Game finished

[Anonymous]

Hi, I've played the game through opposing the Romans and it was a fantastic ride. I havn't played an CRPG of this calibur in a long time! Too long...part of it is that my expectations have risen, another part is that most games out there are clones with the same goal...Your game took the standard format and spat in it's face!
There was no feeling of "Im just the courier" common to most CRPG's and no " Win the game by killing Lord X after fighting your way through a dungeon/castle/tower which has soo many creatures just standing round for no particular reason other then for you to come along and kill them".
Originality in repeating history hehe.It worked very well. There was a reason for every opponent you faced, a goal that didn't involve killing just one uber monster at the end of a tunnel to finish the game.
There's nothing i hate more then dungeons! I mean really! What the hell are all those monsters doing underground and what do they eat/drink? And talk about co-habitation issues! "30 Goblins live in this hallway...wandering up and down..because ummm....."

I saw a thread where you asked what people would like to see. I have a few suggestions.

More Romans- Having more encounters with Romans would give the feel that these guys are knocking on your front door and that they are a real threat! Rome was strong on strategic evaluation. Amping up their skills too, I seemed to be able to kill em almost as easy as robbers... They were trained warriors.

Non-Equal Encounters- The way the Robbers worked was that if you carried an axe, they would only be carrying axes, clubs and knives yes?(My first char used a battle axe) But if you use a sword, they will occasionally have swords aswell?If you have low combat skill only a few opponents will appear, high skill brings many opponents? Why? Screw equality! I never retreated from a single battle! But if i was a beginner character with a spear and dagger and i came face to face with 8 bandits(or more), some armed with swords! Then i'd be packin and run for it or fight and die! It would give the game a more gritty, unfair feel! Something soo many games are lacking... and it would feel more rewarding when you got to the point where you could woop'em.

Weapons and skill- I guess it would be a lot more work, but having weapons have their own skill would feel more real.. Being able to use a dagger well doesn't mean im good with a sword (or axe for club, although the use of these two are closer then sword/dagger). And the use of the Gladius was very different to the use of the Traditional war sword ( But similar to the hunting sword). And short spear and
(the roman) large spear(pike?) were two different weapons in use and design. Also other the the simple club, other sort of cudgels/maces.. The cudgel is one of the earliest weapons, with varients found throughout almost all the world.

Magic Skill- The way 'magic' works is excellent! But i think having a level of skill in each 'spell' would be great... it doesn't feel right that my guy sits down for two days with a witch and then can use dominate with equal skill to the curse spell he learnt 2 months ago and had used excessively since then. Level of skill showing his level of confidence in that particular spells chance of success (plus attribute mods).

Henchmen- Like has been said already in this forum, having henchmen join you would be good. Keeping them not automatic either. Henchmen has happiness levels(eg)- very happy, happy, average, unhappy, angry, very angry(leaves you unless you do some quick gift giving). Keeping your henchmen loyal based on charisma + food + treasure + weaponry with variables of injury and/or tiredness affecting how happy he is in your service ("your working me too hard im leaving"). If he sits on very happy for X period you get another henchmen coz he sees how well the other guy is doing working for you.

Trade- It is a lil tedious and annoying. I got to a point (It was about when I killed the romans and captured the hostages) that I didn't even trade anymore. I took what I wanted (which was very little) and sacrificed the rest. Need more money draining things... like the henchmen idea... or your equipment wearing out much quicker so that you have to pay for repairs more often. Something that keeps me spending.

Opponents- Having a henchmen of someone else take a disliking to you coz your hitting on the woman he wants or wanting to make a name for himself by trying to beat you in a duel.. There really isn't that many duels to be had.. I mean you can start on someone just for the hell of it....but eh. I mean you don't have to overdo it... two or three times that someone starts on you.. and if you back down you loose face (reputation/charisma)but just having that chance there. I can only remember one time a non-robber/roman starts on you without warning.. and its only when you defeat him you find out his reason.

Make peace- This wasn't very useful..and is me offering a sign of weakness? Or is it a sign of pitty?.

Slave Orders- OK, once again prolly too difficult, but i would love to tell em to stop making soo many tunics.. I just don't wear them! (sure i can trade em..but like i said before, i pretty much stopped trading).

Slave "What do you desire master?"

menu= Food Give things Orders Bye

Would love to tell em what i would prefer them to make.

Well thats bout all i can think of right now... once again- Great game!


Thanks
Greylocke

 

[Anonymous]

Uh more-

A mission to wipe out an entire village to improve your chances of defeating the romans.. I would have loved the option to kill Radomund and all his warriors as a solution rather then letting someone else do it... I guess i could have just gone and done it.. but does the story support that outcome?
And taking his wife and slaves for myself as booty, and putting them in my house rather then leaving them there to visit.

Also Having my home village get attacked by Romans or even another tribe (while im there or not). Then having the chance to seek vengeance and take back anyone they had taken as slaves.

Also i gave one of my slaves a blessed cloak and he just put it in one of my chests.. he didnt even put it on the ungreatful sod! I wanted to kill him then and there!

