[Mainline] Deep Dwarfs

[theit25]

Hello,

With the (relatively) recent addition of the Khalifate faction I figured I would try to run an idea past you guys revolving around creating other factions for the mainline game.
I fully intend to start this project myself as an add-on if it gains any traction, but ideally if it gets the green light from the developers I would like to put it into the main game
some day when I manage to create something that is mainline balanced.



And so I present to you a faction idea: Deep Dwarfs.

This faction would have similar resistances to the regular Dwarfs in the Knalgan Alliance but with a -10% to both fire and cold to represent the fact that they aren't used to
dealing with the elements outside of the deep earth that they live in, as well as a chaotic alignment to represent the dark caves that they call home. However the main thing
that I'm excited about is Deep Dwarf mages.

Lore-Wise in Wesnoth Dwarfs do not use magic except perhaps runes on their weapons, but for the deep Dwarfs I would like to give them magic in the form of Deep Dwarven battlemages
choosing to tattoo runes onto their body to channel magical power. However using these runes on their body is dangerous for the dwarves and will result in a slight HP loss for each attempted
attack weather on offense or defense. I do not intend to out-do the Undead faction for strongest mages, rather create Wesnoth's first flexible mage in the form of decent melee and decent magic attacks
balanced with high cost and a HP penalty for each magic attack made.


TL,DR: I want to create a balanced Deep Dwarf faction addon that will hopefully someday be incorporated into Mainline Wesnoth that incorporates a mage that has both melee and magic attacks that harm the user a little each time they are used.

[ForestDragon]

Here are some of my opinions (btw, if i might sound mean at times, it's not intentional, i am just telling what i think):

hmmm... i think you may have taken the addition of khalifate as a bit too much of a 'common' thing. In fact, even the addition of khalifate caused quite a bit of controversy, mostly in balance-edness, but some people don't seem to like something in their design (i am more of a khalifate-lover, but i am just telling you that such thing do exist) , and some just don't like the idea of adding ANY new factions at all. Also, khalifate was made specifically to use the newly-introduced 'liminal' alignment, have good defense on sand and hills. basically they are pretty unique due to their interesting 'lawful/liminal' alignment mixture. Deep Dwarves doesn't sound like something entirely new-enough to impress anyone. Also, you only desinged ONE unit line, which is definately not enough for a well-made faction.

since this was a bit too harsh-sounding, here is a more optimistic responce too:

Don't let me discourage you, it would be nice to have more addons, i am just telling you that mainline is one of the hardest places for factions/units to end up in. For example, there is a unit called Orcish Nightblade in lots, i mean seriosly LOTS of addons. It perfectly qualifies for mainline in art style, but it still isn't in mainline.

[Eagle_11]

This aint how things work here, first you will have to go ahead and make the faction, release it as an faction addon, if it gets found to be refreshingly interesting to the point of brings new things on the table and is totally not played like an duplicate or mixture of mainline factions then has earned the chance of even consideration of getting mainlined but only in principle as in practice nothing ever gets added to mainline at all.
I dont even know how they managed to add an new faction, the Khalifate, into mainline, must have take an divine appareance, an asteroid to fall on their heads or something to do so.*
*poster complains here about nothing ever getting mainlined, not addition of khalifate faction in specific, just to be clear.

[ForestDragon]

This aint how things work here, first you will have to go ahead and make the faction, release it as an faction addon, if it gets found to be refreshingly interesting to the point of brings new things on the table and is totally not played like an duplicate or mixture of mainline factions then has earned the chance of even consideration of getting mainlined but only in principle as in practice nothing ever gets added to mainline at all.
I dont even know how they managed to add an new faction, the Khalifate, into mainline, must have take an divine appareance, an asteroid to fall on their heads or something to do so.*
*poster complains here about nothing ever getting mainlined, not addition of khalifate faction in specific, just to be clear.

agree on that

[theit25]

Thanks for the honest replies guys,

I agree that only a single unit isn't nearly enough to create a faction around and I certainly have a ton more work to do before the faction is even moderately complete as an addon, never mind balanced for mainline.

