Topics

1

Development / Longer shelf life of scribe notes

« on: January 16, 2019, 02:55:05 PM »

It would be nice if scout reports and battle reports lived longer. Battle reports are already saved in the message log for a month, it'd be nice for them to last in the scribe notes for the same time.

Scout reports, and other scribe notes, tend not to live very long at all. Not sure if that's a DB memory issue (I think memory is cheap and that they don't use up all that much data?), or what? Would be nice to have them longer too.

The only issue I'd see would be clogging up the new scribe sharing mechanism, I guess, but that one could have a stricter cut-off.

2

Feature Requests / Build/Loot roads

« on: January 14, 2019, 07:32:11 PM »

Title: Build/Loot roads

Summary: Allow troops to both improve travel times by working on roads and hinder them by looting them.

Details: Looting roads is a great feature on stable that, while extremely situational, has been used rather effectively in a small number of battles. Thus, it is far from game-breaking. It is no longer available on testing, though, and it would be great to have it back. Reversely, there never was any means to improve travel times, and roads on Testing especially tend to be, as the game puts it, "extremely bad". It would be nice if armies could work to improve the road conditions, both as a counter to looting them, and just in general to help improve the travel times, namely on Dwilight, that can be horrendously long (40+ hours is not uncommon, Mountain of Woe to Sabadell is about 70 hours, for example, 69 hours for myself).

Benefits: More strategic options and overall allowing players to actively take travel times into their own hands, and thus decreasing the time they spend travelling.

Possible Downsides/Exploits: Looting roads has never been exploited as far as I'm aware. And good roads are pretty much the norm on stable islands, so allowing players to improve the road conditions in war-torn continents can't really break the game.

3

Beluaterra / Ruins of Wudenkin

« on: January 09, 2019, 08:42:14 PM »

5 Angmar nobles in Bara'Khur's dungeon, yet another military defeat, and the city remains fairly solidly under control. The month(s) long starvation is also over.

God Handkor is having a blast.

4

Feature Requests / Dungeon Message Tweaks

« on: January 09, 2019, 08:33:40 PM »

Title: Dungeon Message Tweaks

Summary: Put yelled messages in the message history and allow prisonners to reply more than once per turn to letters

Details: Right now, when you yell in the dungeon, you don't get a copy of the message in your log. Heck, it doesn't even show on the confirmation page. And when you write letters to your captives, they can only reply once, severely limiting exchanges with them.

Benefits: Better tracking of messages and more interaction

Possible Downsides/Exploits: None for the first part. For the latter, I think spam was the concern back then, but you can just set them to ignore, and I don't think it's a threat to begin with anyways.

5

Feature Requests / Activating Shipyards

« on: November 28, 2018, 03:02:20 PM »

Name: Activating Shipyards

Summary:
Shipyards are infrastructure that we can build since sea travel, but that has no function. This feature request is to toggle two functions for them. One as a ferry toggler, second as a protection provider.

Details:

*Ferry toggle: Ferry routes are a relic from the days before sea zones came in. Sea zones were meant to replace them altogether, but that then remained in limbo as a TODO. The ability to bust into cities directly has always been a little broken, and has had numerous negative impacts. For one, it's a little unfair that some enemies can attack each others' cities without efforts, while others must pass by the much more costly sea zones. Secondly, it meant that in many places, having distinct (or at least hostile) realms was basically unthinkable. Can Fissoa and Madina ever really be expected to go to war, when both of their capitals are one region away from each other for all intents and purposes? D'Hara could never tolerate the idea of sharing the central islands for this reason also. And in the odd cases wars do break out over such places, the result is unlikely to be much fun. Too easy to sneak past each other's armies thanks to a single travel option, leaves everyone kind of forced to just sit in the capital, unless one realm is really much stronger than the other.

Thus, why not turn ferry routes into an extension of the new features, instead of a relic of a prior system? They represent the well-charted routes that sailors frequently use, and that see heavy traffic. But... maybe not all of them are always operational. And the idea of landing in a city via ferry routes is safe, while landing via sea zones is suicide, makes no sense...

