Grab a Sword, Fight the Horde: Front Lines!

After bringing my Armor mod up to a near release level (v0.99, heh) I had a thought for this mod, Front Lines. I started work on it a few days ago and have come far. It's even simpler than Armor. Let me know what you think...

Up to 10 players right now, maybe 11 if I allow human control of the computer's AI.

Humans = Players 1-10 and Computer 11
Orcs (the Horde) = Computer 12

The map is 128x128 split top/bottom by a very high mountain range with three passes. To the north is the Horde Encampment, and to the south is the Human Encampment. Each side has barracks which produce the troops for each army. Humans produce footmen, archers, knights, priests, and ballistaes, and Orcs produce grunts, troll headhunters, tauren, shaman, kodo beasts and blademasters and far seers. Each unit is produced at a frequency directly proportional to it's power, with weaker units produced more often and stronger ones very rarely, if at all. There is a global unit cap on each side which, if reached, disallows further unit production. So even if the 60 second timer has expired that produces a Blademaster, if the Orcs currently are capped out none will be produced, and another 60 seconds must go by before it is checked again.

Objective: destroy the other team's buildings and units. If the barracks are destroyed no new units can be produced (except for players). I'll toy with the idea of making it so humans can't respawn if a certain building is destroyed. Dunno'.

Players spawn as peons in the bottom right on top of a snowy plateua where they choose their avatar. Each player only ever directly controls one unit. At present (v0.5 I think) you can select from a Footman, an Archer, or a Dwarf (toned down Mountain King). Gonna' add Priest next.

The premise is this: you start off as a front line soldier and work your way through the ranks, eventually becoming a General. If a default War 3 Footman has 420 hps, defense of 2, and does 12-13 dmg with a cooldown of 1.35, then so do you if you choose a Footman as your unit.

Only difference is you're a "hero", so you can gain levels, strength, intelligence, hps, etc., etc., and can buy items at Blacksmiths, Lumber Yards and other buildings. You have a few abilities to choose from as well to make things interesting, but nothing too fantastical. Everyone has critical strike and evasion as possibilities, and the footman can learn bash and devotion aura. The archer can pick up trueshot aura, cold arrows, and searing arrows in addition to crit/evasion, and the dwarf opts for thunder clap in place of devotion compared to the footman.

The ranking isn't implemented yet, but the idea is to allow a unit to advance in rank based on level. If a Footman gains level 10 he will be converted into a level 1 Sergeant. A level 10 Sergeant becomes a level 1 Lieutenant, then a Captain, then a Lord, then a King. Nothin' set in stone yet, but you get the idea. The advantage of the rank is that if you encounter un-attached allied computer units they will "attach" themselves to you and follow you around. The higher your rank the more units can attach to your command. I'm gonna' allow simple commands like "Halt" (stay put), "Follow" (begin following), and "Disband" to make them unattach. A Sergeant could for instance be able to lead up to 3 other units. A Lieutenant, 6. Captain 9, Lord 12, and King 15 (NOTE: the unit cap is 150 units per team, so 150 / 10 players = 15 per player). Again, none of this stuff is in v0.5 yet but should be a basic version working by v1.0. Lord willing.

But the big thing is, if you die that's it. You lose everything, including items and levels. You start over in the bottom right as a peon, able to select a new avatar to begin again at level 1. (NOTE: I may decide to allow your items to remain on the ground so someone can pick them up. You gain gold by being the deliverer of the killing blow.)

Think suspense. Think concern. Think fear. Think people dropping after they spend 30 minutes getting to level 9 and then get boxed in by the computer forces and die horribly. Mu hah hah! In the handful of tests I've had since I started I've had plenty of complaints about not being able to revive. But again, you're a front line troop. With a life. You're not there to hurl yourself mindlessly at the enemy, but to think, to outsmart, to survive. If I allowed you to revive, there would be no reward to gaining the higher levels...you'd eventually get them no matter what, right? (NOTE: In the last three tests I had plenty of people get to level 8+, so it's indeed possible with a little effort.)

But no, soldier, you've got one life to live. Grab a sword and fight the horde!

Let me know!

Dogs! Do you want to live forever?

Sounds great! Sorta like Aeon of Strife with actual strategy.

that rules. I think i'm going to be your groupie, because all your ideas are cool.

I *love* the concept! :D
A few ideas:

Regrowing black shroud thingie. No wussy gray areas!

Camera locked to character, maybe? Would make careful mini-map study real important.

Instant promotion for killing high-rank enemies.

