The Beta 2 series of Fallen Enchantress is where we begin to introduce the bread and butter differences between the different factions. Beta 2-B, which, I’m sad to say, won’t be out until at least the 22nd, will reintroduce players to Magnar and Gilden. We’ll be talking a lot about the differences in an upcoming journal.
Broadly speaking, each faction will receive unique equipment, weapons, armor, items, improvements and abilities. While most of our focus will be on making each faction distinct in how you play, we will be working to make them visually different as well. A Wraith city will look different from a Trog city which will look different from a Krax city and so on.
In the meantime, let us know which faction you tend to play as the most and how you would like to see them differentiated from the others. What would make them feel special to you?
Vote here:
https://www.elementalgame.com/journals
I would also like to see Tall vs Wide factions.
Tall Factions -> Gilden, Pariden, Magnar, Kraxis
Wide Factions -> Capitar, Trogs
Balanced Factions -> Altar, Tarth, Urxen, Resolyn
Also, as referenced in this thread, as opposed to 'Good and Evil', I assigned a theme to each race (and expanded upon it)
Resolyn : Death Worshipping Caste system
-> Main inspiration was Hindu India, as well as Buddhism. Some scary parallels with Planescape dustmen.
Urxen : Social order and rapid growth, Religion includes harmony with beasts and worship of serpents (especially dragons)
-> Main inspirations were Confucianism and Taoism (ancestor worship, social order, Kohryu as world dragon/guardian of elements)
Trogs : Warrior Aristocracy focused on Competition and Honor in combat. (Main inspiration is Mycenean Greeks/ Achilles ... and a bit of Sparta too)
Magnar: warring factions held together (and kept civilized) by a magnanimous and immortal leader
-> No specific Inspiration
Kraxis: Masters of Diplomacy and Intrigue
-> No outside inspiration, but the pre-existing lore of Kraxis and the Kraxis symbol of a Spider certainly help
-> Also, as the only humans across the way, in empire territory, they would have to be masters of Diplomacy and Intrigue I think, lest they simply become the playthings of the other Empires (the Fallen races).
I would like to see the faction choice influence the tactical battlefield encountered when attacking a level 4/5 city of a enemy faction. The Tarthans might have a city surrounded by a maze of forests that limit the range of ranged attacks to 8 tiles. A Wriath city might be surrounded by a desolate landscape. An Altair Level 5 city built next to a river would be protected by a moat with a single bridge crossing.
Seconded
One suggestion for the new equipment/gear:
I have noticed that non-champion, dedicated support abilities are completely absent from Elemental. By non-champion support abilities, I mean buffs, debuffs, heals and dots that can be cast by mundane troops outside of the spell-casting arena. I think that such abilities can be woven into some of the existing weapons/items, though many of these abilities would have to be added in via new equippable items. Here are some examples:
Monk's staff: in addition to the current base damage, allows the unit to use the following ability: heal troop (power based on number of units with the staff in the troop as well as the spell mastery of any champion), range one (right next to the unit).
Alchemy sack (kit): Miscellaneous equipment that gives the unit the following ability: Troll essence (gives target troop tactical regeneration +2 and increases the strength of the troop by 9 (split amongst members)). Reduces the tactical movement of the troop by one and reduces strength and defense by X (makes this kit less likely to abused on combat troops without penalty).
Assassin's cloak (kit): allows the unit to automatically inflict critical hits when an enemy unit is surrounded by X number of friendly troops. Reduces unit's defense and constitution.
Paragon shield: Allows the bearer to use the following ability: Defend the weak (shares some damage with the target troop but reduces the movement speed of the user until the end of combat).
Trap bag (kit): allows the unit to set traps on the battlefield. Traps cause damage and reduce the movement speed of the afflicted unit.
War horn: Grants the unit the following ability: Increase morale (all friendly troops gain X constitution and + X defense until the end of combat (can only be used once per combat; other war horn effects do not stack)). After using the ability, the unit temporarily loses X initiative due to being winded.
War drums: Grants the unit the following ability: Blood frenzy (all friendly troops gain +X to damage and +X to crit until the next turn of the user. This ability can be used an infinite number of times in combat, but the user cannot perform actions after using the ability. Buffs from this ability do not stack). Lowers the user's damage by X.
