Staredit Network

Rambling: After consistently finding trash in K&K games for the last 2 years, I've decided to take matters into my own hands. This will embrace the key concepts of the old and add in a lot of new features.

Description:

Name: Kings And Knights : Midnight
Size: 256x256 (1/4 for actual playing space; rest for battlefields, control panels, insides of castles and forts, etc.)
Tileset: Twilight (it goes along with the name and besides, twilight in underappreciated)
Human Players: 4 (2 Kings and 2 Knights)
CPU Players: 2 (one for each [discussed later])

Features:

General:

- Extended terrain for castles, forts, villages, cities, and other landforms
- Toggleable music
- 3 ways to win: Assassination, Conquest, and Subjugation

For Kings:

- Upgradeable villages to provide income and armies
- Kingdom morale system to indicate possiblities of revolt
- Hire generals to lead armies into battle
- Research new technologies to increase your power
- Diplomats can do everything from sabotage armies to incite revolts
- Connect with the gods to recieve divine reinforcements

For Knights:

- Two classes: Might and Magic
- Four Primary Skills: Attack, Defense, Spell Power, and Knowledge
- No more stupid "upgrade for 5000 gold" policies; you have to train in a War Academy or study in a Library, depending on your class
- Upgrade for a total of 20 levels to increase your ability to serve your king
- Lead men as generals into battle with an added bonus
- A lot of Secondary Skills to make the battle more exciting

And much, much more!

Screenshots:

Coming Soon

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In-depth information:

Regarding Kings:

Courier System:

Instead of instaneous payment from kings to knights, the money is subtracted from the King's treasury and a Courier is created. The Courier is computer controlled and will move towards the Knight. If it is killed on the way, the money goes to whoever killed it. Couriers can be given armor, but this also slows them down.

Income System:

Every "week", Convoys (also CPU-controlled) will be sent from the individual villages to the Capitol where they will be added to the treasury. If they are killed en-route, again the money goes to the killers. Convoys can be later upgraded to be given guards.

Army System:

Kings can hire generals (up to 5, one for every Military Upgrade [discussed later]) who lead individual armies. These armies travel the land to attack and defend other locations. When two armies clash, they are transported to a battlefield based on where they are. During a battle, you will be given the option to manually fight it out or initiate auto-combat, where the CPU gains control of the units. If you manually fight, you can Retreat (leave battle screen and run back to Capitol). Auto-Combat generals fight to the death.

Siege System:

When you are attacking a walled town, a siege begins. A siege is pretty much a regular combat, except that the controller of the town has walls at his disposal. Outside armies can attack the besieging army while a siege is occuring. Siegers can use catapults, miners, and/or sheer numbers to win a siege.

Revolts:

Every 10 minutes, X amount of Peasants will become Revolutionaries, where X is your Revolt Percentage. When revolts are caused (either by diplomats or heroes), 2X Peasants become Angry Revolutionaries. An Incited Revolt (as this is called) negates the next revolt. Your Revolt % goes up when you lose ground, you lose a battle(s), or the enemy raises it. It lowers when you gain ground, win a battle(s), or when you prompt it. The Productivity Kingdom Upgrade permanently lowers Revolt Percentage by 5% per upgrade.

Magic VS Science:

Magic conflicts with science. If you choose to pursue Magic, you can use Shrines to generate divine favor and summon Divine units. If you choose Science, you can secure resource deposits and build Technological units.

Kingdom Upgrades:

The Kingdom can benefit from 4 sets of upgrades: Military, Magical, Scientific, and Productivity. Each set of upgrades has 5 levels:

Military: Increases Normal unit HP by 20% for each upgrade. Allows you to hire another general.
Magical: Increases the favor generated by Shrines. Divine unit HP is increased by 20% for each upgrade.
Scientific: Allows you to create more powerful units based on level. Technological units gain 20% more HP per upgrade
Productivity: Increases income rate of villages. Lowers Revolt% by 5 per upgrade.

And that's all for now...

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Regarding Knights:

Life and Death:

A Knight never "dies". When your life goes to 0, you will wait until there are no enemies in the area and then respawn there with 1 hp. Of course, you could simply keep on dying over and over.