But although factions only get mainlined once in a blue moon the fact that it does happen, albeit rarely makes me at least a little bit hopeful that there is a chance that some day it could end up in mainline if I make something different enough and balanced enough to be interesting to play.

Ill start reading up on WML and the graphics guides and try to get an add on started, and see where it goes from there.

[tr0ll]

It gets very hot in really deep mine shafts and it is hard to see and breathe. Some scenarios in the existing campaigns occur in places deep enough to encounter lava. Therefore, deep dwarves might rather have a higher resistance to fire (but not as much as drakes/dragons).
They might also be shorter and paler than regular dwarves, while hair and beards would be a liability. They might have trouble seeing in regular light, but would see/hear/smell better in the dark and deep underground (more than regular chaotic aligned creatures).
I would be interested to see what sort of culture/story you might make with them.

[Durin_the_great]

Deep dwarves could be the faction of dwarves before the Knalgan alliance. I always thought that dwarves needed a faction without the outlaws. Because unlike outlaws, dwarves are honourable and stuff. Deep dwarves could represent the faction before and short after they emerged to the surface. They could have higher fire resistance, but chaotic in caves would be too deadly for dwarves. I was considering a dampaign about the first elvish-dwarvish war when dwarves emerged to the surface and met elves.

I would really join you

Yours

Durin

[Eagle_11]

They could be more magical in nature, living that close to the stone of earth.

[taptap]

There is pretty cool inspiration for deep dwarves in Return from the Abyss. Just sayin'

[theit25]

Wow there are some really good ideas here,

To try to respond to all of you:



Durin_the_great I don't particularly see the Deep Dwarves as being Dwarves from before the Knalgan Alliance, rather an entirely different subrace. Although the idea is a cool one I think it could easily be done by creating an add-on with the Knalgan Alliance Dwarves and removing the outlaws from the spawn list.

As far as the other ideas go I really like the idea of pale beardless Dwarves that are at home in extremely hot environments. One way this could be represented in-game is with something like 20 fire resistance and -10 or -20 cold resistance. This way Dwarves can enjoy some fire resistance without making human and elven mages useless against them.

I also like the idea of the Deep Dwarves not being able to handle themselves during the day outside of their caves, but I struggle to think of a way to represent that in game.
I already intend to make them chaotic to represent their lifestyle under the Earth though. ( perhaps taking a bit of damage if they stay outside in the sun for too long? )

As for culture and story I think that the Deep Dwarves should have a real reason for why they chose to stay deep inside the caves, and for now I think that the best way to explain their choice to stay deep down in the earth so long is best explained with a history of constant wars and conflicts down where they call home. Perhaps they had a period of time where a great horde of trolls nearly wiped them out and the entire race had to unite to survive. Perhaps there was a massive civil war where the losing side decided to flood whole city caverns with lava in an act of vengeance against the side that looked like they were about to win the war. ( Regardless of what I/we actually end up deciding I would like to create a campaign at some point explaining why the deep dwarves are the way they are )




taptap consider Return from the Abyss downloaded! thanks for the tip I'm always looking for new inspiration!

That's what I have so far but I am always open to suggestions involving basically anything about the race, and definitely let me know if one of my ideas is garbage, so I can change it before it is too late!
Thanks again guys!

[Transfermium]

...I felt like the Deep Dwarves would be dwarves that either got trapped underground or refused to go to the surface.

[tr0ll]

I also like the idea of the Deep Dwarves not being able to handle themselves during the day outside of their caves, but I struggle to think of a way to represent that in game.

Cave terrain has its own designation, so they could have a modifier to movement and/or defense in caves, different from regular dwarves. If you want to make them semi-mystical or better at survival in caves, they could regenerate +2 hp when sitting on a cave hex with mushrooms.

You might also like Stone Remembers, a Novel of Wesnoth by A-Red. It really deserves to be made into a movie or something.

[Vyncyn]

I get why (deep) dwarves should be fire resistant, given they are close to hot forges and lava, but caves are usually damn cold. Cold weakness is not a good way to represent an underground faction, imo.
Also a pure dwarven faction is problematic to balance (I had the same problem in my addon). They are exellent in mountains/hills and caves, but bad at the more common terrain. I don't think it would be possible to add a faction like this to mainline, without having to make hard compromises.

