Eternal Keep

[The Gremlins]

There's going to be a new game out sometime in the future called Eternal Keep.

It's going to be based on the Urban Dead system, except instead of having two races it'll have an unlimited amount of races.

All races will have the same access to skills and at the same costs as they vie for control of territory and resources.

It'll feature pretty much the same mechanics as Urban Dead though; "Find shit, blow shit up, get more power so we can get more shit to blow more shit up with."

It'll feature money and eventually an interactive market. It'll also feature a well-developed faction/alliance/team system.

The game world will be grid-based like Urban Dead as well, but will feature a map of 1000 X 1000 grids (that's 1,000,000 grids total).

We're not sure if it's going to be a wrap-around map (globe) or just a flat map (which has borders) yet or not.

In most cases if a character dies they just re-spawn at the cost of some energy. In some cases a character can be permanently killed, but it takes a lot of work for the people that would like to make that happen.

There will also be something akin to magic items in the game. We're not sure if these are going to be random items, patches you can wear, charms, medals or what.

There will be several hundred levels and skills however, and advancement to the highest skills will take quite a bit of dedication over a long period of time - but playing the game itself shouldn't take more than 30 minutes per day in most cases.

Construction will begin immediately and we'll need alpha testers for the game soon. Note: "Alpha" does not mean "beta." The alpha testers will probably be in a game that does absolutely nothing for quite a while. They'll be lucky if they can even move around. The difference between an alpha test and a beta test is that the beta test is used to refine the game, whereas the alpha test is used to actually build the game.

Go ahead and shit some questions if you have any.

[Vmag]

There will be several hundred levels and skills however, and advancement to the highest skills will take quite a bit of dedication over a long period of time

So it DOES plan to follow the "take three steps, rest fot 24 hours"system as well?

[The Gremlins]

So it DOES plan to follow the "take three steps, rest fot 24 hours"system as well?

Um... No.

Okay, yes. But only at first. Players will quickly overcome that and we don't plan to be quite as stingy about how many actions one can take in a day. additionally, stock-piling "action points" should we choose to use that term, will be possible unlike in Urban Dead where it's "use or lose."

Beyond that, players will have the option of buying supplies instead of hunting for them which will save massive amounts of action points. It's actually one of the reasons we're planning on putting a money system into the game.

[AiRsTrIkE]

What about lag? I don't have any doubt your server can handle a million squares and thousands of players, but I do. Urban Dead is slow, sometimes it takes up to half a minute to put requests through at peak hours.

[The Gremlins]

What about lag? I don't have any doubt your server can handle a million squares and thousands of players, but I do. Urban Dead is slow, sometimes it takes up to half a minute to put requests through at peak hours.

Won't be an issue.

The grids people aren't in won't be loaded. The entire game (despite having some images in certain places) is really just text-based. The reason servers for games like Urban Dead and CyberNations lag out or crash sometimes is because they're simply on tiny servers. Hell, our server for these boards is bigger than both of theirs combined.

We're definitely not afraid to throw money at it if it's fun. Lag shouldn't be an issue.

[The Gremlins]

Another thing to add:

While some of you may not like this, it's something we want to do to prevent abuse right from the get-go. Set the precedent early and keep it that way so that the game is inherently as fair as possible (because there will be winners and losers).

When someone tonks the character someone has spent many months building, they're going to be pissed if they suspect ass-hattery.

To prevent that, each character created in the game will be bound to their IP.

This means that:

*If someone creates a character with a proxy, they won't ever be able to access that character again unless they randomly get that IP address back through that proxy. In other words, their won't be any proxies and therefore, no unknown duplicate characters.

*AOL users that use a dial-up dynamic connection won't be able to play. They need a static IP address to play - the only way they can access the character is to be on the same IP they created it with.

*Those of us with static IPs will be able to have our characters but will only be able to access them from the physical geological location we created the character at. In most cases, our homes.

*Yes, you can have one at home and one at work and so on. If you get fired I don't know what the fuck you're going to do about that character though. We might make it possible to "rebind" a character to a different IP, but that's going to be a "down the road" kind of project to create and install that system.

*Multiple characters will be allowed. This way if someone has a brother that plays that's fine even though he uses the same IP. We'll even let the two characters work together and interact with each other (trade, heal, give items, etc). It will require a special program though and this too is a "down the road" project.

*All the code will be hand made by us from scratch. It will not use any open source or copied code. It will be all original.



Oh, and in the game:

You can trade items and put items in bins for other players to grab up if they want them. In Urban Dead there is no way to give items or trade items. That's something we wanted to look at. Dropping an item will still result in its instant deletion, but there will be storage bins and things of that nature for people to use to keep items in the game.