Therefore, block ferry routes as a default, turn them off. But have it so that if two cities connected by a sea route both have a shipyard and belong to realms that are at peace or better with each other, THEN, it toggles back on. But you have to pay a fee. As long as your realm or an ally has a shipyard at either your location or destination, you can pay for ships.

Think of it as a naval guild, where the NPCs run the fleets, and the nobles just pay for their services, more than the noble/realm actually owning the ships. The boats are always there, somewhere, fishing, hauling cargo, transporting people, whatever, and sometimes nobles hire their services.

You pay for the fleet's service, and how many boats you want/need, and then they wait for you a day, toggling the ferry route option. If you don't embark, they sail back without you, wasting your gold. Perhaps a cost of about 1 gold per 5 men if the city lacks a harbor, 1 gold per 10 men if the city has a harbor.

*Second option relates to the choice of hiring different kinds of ships, namely, ferry ships, cargo ships, and warships. Ferry ships do as described above, they let your men travel from one ferry port that has a shipyard to another. Cargo ships extend the range for trading, to as if you were in the city on the other end of the ferry lane. They take 20% of your sales if the city lacks a harbor, 10% if it has one. This ferry-toggled trade would show as a distinct trading box below the regular one, to make things clear, and avoid paying fees without knowing. And finally, warships protect from enemies and harass enemies.

This is to counter a new threat to sea travel. If you are using a ferry route or a sea zone, and there are monsters or hostile warships on it, then they will harass you. You can lose hours, provisions, or men fighting them. "While at sea, monsters climbed on the boats, and stole supplies during the night". "While at sea, monsters climbed aboard your boat, and fought your men. 3 men were killed in the process". Hiring warships offers protection. "While at sea, monsters approached, but your warship escort chased them away". This would all be modulated by the number of monsters swimming in the sea zones. If there are too many monsters, they could outright destroy the warships. Warships have a similar effect on enemy traveling troops. "While at sea, hostile warships harassed your ferry. 4 hours were lost evading them." "While at sea, hostile warships attacked your ferry, killing 10 men." For the sake of simplicity, warships and monsters using sea zones would only threaten those on the same sea zones, and those on ferry routes would only threaten those on the same ferry route. Monsters could always use all ferry routes, regardless of shipyards.

Benefits:

Completes the transition intended for sea zones. Gives a purpose to shipyards. Addresses the diplomatic issues of ferry-linked capitals. Balances ferry vs sea zone travel and attacks. Adds appropriate risks for sea traveling and ferrying across monster-ridden sea zones. Encourages realms to seek nearby expansion and conflict instead of far-away alternatives.


Downsides:
Presumably long and complex to code. Higher upkeep costs for realms that rely on ferries, like D'Hara and Astrum. A simpler alternative might simply be to disable ferry routes altogether, and just focus on the penalties to sea traveling in sea regions with a lot of monsters. Could also be an intermediate step.

6

Dwilight / Dwilight Meme Inc.

« on: November 24, 2018, 03:42:30 PM »

7

Feature Requests / New Dynamic Map Option: Full opacity

« on: November 08, 2018, 01:55:46 PM »

Name: Opacity for the dynamic map

Summary:
Either the ability to display no base map, or to display additional layers without at 0% transparency, or a slider to modify the transparency per layer.

Benefits:
Many of the layers on the dynamic map are fairly hard to "read" because of the transparency and color overlap with the regions below them. "Is that region another color because their layer value is different, or because that one's a rural and the other is a badland?", for example. Being able to toggle full opacity (0% transparancy) would allow to better read those layers, and potentially generate interesting looking results for archival.

Downsides:
None other than the time it takes to code.

8

Helpline / Hits, CS, and equipment

« on: November 06, 2018, 05:34:24 PM »

There's some confusion over what the various values mean, and how they work.

It has been said, for example, that hits are not based on weapons, but on CS, which includes weapons, yes, but also training, and... armor.

Is this true? Does higher armor increase hits? Because it makes no sense.

