The Storm Guard: Darkness is Coming - turn-based roguelike RPG inspired by GoT's Night Watch

[LESS T_T]

http://www.bitmen-studios.com/games/the-storm-guard

Spoiler

Just released as Early Access: http://store.steampowered.com/app/409910/

The Storm Guard is a challenging turn-based roguelike role-playing game inspired by the Night’s Watch in the Game of Thrones.

You assume the role of the Lord Commander of the Storm Guard leading the order during difficult times. An ancient dragon and its minions have returned, threatening the realm of men. While in your base, you must recruit, train and develop a team of heroes in their quest to restore peace. Make smart decisions during the random events you will run into and battle countless different creatures ranging from mere goblins to huge abominable creatures like wyverns, golems, ogres and worse. On the tactical combat map, put the skills you have learned to the test to defeat powerful opponents.

Your chances in battle not only depend on your tactical decisions but also on your preparation. Assemble well-rounded teams and pick from dozens of different skills to creature unique synergies between your team members that work for you and your preferred playstyle.

• Rich turn-based combat with a wide range of interesting mechanics, including numerous conditions (bleeding, burning, weakened, blind, crippled, ...), knockdowns, shouts, buffs, enchantments, and hexes.
  
• Interesting combat mechanics that allow flanking, tying up, disengaging, and smart combinations of skills.
  
• Numerous playable hero classes to pick from to add to your team with dozens of unique abilities to specialize in.
  
• Challenging encounters against close to 40 different creature types each with their own abilities. Ever since the Ancient Dragon returned, Orks, Giants, Undead and Mystic Creatures roam the realm of men causing death and destruction.
  
• Defeat intelligent monsters that collaborate, heal and buff their allies and have their own strategy on how to put your heroes to the grave.
  
• Use your gold wisely on the strategy layer to invest into skill development, equipment, consumables or additional heroes.
  
• Rest in town to recover from injuries that reduce your constitution or gain morale boosts by exceptional performance in battle.
  
• Classic RPG/roguelike features like permadeath, procedural dungeons, and random events result in high replayability.

Sounds good, apart from the cheesy trailer. Curious to see how it plays.

 

[Renevent]

Woooo...that sounds cool.

 

[Jimmious]

The models and their animations are really bad.
However the whole premise sounds really good.

 

[Aenra]

Was about to ask 'how many more decades of fuckheads making tincanned/actual gameplay lacking trailers', but then i woke up..

/carry on

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

So ASoIaF Night Watch meets some most overused fantasy cliches with graphics from year 2002.

Those combat systems better be really fucking solid then.

 

[Renevent]

The models and their animations are really bad.
However the whole premise sounds really good.

That's true, as you said I really like the premise though. Might wait a bit for it to get some polished before I throw down any cash.

 

[Jimmious]

Some nerd is playing the game right now

 

[Metro]

Early Access

 

[Renevent]

Animation/sound looks a lot better in the live stream, unfortunately the person playing it is an idiot.

 

[Jimmious]

I invited the developers to join us, for more first hand info

 

[Bitmen Studios]

Thanks for pointing me to this site, Jimmious. Been watching the live stream, it's a bit painful.
Anyway, if you have any questions about the game, feel free to ask.

 

[Metro]

Did someone say free promotional keys for everyone who's posted in this thread so far?

 

[Jimmious]

I already asked my question about there being a fail-state or not. You are considering it and should make it certain imo
Other than that I suggest a remake of the trailer, the graphics look better already in game, especially the animations.

 

[Metro]

Also the trailer doesn't really show the gameplay and features. Instead of doing something 'cinematic/story based' I'd highlight the game mechanics and features. That way you don't have to have an in-universe voice over of a 22 year old trying to sound like a grizzled 45 year old. Just state how the game plays out and what you do in a matter-of-fact fashion and show them in action. It's a niche audience you're targeting and they'd appreciate that more than an RPish promo.

 

[Renevent]

Thanks for pointing me to this site, Jimmious. Been watching the live stream, it's a bit painful.
Anyway, if you have any questions about the game, feel free to ask.

