only have three.

And a hero is in the army, it is a special unit - with upgrades he or she doesn't change appearance but gets upgrades to stats plus selection of special skills.

Could you please explain the reasoning behind this design decision? It seems to me that the main character (given the focus on RPG features) should have at least as much customization options as the rest of the units, if not more.

I'm somewhat confused about the unit appearance customization/paperdolling too - the inventory seems to have various equippable items that appear to be visible on the unit when equipped, is this true or is the appearance decided only by the level of the unit in question? Or are there multiple armors with distinct looks for each level?

 

[Jarpie]

Hmm, I don't know how I would mix a knight and a baroness Knight and Mystic are male heroes, Baroness is a female hero.

I meant that is baroness always ranged, or can she also use melee-weapons and can have melee skills, and vice versa with knight?

 

[Aterdux Entertainment]

Well, main hero is more customizable than a regular unit - regular unit you have to upgrade from, let's say a militia man into someone more powerful like a pikeman or infantry man - and those units look different. Main hero looks the same and with upgrades it receives better stats and special skills, so he is much more customizable. Introducing a special upgrade tree for a hero doesn't seem meaningful.

When a unit takes a different weapon, it's reflected in his appearance. Not all items do however. And a unit cannot use any kind of weapons, there are some restrictions.

Baroness is always ranged, Knight is always close combat.

 

[Aterdux Entertainment]

Hi everyone, if you are interested, there will be IAmI session at reddit today with me (Alexander). http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/ - right now it's in the list of the upcoming IAmAs... Maybe you already asked everything here though, whole 7 pages here

 

[Jarpie]

Hopefully that will get you another big push on pledges.

 

[Aterdux Entertainment]

Yes, and sending out new press releases too hopefully will help!

 

[Infinitron]

Tweeted by Brian Fargo

 

[J_C]

But what's wrong with Rock Paper Shotgun? They should have posted about this, yet they are just dicking around with other silly game news.

 

[Aterdux Entertainment]

Yup, we were also hopeful for Rock Paper Shotgun. Another press release went out to them (and others) yesterday. I guess we just don't know how they select materials for publication.

 

[J_C]

Yup, we were also hopeful for Rock Paper Shotgun. Another press release went out to them (and others) yesterday. I guess we just don't know how they select materials for publication.

I don't get it. There aren't that many worthy game news on a day that 1 paragraph about Eisenwald wouldn't fit in.

 

[Crooked Bee]

Yup, we were also hopeful for Rock Paper Shotgun. Another press release went out to them (and others) yesterday. I guess we just don't know how they select materials for publication.

They select them on a whim, basically.

 

[Aterdux Entertainment]

They select them on a whim, basically.

It seems like that - and it's hard to figure out how their whim works But - it seems like if project comes from UK it's bound to be an article in RPS there...

 

[commie]

I try to do my bit, spamming Polish forums with Eisenwald news...don't know how much effect I'm having

Oh, Misters Aterdux: One of the things that made me back this project instantly the moment I saw it was not just the Disciples 2 on steroids combat or the graphical quality but also the lack of BLOOM! It's amazing how good a game can look with natural subdued, realistic colours and not everything shining like dogs' balls. I hope that you won't go the 'next gen' graphical route too much. I know some want bloom(sick bastards) but even if it's a toggle, the textures in games that have bloom as an option still tend to be overly shiny even with it off so I'd rather you not change the look from where it is now. Let other games in this genre blind people with their kiddie colours!

 

[J_C]

I managed to capture the moment when they reached exactly 50K. Nice job bros. And fuck the mainstream media, Aterdux did it without their "help". Still, I hope they will write a few articles in the last few days.