Ageless Era World Conquest II

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TheCondor
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Joined: March 19th, 2020, 6:18 pm

Ageless Era World Conquest II

Post by TheCondor »

There was some interest in it on discord so I figured I might as well make a forum post about this. I am currently in the process of adapting Ageless Era factions to work for World Conquest II. In the spirit of how factions work in WC II, all factions will consist of two different Ageless Era factions combined together and paired together. When a faction gets adapted, it will be adapted in all ways: you can find Heroes from that faction even when not playing them through deserters and special sites and they can be used by the AI to generate enemies to face off against you as you play through the campaign.

I would like this forum thread to be place to discuss new faction ideas or to comment on an existing ideas (because honestly I am not that creative and my knowledge of Ageless Era factions is not that good).

Criteria
This is the criteria I use to decide which factions to pair together. This isn't a strict guideline, but more of a suggestion to help myself make the pairings. The number one priority is to make sure the faction is fun to play.
  1. The two factions should have different alignments.
  2. The pairing should somewhat make a theme flavorfully.
  3. Between the two factions there is enough naval and flying units.
  4. If possible art styles should not clash too harshly with each other.
  5. If possible, the factions should come from different Eras.
  6. A complicated faction should be pair with a simpler faction to avoid overloading the player.
Currently Implemented Factions
The specific unit pairings are likely to change in the future as I play test them and get a better understanding of how they play.
The Nomads (Summoners/Desert Elves)
Dimensional Gate / Falcon (Khalifate)
Rhami / Desert Fighter
Desert Archer / Desert Archer
Desert Hunter / Fire Elemental
Water Elemental / Desert Shaman
Novice Summoner / Novice Summoner
Camel Rider / Desert Scout
Carpet Rider / Jinn
The Technocracy (Steelhive/Clockwork Dwarves)
Contraption / Contraption
Steel Slasher / Soldier
Steel Oculus / Triggerman
Golem Soldier / Steel Sentient
Steel Welder / Greaser
Wooden Bird / Steel Drone
Wanderer / Steel Larva
Steel Cybercone / Steel Amniote
The Sisterhood (Yokai/Vixens)
Auxiliary / Auxiliary
Amazon Clubber / Lamia
Feyborn / Amazon Archer
Amazon Huntress / Weaver Widoww
Nymph / Amazon Shaman
Jaguar Scout / Faerie
Surgler Swarm / Weaver Matron
Nixie / Swamp Snake
The Warpact (Nordhris/Eventide)
Auxiliary / Auxiliary
Braveheart / Braveheart
Northern Archer / Northman
Eventide Herbalist / Apprentice
Reaver / Frenetic Shaman
Noct Maceman / Diu Bowmaiden
Desperado / Snowrunner
Swabbie / Poacher
Last edited by TheCondor on March 27th, 2020, 1:43 am, edited 1 time in total.
gfgtdf
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Re: Ageless Era World Conquest II

Post by gfgtdf »

afaik one if the main criteria for the 'normal' WC2 factions was to have one faction with a healer unit and one faction without a healer unit.
Scenario with Robots SP scenario (1.11/1.12), allows you to build your units with components, PYR No preperation turn 1.12 mp-mod that allows you to select your units immideately after the game begins.
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Ravana
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Re: Ageless Era World Conquest II

Post by Ravana »

Dimensional gate ends up getting spammed a lot. It should be paired with weak/expensive unit.
TheCondor
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Re: Ageless Era World Conquest II

Post by TheCondor »

Ravana wrote: March 26th, 2020, 9:54 pm Dimensional gate ends up getting spammed a lot. It should be paired with weak/expensive unit.
You are right, and that has been changed, added a falcon into that recruit pair.
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ghype
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Re: Ageless Era World Conquest II

Post by ghype »

So First of All, thanks that you are doing this. It was long needed. Since it is big task you are doing, I am willing to contribute, especially since yous said you are new. I am giving you my opinion which no one has to agree upon, so do not take it personal if you do not agree with my suggestions.

