Broken Kingdom

Broken Kingdom

Summary: A strategy map with similar gameplay to Europa, but with a much more realistic and rpg-like feel.

Story:
With a dull thud that shivered the roots of the ground, the huge stone settled into place, sealing the tomb into eternity. The tomb was a series of catacombs cut deep into a hill that loomed high above a vast grassy field, brown and parched in the dead summer. The sky was a monotonous sheet of grey. Thunder growled menacingly, far away, but no rain would come. No rain had come at all that summer.

A carefully laid stone path lead up to the now sealed tomb entrance. Six men kneeled, three on either side of the path, just below the seven stairs leading up to the tomb. Their heads were bare and they wore thick black robes. Behind them kneeled lines of guards in full plate armor and various other officials of the court who were also garbed in black robes. Beyond them, many more were gathered, people of all classes, women, children, standing in sullen silence. The four servants who had carried the king’s body into the tomb raised the hoods of their black cloaks and shuffled single file, back down the path, between the kneeling men. As they passed, the men rose. All six were brothers, sons of the king, and they rose in unison, Sir Varaband, Sir Felmor, Sir Cabout, Sir Guildenstern, Sir Kirran, and Sir Tarlach.

Rising from a mere soldier, by age twenty-five, King Haribold had united the divided land into a vast kingdom. He appointed his sons rulers over the six major keeps of the realm to ensure order and establish his rule over that of the old nobility. He suddenly took ill and died the night after touring the construction of his new castle. He was fifty, but his death came as a shock to everyone. He left no will and no tradition to determine which son was to inherit his kingdom. Each of the six sons knew this, and each of the six sons saw this as their opportunity to seize the kingdom as their own.

The six men turned and walked down the path behind the servants, each looking straight ahead, in dead, determined silence. The people bowed their heads, closing their eyes, mourning. Mourning a family shattered, a land contested - a Broken Kingdom.

Gameplay:
6 Players
Overview: Gameplay is very defensive due to limited resources. It is like chess, but with the diplomacy and challenge of six players.
-Objective: Defeat or suppress all other players.
-The Europa/Diplomacy town concept (a unit, representing a town, can be captured, providing tax income) has been expaned upon. Towns are literally towns - they each have a town center, houses, and a barracks (more variety may be added later, depending on loading times and filesize). To capture a town, a player must bring the town center building down below 700 hit points.
-Managing population is crucial. Each house has five villagers, these villagers may be trained as peasants or soldiers. Remaining villagers are taxed. Soldiers and peasants may be disbanded. They will return to their home and be eligible for tax. Barracks will only train villagers from their towns. Once a town runs out of villagers, it cannot train any more villagers. Population does not regenerate.
-Tax is a source of income. Tax is collected every 2 minutes of gametime. Tax is 7 gold per villager.
-Harvesting resources is a source of income. Peasants can harvest wood and gold and return them to either a town center or resource pit. Peasants may only harvest 2 gold at a time.
-Trade is a source of income. Buy trade items from one town and sell them for profit at other towns.
-Barracks have 3 tiers of 2 basic units. The two basic units are a melee unit and ranged unit.
-All Keeps (starting towns for players) have blacksmiths which have ten tiers of two upgrades - weapons and armor.
-Unit variety is found in custom shops. Scattered around the map are many capturable shops where items and units may be purchased. Units are limited to the number of the starting stock.
-Peasants can build a variety of structures. They can build, catapults, barricades, palisade walls, stone walls, watch towers, stone towers, gates, supply pits, tents, and outposts. Outposts are temporary military camps which serve as a headquarters during campaigns. Tents hold 4 units and heal them over time.
-Diplomacy is key. This is the main gameplay point of the map. With all of the towns (around 30), and all of the shops, there are many bargaining chips for diplomatic maneuvers. With limited resources it is essential to pit your enemies against each other and control your losses. There are four different diplomatic stances, alliance, war, neutral, and submission.
-Tactics are key. The map is huge and the units are slow. Planning and positioning are important.