[johndh]

As Vyncyn said, a purely dwarven faction would be difficult. I suspect this to be the reason why outlaws are a big part of the Knalgan Alliance. A purely dwarven faction would be heavily weighted to a particular set of strengths (tough, high defense on mountains, etc.) and weaknesses (slow, weak defense on flat, etc.), and opponents would have an easier time exploiting this. This is good in a campaign because it allows the campaign author to challenge the player in specific ways (like the skeletons in Dead Water being highly resistant to most of your attacks), but is a dealbreaker in competitive multiplayer. Different factions have their strengths and weaknesses, sure, but this would be rather extreme. Even the expensive and highly mobile drakes have the clasher line to balance them out with a tough melee fighter and the skirmisher line for cheap cannon fodder. Now, there is some opportunity to diversify with magic and beasts, so cave lizard cavalry or a teleporting mage might make up for poor mobility, but if you rely too much on this then it starts to strain credulity.

In my opinion, the best place for a dwarven offshoot (at first, at least) would be as part of a campaign scenario, and they would serve a role like the shadow mages in Liberty. Perhaps your protagonists try to escape some kind of threat by fleeing deeper into the ground until they discover a long lost group of pale mystics who either help or hinder you, and you get to recruit a unit line of deep dwarf runemages. Maybe you discover that these deep dwarves hate the Knalgans just as much as you do because of some previous betrayal, or they wish to honor a kindness done to them by your troll allies in the ancient past.

"Aye, our ancients pass down a tale of your chieftain, Grubsh, who aided our ancestors in a time of great peril when the very stone about our feet shook and trembled, and magma threatened to swallow us whole. Ye trolls courageously came to our aid, nor are ye any friend of flame. Scores of our kin perished, but with the help of the trolls the balance of our people escaped to our new home. Tell me, does Grubsh yet live?"
"No. Grubsh sleep with stones long time now."
"I see. Ye trolls are long-lived, but it has been nigh unto thirty generations, so this news holds no surprise. We mourn his passing nonetheless, and we dvergar owe ye a favour."
Excuse the Ye Olde Butchered English

A serviceable campaign faction could be made from one or two custom lines, some regular Knalgan units, and miscellaneous. For example: dwarven fighter, dwarven guardsman, vampire bat, custom mage unit, ulfserker.

[skeptical_troll]

I like this idea of 'deep dwarves'. Although I am not into multiplayer I see a lot of potential campaign-material out of it, because really little has been done about origin and cosmogony of dwarves, as far as I know.

If I were in you I would just leave out the goal of mainline for the moment, not just because the chances are low, but also because it may let you stick to mainline factions features and possibly be less creative. If you really create this faction I'm sure a lot of UMC creators would like to use it anyway. Of course there is a lot of work is involved, especially the sprite-drawing part. Once you have clearer ideas you may start a post in the 'faction & era development' section.

I add my random thoughts on the matter:
I don't think you really need to make them very similar in resistance to normal dwarves. Dwarves' resistance comes mostly from their ability as blacksmiths, and I imagine this 'deep dwarves' to be more primitive and based on magic rather than technology. Rather than the elvish/human magic that is used to create fireballs/thunders and similar, their magic could be more employed to summon elementals, golems, or to enhance their physical skills temporarily or permanently (like your mage example). It would also make sense for them to tame underground beasts like giant spiders, worms, centipedes, olms etc.. exactly like humans do with horses, undead with bats, orcs with wolves etc. and this may provide more variety to the faction, as suggested by johndh. They may also be smaller than normal dwarves, since they need to move only in tunnels and being able to cross small gaps is a clear advantage, and maybe they are able to swim in water to use underground rivers.

A way to characterize their problems with sunlight could be a time-of-day dependent movement or movement costs (not sure if there are already examples of this): when they are dazzled by the light they are not able to move well and they are slower, while they are very agile in the darkness thanks to their acute senses. I had in mind for a campaign a unit which petrifies by day, which is probably too extreme in this case. It may sounds annoying but petrified units are invulnerable, so it is basically an indestructible temporary shield (never tried it in practice yet though).