Your Class:

At the beginning of the game, you can choose Might or Magic as your class. This choice is permanent and affects many things, including your upgrade path and Primary/Secondary abilities.

Upgrading:

You upgrade by training either at a War Academy (for Mighty Knights) or at a Library (for a Magical Knight). It costs money to get in and costs money to train. You pay for how many seconds you spend there. You get points for every second you spend. When you reach a certain level of points, you can "upgrade". Talk to the Perfected Warrior (for the Might-orientated) or the Distinguished Mage (for the Magic-orientated). They will teach you a new skill.

Commanding Armies:

You can choose to command armies instead of having a General do so. Some reasons why:

- You can join the fray (for the Mighty) or cast spells (for the Magical)
- Knights can lead a larger army than generals
- Knights never die (see above)
- The Knight can manually lead the men without fear of doing something else wrong

Primary Abilities:

Primary Abilities define what your Knight can offer. For the Mighty- Attack and Defense simply let you upgrade that particular attribute. For the Magical- Spell Power increases the power of most spells, while Knowledge allows you to cast spells more and more frequently.

Secondary Abilities:

Secondary abilities are gained every level and go from casting Meteors to Flaming Shafts. They are activated when you unsiege a tank on a beacon. Some secondary abilities have short cool-down times (like Deadly Thrust or Lure) while others take a long time to use again (like Serene Beserk or Aura Of Resilience). Might heroes simplty have to wait on their cool-down while the Magical can upgrade theirs through Knowledge.

And that's all for now...

Whew this has made for a long post. I'll keep you all updated as I go. Post feedback and questions. There are some more things I need to cover, but I'm not up to it tonight.

Wow man, sounds sweet. All the K&K games I've played have been sub-par on battle.net, but you seem to be putting alot of ideas and triggering on your plate. Make sure you can actually do half of that stuff

Don't worry. I can. I've been writing it all on paper this last week. Since it's spring break, I'll have plenty of time to work on this.

Now, let me go into armies:

Every _ (haven't decided yet) minutes, each village will spawn X number of Level X creatures with X x 20% HP, where X is your military upgrade level.

IE. You control 3 villages (VERY BAD) and have level 2 Military. Every _ minutes, you get 6 level 2 creatures with 40% HP.

That means, at the most, you will spawn 200 normal units (40 Villages Total). I may put in place a population limit of (3 x Military) per village.

Divine Creatures:

In order to access Divine Creatures, you must choose Magic over Science. There are 5 Shrines on the map for the 5 elements (light, fire, water, earth, and darkness). Each of these provide one unique unit (Graceful Seraphim and Leviathan, for example). Controlling a Shrine gives you (1 x Divine upgrade) favor every _ minutes (haven't decided yet). Summoning a Divine Creature takes 25 favor. There is a favor maximum of 40. You can choose when to summon a Divine Creature. An alert will sound when you have 25 and another when you have 40.

Technological Units:

Technological Units require Science to purchase. Resource Deposits will be scattered around the map (5 in total). Technological units spawn the same way normal units do (Every _ minutes, you get X number of level X creatures with X x 20% HP). I'm probably not putting a population limit on Technological Units.

When I post next, I'll go into more detail on specifics such as the units themselves and secondary abilities.

I'm currently working on normal terrain. Once I'm satisfied with that, I'll go into Starforge.

Hey Gladius slayer766 here. just dropped in to say can't wait to try out your map, with all the details you gave sounds like it will be great!
Also i like the ideas that you have given your map. Good luck on completing your map. Keep at it.

Don't worry. I have no limit for dedication when I'm doing something I actually want to do.

Ok, I would prefer some feedback here. Should kings control all of their 20 villages at the beginning of the game or should they be neutral and need to be taken over? I'm currently leaning on a compromise where you control the nearest 10 and the other 20 are neutral.

And here is the first screenshot of the actual playing area. Subject to extreme revision. Advice would be appreciated. The villages are represented by the crushed rock.The castles will be in the top-right and bottom-left.

Yes, it appears crowded, but all villages are enterable (hence the empty space) and the castle is as well. The castle isn't there yet, and that's because I'm using SF for that and I'm kinda in a hurry.