How about... 50% chance to be wounded instead of killed when hp reaches 0. You then have your camera locked to a medic unit in your base, who sloooowly walks to the spot where you died, turns around and walks back to a tent or something. Once it gets there, you are resurrected after half a minute or so.

Nyah, for gameplay reasons I think I'll leave them both (shround + camera) at default modus operundi.

Personally, I hate cams locked to chars....

Possibly...hmm. May be good.

This I like! That would rule. Here's my twist: the "medic" would just be the elf priest and would simply have to go to the hero's corpse to revive it. I'll have to work on this, but it sounds great.

Thanks for the ideas!

Care.

Here's the latest beta version for you to try out.

Condition: let me know what you think!

Take care.

Nice beta, I think... uhm... It's... uuh. Good. Yeah.

Here are a few more suggestions, feel free to ignore all of it:

More different classes, for example:
Engineer. Build barricades and weak towers, strong attack vs buildings. Other stats like a militia.

Sniper. Huge range, huge damage vs units, but MASSIVE cooldown. Also a very short-range secondary attack vs buildings that does very little damage but has less cooldown. Other stats like a rifleman.

Scout. Windwalk spell and good sight range. Can't attack buildings.

Less grunts OR 600 hp grunts. 700 hp is a lot.

Why the uncertainty? Explain.

Yeah. I'm slowly adding. Originally was just Footman and Archer, then added Dwarf. Next Priest, and finally the Mage.

I plan on adding a thief/scout type class, but then that'll probably be it.

I may do the engineer thing. Maybe.

The plans are in motion to expand on the existing classes:

Footman (reaches lvl 10) -> Sergeant (should be working)
Sergeant (reaches lvl 10) -> Captain (not working yet)
Captain (reaches lvl 10) -> Lord (not working yet)

I haven't tested the Sergeant thing fully yet. I got it to where you reach level 10 and you become a Sergeant, but I forgot to reset the level to 1. I fixed it, but haven't tested it yet (016 has the fix and should work if anyone decides to spend the time and effort getting to level 10 - *grin* let me know).

But anyway, the "Footman" class' strongpoint is it's open ended-ness. You may start with 420 hps and 12-13 dmg, but after you're a 10th level Lord you'll have 9+9+9+10=37 levels worth of stats under your belt. Your hps will be 2220, and your dmg 83-84.

Dwarfs are similar to footmen, but will only gain twice instead of thrice:

Dwarf (reaches level 10) -> Dwarf Captain
Dwarf Captain (reaches level 10) -> Dwarf Lord

Archers:

Archer -> Ranger

Archers by far have been the best class in all the tests I've done to date. They are the easiest to level, and die less often than the others since they aren't mixing it up with 700 hp grunts. :)

Priests:

Priest -> High Priest

Mage:

Mage -> Arch Mage

The Priests and Mages are unique in that they start with all three of their abilities without having to put pts into them as they level. I didn't plan it this way, but it's the only way it works. As compensation I've given the Priests the Tranquility Ultimate, and the Mage will get something Ultimate too. High and Arch versions will each get another Ultimate for a total of two Ultimate skills. Hopefully.

I'm trying to work it in so you can buy a horse to convert a Footman into a Knight or a Mage into an Arch Mage, but have been experiencing technical difficulties. :)


That's their new default in 1.03 I guess. I didn't change grunts at all. Or any Orc unit for that matter.

Well, enough for now.

Care.

I couldn't decide between Great, Wonderful, Amazing or Good. Since it IS a beta, I finally decided to stick with good for now.

A bunch of brand new ideas coming up. As usual, feel free to ignore them.

First, set it during the second orc/human war (Warcraft 2) by simply replacing the tauren's name and model with the ogre and replacing the headhunter missile with an axe and its model with a forest troll. Oh, and Shaman -> Ogre Mage wouldn't hurt, either.

Maybe upgrading to the next class should require visiting a specific building in the base? This could also allow multiple paths to upgrade your unit. For example, a level 10 footman would visit a barracks to become a sergeant or a stable (I'm sure there's something remotely stable-like to use as model.) to become a knight.

For the dwarf, an alternate path could be Dwarven Sapper (If giving units the goblin landmine item ability works, you could enable him to sacrifice health to place a mine)

Ok, I figured out I couldn't use replace/set lvl/set experience for the footman->sergeant thing. It just didn't work.

I had to actually remove the lvl 10 footman and create a new lvl 1 sergeant in it's place. But that necessitated storing some stuff like old life/mana to keep it relative on the new unit, and all the old unit's items. But it works! When you hit lvl 10 you become a brand new lvl 1 sergeant, with all your old items. Whew!