Siren horn: Grants the unit the following ability: Weaken resolve (all enemy units lose X damage and have all of their resistances lowered by X until the next turn of the user. This ability can only be used once per combat).
Please consider implementing some support abilities. Several of these suggested items would not significantly lengthen the duration of tactical combat, and if sufficient restrictions were placed on them, they would increase unit versatility while not over-complicating the system.
I am curious to know how the lore will be shaped with all these new game changes coming out in the journals. It was made pretty clear before that Empires were not evil and Kingdoms were not good inherently. Has that changed like magic has, or is this moreso just an approximation for people to better understand the personalities of the Sovs?
Using that kind of scale means that the game mechanics should change significantly. Will Lawful and Chaotic differences affect diplomatic relations, besides just Good and Evil? I am all for it if this is the kind of mechanic you want to implement, but if this is merely a cosmetic change, it will seriously detract from the game. I honestly prefer the previous lore about morality having less to do with things.
If I had to assign alignments however....
LG= Gilden, NG= Pariden, CG= Altar
LN= Capitar, NN= Umber, CN= Tarth
LE= Magnar+Kraxis, NE= Yithril, CE= Resolyn
reasoning
Resolyn-> wants people to die, thinks ending the world (shadow dimension) sounds fun
Yithril -> honor code aristocracy, yet also love fighting/bloodshed
Magnar and Kraxis -> Civilized and Conniving
Umber -> believes in social order and harmony with Nature/beasts, yet only for fellow Urxen.
Tarth -> Rogues
Capitar -> Slavers
Altar -> the 'Mutts' among the human kingdoms. Wishes to unite all of Men without sticking to the ancient Customs.
Gilden -> Must stick to ancient customs at all costs
Pariden -> We are the "good guys" yea ... we deserve the rule everyone because we are *very* nice to our slaves subjects.
I'd consider Pariden similar to the Elohim (if the Elohim had a 'heir to the entire world' complex)
I'm not a fan of adding a hundred little things like custom buildings, equipment, and spells to every faction. It seems unnecessary and a drain on resources. Rather 3-4 large things should be added and they should make a difference in their own right. It just seems to me that all these items will be a huge drain on memory. I mean for cities to look different that means each faction is going to have a few custom buildings or different art for their improvements. That's a lot of work for very little gain, even just balance wise and the balance right now is already pretty bad. It is still early in the beta. Please try and get the city system working in a satisfying way before you start messing around with faction buildings.
Also I am really concerned that we are moving away from customizable factions. Are all these items/buildings going to be tied to traits, or are they going to be unchangeable and tied to races? I really hope you don't go down the race path because it will kill faction customization. Even if you do keep all these things as traits ask yourself if all these items are really good enough that you would choose them over another trait. In the end having +1 damage on a early game bow isn't going to really effect strategy or immersion. Please please please keep all custom buildings, items, and whatever tied to faction traits!
All the faction differences ultimately derive from the underlying race.
Oh, well the names could be changed from "Necromancer" to "Magister" then. Whether they're undead or not, they're certainly semi-fallen creatures that are bound to Ceresa through magic.
Frankly i would be happy if there was no option to create your own faction. If you want to make your own faction then learn some XML.
Except for all those traits you add in the custom faction creator which are in no way tied to race?
I would love it if we got a race customization option instead of the current faction customizing option. It really just encourages gaming the system at this point.
And I don't identify with evil. Haven't played any of the evil races in WoM or FE, and probably never will. So it limits my play choices. But good/neutra/evil is a little better than just good/evil.
I didn't vote as I usually create my own custom faction.
I would love to have the option of starting a random game where my sovereign is created randomly as well as everything else so I have no idea of the size or scope of the game I would be up against. It would be fun not knowing how many enemies there were in the world, etc...
What impact would alignment have on gameplay? I'm not too fond of DnD alignments and Elemental does not plays like a struggle between good and evil. I'd rather have a few strong traits (and about 10 starting technologies) defining each faction than a lot of small assets.
Maybe if it was rebranded Chaotic Kingdom, Lawful Kingdom, Neutral Kingdom, it would fit better with the lore we are already used to.
Strange lack of people talking about their favourite faction and how to make them great. Strange because there is like 10 posts just about that.
