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4X Leylines by Crystal Shard - now available on Steam!

Fizzii

Crystal Shard
Developer
Joined
Sep 26, 2013
Messages
185
Thanks for the bug reports Kabas. After the Regency mission, you should indeed have unlocked the Regency race and not the Dwarves, so that is a text error. The other comments are valid; I also noticed those oddities when I last played it.

CryptRat - yes, the reason the gold/mana stats aren't visible is because of the lower res. Though, I wonder if maybe Radiant can use the smaller buttons and squeeze it in. I'll ask ;)

Welp, despite all of the technical issues so far i found myself not regretting buying the game and being the beta-tester who paid for it. The factions are indeed interesting and diverse enough for me to continue playing.
Glad that the bugs haven't put you off so far. It's just Radiant and myself working on this game at the moment, so apologies for the bugs. We certainly can't afford to pay beta testers, mind you, given I personally haven't seen any earnings from our games yet :P

On the Steam side, Radiant is considering a couple of options. One of them is forcing OpenGL mode instead of DirectX, though I don't know if that will cause issues for other computers. The other option he is thinking about is swapping the entire thing out for Allegro (currently the game is made with SDL). Hopefully will have something sorted out soon...
 

Kabas

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Feb 10, 2018
Messages
1,258
Whatever makes your units regularly catch the plague in the lizard mission affects the undead too.
n2xGrnH.png
 

Kabas

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Feb 10, 2018
Messages
1,258
I found it a bit a disheartening when you're doing pretty okay and right after you witness this cursed number of 998 gold. Feels like cheating, though you can break it if you start doing ridiculous stuff like mass summoning of 50 upkeep dragons without limit utilising your 3tier energy magic.
I also found that using the simulacrum spell on your slaves is a perfectly viable way of playing regency. Slaves are an amazing production boost and loosing them early can be very crippling. I do like that the natural way of acquiring them is raiding the enemy town with your slaver.

Also, i found that the game can now freeze after clicking the end week. Don't know what triggers it, but this is fixed by doing arbitrary stuff on your turn. Can send the save if needed.
lyBmvCx.png


Also also also, i have a few questions:
-How does the corruption mechanic works? Can you affect it in some way, apart from the lawmaker trait?
-Does the spectre ability of bolstering undead works on liches and demons? It does increase the ghoul attack if you check the unit stats, but i didn't notice such thing on these two.
-I don't get the Theria infiltrator, how are you supposed to use this one?
 
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Fizzii

Crystal Shard
Developer
Joined
Sep 26, 2013
Messages
185
Also, i found that the game can now freeze after clicking the end week. Don't know what triggers it, but this is fixed by doing arbitrary stuff on your turn. Can send the save if needed.
Also also also, i have a few questions:
-How does the corruption mechanic works? Can you affect it in some way, apart from the lawmaker trait?
-Does the spectre ability of bolstering undead works on liches and demons? It does increase the ghoul attack if you check the unit stats, but i didn't notice such thing on these two.
-I don't get the Theria infiltrator, how are you supposed to use this one?
Thanks - yes, if you send the save on to me, I'll forward it on again to Radiant.

I've sent him your questions to answer since he knows the game mechanics far better than I do :O.

In other news, Radiant is currently working to convert the game to Allegro (from SDL). Which is apparently not too much work because there is good separation between code and graphics. Hopefully that helps to resolve the compatibility issues.
 

Kabas

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Feb 10, 2018
Messages
1,258
I noticed that the various random pop-ups, like "was struck by an elemental spell", at the beginning of your turn can prevent you from casting your spell, thus wasting the cast. The same if you get attacked.

In the goblin mission, you get this when you enter the goblin town. I did learn later that the goblin faction doesn't actually have towns, but i guess this shouldn't be happening.
m8ZYQOk.png

Speaking of goblins
Sexv8fw.png

^This "town" image can sometimes change into those of other races.
 

Kabas

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Feb 10, 2018
Messages
1,258
Oh, scratch that question about bolster undead, it does work on demons and liches.
 

Melan

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Oct 20, 2012
Messages
6,602
Location
Civitas Quinque Ecclesiae, Hungary
PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 Codex 2016 - The Age of Grimoire Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy Insert Title Here RPG Wokedex Strap Yourselves In Codex Year of the Donut Codex+ Now Streaming! I helped put crap in Monomyth
I am interested in this game! For those of you who have played it, how does it compare to Master of Magic and the first Age of Wonders? Those two are my reference points (and the kind of 4x stuff I am most interested in). How about its complexity / difficulty? Can you play on random maps? Can you create new maps?
 