Next I'll create the other tier 2 heroes to upgrade to (archer, dwarf, priest, mage).

Tomes present a problem, since when I create the new lvl 1 sergeant it has preset str/int/agi based on what you'd have as a lvl 10 footman. I'd have to make an array for every time you used a tome and how much str/int/agi you got from it, then apply the array each time you gained a rank. Bleh.

For now no stat tomes. Exp tomes still work fine.

As for pre-War 3 settings, nyah. I like fighting Taurens. :) I always thought the War 2 stuff was a bit on the silly side. I mean come on, a unit that farts? Heh.

I prefer to allow the units to rank up "in the field", as it were. You've got a good idea though...they can level up in the field, representing battle experience, but need to return to base to receive their new "rank". Sounds do-able!

Dwarfs as sappers? Nyah. You've noticed that I don't have Riflemen, right? I hate gunpowder in fantasy games.

Care.

Who needs gunpowder? They're, uhm... maaaagical mines.
Yeah.
Magical.
:Heh:

Played an 017 beta this morning. Had a full house going in (10 players, counting myself) and only lost one or two I think before game's end. That was awesome. I would like to think that it means seven people (not counting myself) actually enjoyed the game to stay. :) It lasted about 30 minutes I think.

I began by going for the footman so I could test the footman->sergeant thing, but things were so crammed with all 10 of us peons on top of the plateau that I passed too close to the priest....

Five levels later I finally learned Tranquility. Four levels after that and I was a level 10 Priest. Hoorah! My career consisted of healing the front liners, infusing some with inner fire, and performing tranquility when I could (loooooong cooldown). Oh, and making sure I didn't get trapped between the orcs and our allied forces, who have a bad habit of lining up right behind you (the archers at least). Occasionally I'd get a shot off at a stray orc or troll. Heh, quite fun the non-combat life.

Then I strayed too close to the front lines, trying to heal our only resident footman, yellow Metaphors. I was helping him stay alive to level 10 so we could see if the sergeant thing worked. Well, he lived alright and the conversion from footman worked fine, but like I said I strayed. Got caught between several orcs. I didn't happen to have a scroll of tp so I perished, alas! That hurt.

I started over as a Dwarf. By the time I made level 4 or so the rest of the crew (mainly archers) were all level 9 or 10 themselves and had taken out the enemy's barracks. Shortly thereafter the Horde was annihilated.

The last several beta's have been won mainly by archers sneaking around back and literally picking off the barracks. I may need to beef up base defense some.

This is developing into quite a fun mod, even if I do say so myself! Heh heh.

Care.

Front Lines: Grab a Sword, Fight the Horde!

That's what the title is now.

But what if I made a second version where you fought all undead? Heh. Any ideas? [EDITED to mean second version, not replaced first one]

How about this:

Front Lines II: Get an Urge, Kill Some Scourge!

Whaddya' think?

Care.

Went to a LAN last weekend, and put up a 7 player game (Might not have been the most recent beta, though). There's two things I noticed...

Mage is too weak. That firestorm barely hurts the grunts. I'd give him creep blizzard as a normal skill, firebolt as a hero skill and inferno with a toned-down infernal as level 6 spell.

Tomes of Greater Experience are way too cheap. You can just buy yourself right up to level 10 if you die and have some cash.

Up to build 038 now. Quite a few changes since 017. Heh heh. I think I'm calling it v1.2 now too, since enough things have stabilized to consider it at a 1.0 level.

Some awesome tests lately, since I'm still adding stuff. Couple of games there have been some people who ragged the game as being "lame" and "gay". LOL! 30 minutes later they're still playing, apparently either having too much fun to care how lame/gay the game is. :) That or they're some sadistic little suckers. Heh.

Classes are now:

Footman->Sergeant->Captain (Crit, Evasion, Devotion Aura)
Dwarf->Dwarf Captain->Dwarf Lord (Crit, Evasion, Bash, Warstomp, Thunderclap)
Elf->Ranger (Crit, Evasion, Trueshot Aura, Cold Arrows, Searing Arrows)
Mage->Archmage (Slow, Invis, Poly, Rain of Fire, Blizzard, Teleport)
Priest->High Priest (Inner Fire, Heal, Dispel Magic, Holy Light, Tranquility, Resurrection)
Thief (NEW)->Assassin (Crit, Evasion)
Engineer (NEW) (Crit, Evasion)

The Footman can now issue the following orders upon reaching Sergeant (lvl 10):

follow (they blindly follow the leader and do not attack)
attack (releases them from a follow command)
move (makes them scatter in case he finds himself surrounded)
retreat (makes all in range return to base immediately)

I've opted to take the easy way out and just make ANY surrounding allied Footmen respond to the commands, no limit on quantity. The range is the only differentiation between Sergeant and Captain, with Captains having more range.