What kind of customization can be made to each character? What I mean is, are there skill to unlock, attributes, etc?

Can you equip characters with weapons/armor/tinkets/etc? If so, how does the loot/item system work?

 

[Bitmen Studios]

What kind of customization can be made to each character? What I mean is, are there skill to unlock, attributes, etc?

Can you equip characters with weapons/armor/tinkets/etc? If so, how does the loot/item system work?

Each character starts out with 3 random skills and can learn more skills during the course of the game. Each skill can be leveled up as the character levels up to improve it.
As the game progresses, advanced and later elite skills become available for learning. Each character has more than a dozen of skills to chose from, but gold will limit how much you can learn, so you need to decide what hero combination and skills on that hero you want to go with.

As far as gear is concerned, you can buy equipment for each hero or sometimes loot it. Equipment will improve various stats and/or increase your armor and is essential in later stages of the game if you don't fancy dying a lot. However, damage comes mostly from skills and character levels, there's no mighty sword of doom that does insane damage, you need to be smart in skill usage and tactics rather than just equip a powerful weapon and hack and slash with it.

One thing I'd like to emphasize is that the game is not a Diablo clone in any way. It has been inspired by XCOM, FTL, Guild Wars, etc. and is more about tactics rather than grinding. Just to set the right expectations.

 

[Fug]

The models and their animations are really bad.
However the whole premise sounds really good.

I'm not much of a graphics whore, so it's fine that they aren't too good, what matters is if the game itself is actually fun to play.

 

[Fug]

What kind of customization can be made to each character? What I mean is, are there skill to unlock, attributes, etc?

Can you equip characters with weapons/armor/tinkets/etc? If so, how does the loot/item system work?

Each character starts out with 3 random skills and can learn more skills during the course of the game. Each skill can be leveled up as the character levels up to improve it.
As the game progresses, advanced and later elite skills become available for learning. Each character has more than a dozen of skills to chose from, but gold will limit how much you can learn, so you need to decide what hero combination and skills on that hero you want to go with.

As far as gear is concerned, you can buy equipment for each hero or sometimes loot it. Equipment will improve various stats and/or increase your armor and is essential in later stages of the game if you don't fancy dying a lot. However, damage comes mostly from skills and character levels, there's no mighty sword of doom that does insane damage, you need to be smart in skill usage and tactics rather than just equip a powerful weapon and hack and slash with it.

One thing I'd like to emphasize is that the game is not a Diablo clone in any way. It has been inspired by XCOM, FTL, Guild Wars, etc. and is more about tactics rather than grinding. Just to set the right expectations.

What's your stance on mod support? Mods can keep a game active well past the standard lifespan, and generally will result in more purchases if the modders are competent.

 

[Johannes]

Nice Grimoire shoutout in the trailer music.

 

[Infinitron]

Thanks for pointing me to this site, Jimmious. Been watching the live stream, it's a bit painful.
Anyway, if you have any questions about the game, feel free to ask.

Crooked Bee Can you give this gentleman a Developer tag?

 

[udm]

Sounds interesting so far. Will be watching its development. Out of curiosity do you have any inspirations from tabletop games behind the system, and if so, what?

 

[Aothan]

..was about to ask whether there would be Gryphons (and then noticed one of the preview videos)

 

[Excidium II]

Does it feature tastefully done rape?

 

[Bitmen Studios]

Sounds interesting so far. Will be watching its development. Out of curiosity do you have any inspirations from tabletop games behind the system, and if so, what?

I play my share of tabletops, so they certainly had an impact. I'd say Descent 2 made me give the heroes up to 2 attacks per turn while monsters can only attack once. They generally hit harder in the late game to make up for it.

 

[torpid]

Looks interdasting, though "roguelike role-playing game" sounds extremely buzzwordy. The one Steam review was written by someone who admits to being a RPG neophyte so he's rather vague when it comes to the combat. Something I'm curious about is the difficulty progression: as I understand it, the game generates a random mission map every time you leave town. What determines the difficulty scaling from mission to mission? Is it level-scaled, or is there a generic "increase difficulty by X% every expedition" mechanic?