Should something happen to the storage bin and it gets destroyed however, the contents of that bin hit the floor and are toast.

Just tossing out some random stuff.

[The Gremlins]

Just another FYI, we've begun purging the site we're going to use. This usually takes a couple of days, but then we can get started.

We'll start with a wiki for you all to get interested in while we work on the actual code. The code's going to be a long time in the making, but hopefully we'll at least get everyone a character and someplace to move to to start off with.

[The Gremlins]

Here's a question...

The game map is going to be huge so space should never be a problem.

But do you guys prefer a wrap-around map (so it would work like a globe) or a flat map so that it works like a square area of land?

[Stevurn]

Globe.

With it being so big, you don't want to end up at one end and then have to take your time travelling all the way back again.

I think square works better for smaller spaces.

[Alastor]

Globe.

With it being so big, you don't want to end up at one end and then have to take your time travelling all the way back again.

I think square works better for smaller spaces.

I think that makes it more fair too. If I have a corner, I only have to defend/maintain two borders. Someone in the middle has to defend each compass direction.

A globe is fairer.

[Kitsune9tails]

Just popping in to make sure I can post and agree with a wraparound map. Give me a call, by the way, Alastor.

[The Gremlins]

The gamespace is being purged as we speak. As soon as that's done, we can get started.

Holy shit, what a project! It should be fun though.

[Kitsune9tails]

So, although I have discussed this in RL, the first questions I am going to ask will be:

- What's the genre?
- What's the setting?
- What's the theme?
- Is there a metaplot?

[The Gremlins]

So, although I have discussed this in RL, the first questions I am going to ask will be:

- What's the genre?
- What's the setting?
- What's the theme?
- Is there a metaplot?

Okay, well bear in mind that there's more than one "The Gremlins."

You know most of them. Well, you know... Several of them at least. The game is mostly being made for the pleasure and practice of one Gremlin in particular, but it's certainly open to discussion and "co-pilots" are welcome, which is kind of the point of having this thread.

So with that in mind, I guess the point is that everything's open at this stage.


That said...

The Genre:

Mostly real, some sci-fi.

The game premise is that at some stage some alien beings that were really powerful and twisted in the head came and stole a bunch of humans up. They then created an area on an otherwise desolate planet with a lethal atmosphere where the humans could live and called it "Eternal Keep."

Their goal was to have a sort of arena to watch the humans do what they did best; be violent for profit. Sort of like when a child tries to raise sea monkeys in the hopes they have a war, or watches flying ants, bees and wasps go to war with each other. Pretty fucked up shit, really.

In any case, the humans are placed in the protected area and given freedom of choice and movement. They're also granted limited access to some technology, such as nanobots and various other "high tech, but not exceptionally high tech" stuff.

The humans are then left to their own devices so that the "Eternal Keepers" can watch for some morbid entertainment.

The Setting:

The setting is as stated, a portion of area that the Eternal Keepers set up so that the humans wouldn't die upon being exposed to the atmosphere.

The entire region aside from a small portion of territory is absolute wilderness. It's hard to move in and very dangerous. Native creatures come out of the ground or come in from the sky to attack the humans they see as treats.

The humans can gather some safety and supplies in the initial area which contains some buildings. Here the humans will be able to find first-aid kits, weapons, and some other handy items.

The humans will also be able to learn skills as a result of doing certain things (like killing monsters or each other - act shocked).

As they learn more skills they'll be able to walk farther, do more things, gain greater skills, learn to build things and so on, and eventually will be able to spread out from their "homestead" if they so choose. They'll have to defend the homestead first though until they get the organization, skills and resources to spread out more.

From there, they can pretty much do whatever they decide to do.

The Theme:

The basic goal is to survive and prosper in a hostile environment where all your cohorts have weapons and not much else to do but either build stuff, destroy stuff, or shoot each other.

The theme isn't terribly complex. Kill things, take over territory and build things to get more money. Money buys resources, even if in limited quantities, that help perpetuate the power of a given group or individual. Along the way if someone happens to figure out a way to get out of the Eternal Keep, all the better.

Is there a metaplot?

What's a meta-plot?

[Kitsune9tails]

Sounds good so far. So, what kinds of ideas are you soliciting? Are there any kinds of ideas you are NOT soliciting?

[The Gremlins]

Sounds good so far. So, what kinds of ideas are you soliciting? Are there any kinds of ideas you are NOT soliciting?

No, there aren't any ideas we are not soliciting.