Kabas

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Feb 10, 2018
Messages
1,258
I am interested in this game! For those of you who have played it, how does it compare to Master of Magic and the first Age of Wonders? Those two are my reference points (and the kind of 4x stuff I am most interested in). How about its complexity / difficulty? Can you play on random maps? Can you create new maps?
It's quite comparable to the first AoW in terms of complexity, with the exception of the combat part which is more like disciples.
City building aspect is a bit more involved(unless you're a filthy gob). You can't build everything in one town, need to choose your cities specialties.
Factions are very diverse and give you a couple of interesting unit choices, but you can't build anything in the towns that don't belong to your race. You do get the random mercenaries instead.
Global spells allow you to do some crazy stuff, like the one that rains fire on everyone every turn(annoying damn it) or the one that drops all the land into space tile by tile(didn't try using this one yet).

I noticed that all the campaign maps are semi-random. The scenario maps are semi-random too, probably? Didn't check yet.
You can create your own maps with your own rules, map editor is included.
l9b65IB.png
 

CryptRat

Arcane
Developer
Joined
Sep 10, 2014
Messages
3,548
Catched it :D. Now I can switch back to full screen and not care about not seeing my gold again (I always have an idea).
With the autosave I don't have 998 golds and with the next save I do. I added an additional save, the amount of gold switches to 998 as soon as I move an unit.
https://ufile.io/4kvqy
Honestly it's the only annoying bug, the occasional crashes are not particularly annoying since with autosave and very quick loading time relaunching the game and returning at the same point is faster than reloading your savegame in some games.
 

Slimu

Augur
Patron
Joined
Sep 26, 2011
Messages
169
Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pathfinder: Kingmaker Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
If I buy the game on itch, will I get a Steam or GOG key (if released) ?
 

Fizzii

Crystal Shard
Developer
Joined
Sep 26, 2013
Messages
185
Catched it :D. Now I can switch back to full screen and not care about not seeing my gold again (I always have an idea).
With the autosave I don't have 998 golds and with the next save I do. I added an additional save, the amount of gold switches to 998 as soon as I move an unit.
https://ufile.io/4kvqy
Honestly it's the only annoying bug, the occasional crashes are not particularly annoying since with autosave and very quick loading time relaunching the game and returning at the same point is faster than reloading your savegame in some games.
Thanks, have sent Radiant the link and comments :)

If I buy the game on itch, will I get a Steam or GOG key (if released) ?
Normally we wouldn't, because people who buy from Itch do so because they don't want to purchase from Steam. However, I will be asking for keys for all the people who have purchased from Itch.IO before the Steam version is released - Itch records all the email addresses so it should be pretty easy to organise.
 

Merlkir

Arcane
Developer
Joined
Oct 12, 2008
Messages
1,216
Oh hey, saw screenshots of this in the screenshot thread, looked cool!

Is there any estimate when the Steam version will be available?
 

Fizzii

Crystal Shard
Developer
Joined
Sep 26, 2013
Messages
185
Oh hey, saw screenshots of this in the screenshot thread, looked cool!

Is there any estimate when the Steam version will be available?
I'm hoping we can get it on Steam before the end of the year. The first build in Allegro was hyper fast, then now it's just a tad slow, so needs some adjustments. And also needs sound working. I'm chasing Radiant for an update on this; I suspect he got a bit busy with real life over the weekend.
 

Jinn

Arcane
Joined
Nov 8, 2007
Messages
4,930
I'm hoping we can get it on Steam before the end of the year. The first build in Allegro was hyper fast, then now it's just a tad slow, so needs some adjustments. And also needs sound working. I'm chasing Radiant for an update on this; I suspect he got a bit busy with real life over the weekend.

Looking forward to it. Take your time and make it a solid release. Maybe it'll give you some time for a little PR/Marketing of some sort? I feel like there are quite a number of fans of MoM and AoW lurking around the the internet that probably don't know about the existence of this project.
 

Slimu

Augur
Patron
Joined
Sep 26, 2011
Messages
169
Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pathfinder: Kingmaker Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
I just bought a copy of the game and can't wait to play it on the week-end.
Maybe sending a review copy to https://explorminate.net/ would help a bit so that more people interested in this genre could hear about it.
 

Fizzii

Crystal Shard
Developer
Joined
Sep 26, 2013
Messages
185
So, latest update: Radiant has finished converting to Allegro and has resubmitted the game to Steam for review.

V1.1 has also been uploaded to Itch.IO, changelog details:
Replaced SDL library with Allegro.
Fix crash when showing unit from tech tree.
Fix hang for AI units in evasion mode.
Fix hang for AI targeting immune units in combat.
Fix infinite money bug.
Prevent aquatic units from entering cities without a harbor.
Show correct text for unlocks after conquering a realm.
Minor cosmetic fixes.

Also, some answers to questions posed previously:
To answer Kabas's questions: Corruption simply means you lose a percentage of gold each turn; this is a mechanic to counter hoarding. It is affected by your race.
Spectre bolstering should work on all undead, including liches and demons. Temporary bonuses should not show on unit stats.
Infiltrators have the 'spy' ability, meaning each enemy wizard sees them as HIS color. Park them next to an enemy city and he'll probably not notice. To make this easier, they also have illusion and foresight.
Yes, using simulacrum on your slaves is a entirely in character for the Regency.
And no, scenarios are not random or semi-random.

