Hey guys, since I added this project to IndieDB I would like to talk about the status of development of this game as well as the future plans.
Currently the game supports basics of the core features
- Diplomacy (Declaring war, making pacts such as defensive pacts or trade agreements, marriage)
- Doing battle (sieges, open battle, path finding for armies) with an abstract view. Each Barony has 2 armies, a garrison which can only be used for defending sieges and a levy which can be used to comat other armies in the open field as well as perform sieges.
Battles themselves are fought in an abstract view. Each army consists of a 2x2 array of regiments, the first column being the front column and the second column the support column. Specified units can support each other. For example Guardians can support adjacent regiments and greatly reduce damage. Besides this there exists a Rock-Paper-Scissor like affinity system between the units like axe breaks shield, sword breaks axe and so on.
When wielding armies one has has to consider parameters such as moral and unit maintanance.- Moral is determined by suffering losses in battle. It regenerates over time assuming the maintanance costs for the armies can be paid.
- Maintanance are seasonal costs the armies need to be paid. Should you not have enough money to pay maintanance costs, the moral will drop and if you have less than a certain threshold your troops will desert.
Maintance costs is influenced by whether your army is in the open field and whether it has enough supplies to support itself. Should the local supplies not support the army, you will pay extra supply costs depending on the nearest distance of an allied barony. In other words, performing an invasion into enemy territory can be very costly.
- City building and population management. As in traditional strategy games you are able to improve your holdings by building markets, forges, etc. to increase income and productivity. In Sword & Scroll you also have to manage your population. There exists for 4 classes
- Peasants Are the most likely to join your armies and are the most numerous but have little to contribute in terms of tax money and productivity.
- Traders Are the most fickle ones. They add a lot of tax money but are easy to loose by somebody else having a more attractive location for them to work.
- Workers Are the most productive ones and contribute to the local productivity.
- Scholars have both money and science production to contribute.
Increasing your population can be most effectively done by erecting buildings. For example building a market will attract traders. But not just that, workers are generally interested in any place where a lot of building projects are performed, so it will also attract workers from nearby holdings. This of course lowers nearby holdings productivity and tax income making them an easier target for war.
- AI. The enemy AI can perform basic decison making like picking decent targets and also points of times to declare war on an enemy. It also builds buildings, its armies and tries to improve its standings through pacts and marriages.
But the AI is still rather.. dumb.
This roughly covers the current core gameplay features. Next, lets take a look at what gamplay mechanics I intend to add and where the game is heading.
- Technology. The player will be able to perform research projects as in classic strategy games.
- Culture. The player will be able to establish a national cultur required for founding a kingdom by achieving certain goals.
- Intrigue. Similar to CKII intrigue system the player will be able to perform intrigues and supporting other people in doing their intrigures.
- Seasons. Seasons will play an important role. For example, during winter supplies wil drop and hunger will most likely begin to set in. A lot of trade goods will also only be available in certain seasons.
On the technical side, currently the game is aimed for the android platform. I have ported 50% of my base engine to desktop where it works on Windows&Linux. I am not yet sure whether the current art style will be also in the desktop version or if I will begin searching for an artist to partner up with since my art skills are very subpar.Thats it for now I hope to have given the readers some insight into this game project. Cheers!