I really much appreciate your criteria, but at (I think) at over 80 factions it is hard to always being able to apply each criteria to the fullest. So keep that in mind. My suggestions are based on the criteria, but when they don't fit the criteria, I still have balance, visual appearance and game play in mind. I am doing this Chronologically alltough that isn possible either as I am already starting to Pair.

But first I am going to comment generally on some Ageless Factions:


Archaic:
This era generally has very strong factions, but they are very different in styles and do not have crazy specials like EoMa. That's the reason I have no problem to pair them with other factions.

Default:
If you want to make an Ageless WC then it is obvious that you don't want to have default factions here. So I would completely exclude them.

EE:
Similarly to Default Era, EE is just Default factions with 1 or two extra unit lines. I do not think they are versatile enough to be interesting for this WC. The only exception is EE - Monsters which I paired with another faction from Archaic Era, EE - Chaos and EE - Dark Elves.

EFM:
This era has very distinct art style as they were drawn from scratch and not frankened, but doesn't meet todays mainline quality. They are still fun to play.
So if they are paired, I would pair them with themselves. Considering how many Ageless Factions to choose from, I might as well leave them out. Just because of the art style.


EoMa:
Being probably one of the most popular UMC Era, this faction also is hard to pair with others as EoMa factions are very overpowered. So you would have to couple them with very weak factions which I think just takes away from the experience. And even if you couple them with weak units, I believe a player could just let the weaker non EoMa units die and still keep going with remaining EoMa units. So I do no want to suggest any pairings because I really do not know how to handle this from the play side.
EoMa pairings for AI however is possible, and i think that would be much more interesting then having players play them. If I pair them for AI, then I would pair EoMa with EoMa. So I don't know what to say. All I want to say is that EoMa will need a bit more carefull of handling/implementation in my opinion.

MiE:
With this faction im not so sure what say either. Their Concepts are cool but not new. Either they are combination of existing ones or just small alterations of existings ones. I worked on this faction so I also know that most units have only Lv1 sprites. So lv2 and Lv3 Sprites are missing. MiE - Thelians are the only one which is really good and has none of these problems. All other ones I would ignore and exclude.


Some of them are unpaired yet because I couldn't find a suitable pair or just didn't know wether to even include it.
Feel free check them out and implement which you like the first.
If I could ask you though to definitely implement ELE since it is my Era ... thanks.


Other then the Era I excluded upfront, this should be a complete list of the remaining ones.


Archaic Era

Archaic Khthon - EE Monsters

Archaic Menagerie

Archaic Phantom

Archaic Primeval

Archaic South-Seas - ME Slavers
BEEM

BEEM Anakes

BEEM Calydonians
Dunefolk

Dunefolk
ELE

ELE Centaurs - EoS Minotaurs

ELE Fallen - Archaic Despair

ELE Horned Skeletons - EOM Vampires

ELE Vikings - Archaic Ukians
EOM
EOM Devlings - ME Infernai

EoM Elemtals - AE Frozen

EOM The Warg - MiE Thelians

EOM Therians - Exclude because of missing sprites.

EOM Windsong
EOS
EOS Eltireans - Not so sure about this one. I would exclude them just because they are Default Loy with different Stats and different lv 1 base units. It just feels weird.

EOS Free Saurians

EOS Triththa
EoC
EoC Aragwaithi

EoC Chaos Empire - EE Chaos ( This are pretty much the same factions but they though have still different untis and different lv ups. It could be interesting seing them in one pair)

EoC Quenoth - I would exclude them for now until some one ports the new reworked Quenoths from UtbS to Ageless as they are a lot more exciting then just your Elves faction with desert affinity instead of forest affinity

EoC Sylvians - EE Deep Elves
Feudal
Feudal High Elves - EE Dark Elves
Imperial
Imperial Arendians - Imperial Sidhe

Imperial Issaelfr - Imperial Marauders

Imperial Cavernei - Excluded due to too similar to other dwarf factions

Imperial Orcei Gladiatores - Archaic Northern Orcs
ME

ME Avians - EotF Welkin

ME Blight - Excluded due to Sprites not meeting quality of other Sprites

ME Cult - EoC Wild Humans

ME Emperor's Guard

ME Enchanters

ME Equestrians

ME Fanatics

ME Highlanders

ME Hive - Excluded due to Sprites not meeting quality of other Sprites

ME Holy Order - Excluded due to some Sprites not meeting quality of other Sprites

ME Mercaneries

ME Oracles

ME Refugees - Excluded due to some Sprites not being enjoyable quality.