I just bought a copy of the game and can't wait to play it on the week-end.
Maybe sending a review copy to https://explorminate.net/ would help a bit so that more people interested in this genre could hear about it.
And thanks for the suggestion, we will arrange that after we get Steam sorted out :)

Making progress!
 

Kabas

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Feb 10, 2018
Messages
1,258
Thanks for the answers, the game is now running way more smoothly.
 

Fizzii

Crystal Shard
Developer
Joined
Sep 26, 2013
Messages
185
Leylines is now available on Steam!

Currently 15% off.

Radiant has also requested a bunch of keys for those that purchased from Itch.IO before we got the game out on Steam, we'll get those out once we have the keys.
 

Yeoman

Educated
Joined
Aug 4, 2017
Messages
29
Here are my quick impressions, I've only played the tutorial and a bit of the lizardpeople realm scenario so I'm probably still poorly informed about much of the game. Can't comment on the AI yet obviously.

Pros:
- Better and more varied tech trees that promote more varied build orders
- Less city micromanagement
^These two address the biggest issues I have with MoM.
- Mercenary bidding mechanic is nice
- Each unit has a good amount of flavor text
- Good unit sprites, terrain tiles and UI style
- More varied terrain than MoM
- Game engine uses minimal resources like it should

Cons:
- No neutral cities, monster lairs or dungeons, no epic fights for mana nodes
- No random resources that give bonuses to cities. So far the only random resources I found are unguarded resource fountains that provide gold/mana/research income when you camp a unit on them. The overall map resource control system seems pretty much the same as AoW:SM (underwhelming as hell, mana nodes and gold mines feel no different) but with the varying population/gold/production tile values of MoM.
^These two cons really weaken the whole exploration aspect compared to MoM.
- No racial relations mechanic, can't build anything on captured cities of different races!!!
- Less customizability of wizards (can only pick one trait, fewer schools of magic, total spellbook/sphere picks are fixed at 3, can't pick starting spells)
- No combat spells
- No auto-resolve combat option
- Lots of small issues with the UI
- Wizard portraits are quite poor (so please add a portrait import option ;))

Neutral:
- No random match mode, the campaign scenarios (7 in total it seems, one in each race's homeland) have randomized maps but have fixed map themes and conditions. Still, probably has more variety than MoM which has no map themes and only customizable land sizes.
- Simplistic combat. I don't mind. There's far less possibility of abusing the AI but that could be either a good or a bad thing. I don't like being allowed to do tedious tactics to cheat the AI but some like being able to do so. I still miss combat spells though.
- Cannot stockpile mana. Your mana income determines the maximum amount of mana you can spend in a turn.
- You can turn city morale on a dime with a bit of gold. Not sure how I feel about that yet.

Compared to MoM and AoW:SM, I would say the game has better city management which is a huge deal, but the lack of any multi-race dynamic really hurts that. In terms of exploration and wizard customization, it seems quite weak. The simple combat and lack of combat spells might be a huge turn-off for some. So far, I think the quality of the AI and the online multiplayer (which has yet to be implemented) will determine if the game will hold up against the two.
 

astrosmurf

Novice
Joined
Oct 29, 2008
Messages
30
Simplistic combat. I don't mind. There's far less possibility of abusing the AI but that could be either a good or a bad thing. I don't like being allowed to do tedious tactics to cheat the AI but some like being able to do so. I still miss combat spells though.
How does combat work? How is the AI?
 

Yeoman

Educated
Joined
Aug 4, 2017
Messages
29
When combat starts, you pick which of your units go in the front row and which go in the rear. You pick which units attacks whom. The attacking wizard gets first turn.

When it's your turn you can order your units in any order. Aside from attacking, you can order your units to retreat to the rear row, advance to the front row or flee (unlike MoM your units can flee individually).

Attacks seem to work the same as MoM where you have the attack, defense and resistance ratings and some dice rolling going on. A unit being attacked in melee retaliates, again same as MoM. No multi-figure units though, all units seem to be just one figure. Each act of melee also seems to involve several blows being traded.

The first few rounds of combat are in the "long range" phase where only ranged units can attack. The idea is to simulate the units crossing the battlefield. Once that phase ends then it's the "close range" phase where both ranged and melee units can attack.

Units defending a city get bonuses to defense and resistance, probably depending on faction and buildings. Some terrain types give bonuses to defending camped units.

However, I can't seem to understand the way the front/rear row thing works. Melee units in the rear row can't attack as you would expect, but in some cases I still see them being engaged by an enemy frontline melee unit even when I have a unit in the front row blocking him. Maybe a bug?
 
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