[attachmentid=6574]

Upon looking at this, I realize you can't see a thing . It looked okay in the preview... Better screenshots are on their way.

Damn man, nice terrain. It looks awesome, I can't do terrain for shit. =/

Thanks for the praise. And I thought I couldn't do decent terrain for my life...

Let me make some things clear. That screenshot shows the "World Map". Only Armies, Convoys, Couriers, Surveyors, Knights, and Knights leading armies can move on the World Map.

Surveyors are controlled by the king and control village upgrading. This is how village upgrading works:

1. You move a surveyor to a Village.
2. Using a Coordinate System, triggers will figure out exactly what village your at (might have to add in some landmarks if this gets tricky).
3. Your view will be centered on a Dropship with all the possible upgrades. Units in the dropship display the upgrade name and the cost in parentheses.
4. Unload the appopriate unit to construct that upgrade. If you don't have the money or already constructed it, the transaction won't go through.

Simple enough.

Village Upgrades:

(I'm not sure how much I want everything to cost yet)

Fort: Adds walls to the village (changes the battlefield so the defenders have walls; without walls, it acts as an open terrain battle).
Citadel: Adds more defenses to the village (details unclear)
Fortress: Adds more defenses (detals unclear)

In essence, they just make it harder for you to take a town. Each of these three upgrades change the outside appearance of a town from the World Map. So if some idiot decides to attack a Fortress with a tiny army, feel free to laugh.

so... wheres the extended terrain?
I thought you said in first post your making extended terrain castles...

That terrain doesn't look very good unless its an arena type game then it would be good

I'm sorry, I'm putting extended terrain in later. I thought I put that into the post.

And yes, I know the terrain isn't that good. That's why it's subject to extreme change.

I think the fact that someone is taking the time and doing some work on these types of maps is a good thing.

I've always felt that Kings and Knights maps were too bland and needed more to them.

Best of luck to you.

I've made the decision that the World Map will have no extended terrain - for now. I'll save the fancy stuff for the battlefields that I will we drawing up tomorrow. For now, I'm working on the control pads for the kings and knights.

Battle System:

Whenever two armies clash, they are transferred to an appopriate battleground.

For example, if two people were fighting on a ramp, it would go to something like the picture shown below. The picture has no doodads and is somewhat blocky, which is what I'll fix later on.

[attachmentid=6627]

Naturally, the person on the top of the ramp is on the top of the ramp. Same goes for bottom.

Then, if your fighting on a bridge, voila.

[attachmentid=6628]

Get the picture?

EDIT:

For simpler use, I have made it so you get one special every 2 levels as a Knight. Therefore, you can fit all 10 (or the ones you actually use) with hotkeys.

Basic List Of Spells/Abilities:

Spells: Spells are exclusively for Magic-trained Knights. They tend to take a lot longer to re-use than the Might ability of the same level, but this is compensated by their increased power and the ability to shorten cool-down with the Knowledge Primary Skill (since the 4 Primary skills are given out semi-randomly, spells will still take longer than abilities to re-use).

*First Spell is acquired at level 2 (you start at level 0).

Spell Format is shown as <Name> : <Level Of Spell> - <Level Needed To Learn Spell> : <Effect>, Cooldown : <#> Seconds

Lure: 1 - 2: Sends (1 x Spell Power) enemy soldiers towards you. Lured enemies cannot attack or use abilities. Wears off after (3 x Spell Power) seconds. Cooldown: 30 Seconds.

Barrier: 2 - 4: Raises shields to 50% (normally always at 0%) constantly. Lasts for (2 x Spell Power) seconds. Cooldown: 40 Seconds.

Energy Burst: 3 - 6: Gives Knight to Player 7 (lots of attack upgrades) for (1/2 x Spell Power) seconds. Cooldown: 50 Seconds.

Fireball: 4 - 8: Creates (1/2 x Spell Power) Fireballs (Infested Terrans). Requires at least 2 Spell Power (highly probable at level 8, but I have to make sure). Cooldown: 60 Seconds.

Freeze: 5 - 10: Gives (1/3 x Spell Power) enemy soldiers to Player 12 (freezing them). Requires at least 3 Spell Power. Lasts (2 x Spell Power) seconds. Frozen units may be attacked. Cooldown: 70 Seconds.