Inversely, does the number of hits taken to cause losses also work off CS. And thus, do weapon ratings play a role in this?

Because if both armor and weapons are calculated in everything... why have distinct stats at all?

9

Feature Requests / New intermediate caste: aristocrats

« on: November 06, 2018, 03:18:03 PM »

Name: New class representing a new caste, aristocrats

Summary:
This proposal seeks to find a compromise between the desires for two characters per continent, and the advantages it brought, while bearing in mind and avoiding the major pitfalls that having two characters per continent brought.

Simply put, the aristocrat class would be an intermediate class between the existing "noble" classes, and the existing "non-noble" adventurer class. They would represent minor nobility, that have a clear and strong allegiance to their realm, but who lack many of the perks the full "major nobles" benefit from. A player could create an aristocrat directly if he can create an adventurer, and it would draw upon his adventurer pool for character limits. An adventurer who meets the requirements to become a noble would now become an aristocrat instead. To become a full on noble, it would require even more than he currently needs, possibly 5 recommendations and 20/10 h/p.

Details:
Aristocrats would not benefit from the major perks of nobility. They would not be included in the "message all nobles of the realm" chat. They would not be allowed to vote. They would not be allowed to become lords, dukes or hold government titles (but they would be allowed to pick an estate and become knights). They would not be allowed to lead troops. lord taxes on their estates would be doubled, and they would follow the same rules as adventurers for wealth and property taxes.

The aristocrat class would be turn-based, and have very few mechanics of its own. It would only have newbie mechanics available, such as visiting the locals and paid work. However, it would gain access to a number of subclasses, which would either be specific to them, or retweaked existing subclasses. For example:

Preacher: gets preaching and a few of the priest's abilities, but not the more advanced stuff like influencing region stats, auto da fe, or claim region. Gets to help morale of units that adhere to the same faith.
Officer:  can target friendly units to improve morale, can evaluate how much stuff there is to forage, can make some activities (hunting, maybe looting, civil work, etc.?) more efficient, can recruit standard scouts.
Merchant: perks of the trader class, perhaps improved with some of the resource ideas.
Explorer: is essentially himself a scout, can look at a region to get a detailed report (perhaps including all the info from all the scout types?), can help troops find shortcuts?
Infiltrator: basically the current infil subclass
Administrator: basically courtier/diplomat stuff

An aristocrat, unlike an adventurer, would have his loyalties clearly displayed. On scout reports and when looking up a region, for example, they'd be there, showing their profession, family, and realm. Something like this:

Nobles here
   nobody
Aristocrats here
   John Poopoo, Administrator of Outer Tilog
   Aroo Doodoo, Administrator of Outer Tilog
   Bobby Looloo, Merchant of Outer Tilog

As a whole, aristocrats would have minor powers over realms compared to true nobles, but in numbers they will still be able to have appreciable impacts.

Benefits:
Many players crave for the possibility of a second character. But most importantly, the game was designed around two characters per continent. While the restrictions was wholly justified and overall beneficial, it did have many drawbacks that this proposal seeks to address. For example, the support classes... Having courtiers, priests, and diplomats was much easier back in the days, we had a lot more. Players didn't mind setting their secondary characters as support classes, because they were still able to fully participate in the team efforts with the "main" character. But nowadays? Most players I come across that play support classes do so because they feel their realm/religion needs it, but don't get much personal pleasure out of it at all. The loss of nobles overall, and the need to put some of these on support tasks, hurts realms' offensive capabilities, and thus the potential for war altogether. As it is, in many places, adventurers have been used as support alts anyways, for example with the wizard army of Angmar. But the problem with that is that adventurers are mostly hidden, weren't meant to be used as such, and aren't turn-based, so this class would help soothe that need while addressing that problem.

Downsides:
One of the drawbacks of 2 chars per continent was spying. This is addressed by aristocrats not being included in their realm chat. Another was grid-locking alliances, this is addressed by aristocrats both not being in the realm chat, as well as being unable to vote or hold office. A third drawback was drone characters, which were boring to interact with because they weren't really roleplayed, and again this is handled by putting them clearly on the sidelines.

