"The Gate"

The game was inspired by "Castle" at http://www.xgenstudios.com/ check it out if you want to kill a lot of time :P Unit throwing, however, is not going to be included, sorry.

Game Basics:
1-4 Players
For now only solo play, may do a battle mode if the map isn't huge when everything for solo is completed

Gameplay Basics:
Each player has a Gate they have to keep the invaders from breaking through.
If the gate is destroyed, you lose. I am thinking along the lines of 100 or so levels.

This is NOT a TD, but has towers in it, although they don't function how you would think.

There are a number or preplaced towers (I use the term loosely since things like catapults and the gate work the same), like a normal castle would have. Each tower has three units it can train: a worker type, an attacker type, and a mage type. Each unit does different things for the towers.

Towers can also get "Add Ons" which will add something to the tower, one example is "Flaming Arrow Tools" which will allow archer towers to fire a flaming arrow every so often.

Towers also get different abilities. An example would be the White Mage's Tower "Heal" ability, or the Archer's "Piercing Arrows" ability.

In order to train units for a tower you must have citizens available for training, and possible have the tools needed. I am working on an idea where you will also need things like a spell book for a mage, or a bow for an archer, this is not a sure thing though.

Some things thought up so far, some of which may be partly in game already:
Archer Towers: Main Attack Tower. Hits Single Targets. Some ideas for it are: Fire Arrows, Ice Arrows, Peircing Arrows, Poison Arrows, Rapid Fire, & Multishot

Catapults: Secondary Attack Tower. Hits groups of units, but fires much slower. Some ideas for it are: Fire balls, Overload, Timed Explosion (for air unit attacking capability), and Quake balls

Mage Towers (White/Black/Red): Main function is to cast spells, but they can attack as well. Some ideas: Heal, Mind Purge, Slow, Summon, Beast Within, & Dark Minion

Air Battery: These are your anti-air towers. Seeing as how Dragons, Mad scientists, and who know what else will be coming at you from the air, these will be used a lot. Single Unit Attack. Some ideas: Charged Jolt, Stun, Steady Shock

Barracks: Trains various units to be transported out in front of the gate to defend it.

Forge: Trains Blacksmiths. Can build "Add Ons" for towers, as well as items like land mines.

Engineer's Guild: This is where you will do things like upgrade the gates hp or armor, and some other useful functions.

Mercenary Camp: Hire mercenaries to fight with units trained in the barracks. Each Merc costs gold to retain services.

Shrine/Alter/Temple: Allows some invaders to be converted to fight for you. May perform other things as well.

Mini Towers: 6 units can be stationed within. Many different units available to be trained to be put in them. (This is a big maybe)

Heros: Defenders of Gateville, each has useful abilities, but each town keeps only 1 Hero on staff. (another big maybe)

Spike Traps: Traps are laid out on the path leading up the gate, and will damage incoming invaders. Once a trap is activated it is gone.

Land mines: Similar to spike traps.

Burning Oil: Oil can be poured from the gate (possibly other functions) and will burn until the oil is gone.


Well, I guess that is enough for now even though I got a lot more in my notebook :).


The Attackers:
Attackers include footmen, knights, warlocks, giants, lizardmen, dragons, choppers, demons, and more. (Currently ~30 units)

Invaders will be sent semi-random. Basically, each level will have a "score", and using a formula, I will set a chance for spawn for certain unit types to equal that score.
Example (not real numbers):
footmen =1 knight=5 baby dragon=20
Level score 1 = 50
Level score 2 = 70

Level 1 may have 10% chance to spawn footmen, 4% chance to spawn knight, and a 1% chance to spawn a dragon
Level 2 may have 0%chance for footman, 2%chance for night, and 3% chance for dragon.
This should keep one tower from being more useful than another, one level it may be good to have a beefed up catapult to kill mass units, while the next may be more about killing of tough single units.

Units will change as levels advance, some stop spawning, while others begin. Basically, in the beginning you will be fighting brigands and outlaws, progess to armored knights, and by the end you may be killing off demon spawn.

I am going to try to keep unit types that may spawn in a given round somewhere around 5-8, but this is still very early.

Other Stuff:
In between levels is the only time you are allowed to do some things, it is also the time the traveling traders may come to town with useful items.

I am trying to come up with a way to do what I'll call "Random Events" These will have a chance of happening in between levels. Some ideas are children coming of age thus giving you some free citizens, a group of theives that attack the trader and then go on to attack the gate (effectivly "linking" two levels and eliminating between round actions) and lots of other good stuff. I currently only have 12 random events thought up, if you have an idea feel free to list it, I would like to have somewhere around 25 of both "good" and "bad" random events. I am thinking along the lines of a 3:100 chance of a random event happening every round, which means you could play for a long time without experiencing the same events.

I guess that is all for now. Tell me what you think so far, play the above game, and let me know if you have any ideas, comments, suggestions, changes, or whatever. I may be willing to work with another person on this, but not at the moment.

Here is a quick picture of one "lane" (this may change) I was going to upload a very early test shot also, but I again can't upload... even though I just did :(

Just finally was able to, and had time to, upload the really early in game pic. You can see a few cool things in the picture, although they may change as this is still so early in development... anyways, enjoy.

Hey Smurf, hrmm, the map sounds cool but I hope this doesn't mean you're forgetting about Minotaur's Labyrinth 2...

I like the sound of a lot of things in 'the gate', it seems you're a master creator of TDs. Good luck, I'll keep my eye on this one...PM me if you need a beta tester or someone to consult about triggering.