Greater Barrier: 6 - 12: Same as Barrier, except that it raises it to 100% continually for (2.5 x Spell Power) seconds. Cooldown: 80 Seconds.

Earthquake: 7 - 14: Creates (1/3 x Spell Power) lurkers burrowed underneath Knight. All non-flying enemies/allies near epicenter begin moving randomly. Lasts for (1 x Spell Power) seconds. Cooldown: 90 Seconds.

Delayed-Blast Fireball: 8 - 16: Creates (1/2 x Spell Power) spider mines underneath Knight. These spider mines DO NOT follow your knight. They last forever until detonated or end of battle. Cooldown: 100 Seconds.

Spite And Malice: 9 - 18: Sets all units on battlefield to 50%. Cooldown: 110 Seconds.

Meteor: 10 - 20: Creates 1 observer with a meteor animation for (2 x Spell Power) seconds. Anything directly under the Meteor dies. Anything near the meteor is reduced to 1% HP. Cooldown: 120 Seconds.

Obviously, these are subject to major adjustment.

I will submit the Might abilities at a later time.

ANOTHER EDIT:

In case you didn't know, here is an explanation on the victory terms:

Assassination - the good ol' KILL THE KING!!!
Conquest - Take control of all villages. This DOES NOT require you actually taking the castle itself. In essence, anti-turtling.
Subjugation - The enemy revolt percentage is 95% or higher.

You know, I've realized that editting doesn't bump the thread in the forum. I also don't feel like double posting. If no one else posts, what am I supposed to do?

YET ANOTHER EDIT:

This is getting inane.

Here is the Might ability list. Format is the same as for spells.

Deadly Thrust: 1 - 2: Kills a non-flying non-special unit at Knight's location. Cooldown: 10 Seconds.

Evasion: 2 - 4: Creates a hallunication at your level HP. Lasts 10 Seconds. Cooldown: 15 Seconds.

Archery: 3 - 6: Creates a cloaked Wraith. You have 5 Seconds to pick out a target. Kills unit at target location. One shot. Cooldown: 20 Seconds.

Greater Evasion: 4 - 8: Creates a real image of yourself at your level HP. Lasts 20 seconds if not killed before. Cooldown: 25 Seconds.

Flaming Shafts: 5 - 10: Creates a cloaked Wraith. You have 10 Seconds to pick out a target. Kills unit at target location. Sets units near it on fire, causing them to move randomly. Cooldown: 30 Seconds.

Roll: 6 - 12: Creates a burrowed Zergling under Knight and unburrows, causing "stumble" effect. Makes Knight invincible for 10 seconds. Cooldown: 35 Seconds.

Whirlwind Of Death: 7- 14: Kills all non-flying units in a circle around Knight. Cooldown: 40 Seconds.

Flurry Of Arrows: 8 - 16: Creates 5 cloaked Wraiths. You have 10 seconds to pick out targets. Kills units at target locations. Cooldown: 45 Seconds.

Honor And Glory: 9 - 18: All combat allies go to 100% HP. Effect wears off at end of battle. Cooldown: 50 Seconds.

Serene Beserk: 10 - 20: Transforms into Perfected Warrior for 30 seconds. Cooldown: 55 Seconds.

Oh, and by the way, spells/abilities are only activatible in battle. Outside of battle on the World Map, they can act as diplomats, doing all the evil things that diplomats do.

Semi-Bump.

Generals:

General Tokens on the World Map are represented as High Templar. Army Tokens on the World Map are represented as Reavers. A General's army is represented by Overlords. Every Military upgrade, you get another Overlord.

Armies:

Every "week", soldiers are trained at villages. You can set a default for their behavior, either going into the garrison or going with the income Convoy to act as guards and add themselves into the army.

If soldiers are left in the garrison, your generals can then come and pick them up later, adding them into the army if possible. If not possible, they will automatically go with the next Convoy.

Garrisons:

You can leave soldiers at villages to protect them. They go to garrisons, where they can defend a village without need for a general. Garrisons are simulated by shuttles. Every time you upgrade a village, you get another shuttle (maximum of 4 for any particular village).