We need:

Building types and what can be found there
Items people want in the game (including Easter Eggs)
Monster ideas (the game will rely on NPCs heavily at first)
Skills you guys think you might want to have

If you guys go play Urban Dead a bit and think of what would make that game better, it'd be a good start to help us out here even if someone can't think of anything they want in this game.

Thanks for asking!

[Kitsune9tails]

Off the top of my head:

When you search a virgin square, you earn a random number of points toward a % increase in your Search skill, and a random number of points toward finding a random object.

Among the objects you can find are:

Tools: Depending on the tool, you can then use it in a room with a valid target to earn random points toward skill in using the tool and random points toward doing to the object whatever is appropriate. For instance, using a hatchet in a room that has a tree can earn points toward causing the tree to spawn lumber, and also points toward killing the tree itself. You might then be able to use a hammer and nails on lumber to build a building.

Plans: The type of plans you find determines the type of building you can build.

Weapons: self explanatory?

Armor: self explanatory?

Once a building is constructed, you can enter it and 'labor'. Laboring in a building earns you points toward gaining skills of the appropriate type, and possibly toward producing an appropriate good or service. For instance, you can labor in a library to produce books, which can then be read to learn skills.

The main method of advancing, though would be through combat. Killing a critter or player gains you experience, which you can spend to learn whatever skill you want (instead of those limited to the gear and buildings you possess) and money, which you can use to buy things in the appropriate buildings (which is faster than earning them through labor).

[The Gremlins]

Off the top of my head:

When you search a virgin square, you earn a random number of points toward a % increase in your Search skill, and a random number of points toward finding a random object.

That's over our head. It would require a separate type of experience to come from that action, go into a separate pool, and then be usable only with that skill. If we did this for each of the skills we'd essentially be building the same system many times over.

It's a nice idea for down the road, but it would have to be way down the road.

Among the objects you can find are:

Tools: Depending on the tool, you can then use it in a room with a valid target to earn random points toward skill in using the tool and random points toward doing to the object whatever is appropriate. For instance, using a hatchet in a room that has a tree can earn points toward causing the tree to spawn lumber, and also points toward killing the tree itself. You might then be able to use a hammer and nails on lumber to build a building.

Like the other one, it's a neat idea but over our head. We'll have tools and you can do stuff with them and earn experience, but it'll be "general experience" which the player can then apply as they see fit.

Plans: The type of plans you find determines the type of building you can build.

Oooo. Hadn't thought of this.

Weapons: self explanatory?

We're starting off with just three. Melee weapons, pistols and shotguns. We'll definitely want to add more later though.

Armor: self explanatory?
Definitely.

Once a building is constructed, you can enter it and 'labor'. Laboring in a building earns you points toward gaining skills of the appropriate type, and possibly toward producing an appropriate good or service. For instance, you can labor in a library to produce books, which can then be read to learn skills.

Laboring in a place bringing one resources is a good idea. Laboring in the gun store for example might produce a firearm or some ammo.

The ideas are cool. It's just over our head at this stage to construct that way. We're still on training wheels here.

[The Gremlins]

Let me clarify. In terms of game design and admin, there are several of us working on it (of which you are one, Kitsune). Of the programmers, there is one and he doesn't know what he's doing.

[Kitsune9tails]

Got it.

So I'm thinking the flow of the game will work like this for the first guy to log on ever, and for many characters afterward (per the last convo I had with Alastor):

1) Click on the 'create a character' link.

2) You are taken to a screen with a generic character sheet with the same stats as every starting character. You can enter a bio and get a few 'free' xp to put toward some basic skills to customize your guy.

3) You pick a sector of the game to start in, such as "I want to start in sector 50 across/81 down".

4) You appear in a random square inside that sector, outside of any existing buildings.

5) You will read a description of that square, saying basically that it's rough terrain.

6) Survey the in-game list of in-game commands.

7) Search until you find terraforming tools (or can you terraform without them)?

8) Get killed by a wandering monster.

9) You are prompted as to where you want to respawn "Sector 50 across/81 down" (hopefully, the monster has wandered off by now).

9) Search until you find weapons.

10) Terraform the square until it's flat.

11) Search until you find plans that allow you to build a building that allows you to make banners.

12) Search until you find building building tools.

13) Build a building that allows you to make banners from the plans you found with the tools you found.

14) Build a banner.

15) Plant the banner: Grats! You now own a square in the game!

My question is: in your opinion, how many hours/action points should the above actions take?

[The Gremlins]

1) Click on the 'create a character' link.

Yep.