Project History:
I started this map last summer, and left it for a year before coming back and deciding to complete it. I've simplified the original idea greatly and made alot of progress on it. I have the major systems and ideas in place. The terrain is complete. I just need to add more content. It is about 60% done now. With alot of polishing and balancing on top of that.
Here is the original thread: http://www.wc3campaigns.net/showthread.php?t=69748

Yes, I know that was a long read. I will be posting screenshots very soon. Please critique and comment. Thanks.

Zurg! You're back!

The idea sounds promising, however, non-regeneration of populace; wouldn't that be likely to cause the game reach a stalemate after all the lives in the kingdom are spent?

Looks very promising, (rather like my royal empires map, which of course I could never be bothered to actually make).

I agree with Anitarf about the non-regeneration, but I'm also wondering how deep the tactics and military strategies will be, and where the micro/macro balance will lie.

Probably wouldnt work on BNet, but it sounds good regardless.

It may not be popular on battlenet, but I know that it works and is fun in multi player. About a month ago, I played with two other people. We played for over an hour on half the map and no way to unally. It was alot of fun to just explore and play around in.

And about the non-regenerating population - I really like this feature, and I hope that it does not impede the gameplay. I think good players will realise the need to preserve population and wait until the right moment when the loss will be minimal to strike. I think that the shops should provide enough extra troops to prevent a long stalemate.

I am very anxious to actually do some multiplayer testing. I really can't predict how it will play and what gameplay problems will arise. I know that it will be slow, but I don't yet know if it will be too slow. I know that it will require a great ammount of diplomatic and strategic skill, but I don't know how fast players will grasp this.

Hi Zurg:

It would be great if you post some screenshots about your project. And welcome again to the game :)

As promised - screenshots:

Yeah, I realise that it would be a great map, but I dont think highly of the average BNetter, or their ability to maange non-renuable resources well.

If you ever want testers, sign me up :D

Oh my godness!!!! this is a huge map!!!!! the terrain is impressive. I'm dying to play your map :)

Include me in the list please =)

I hope to make daily progress updates. I plan to work on this map for atleast an hour everyday. Today I added a town - Flynburg.

Yes, it is a double post, but its an update.
Yesterday, I started work on another shop, but today I decided to take the project in a different direction. I want to complete the remainder of the towns and do some testing to see what I want to do with the shops. I know that shops will probably provide half the units and will provide a vast variety of units that can be worked into many different strategies. I want to see how much shops are needed and what exactly is needed with them.

So today, I added another town. Whitehaven. I have fourteen villages left to add.

Since my last post, I have added two more towns and done a little bit of single player testing.
I have added Salcombe, the center of farming for the fertile flood plains, and Easingwold, a former outpost turned wealthy farming town.
I have also decided to add two units to the basic town units.
Currently each town has a barracks with three tiers.
The Crude Barracks trains militia and spearthrowers, very cheap, very weak units.
The Improved Barracks trains archers and footmen.
The Advanced Barracks trains longbow archers and swordsmen.
Each additional tier can train units from the lower tiers.

My plan is to add more buildings to the standard barracks, houses, and town center. I am going to add a blacksmith enabling pikemen to be trained and/or a stables allowing knights to be trained. Knights will be one of the most powerful units in the game. Pikemen will counter knights, but will be weak to other foot soldiers and archers. I may also add Taverns where heros may be hired.

Heres another progress update. I've done quite a bit of work on the map over the past couple days. I've added a couple new towns, started work on a new keep and did some trigger work for the diplomacy system. I will post more information regarding the loot system, the diplomacy system, and the lord death system. Attatched is a quick poster/wallpaper that serves as a "sketch" for what the loading screen will look like. I put it together really fast in PSP, but I will do the final one in Photoshop.

Looks nice. Gameplay is to sophisticated for the average Bnet player. But it sounds fun.

Hey Zurg!

Long time no see (or chat...) I hope your map is going uberly swell and get a few hundreds (or thousands) of downloads with good rating, of course, we know what happend to your last major project ($$$ :P)

Anyways, I also hope you have fun doing this aswell

Talk to you soon budd, keep giving us screenies!

JnM