Information on Diplomats:

Diplomats are hired and controlled by kings. You may only have one diplomat at a time. Diplomats are invincible but can be captured. They are also "blind", so the scouting advantage is kinda pointless.

But that's not why you have to have diplomats.

Diplomats are very cruel, cruel people (so sue me). You need to be at a village to activate their effects. Costs for their operations are being deliberated upon. They can:

Incite Revolt(s): Creates (2 x Revolt %) Angry Revolutionaries for your king. These men will automatically attack the garrison (if any) of that village. If you succeed, you can add them to your army by way of a convoy or keep them in the garrison.

Sabotage Troops: Lowers HP of soldiers in the garrison of a village to 1%. This does not inform the ruler, so if they aren't careful, they can lose the village very easily.

Bribe Troops: Bribes men of a garrison and gives them to your king. They will immediately engage with the rest of the garrison.

View Kingdom: Allies vision for half a minute.

More abilities will be added later.

Midnight I must say all your ideas are not what I would have expected from a typical Kings and Knights game.

In fact in my opinion you give the entire game a new propective.

It's an awesome idea for a world map and mini battle fields for battles.

You know for the Knights part? Why not add something for them to heal units in the battlefield or something?

For the Generals do they have any special abilities while fighting?



Keep up the good work, I look forward to playing this game.

One more thing for the knights do they have preset units? Or do they get to choose betweent ehm leveling up or something?

Err keep forgetting to add things. About how far would you say you are?

Finally someone who has something worthwhile to say

That's something I forgot to bring up.

War Machines:

There are three kinds of War Machine available in K&K Midnight. You may only have one War Machine per type per General/Knight. They are:

Ballista: [Reaver] used for general assault purposes. Can be globally upgraded to increase damage. The Ballista is not as strong as a Catapult but also costs less.

Catapult: [Siege Tank] used for long ranged attacked and for bringing down walls. Originally attacks very slowly (gives to p12 after one shot). Can be globally upgraded to increase firing rate. The Catapult is heavily armored and is hard to destroy.

First Aid Tent: [Covert Ops or another addon] heals units near it on the battlefield. Can be globally upgraded to heal more units. The First Aid Tent is very vulnerable and can be easily destroyed.

I'm pretty sure that solves your first question.

About Generals, I probably will if/when I have time for it. I will not, however, allow them to join in the fighting. They're GENERALS, not CAPTAINS.

As for Knight leveling, you keep the same unit all game long (except in special cases). The Mighty Knight is a Zergling while the Magical Knight is Tassadar. Every level, you get more HP, a semi-randomly selected Primary Skill, and every two levels, another ability.

As for how far I am, I am currently doing battleground terrain. Once I've finished with that, I can speed through triggers rather easily, considering I've been thinking this out for quite a while.

CONCEPT:

Wanting to save space and locations, I've decided that when not in battle, Garrison troops will still be in Shuttles. However, these Shuttles will now be above the village itself. Same will go for Generals/Knights leading armies and their Overlords. In battle, the transports will go to a generic area, unload their troops, and then move the troops onto the battlefield. I like this idea more because it gives me a LOT more room to do stuff.

EDIT:

I've completed the 8 Small Battlefields and have finished the walls/crenellations for the 4 Siege ones. Screenshot is as below. I've made the output size larger so you can actually see the things.

[attachmentid=6676]

Keep in mind that I have not and will not start doodad/sprite work until everything else is done.

I know its a General not a captain but still. A General is there for his military prowess so doesn't it make sense for them to have some abilities to bolster his own forces?

For the garrison idea. Why not make it so that when you have the dropships with your garrisoned units leave one or two spaces. Like umm...1 space is so that when you go to the battle field the defender can use that space to place a bunker maybe where he wants it so you can actually make it like a garrison of units...unless of course the unit is close ranged, in that case the other space could be used to unload the garrisoned units somewhere on the map. After the defender is done palcing his units or maybe after a time limit is up the battle begins.