ME Tribalists
RE
RE Dardo -Imperial Lavinian Legion

RE Aquana - EotF Brungar

RE Chevalier - Feudal Ceresian League

RE Darkelves -RE Elyser

RE Dwarves

RE Forestdwarves - RE Forestfolk

RE Luz - EoM Celestials

RE Marashy - AE Dark Legion

RE Mountaintribe - BEEM Wood Warriors

RE Necromancers - Exclude because to similar to default Undead

RE Regis

RE Trarashy
TheCondor
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Re: Ageless Era World Conquest II

Post by TheCondor »

Thanks for the comments. In terms of AI pairings, WC II doesn't have any specific AI pairings. Instead it is given a list of possible races it can choose from and makes the pairing itself based on the level: Level 1 is one faction leader (gets both base faction troops and leader specific troops) and one helper faction (gets base faction troops only from the faction), Level 2 is separate faction leaders without any helper factions. The other interesting thing about it is that the leader of the AI influences what units it recruits.

The real question I am having now is deciding how to handle deserters. How it currently works is that with the 6 factions (WC II handles dunefolk weirdly) is that 2 factions are consider your core, if you get a new commander you get it from that race. Past that 2 different factions are labeled for where you can get heroes from (fills out the list of heroes you receive on a recruit). The remaining 2 factions are considered Deserter factions and they determining your 2 starting heroes and what you get when you choose the deserter choice. Base on how it looks, deserter factions are meant to be a catch all for all units and factions not part of faction or part of your hero selection.

This leaves me with a choice. Currently how I am handling Deserter units for the new faction is that I am considering all races and units as eligible for being a deserter (even your own faction units can be selected). This makes it extremely easy for me coding wise because any new units added will automatically be added to the existing factions for deserters and makes it so I don't have to constantly update older factions. The other way I could do it is to try to stick to only two deserter races per faction, which involves a lot more work figuring out even more connections between factions.
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ghype
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Re: Ageless Era World Conquest II

Post by ghype »

You can handpick Deserters your self across all factions, those you think are worthy to be commander gameplay wise or which just fit the vibe.
So you select lets say 20-40 single units, and who ever choose the deserter gets one of the fixed pool.

Also, if there is a place you could share your project so far I could help you with the pairings, at least for my factions ... if that's in your interested.
duuuuude
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Joined: April 23rd, 2020, 2:27 am

Re: Ageless Era World Conquest II

Post by duuuuude »

Hi @the condor

Funny thing is I started doing this a few weeks back too. Lafa let me know a few days back you also had this idea and sent me link to here.
I got 9 factions spliced so far from ageless. Let's talk on discord and work together, as this might take a while!
My ID is LordMat#7459
clmates
Posts: 79
Joined: February 17th, 2005, 11:19 pm

Re: Ageless Era World Conquest II

Post by clmates »

Hi All

Last update of this mod, breaks XP mod. Now when I set XP Mod on for any other scenario, it forces to change to Ageless World Conquest or disables the add on .....

Can you check this?
Best regards

clmates
FortTell
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Joined: April 8th, 2018, 10:49 am

Re: Ageless Era World Conquest II

Post by FortTell »

Warning:
Do not give items granting keywords for melee attacks (e.g. zombie book, poisoned blade, holy water) to the Bloodmaiden line (Dawn faction, unit from the Deep Elves). They have a special ability granting +2 bonus damage vs units of the same type they killed last. Unfortunately, the way it is coded, it uses the

Code: Select all

[set_specials]
    mode=replace
code block, which overrides all weapon specials on all melee attacks of the unit with the single "+2 dmg vs <unit type>" ability.
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