Anyone can issue a 'medic' command which will give nearby allied Priests the order to heal the player. Doesn't work 100% of the time I've noticed, but I think it's because sometimes the Priests are still in their heal spell cooldown period and don't respond.

The new Thieves get only two abilities: Critical Strike and Evasion, but they also have Shadow Meld. When they become Assassin's they get Permanent Invisibility, but you can buy Gems of Seeing and Sentry Wards, and Engineers can build Elven Guard Towers which can see invisible. But wait, why would you have to worry about other players as Assassins? Hee hee...see below.

The cool thing about Thieves and Assassins is their ability to Backstab. I've coded it so if the Theif/Assassin is DIRECTLY behind a target it does 150 x his level in damage, 250 per level for Assassins. Thieves have a 45 degree window, Assassins a 60 degree window (i.e., it's easier for Assassins to backstab). If you're good at maneuvering you can really rack up the kills, but it takes a good eye. I'm still working on balancing the damage, and may end up introducing a random factor.

Engineers, finally. Peasants who can level up to level 10. Heh heh. And they're as strong as a Peasant too, when they start at level 1. Weak I mean. ;) It's funny. But they can build towers, which is cool. Scout towers (upgradeable to Guard/Cannon), Cannon Towers, and Elven Guard Towers. Anything killed by the towers gives the owner the gold, even if the owner is no longer an Engineer, which is cool. They can also repair buildings. Thinking about making it so towers can hold a trooper, so if you get caught in the open you can run to your tower and call for backup. Until they get your tower that is....

Each player gets their own Blacksmith and Lumber Mill which sells stuff and allows upgrades. Blacksmith allows weapon/armor upgrades, 3 levels per, and Lumber Mill allows archer upgrades, range and damage. Smith sells claws of attack and rings of protection, while Mill sells boots, cloaks, gloves and some other agility/speed related stuff. If the building is destroyed you can no longer buy upgrades or items. Oh, and Mill sells Wood in lots of 50 so you can still purchase the upgrades.

There are 3 other buildings that sell various stuff. Arcane Sanctum has mage oriented stuff, while Arcane Libram sells scrolls mainly. Workshop sells miscellaenous items and the Gyrocopter. The Gyro' can transport your unit across the map. It doesn't attack. It's great for when you get trapped by the comp's units and need extraction. :) Or for delivering you into the enemy's base.

I've also made it so if you attack an allied unit 7 times, which gives you a little leeway, you become an Outlaw. Outlaws are targeted by all allies of the unit you attacked, and when they die they respawn in the Orc base. Heh heh. Only thing I haven't done yet is make some item selling buildings in the Orc camp. Additionally Outlaws respawn as the unit they die as. The pro is that if you're a Lvl 10 Dwarf Lord (i.e., lvl 30) then you restart as a Lvl 1 Dwarf Lord and not a Lvl 1 Dwarf. The con is that you don't ever get to change your class again.

Which brings me back to Assassins. Outlaw Assassins are nasty. Me and this one guy worked our way up to Assassin, and he to lvl 10 like 4-6 levels before me. He then turned Outlaw. Bleh! This was back before gems of seeing or sentry wards, so the only time he became visible was when he was attacking. He single handedly wiped out just about all of the 5 or so remaining allied players, and was working on the leftovers when I finally managed to maneuver a backstab on him. And only because he had just bought a Gyrocopter and was controlling it. He wasn't paying attention to his Assassin, which was whacking on a player Dwarf and consequently visible. I lunged in and got a killing blow. Unfortunately the loss of our lvl 10 High Priest, lvl 10 Ranger, etc., etc., spelled our doom. Heh. The Outlaws won the day.

Well, that about sums up the changes. I need to post the latest build later.

Take care and hope to see you online so you can help me test!

EDIT: added abilities in the list of classes, above

EDIT: with 1.04 I'll be able to make the regular abilities like slow, heal, etc., into learnable skills with 3 levels each! Woot! This means the Priest, who doesn't get any learnable skills right now until lvl 10 (Holy Light) will now have to learn Inner Fire, Dispel, and Heal to lvl 3 each instead of having useless skill points. Same with mages.

Care.