Specifically it will have a notice that all characters are IP bound, meaning once created, that character can only be accessed by that IP address. Hopefully we won't have to wait too long for an exception to be built so that some of us here that use dynamic IPs but that are indeed legit can still use a character and play.

Beyond that, people that are not part of the project should be able to get an exception to that rule for a small charge (we're thinking 5 bucks) so that if they're in a special circumstance they can still play too if they really want to, and the fee helps deter "cheating" - as well as off-sets some of the cost of the site.

2) You are taken to a screen with a generic character sheet with the same stats as every starting character. You can enter a bio and get a few 'free' xp to put toward some basic skills to customize your guy.

Good idea.

3) You pick a sector of the game to start in, such as "I want to start in sector 50 across/81 down".

I think we've decided that in a 1 million square grid, that the player can choose from one of 100 regions to start in (each with a 100x100 area). Ten across and ten down. It'll be shown as an image and the person can just click on which portion of the 10x10 map they want to spawn in. From there the game will place them randomly in that area and it will be up to the player to get the character to safety.

4) You appear in a random square inside that sector, outside of any existing buildings.

By and large. The exception will be if one faction/alliance/team already has that square as "territory." The game won't place newbies in areas that are already controlled by another team. Why we want to put this in the game early on is because later, when we add walls, we don't want newbies spawning inside of someone's walled-off areas.

5) You will read a description of that square, saying basically that it's rough terrain.

Unless of course it's terrain that's been improved and just isn't claimed by any teams yet. But yes, by and large I'd imagine that if someone intends to improve a piece of territory that it's also going to be claimed.

6) Survey the in-game list of in-game commands.

Yes. All the options for the player should appear on the main game screen along with a map of their immediate area. Any action they can take should appear on that same window.

7) Search until you find terraforming tools (or can you terraform without them)?

Okay, so there will be five levels of terrain:

1. Wilderness - consider this a jungle. It's dangerous, tricky, not level, critters are in your way and sometimes dangerous, trees and vines and mugs are all over the place. It's land that has been previously untouched by man (at least in the recent past). It's a bitch to get through. It takes 5 AP to move into such a territory.

2. Open land - Still pretty rough, but some effort has been put into making the area reasonable to traverse. Players can improve land from a wilderness state (which is more likely to spawn worse monsters) to open land with either their bare hands or basic tools like machetes, axes, shovels, etc. This type of land costs 4 AP to traverse (move into).

3. Rough trail - Someone has put effort into clearing major obstacles and filling in gigantic holes in the middle of the area, or getting water out of the region to eliminate swamps, mugs and other hazards. This too can be done with rudimentary tools, but not bare hands. This type of area costs 3 AP to move into.

4. Clearing - It's a clearing. Picture any reasonable horse pasture. Someone worked hard to get tree groves either cleared out or pruned, it has relatively flat terrain, there are no impassable bogs, and generally it's pretty fit for basic travel and maneuvering. This type of land costs 2 AP to move into.

5. Developed - This is pretty much land any idiot could, if so inclined, go build a shack on and expect it to stand there until affected by outside sources such as wind or snow. It might even have dirt roads or solid cobblestone paths running through it making it exceptionally easy to travel through and on. This type of area costs 1 AP to enter.

A wilderness area starts with a certain amount of "points" to it. As it "gains points" by players working to improve the area, the area will improve.

An area has to be developed in order to be "claimed." Once an area is claimed it no longer deteriorates on its own over the course of time (unclaimed areas will).

Once an area is claimed that claim can be improved by people that wish to do so, or that claim can be diminished by adversaries. Picture it like this:

Team A wants to claim a tile of territory to expand their empire, so they send ten characters with tools out to the next tile which is in a wilderness state and has been since they started building - it's not been touched before.

The ten characters set to work hacking out the area and clearing the critters until the area has become developed. Now they stake a claim to the area. By putting in as much effort as they like, they can increase their claim on the area. Their claim won't decline if neglected. It'll just remain in place. In this way there's no "upkeep" cost once the area is developed and claimed - but adversaries can come into the area and essentially dispute the claim - and diminish the claim of the original owners. Once the original claim is gone the new group can establish their own claim to the area.

In order to build something on a claimed territory, the players who own the territory (or members of their faction) have to go build it. Once the building is started anyone can help build it (or destroy it). Once the building is complete, it should function as normal.

Claims can be disputed with structures still present on them. Claims can be bolstered once the structure is built. If a territory has a building on it and the faction it belonged to loses its claim, the building will cease to function for everyone (and never works for enemies to begin with).

If a territory has a structure on it and belongs to an opposing faction, the building must be destroyed prior to removing the last bit of claim that the original faction had.

