Looking for some help on a Discworld scenario...

[Cyrion]

@ Curt: no need to feel bad about the Horsemen!!

AND, Ladies and Gentlemen, the tech description is finished!! I now understand why most creators don't bother writing the describe.txt file: it takes a very long time...

So only the readme to do now!! And at the beginning of next week, the final playtest will start, the release being planed for the 22nd!!

And the first files are on their way to Duke of York...

[yaroslav]

Cyrion, I've returned so I'll love to continue the playtesting

[duke o' york]

I'm half-way through reading the tech descriptions at the moment. Great work so far.
Back to it (or to work, whichever seems more pressing ).

[Cyrion]

Readme ready and sent for spellchecking...

[rjmatsleepers]

Nearly there ... you're on the last lap now.

RJM at Sleeper's

[Cyrion]

Finish in sight...

I just sent to you (Arthedain, rjm, curtsibling, duke of york, yaroslav and Case) what is, hopefully, the last beta!

I plan to release the scenario at the beginning of next week, if no huge problem appears!

So if you could give the last version a look, I would be really grateful!

About playability: I really need your opinion on the 3 following points:
1) are the Independents too much of a nuisance? I lowered the stats of the crossbowmen to 2/3/1; if yes, what should I do, give them a move of 0?? That would make attacking independent cities a bit too easy, I think, as you could just park a catapult on a plain next to it, as they would have no way to counterattack (not that the crossbowmen are really effective...)??

2) how is the tech progression rate? I switched the tech rate back to 10/10 (from 20/10), but I'm afraid that with the merchants help, the techs are gained too quickly (in my playtest with Omnia, thanks to merchants, I gained nearly 10 techs in 30 turns...)

3) are the orange civ (Dungeon Dimensions, the "baddies") agressive enough?

That's it guys! I hope you enjoy it...

[duke o' york]

I can't play your beta until this weekend I'm afraid, so any comments may have to wait until Monday. I doubt I'll have too much to say, but will this be too late for you?

[Arthedain]

Uhm, you need to rename railroad to suburbs or whatever the name you want for them

[Cyrion]

Originally posted by Arthedain
Uhm, you need to rename railroad to suburbs or whatever the name you want for them

Oups, forgot to change that!!

Originally posted by duke of york
I can't play your beta until this weekend I'm afraid, so any comments may have to wait until Monday. I doubt I'll have too much to say, but will this be too late for you?

Monday is perfect: I'll be away from Friday morning to Sunday evening (skiing in Zermatt, at the feet of the Matterhorn... ), and so will consider all your comments on Monday evening! So playing over the week-end is perfect!

[duke o' york]

[extremely jealous] Fine, enjoy your weekend of skiing. [/extremely jealous]

[Arthedain]

I've played some with A-M. Managed to solve the starvation problem and captured a city. Further expansion is impossible at the since the are is swarmed with crossbowmen units. I have build fortresses to keep them at bay but it's a hard task since they're so many. So I still find them very tricky. I don't know what the other players feel about this though.

[Cyrion]

Originally posted by Arthedain
I've played some with A-M. Managed to solve the starvation problem and captured a city. Further expansion is impossible at the since the are is swarmed with crossbowmen units. I have build fortresses to keep them at bay but it's a hard task since they're so many. So I still find them very tricky. I don't know what the other players feel about this though.

Exactly the kind of feedback that was needed right now!

They proved harassing in my game too! I might well make them non moving units...

[Arthedain]

Well, I can say that in my game, there's TONS of crossbowmen around my city. It's really hard to break through. Maybe you should just make them alot more expensive so they won't build as much as they do right now, then you cans till have them moveable.

[Cyrion]

Excellent idea, that might do the trick!

But they have a lot of them from the start, so maybe they would still use them and leave their cities undefended??

I'll try that tomorrow nonetheless!

[rjmatsleepers]

Re: Finish in sight...

Originally posted by Cyrion
I plan to release the scenario at the beginning of next week, if no huge problem appears!

I played until Autumn 79 with as Klatch and experienced no play problems. I won't be able to play anymore for a while, so here are some preliminary comments.

The 'pedia is very well done and it is clear that you have put a lot of work into this and all other aspects of the game. The scenario deserves to be a huge success.

Originally posted by Cyrion
About playability: I really need your opinion on the 3 following points:
1) are the Independents too much of a nuisance? I lowered the stats of the crossbowmen to 2/3/1; if yes, what should I do, give them a move of 0?? That would make attacking independent cities a bit too easy, I think, as you could just park a catapult on a plain next to it, as they would have no way to counterattack (not that the crossbowmen are really effective...)??

The Independents were not too much of a nuisance - particularly once I used the Death unit as a honeypot trap. In due course I adopted the strategy of using my flying carpets to empty the enemy city of defenders and then capture it with a scout unit.

Originally posted by Cyrion
2) how is the tech progression rate? I switched the tech rate back to 10/10 (from 20/10), but I'm afraid that with the merchants help, the techs are gained too quickly (in my playtest with Omnia, thanks to merchants, I gained nearly 10 techs in 30 turns...)

I suspect tech progress is too fast. As Klatch I used a few merchants and a lot of tech swapping which got me through the tree very quickly (and had me #1 in technology) without increasing the research rate or building any libraries, etc - I did get a couple of cities celebrating though.

Originally posted by Cyrion
3) are the orange civ (Dungeon Dimensions, the "baddies") agressive enough?

The "Orange meanies" do not seem very aggressive. At times they seem to stand there just waving their units around - but they are very good at walking into an undefended city and they do eventually capture cities by force.

BTW I loved the introductory graphic.

I have a few points that you may like to look at.

The message about building an underwater vehical seems to say I built it, but I don't think I did - maybe adjust the wording here?

The message about breaking the fabric of space time by building an enormous pyramid specifies Djelly Belly as the city responsible. But in my game I owned Djelly Belly. Possibly you could adjust it - renegades build near Djelly Belly, or something like that.

I destroyed one pyramid, but it cost me a lot of units. The reward seemed to be pretty meagre for the effort involved, so I didn't bother with any more.

Finally one point that may impact playability. It appears to be impossible to move the portal closure unit without building a chain of cities and this is difficult with so few public workers. So in my game it just sits there doing nothing Whether you need to do anything about this depends on how the unit is intended to be used.

Good luck with the release version!

RJM at Sleepers