Self intro:
Hi, im pep, ive played since december 2000, ive led a KD since 2002 (its still there), and im bored out of my skull with this game. Since, like, 2006. I also never thought id be posting a suggestion, but i figured it worth a shot with the new landlords.
why this suggestion:
more strategic depth. Every age you try to strike a balance between three things. Adding a fourth would spice things up. I picked shamans/rituals because of my limited imagination. I just kept thinking "what else can we have except military, wizards or thieves?"
clarification
the suggestion itself, and all the text below, is not as important as the why behind it: to have a number four thing to juggle as a Kingdom/province.
mechanics
- shamans work on KD acres, not province acres. a KD with 20,000 acres needs 20,000 shamans to unlock tier 1 shaman rituals, and 40,000 for tier 2, etc
- tiers can have a variety of effects: duration boosts, new types of rituals unlocked, cheaper shamans, etc. A high tier could see two rituals per tick
- new building, stone circles, to cut shaman training costs KD wide. If the KD has 20,000 acres, and has a total of 1000 (5%) stone circles, then KD wide shaman training costs will be lowered
- KD appoints (or monarch appoints) an archdruid (or smt) to oversee the rituals. The pool of shamans can be distributed to three tasks: beneficial rituals, offensive rituals, and ritual defense. The monarch can never be the archdruid.
- these three tasks still work on KD acres, the more shamans you appoint to a role, the more powerful the rituals (or less randomness?) This is meant to give KDs a reason to have more shamans than needed for a tier unlock. For instance, if a KD has 2 shamans per acre KD wide, they could allot 0.7 shamans per acre to beneficial rituals, 0.6 per acre to offensive rituals, and 0.6 per acre to defensive rituals
- warwins could award proportional shaman credits to make scaling less painful
- rituals target provinces in a quadrant of either nw and acres (selectable). If a KD has 20 provs, the archdruid can target the five biggest provs, the five smallest provs, or the two quartiles in between for rituals.
- the rituals are cast on tick. The affected province(s) is/are randomly selected within the quartile. The archdruid has some control over what types of rituals are cast: offensive rituals can, for instance, target offense, defense, economy, thieves or wizards.
- active rituals show on sot, much like dragons/riots/plague etc
- shamans are intended as a tradeoff, so they will take population space. A balance needs to be struck between how effective you want your province to be at thievery/magery/attackery and how effective the KD wants to be at rituals.
types of beneficial rituals
- for the next twelve hours, the affected province has +50% income
- for the next twelve hours, the affected province has -50% training costs
- for the next eight hours, the affected province has +500% birthrate
- for the next eight hours, the affected province has a ghost workforce, filling unfilled jobs
- for the next four hours, the affected province's elites will have a raw +2 modifier to its defense stat
- for the next four hours, the affected province is immune to ambush
- for the next four hours, the affected province spends 1% stealth per thievery op
and so on. Id suggest that beneficial rituals are grouped to work either on buildings/peasants, thievery/magic boosts or military boosts
types of defense rituals
- for the next 2 hours, the next offensive ritual cast on this province will fail
- for the next 2 hours, the next offensive ritual cast on this province will be mirrored on a province in the opponent's largest quartile
- for the next 2 hours, the next offensive ritual cast on this province will be transformed to a random beneficial ritual, but has a 75% chance to also benefit one of the opponent's provinces in the largest quartile
one of the above modes would be selected. Tiers could increase duration, as would amount of shamans assigned
types of offensive rituals
- for the next 5 hours, the defensive value of the opponent's defense specs will be lowered by 2
- for the next 4 hours, the opponent cannot use their thieves, and they will lose 3% stealth per tick
- opponent loses 5% of its military
- for the next 6 hours, the affected province will lose 5% BE per tick
like mentioned before, offensive ritual groups could target offense, defense, economy, thieves/wizards <-- one of these would be selected.
other thoughts
- another possibility is to have rituals that screw around with mechanics: grant provinces spells, or disable spells. Take away racial bonuses, or give them. Have ritual only spells (clear sight, fog returns!) Theres a lot of flexibility
- a new attack or thievery op could target opponent shamans (capturing or slaughtering them)
- races can have new self spells (double the duration of beneficial rituals) or racial modifiers (offensive rituals have a 50% chance to be deflected to a different quartile). Or weaknesses: "defensive rituals cannot target this race"
- i havent taken balancing in account, or potential abuses. I also didnt think up fancy ritual names. I havent thought of quartile prov count rounding. But im sure the idea in general can work.
- alternatively, shamans can be called mangoes, although this will cause problems: does mpa mean military per acre, or mangoes per acre?
summary
pillars of this system:
1) a fourth thing to balance other than mages/thieves/military
2) some degree of randomness
3) operates/scales on KD level
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Originally Posted by The Moon of Earth