10

Helpline / Special Forces

« on: November 04, 2018, 03:45:36 PM »

After a few talks on discord, and stumbling upon some old forum posts... I've been digging into SF, and wandering about others' opinion of them, and how they work.

So, basically, SF are like MI, right? Same behavior code, I believe? Though presumably better?

First, a look at range. Range has zero impact on recruiting costs. Melee SF, R4 SF, R5 SF, all the same. Basically, the formula for recruitment cost seems pretty simple. (Weapon+Armour+Training)*0,45 = gold per 10 men. For archers, inf, and possibly MI, that looks rather like 0,25. In other words, SF are nearly twice as expensive per man as "standard" types.

But are R0 as (in)effective in melee as R5 ones are? Are they still essentially better MI, or are R0 treated as better inf? Because if they are exactly the same as ranged SF, but with no range... and they cost the same... that's pretty terrible. Garbage even. I bet if players knew this, many would do a few things quite differently.

Regarding recruitment limits, SF seem to be about 1/3 of standard (inf/archer/MI) types. Recruiting 100 SF at 90 gpt (gold per ten) would cost 900 gold, while recruiting 300 archers at 50 gpt would cost 1500 gold, for example (if your honor is somewhere in the 800 range or so). Maxing out on SF would therefore cost less than maxing out on archers, for units of the same w/a/t values.

How much CS would a 100 men 90gpt SF unit have, as opposed to a 300 men 50gpt archer unit have? I don't know... that data is a bit less available, harder to compile and extrapolate from. You can't see what others have as w/a/t values, and people often mix unit sources, so it's then hard to extrapolate from the recruiting costs. Also further obfuscated by the fact that large units get a debuff to CS/man, which may or may not be modulated by type (I'd assume it isn't?). If anyone has data, I'll take it. Otherwise I'll try to collect some in the weeks to come.

So for now, the following question remains unanswered: for the same equipment values, will you  get more CS from maxing out on archers, or on SF?

But that also props up another question: is that CS value really representative?

In an old forum post, I saw someone claim that SF will typically deal about twice as many hits as a comparable standard unit. However, they would still lose as many men/hit as the other things. In other words, glass canons. Are they really worth twice the cost per man if only their attack is doubled, but not their defense?

Depending on all these answers, what should one conclude? Is ranged SF worth it? Is melee SF utter garbage? Looking forward to your input! 

11

Roleplaying / In the Hetmanate of Fheuv'n, long, long ago, when IVF stood for something else

« on: October 29, 2018, 11:53:01 PM »

Letter from Guillaume Chénier   (26 days, 18 hours ago) [sent in december 2011]
Message sent to everyone in your realm (15 recipients)
Nobles of Fheuv'n, my Enweili brothers,

It is apparent that the daimons seek to strike fear into our hearts. Some rulers may seek to simply hide the information from their nobles, I would not.

Rather, I would tell you why you need not fear. For yes, there will be a great trial ahead, with a lot of suffering and death. We may all die because of it. But paradise awaits.

The signs have been numerous, for those with open eyes. But hard to confirm, mostly. Some of you may wonder why I so strongly believe we are the chosen people, and why our fate is none else than glory. Let me tell you that while my brother preached the same in his days, I was not always this confident.

In fact, my confidence started where his ceased to be. Let me explain. A few years ago, in the beginning of the last invasion, large hordes of monsters attacked Enweil with viciousness none had ever seen before. Nobles were not simply being wounded in battle, they were being killed and dropped like flies. At least a dozen died in battle in just a few days, trying to save Enweil from the invading hordes. Amongst them was my older brother, Nicolas Chénier, the Field Marshal of Enweil and first Supreme Chancellor. I was a priest at the time, and had not witnessed the battles. But as I heard of the news, the first thing I did was to go fetch my brother. My grief was too great, I could not accept that he had died. So I took a horse and a donkey, and brought his body with me to the North, where I bugged to the undead and to the West, where I begged to the goddess of the Daimons. My sorrow was too great, I was ready for anything to bring him back. But the undead could not return his soul, and the daimons would have perverted what he was. In the deserts of the West, in the outskirts of Taghalaz, I mourned. I cried, I yelled, and I chanted prayers to the gods. He had always been there for me, protecting me, I felt alone, vulnerable, and betrayed. My peers were dying left and right, and I did not know what to do.