Instead everyone is obsessing over Frogboys fun little picture, which I assume has no real impact on the game at all.
I'm pretty sure the picture is not meant to be taken literally. Its just a general guide, the factions aren't being completely rearranged to reflect that picture.
I have actually modded in a complete race. The point is that the faction creator is a awesome feature that allows players to create there own worlds and civilizations, and if you are forced to mod in factions you are essentially cheating.
If the Lawful-Chaotic, Good-Evil matrix defined how diplomacy functioned I'd be comfortable with that. While Good-Evil is a little trite now-a-days it is an easy concept to grasp and instantly positions the factions with regards each other. Having traits that are only available to certain alignments would make the game interesting so I'm all for this. Perhaps diplomacy could be tied more to trait choices within the alignments than with the alignments themselves. For example, Good Chaotic races could have a range of faction traits including Interventionist while another race may have a trait called Isolationist. In the diplomacy setup, races with these traits would have a stronger hatred for each other regardless of alignments.
It's really just the same system that Masters of Magic had. Each of the races (High Elves, Humans, Dwarves, etc) had a strong influence on your game. But MoM starts still felt fairly customisable because the Wizard customisation counted for a lot (particularly whether to start on the normal plane or the magic plane).
So I think their current plan could work. My biggest problems with the current system are:
1. I have no idea what the special bonuses/starting stats of each of the races are and the current interface doesn't tell me.
2. I have no concept of what the races are because they are made up for the Elemental world rather than using the typical fantasy choices of dwarves, elves, etc. This probably wouldn't be a problem if point #1 above was solved comprehensively but right now it just compounds the problem.
While the D&D thing threw me off the main point of the post, I have a few ideas about the other races I have played.
Here is how I think some of them should work diplomatically:
-Capitar: Relies on many treaties to gain resources and diplomatic advantages. If they are weak in the game, they are more likely to spend lots of gildar on making a trade treaty and caravan treaty just to get the bonus to diplomacy. Essentially they will rely on good relations and mutual benefits to avoid war with all but the most aggressive nations. If they are strong, they will do the inverse of that. They will still want trade, but this time it is only for the benefit of gildar. If your economy is too weak, they will attack you and take your lands, unless you have the means to persuade them otherwise. They are also likely to pay a trade ally that is nearby to annex your lands. As the Ferengi Rule of Acquisition say, "War is good for business." For Capitar money is power. They prefer to work with both faction sides, seeing that as the only logical way to really win. Their ideal goal is to have all factions at odds, with only Capitar as their friend.
I like the idea that they are not great at producing soldiers or buildings, but get bonuses to mercenaries and gildar producing improvements (which need some armor BTW). They should get a large reduction in the Rush Buy cost for production, allowing them to focus gildar on special projects when it is deemed necessary. It would be nice if they were focused mostly on the Civilization Tree, seeking to capitalize and expand as much as possible.
It would work really well if they got more movement on roads, or perhaps upgraded roads very quickly as a race trait. They should be a Kingdom based on roads, relying on fewer armies, but fast movement and highly skilled mercenaries.
I noticed that there are 3 families that Capitar claims lineage from. We only currently see any evidence of Serrane. Maybe this is a chance to flesh out the history of the other 2 families with some unique buildings. A Mercenaries Guild would be something nice to add for Capitar. Perhaps they get a resource of Death Merchants, which are mounted archers and spearmen that have +1 to movement and +2 Initiative.
I feel the greatest differentiation comes from the domains. Each sovereign, each faction, has its own views on what the land should look like. Not all of the empires would want to make the world a blackened wasteland, not every kingdom a land of ponies and rainbows. Let some factions spread icy tundras, horizon-spanning deserts, cover the world in trees, create vast swamps, sweeping plains, chaotic nightmares, etc. The domains can be purely cosmetic, but it would be cool for each faction to have its own domain - let us truly shape Elemental to be in our image.
Altar would be the default kingdom, I think. Snowy Pariden, tree-covered Tarth...perhaps Ceresa and her death-worshippers live in a twisted nightmare-world that drips molten darkness, and Magnar thrives in the default empire. Krax would be barren and harsh, while Gilden would thrive with mountains and hills.
And of course let us play with these in our custom factions. Because while I make my own Pariden copy each time, I'd still like to cover the world in an endless desert.
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