Yes, I've been reading through the blog too. Not sure how far it's worth reading back. I guess I'll find out when I finish it.
I've been wondering, when ruling and cities come around, will there also be the option of telling specific NPCs what to do, such as having someone who you keep around for political reasons, sending them out on certain tasks like going to settlements to communicate with its citizens; or going up so some schmuck in the street and offering a load of money if he can hunt down a nearby dragon den within a month; or some other example of having an NPC do something you ask of them, potentially with conditional rewards or gifts and things.
Also kind of depends on how much autonomy the AI has. Will individual characters have their own desires and motives, and be able to themselves ask things of other NPCs? I'm thinking that NPC motives are going to be a thing, because of rebellions etc.
Some of the older entries refer to a very different game to the one currently there, which is in turn different to 0.2.0, so I'd maybe check back by a couple of months at the outside, and certainly not the entire time the blog's been there!
You'll certainly be able to delegate, and even if you're not a ruler - mercenaries will definitely exist, and also people who you can hire or reward in some way for various tasks. Just as NPCs will give you objectives, I think it could be a neat reversal if you can also give out generalized quests "I'd like someone to retrieve X from Y" and NPCs might try to do it for you! NPCs will, I hope, be able to do a lot of what the player can do, even up the point of trying to stage coups, etc.
Since this is trying to be realistic I just want to do a quick rant on ancient warfare...
During most of ancient history, pretty much up until humans collectively realized that it is stupid to stand in a square formation in the open when people with guns are shooting at, warfare was two big groups of people stabbing each other until one gave up.
Calvary and archers were just gravy, but the footsloggers did most of the work. Often it wasn't the army that killed the most that won, rather the army that didn't break won(and killed more people). That's why soldiers which could either scare the shit out of their opponents, or didn't break were valuable.
On a personal level, weapons break and dull waaaay quicker then you would think. Using your sword as a defensive tool is a bad idea, because it will become dull and useless(speaking of which, is there going to be degradation? Stuff between it's broken and useless, and full repaired? Dull and less effective, but still able to kill things?). Fighting was mostly body checking and trying to get around your opponents shield(or trying to hit them in a vulnerable spot/hit them period if they are dodging).
And that's all I'm pretty sure. Things to keep in mind.
All very interesting! Re: degradation/damage/decay etc... I'm not decided on that yet, though I am strongly leaning towards yes. Weapons and armour will become damaged with use, and obviously some forms will be better than others; a rusty shield can still shield, but a rusty sword is going to struggle do its job (a crude example, but I will have the effects of damage differ by item). I like that description of fighting you've described; shields are, I wager, going to become a very important part of combat for a lot of characters, and when you attack a foe, it'll tell you whether they have a shield, and also possibly have some limbs in/out of range according to where they are holding it at that point. I'm also going to split leg attacks into front/back ones (front more likely to hit bone, back more likely to hit muscle, etc) and same goes for torso attacks (back doing much more damage and having generally a lower defense, most likely to damage organs, front more likely to damage ribs, etc).
I think you are oversimplifying a bit. That statement would make Sun Tzu very angry if he heard this. There is a lot more to it than crashing two big squares of angry men towards each other. There are things like flanking, ambushes, fake retreats, use of fire, using the darkness of the night (not just with ambushes), false flag, deception, decoys, exploiting the terrain and the weather, use of skirmishers, shock tactics, special movement tactics like pincer movement and testudo formation and a lot more I can't think of right now. There are even unique tactics that were only used by certain cultures.
Also, calvary and archers are crucial to army morale and everybody knows that army morale is the only thing that can win battles.
Darkness at night is an interesting one (which reminds me to reduce look radius accordingly!) - everything you've listed would be great if I could make it matter. Even if some of those factors maybe didn't matter as much as others in the real world, I want to introduce a large number of variables that affect how both you and the AI go about battles, and that's exactly the kind of stuff I'd like. Unique tactics is an interesting idea... which ties into something else, but for now, I'll have to ponder that one. Ahh, the morale system - I've tried several systems already and didn't like any of them, so I'm back at the drawing board! It won't matter for a little while, but I'm still thinking about it.
Cavalry also brings up a really important point: Do you have stirrups or not? Stirrups allow for true Heavy Cavalry, with all of the battlefield dominance that went along with it. Prior to that Cavalry were more of a Skirmishing unit. You could hit pretty hard with them, but not nearly as hard as you can when you have stirrups and a set lance.
Although even there it came down to a changing of tactics, as armies went back to large pike groups to fend off the cavalry that had been made obsolete by advanced Roman infantry tactics.
Interesting. I see what you mean; therefore, the answer is now yes. Maybe lances should be added to the long weapons list?
What will you be doing to ensure battles don't become repetitive? How varied will NPC tactics be? Will they adapt to your battlefield decisions? Will a civilization you've beaten repeatedly adopt new strategies in order to combat you?
Will I be able to capture Prisoners of War and personally torture information out of them? And how about public executions for criminals/enemies of the throne?
Those are some mighty important and mighty fundamental questions. I guess on one level, the answer above - as many variables as possible both pre-battle (weather, formations, height, deployment, blah blah) and also on the 'micro' level within battles themselves, according to advancing, retreating, and what weapons or unit types you and your foes have laid out. I'd like on the micro level a rock-paper-scissors approach, though with vastly more than three variables; different units will all require different units or tactics to deal with most effectively. I might also try and get a system whereby a riskier tactic, if it works, provides a bigger morale boost than a safer tactic does. Definitely prisoners of war, and how could I resist executions?
Mmh, personal vs impersonal seems like it'll be an important divide.
Most of the stuff you'd want other people to be doing, but some things would be more satisfying to do personally, like going to the chamber of the captured head of an opposing city, then beating the information out of them. And then beat them some more.
Exactly my thoughts! Hopefully almost everything (if you rule, or are in some similar position of power, maybe if doing espionage) will have options between delegating and doing-it-yourself, with appropriate advantages/disadvantages for each, and making sure to have various ways to prevent regularity in the delegation approach.
Author
Topic: Dwarf Fortress meets The Outer Wilds? "Ultima Ratio Regum", v0.10.1 out Feb 2023 (Read 596267 times)