My presence and chantings were not appreciated by the locals. These memories are blurred, and I do not remember if it was daimon worshipers or the New Path of the Dragon (they are both as bad, anyways), but shadows rose with a desert storm. I remember only screaming and stabbing. I do not remember how long it lasted, how many there were, if they were human or not, what time of day it was... These memories are all gone.

When the sand storm calmed, my body lay lifeless in the sand, buried in the sand. I do not know how long it was there, cold, drying out under the sands of the desert. But this, my brothers, is when I truly gained my faith. While I was a priest at the time, the words I preached had never truly echoed in my heart. Until then. For that is when the gods spoke to me. I was... I am not sure where. Neither on this world, but not yet in the next. I was alone, when they spoke to me. Many but united. They told me not to grief for my brother, that he was in their care now, and that I should celebrate his death instead of mourning it. They told me, however, that my own time had not yet come, and that I now had a great duty to achieve. They told me to return to my people, that I had to guide them to victory. That they had grand plans for us, and that our suffering would not be for nothing.

And then they cast me back. I awoke, buried under a foot of sand, having laid there for who knows how long. I was cold, icy cold. My throat was so dry I thought I had not drank in months. Pain crippled me, and I could not stand up. Their words echoed in my head for days, or so it seemed. It took a great amount of time before I felt my heart beat again. Then, some time later, I finally felt the need to breath again. The shock of it burst me out of the sand, where I grasped for air. All was dark around me, but I could see the sun was rising. My arms and my torso were littered with scars, scars I still have, but were intact and healed.

After I rose, I saw my brother's body next to me, surrounded by vultures. But as I scared them away, I noticed none of them had even touched him, and he was perfectly intact. I then carried him on my back as I walked back to Enweil, to bury him in Wheling's Imperial Crypt.

That, my brothers, is why my faith is so strong, and my determination resolute. The gods favor us, and regardless of what is to come, we can be content by knowing that bliss awaits us in the afterlife.

Guillaume Chénier
Hetman and Ataman of Imperskoe Viys'ko iz Fheuv'na, Duke of Iato, Ambassador of Imperskoe Viys'ko iz Fheuv'na

12

Feature Requests / "Troops" adjustment on Dynamic Map

« on: October 29, 2018, 01:49:56 PM »

Title: "Troops" adjustment on Dynamic Map

Summary: The dynamic map presently has a "troops" option to check. When you click it, army icons appear on the map for your realm's troops. They sometimes have a frame, at least two different colors exist. It isn't explained anywhere what that means. It would be nice to improve this feature.

Details: I have no idea how hard it would be to code, but it would be nice to have this feature represent fairly accurately army positions. Would make it so much more user friendly for marshals and generals. Maybe the frames are already supposed to indicate how much CS there is... but that's not explained, and that's not very intuitive. Having a greater number of flags (1 per 2500 cs?) display or, even better, a number next to it would be so very nice. For example, if region A has 1337 CS of army B, then there could be the army flag followed by 1.3 (base 1000 CS, 1 decimal).

There'd also need to display the non-army troops. Perhaps the general should get to pick a flag for the realm's unassigned troops. Then give it a frame for the militia version.

Potentially adding all foreign troops as well from all of the realm's shared scout reports?

With the potency of this info, though, it should be reserved to marshals, vice-marshals, and generals. Perhaps marshals should only see their own army, militia, and their own army's scout report results, and only the general should get the whole picture. Way too easy, otherwise, for a spy to just grab a print screen, and send it to his buddies on their private discord.

Benefits: Makes it so much more user friendly for marshals and generals. Also, would be so very cool to look at.

Possible Downsides/Exploits: If restrictions aren't made on who gets the info, it would make spying so much easier via print screens and private discord channels.

