Brainstorming The Concept Of Controlling Multiple Characters

[Bluddy]

Chris, what do you think about integrating the movement and the strategy screen? I think one of the difficulties with the strategy game is that it's tucked away and has an interface that, while overlapping with the main map screen, is different enough that it's a little intimidating to new users. If strategy elements were slowly added to the main screen, players would have more time to play with them and feel more comfortable with them.

Also, I don't know if it's necessary to limit the ability to give orders to when you're in the city screen. By allowing it everywhere, you could for example find a survivor, then immediately send an NPC to rescue him so long as your peeps have time units. The strategy game then becomes much more immediate. Communication with your town is presumably done via magic, so that's not an issue.

Connecting this to the strategy clock idea, given the right difficulty level (ie. one that activates the clock), it would be much more obvious that moving to a town would end the turn.

[x4000]

It's an interesting idea, and I'm not really sure at the moment, honestly.  I dislike having the two screens as they are in their current forms, though, that's for sure.  One thing is that the current strategic and citybuilding parts might get the axe entirely and then get their core concepts reintroduced in a better-integrated fashion.  Or they might get developed out way more to the point where there's just no way that they could possibly be tied into the main interface, which was the main intent previously. 

Keith and I have some things to talk about in terms of what direction we want to take the strategic stuff -- having strategy to the game, and having the ability to boss NPCs around and get them to help you, doesn't necessarily involve the sorts of mechanics or interfaces that are currently implemented (as I know you know).  So... there's lots of possibilities there.  I'm looking for something simple and yet deep, and the current implementation is complex and yet shallow, mainly because it was headed towards complex and deep but is only 10% done.  Right now it could go kind of either way, but Keith and I have a call today in about an hour to talk about that and some other things and see what he's most interested in doing since it's his side of the game there.

[Martyn van Buren]

Sorry to add to what looks like a mostly closed thread, but if we abandoned the notion of move orders and implement the character-specific bonuses we're talking about in the permadeath thread, won't this arise fairly naturally just through the glyph transfer scroll?  I don't see any reason for different characters to have different inventories, but I could see developing one character with a lot of mobility bonuses and another for combat, so as to cut my losses when I wind up losing one.  Assuming that you get some choice with the bonuses and some way of checking out the stats of NPC characters, it seems like building a roster of adventurers would happen naturally without the need for new interface.

[Dizzard]

Sorry to add to what looks like a mostly closed thread, but if we abandoned the notion of move orders and implement the character-specific bonuses we're talking about in the permadeath thread, won't this arise fairly naturally just through the glyph transfer scroll?  I don't see any reason for different characters to have different inventories, but I could see developing one character with a lot of mobility bonuses and another for combat, so as to cut my losses when I wind up losing one.  Assuming that you get some choice with the bonuses and some way of checking out the stats of NPC characters, it seems like building a roster of adventurers would happen naturally without the need for new interface.

That's true...

It would be useful if there was at least some way of marking npcs as "adventurers" (like it's their job) for ease of access. Like making them join an adventurers guild. Then you could do glyph transfer all you want.

[zebramatt]

A few thoughts:

1. The problem isn't actually the travel time for sending these characters to places, it's the interface to actually do so.  You aren't just sending Joe Blow over to some specific region, you presumably want him to go into some sort of specific location in there if you've been there before.  That whole thing gets complex and messy, especially when you consider what is and is not in RAM at any given time on your local machine in solo or multiplayer play.

If we're just talking a 'pets' concept (which a lot of us aren't admittedly but hey) then 'all' you need is a menu which allows you to select the pet, select an action with a time and possibly shard cost - e.g. craft scrolls - then open the foldout for that interface as usual, do your stuff in there and confirm but, rather than receiving the resultant item right away, you have to wait for your pet to return.

You could also have it do things like 'gather health' which is probably an expensive activity but requires just the new 'select an action' screen and confirm box, then has your pet scurry off to bring back a random amount of health.

[x4000]

Sure, that's more like a "dispatch mission" and doesn't really require any specific locational orders.  A "pets" system like that (or even a "familiars" system) would be a lot more feasible.

[Kentarou]

I have to say I LOVE this idea and was almost ready to make a seperate thread about it until I saw this. Something along the lines of controlling those you rescue from settlements and having a small team... It's actually the #1 thing I would LOVE to see right now, more than ANYTHING else. I guess I'm weird like that. I want to play with multiple people, to feel not so alone in the game world, yet I want to play single player so I can feel free to do what I want at my own pace.

Please really consider the ideas in this thread. At the least if it was an option, not something required... more options in open world games is always better. And it would add countless hours of playtime to a game I'm already near obsessed with to this gamer right here.

[tigersfan]

I have to say I LOVE this idea and was almost ready to make a seperate thread about it until I saw this. Something along the lines of controlling those you rescue from settlements and having a small team... It's actually the #1 thing I would LOVE to see right now, more than ANYTHING else. I guess I'm weird like that. I want to play with multiple people, to feel not so alone in the game world, yet I want to play single player so I can feel free to do what I want at my own pace.

Please really consider the ideas in this thread. At the least if it was an option, not something required... more options in open world games is always better. And it would add countless hours of playtime to a game I'm already near obsessed with to this gamer right here.

I'm pretty sure what this idea/discussion evolved into was the current system of sending NPCs out to find resources and take down the overlord for you.