For example, Group B wants an area controlled by Group A.

Group A has cleared a territory and built a general store on it.

Group B sends in 20 characters and kills everyone. They start working to take over the territory and manage to get rid of almost all of the claim set out by Group A originally.

To completely eliminate Group As right to the area, they need to destroy the structure that's there, the general store. Once it's gone the last pieces of the claim can be removed.

Group B does so, and can no stake their own claim to the territory. Once they have claim to it, they and only they, can begin to build a new structure. Once the new structure is started, anyone can help build it (or tear it down).

8) Get killed by a wandering monster.

Yes, but as the territory improves it is less likely to spawn a monster, and the type of monster it spawns will be less dangerous. Eventually when a territory is fully claimed and built upon, no monsters will spawn there (though they may still wander in from other places).

9) You are prompted as to where you want to respawn "Sector 50 across/81 down" (hopefully, the monster has wandered off by now).

We probably won't let players choose the exact spot of their re-spawn, unless they've specially built a structure to help them do so (like a hospital for example). But yeah, they'll get to come back in the general area of something their faction controls.

9) Search until you find weapons.

Yep.

10) Terraform the square until it's flat.

Yup.

11) Search until you find plans that allow you to build a building that allows you to make banners.

I don't know about the plans idea yet. Maybe that's going to be too tedious. Maybe we should only use that on certain building types. It's already a pain in the ass to build something. I don't know how much harder we want to make that. This is something we'll have a better idea of once we actually get the game functioning.

12) Search until you find building building tools.

Yup.

13) Build a building that allows you to make banners from the plans you found with the tools you found. 14) Build a banner.

What's a banner? What does it do? Why is it needed? Explain banners to me, please.

Is that like how someone stakes their claim to a territory?

15) Plant the banner: Grats! You now own a square in the game!

Oh, okay. I see. Yeah, I was going to use claim stakes, but that sounds stupid. I like banners better.

My question is: in your opinion, how many hours/action points should the above actions take?

A lot. It's going to have to take a concerted effort by a team (although it's possible for someone to do alone). Here's why:

As the game goes on, people will get better at things (like getting over difficult terrain) so the cost of doing so goes down. At the same time, they'll be able to invest in skills that allow them to earn more AP each day and to store more AP overall (so that days they don't play aren't wasted).

When a player gets 200 AP a day and can have a stockpile of 500 AP to boot, that one player alone can build a territory up pretty quickly. In this way, high level characters and larger factions can create things in relatively short order especially if well organized and on the same page.

So... I think we're looking at "from beginning to end, finding a square, clearing the square and putting up a usable structure" will probably take a few thousand AP total - more or less depending on how efficient the players are, what tools they have, etc.

[Kitsune9tails]

So our hypothetical 'player 0', somewhere in region 8 across/3 down, with no one around to help him, starting from level 1, needs to spend 2000 ap to get his first structure up?

How many hours is that?

You might want to have some cheap starter structures that anyone can get going in a couple days, scaling up to huge structures that are intended to take several weeks of hundreds of players working together to construct, so that Player 0 has a sense of accomplishment.

[The Gremlins]

So our hypothetical 'player 0', somewhere in region 8 across/3 down, with no one around to help him, starting from level 1, needs to spend 2000 ap to get his first structure up?

How many hours is that?

You might want to have some cheap starter structures that anyone can get going in a couple days, scaling up to huge structures that are intended to take several weeks of hundreds of players working together to construct, so that Player 0 has a sense of accomplishment.

There will definitely be a starter kit for people. A neutral area that has some structures in place for everyone.

[Kitsune9tails]

In addition to a pre-existing neutral area, will there be any kind of 'low hanging fruit' to strive for? Or is it intended that a solo player not be able to claim land and have even a tiny building in less than 100 days?

I'd suggest little things, like maybe a 'campsite' that produces a little food, and is a massively scaled down version of a 'garden', which is a massively scaled down version of 'farmland', which is a massively scaled down version of a 'grocery store', which is a massively scaled down version of a 'super market', which is a massively scaled down version of a 'mass food replicator'.

At the low end, there could be massively inefficient (but better than nothing) buildings that have 1 hp and can be built solo in a day or so scaling up to super powerful buildings that can supply the needs of an entire guild and are industructible barring special tools but which require hundreds of thousands of ap to build.

[The Gremlins]

Oooo... I like the campsite idea...

Let us ponder on this.

[The Gremlins]

The site is now purged.

We'll start work today.

I guess the first thing to put up would be a splash page, and then a wiki. Probably in that order.

[Kitsune9tails]

Awesome!