13

Feature Requests / Adjustments to the View Army page

« on: October 23, 2018, 03:58:18 PM »

Title: Adjustments to the View Army page


Summary: An extension/restatement of the discussion had on Discord the other day

Details: Remove "rank" column, move "siege engine" column to the end and make it narrower, replace "readiness" column with "equipment damage" column. Add "Average equipment damage" to the tally below the army tables.

Have generals able to see all of that info, minus "troop number", "CS", and "equipment damage".

Benefits: Replaces useless info by actually useful info, removes superfluous info, adds important info, helps the general do his job.


Possible Downsides/Exploits: I know the devs are reticent to add more info to the general to avoid micromanaging, but setting aside that this behavior is really moot in our current context, I don't think the additional info requested here will be sufficient to make him be able to substitute the marshal. It will help him decide what army to dispatch where, though, and what nobles to dispatch to what army.

14

Feature Requests / Colonial Master!

« on: October 19, 2018, 02:31:02 PM »

Name: Dwilight Colonial Master

Summary:
Remove distance from capital penalties on Dwilight

Details:
Dwilight was the Africa of BM, colonization was always in its soul. Back when it was opened, we had the player base to sustain a model of expansion that involved spreading through the wildlands, creating one new realm at a time, and pushing the frontier continuously with more new realms until the whole space was occupied.

But we don't have the player base for that old model, anymore. We barely have enough nobles for the realms it already has, some would argue we'd even be better off with less realms in total.

But the density mechanics combined with the capital radius mechanics have a perverse effect: There is very little incentive for war. Why go fight the neighbor, when the new lands would be beyond your capital's reach, and you'd have a ton of penalties for them? Heck, why attack your neighbor if your realm has already attained the minimum densities the game doesn't want you to go below of?

Hinterlands might help a bit with the latter, but it's really complementary to this idea. Dwilight is testing. It's already the only island with seasons. Maybe we could experiment what it'd be like without the distance from capital penalties for (mercenary) troops and for regions?

Benefits:
Additional conflict, additional things to do for the realms. As it is, the game incentivizes conflict so much, that realms just don't bother. "We've already got all the regions we can hold". "Those regions would be too far, they wouldn't give us anything worthwhile". "The penalties for going so far would make our army completely ineffective".

Dwi has a lot of rogue regions, including a lot of rogue cities. If any realm could sail to take them over, it would certainly FINALLY create a lot of jealousy. "No, WE wanted those regions!" "Well nyuh uh, we took it first!" Successful realms like Westgard and the Lurias could start a colonial rush to secure greater resources, setting up outpost in remote cities, farming far-away lands, and perhaps finally getting some borders with other human realms.

Downsides:
Since this change only concerns 1) region penalties for distance from the capital and 2) (mercenary) troop penalties for distance from the realm, and has no bearing on any other of the density mechanics such as the monster migratory behaviors, the downsides should be limited. At first, it might further dissuade realms from attacking each other, since there will be empty lands to take... but this is both unlikely, and if it were to be, would be temporary as the colonial rush is CERTAIN to create jealousy. Secondly, it'll make some realms more able to project might and bully far-awar realms. Given how little PvP is left on Dwi and in BM as a whole, I'm not convinced this is such a bad thing. And since it's all just a very simple change that doesn't involve the creation of a ton of fancy new mechanics, it should equally be simple to just return things to how they were if we see it doesn't turn out as desired.

15

Feature Requests / Rejected: Remove adventurers from the game

« on: September 07, 2018, 03:09:22 PM »

    Title: Remove adventurers from the game
    Summary: Delete all adventurers and prevent new ones from being created.
    Details: Having 4 adventurers come out of the blue to kill a realm without a trace or explanation is pretty self-explanatory of how lame adventurers are to the game. They were meant as a side-game, and now with scrolls and portal stones, they are having more impact than the realms themselves.
    Benefits: A return to more normal team play of realm vs realm, army vs army.
    Possible Downsides or Exploits: None whatsoever, adventurers are lame and they've done enough harm already.