Oh one more thing for knights how about making it so that they can be maybe a sort of Blade Mage or something where the knight could have military abilities and mage abilities just that he can't have all of them. So if they can have 10 abilities the knight who is that sorta knight will be able to choose between military abilites or mage abilites. Since they have to choose between the 20 abilites and can only choose 10 they won't be able to get the most potent of abilities yet have a diverse mix.

For the catapult how will you make it so you know when they have shot once?

Keep forgetting to add things...Is there a way for armies to retreat? Hit and Run? Go into a battle field to drop something like a mine for a future battle?

For the how many villages you start with...hmm well it depends how often monsters appear. If you have no defense you could basically die early in the game. But I would have to say to start with just their basic kingdom. It gives the kings and knights of the team their own way of how to take the field.

Grrr this is the 3rd damn time.....Top Right's kingdom looks more vulnerable then bottom left. And since the armies are in overlords and shuttles couldn't they just aim right at the other Kingdom?

Well, this sounds very good. If you make as good as you are planning this will be a complete new genre.

Keep up the work!

Hehe. You got me wrong.

The armies TRAVEL in overlords/shuttles, but in the case of overlords, they are CPU controlled when not in battle and continually move over the Army Counter (reaver). The shuttles are also CPU controlled when not in battle and are permanently stuck over their corresponding Villages.

I like the idea for allowing the defenders to set up early. I'll implement that when I get to that point in time. Thank you for the idea.

No "mixed blood" Knights allowed. I want to firmly set a distinction between Might and Magic. Same goes for Magic and Science.

As for timing catapult shots, all I have to do is start a death counter when the CPU gives it to the player and then give it back to the CPU after enough time passes. That can be achieved through simple trial and error.

Generals can retreat in battle, but hit and runs are somewhat impossible as armies are represented by reavers. If you can hit and run with reavers without scarabs, fine with me.

As for mines, I'm not going to allow that because except in special cases, battlefields are chosen randomly. Also because the only thing in the game that can simulate a mine is a Spider Mine, and that's already being used for Delayed Blast Fireball.

I've somewhat made the decision to have Kings start with their nearest 10 Villages. The 20 in the middle start with their own garrisons and can be captured by whoever can.

As for the Westen Kingdom being more set up than the Eastern Kingdom, I'll have to check into that later.

Thanks once more for the generous feedback.

EDIT: |)ark2004, of course it's a whole new game. I'm not plagiarizing off of anyone and I'm only taking ideas and expanding on them. Thanks for the comment though.

kk I just thought of the mixed knight because I read too much Forgotten Realms books .

Anyway keep us updated so I can give even more feed back lol.

lol I haven't been this active since Psi Generals map.

What happened to that anyways? Did it just die off like all the other maps that died off? Or is it like Deep Blue, where someone's actually going back and finishing it?

This reminds me of Heroes of Might and Magic. Which is a VERY good thing, because I've wanted to see a HoM&M map for StarCraft for a long time.

Keep up the good work.

Well a slight version came out...

I could go look for Psi on StarCraft or Aim if you guys want.

His was about the only thread in which I posted to just about every post .

Fu Leng: That's such a shame.

Voyager: Good, because I'm somewhat modeling it after HoMM3, of which I'm a devoted fan. You're the first to make the distinction.

On topic: I have begun working on in-game triggers, so expect some in-game screenshots soon (hint hint tomorrow). As everything else is coming full circle, all I have to worry about now are locations/strings running out and/or unexpected errors. I have a basic idea of how to do everything, so that shouldn't happen.

Off topic: w00t w00t second page!!!

Yes...yes it is... I'm not really active much because I don't find many fun maps to play anymore. I'm hoping this'll change that so I'm giving you as much support as I can.

Thanks man, I really appreciate it.

Your name and others will be going on the Credits list, in case that means anything to you (it sure does to me!). I'm only putting 5 names there, so you've pretty much secured a spot.

On topic: I will probably go back near the end and make those isometric borders square. I didn't do it yet because it messes up my isometric terrain on SCXE. I'm hoping that'll make it seem more smooth.

Also, in case of multiple battles, I'm going to make the borders 2x high terrain so you can't see over them.

In my latest screenshot, that part near the top is the beginnings of the control panel.

kk thats cool.

Can't wait for tomorrows Screen Shots.

Any chance of any later this night?