Thanks
Greylocke

 

[Wolf Mittag]

Hello Greylocke,

> Robbers, their number & strength depending on your own strength/equipment: Well, yes and no; I partly agree; but on the other hand, does anyone really want to be killed by robbers during some chance encounter? I think they ought to be a challenge, but one you usually have a chance to overcome. So I think the basic concept of considering your combat strength in deciding how many robbers are deployed & how well equipped they are, is right. However, I like the idea of breaking this rule from time to time, in order to add some unpredictability: I'll modify the system as to sometimes deploy gangs of foes that will probably be too strong for you defeat.

> Weapons skills: In Teudogar, you have basic Attack/Parry (plus Dodge and Shield) skills which apply to all weapons. Your Weapons skill (Sword, Axe, Spear) reflects your experience in handling the kind of weapon you're presently using, and will determine how well you can use your Attack/Parry skills with that weapon.
I might differentiate these weapons skills further (e.g. short sword and long sword are really used in different ways). However, I think there are strong "transfer effects"; even if use is different (one for stabbing, the other for slashing), your experience with one weapon should make it very easy for you to quickly learn to handle a similar weapon well. This is reflected in each weapons skill's rather broad scope (e.g. sword skill = sword, short sword, dagger).
So instead of differentiating weapons skills further, I might perhaps add a "lots-of-experience-with-this-particular-weapon" bonus which would apply only to a specific kind of weapon.

> Magic skills: Your success in performing spells like Frighten or Curse depends mainly on your Charisma and Experience of Life skills (other spells require Faith or Knowledge or Perception skills). So practicing the Frighten-spell will automatically make you better at Curse (and vice versa), since both require Charisma skill, and practicing one or both spells will gradually increase this skill. This seems right to me. However, if you're good at Frighten and then learn Curse, you'll be equally efficient in this new spell, too, right from the beginning. I agree that's kind of flawed. In order to fix this, I may really add an additional experience counter for each particular spell.

> Henchmen: I like your ideas on that very much. However, implementing such a party system would be an awful lot of work; and since Teudogar's focus isn't so much on fighting & gaining booty, I think having all these people accompany you wouldn't bring a correspondingly large practical advantage. So I'll probably put this off to DARGHUL II or maybe some later game.

> Trade: This is a good observation. A real drawback of Teudogar's historical setting is that there isn't enough useful stuff to buy. Once you have a good set of arms&armor, and have paid for all of these witches' services, you basically have all you need. I've for some time been intending to give you a chance to invest surplus booty in your farmstead (buy cows/slaves), but have up to now shirked that extra work (difficult to program; and besides these extra cows/slaves still wouldn't bring a real practical advantage to you). The perfect solution would indeed be if you could employ and equip your own army of henchmen; that would reliably and constantly drain your financial ressources. Well, at least equipment wearing out much quicker is something I can do easily.

> More duels, initiated by others: I agree & will see to that.

> Make peace: The problem with this is, if your opponent is strong enough to kill you, why should he make peace with you? (In 12 B.C., there was no Christianity, and ideas like "you shall not kill" would have been considered crazy by both Teutons and Romans.) So this'll basically only be accepted by people who feel that you are certain to kill them if they don't stop fighting right now.

> Slaves: They stop producing tunics etc when they feel you've got enough of these. However, I like the idea of telling them what to produce.

> Killing Radomund on your own: You could have done that; but his tribe would have considered it a hostile act if you (who belongs to a different tribe) simply came along and killed their king (whom they had elected, after all). So that'd kill your chance of forming an alliance with that tribe. (It's a different matter when Adalmar does it, since he belongs to the same tribe and has a reason that'll be accepted by everybody.) And of course after slaying Radomund, you could theoretically take Radomund's widow as your slave, but the problem with nobility was/is that they're all related to one another; so in practice that would have led to feuds with several powerful clans.

> Having my home village get attacked by Romans or even another tribe: I sort of intended this for Teudogar 2 (yet to be written some day). In Teudogar 1's plot, in 12 B.C., the Romans had just started their war against the Germanic tribes, and were still dealing with the tribes to the north and west of you, i.e., their armies wouldn't yet reach your own tribal territory for many months.

> Slaves/cloaks: Custom wouldn't allow them to wear these. (Well of course they'd wrap themselves in some sort of cloak during winter; but the Teudogar plot assumes it's summer, and the cloak in question here would have been more of a status symbol.)

I'll implement the above points bit by bit as I find the time (at present I'm devoting almost all of my time to finally finishing my new fantasy RPG DARGHUL); of course I'll make all improvements available as update patches, as usual.

Many thanks for your ideas and suggestions!

 

[Anonymous]

Thankyou again for reading and replying thoughtfully. It is very rare and greatly appreciated!
I can't wait for Teudogar II. I'm hanging for it already.
I'm very much over heavy fantasy RPG's...
Make Teudogar II now please!!!

Thanks
Greylocke