Mod: Urdheim, The Infinite Horde

[Saulot]

(Download v.50 is now available)
Some of the following may be obsolete:

Hello everyone.

I'm your friendly neighborhood long-term lurker. I've decided to step out of the shadows, because I've been working on some mods for quite a long time (just for my own amusement), and one of them is (IMHO) getting to a level where, with significant balancing and some additional attackgraphics/polishing, it could be enjoyable for others. The reason, of course, is that I've enjoyed so many great mods by the community (and of course the basic game itself; Thank you devs and modders!), so I'd like to give back. This is my third new nation mod, which is called 'Urdheim, The Infinite Horde' and consists of kobolds and dragonkin, lead by Half-dragon mages. I'd like it eventually to have moderate to above average balance when compared to most vanilla nations.

This is inspired heavily by DND kobolds, and the name Urdheim, comes from old-school dnd winged kobolds known as Urds. It should be noted there are no Urds per se in the nation, though there is some decent variety amongst the bloodlines of the kobolds. I've also pursued about every fantasy resource freely available on the web on all topics related to kobolds, draconians, dragonkin, drakes, half-dragons, and all things draconic.

I suppose I'd also like to see the level of interest in a Kobold Nation. I should have a beta download ready either this weekend or the next one. By posting this, I am basically committing myself to finishing it, which helps along with positive interest in the community, as far motivation goes. (It's hard to stay motivated after spending hundreds of hours scouring the web for reference pictures for sprites, and various sources for ideas for units.)


Anyway here's the detailed nation info:

Era: Early
#descr "A nation of Kobolds. Kobolds are tiny and weak lizardlike creatures possessing great speed. They are aggressive, xenophobic, yet quite industrious. Kobolds are noted for their skill at using poison, building traps, preparing ambushes, and mining. While having longer lifespans than humans, they reach adulthood in a matter of months, and breed frequently and in great numbers. They claim to be distantly related to dragons, which they worship as deities."
#summary "Race: Kobolds. Military: Small and stealthy light infantry with good leaders. Prefer Heat 1."

MAGIC: Fire=4, Earth=3, Death=2, Water=1, Nature=1
PRIESTS: LVL=1, sacred Ascendants

Numbers used in mod:
-- Weapon 880-898
-- Armor 380-381
-- Monsters 2865-2899
-- Sites 880-881
-- Nation 78

Fortresses:
Capital: Cave City
Default: Cave Fort
Farmland: Motte-and-bailey
Mountain: Cave Castle
Swamp: Swamp Fort
Forest: Forest Fortress

Province Defense:
Commander at def 1: Kobold Warchief
Units at def 1+: 2x Kobold, 1.5x Kobold Lt. Infantry
Commander at def 20: Kobold Sorceror
Units at def 20+: 1x Kobold Med. Infantry, 0.5x Firebrand


Strengths: Strong if highly focused magic, Stealthy and highly mobile troops, tough sacred unit, some potent national spells, good province defense, small production bonus.

Weaknesses: Weak priests, most units are cold-blooded, most units wear no armor, lack of true archers or cavalry, morale problems, no recruitable sacreds.

Kobolds have stealth, cold-blooded, 25% resist-fire, mountain survival, 50% darkvision, and are size 1.
Also: good leadership, good speed, good attack/def, good magic-resistance, pathetic hitpoints, low strength, poor morale.

kobold regular should have:
5 hp
6 str
11 att
11 def
4 prot
9 mor
12 mr
4 enc


units recruitable:
kobold (shortspear)
kobold skirmisher (shortspear/net)
kobold raider (hammer/torch) + pillage + animalawe
kobold light infantry (shortspear/shield/^poison dagger)
kobold medium infantry (shortspear/scale/cap/shield/^poison bolt)
kobold miner (pickaxe/pickaxe) + siegebonus + defense
$ firebrand (fireblast/firebreath) + fireimm. + gluttony + (nostealth)
$@ winged hellion (firespikes/barbed tail) + magicbeing + blind + heat + fireimm. + flying + (nostealth)

commanders recruitable:
kobold ranger (shortspear/net trap/leather) + stealth10 + spy + patrol + okleader + wastesurvival
kobold warchief (shortspear/^poison bolt/blades trap/scale/cap/shield) + summons 5 light infantry + good leader
kobold firelord (fireblast/firebreath/plate) + awe + makes 1 firebrand + gluttony10 + incunrest3 + (nostealth) + excellent leader
waterborn (quarterstaff) + amphibian + poisonres + (100% water/nature random) + (nostealth)
blessed one (magicstaff) + amphibian + poisonres + sacred + 1 holy + (120% water/nature random) + (nostealth) + supplybonus 20
kobold summoner (claw/summonflame) + makes 1 ash wyvern + animalawe + supplybonus 20
kobold sorceror (magicstaff) + 2 fire + 1 earth + 1 death + (100% earth/death random) + (10% fire/earth/death random)
@ scion of glaurung (claw/firebreath) + sacred + 3 fire + 1 holy + (20% fire) + (20% fire/earth random) + flight + heataura + (-research) + (nostealth)
@ scion of sirrush (claw/firebreath) + sacred + 3 earth + 1 holy + (20% earth) + (10% death) + regeneration + fire/poison immunity + siegebonus + (-research) + (nostealth)

makemonster unit summon:
Ash Wyvern (Same as normal wyvern, except: Size 3, -2 strength, +50% fireres)
Magma Drake (Sacred Drake on steroids, can go berserk, is weak to cold, bonus in hot provinces, and costs some gold upkeep)

ritual unit summons:
Kobold -Conj. 0 x30 E ( 5 earth gems)
Glaurung Ascendant -Conj. 0 x4+ FFFF (16 fire gems)
Kobold Skirmisher (farsummon) -Conj. 2 x30+ EEF (12 earth gems)
Kobold Raider (farsummon) -Conj. 4 x40+ EEEFF (18 earth gems)
Cursed One -Conj. 5 x2 DD ( 2 death gems)
Ancient Gargoyle -Ench. 7 x1 EEEA (20 earth gems)

ritual commander summons:
Dragon Ancestor -Conj. 3 x1 DDE (12 death gems)
Draconic Demilich -Conj. 8 x1 DDDDD (80 death gems)

heros:
Kobold Strider (Wicked Polearm/Strider Claws) + rejuv. + excellent leader + standard
Kobold Evoker (Staff of Withering) + 2 fire + 2 earth + 2 death + 2 (fire/earth/death) random + fear + rejuv.
Scion of Abraxas (Enchanted Sword/Lightning) + sacred + 2 air + 1 holy + shockimm
Master Summoner (Partial Displacement) + Summon MagmaDrake

pretender:
Ancient Dracolich
Arcane Dragonstone

$ = I was for a long time considering throwing mounted firedrake riders, or flying wyvern cavalry into the kobold mix, but for the following reasons I went with a different route: 1. they seemed way too far on the strong/expensive side of the scale, 2. along with cavalry seeming unthematic for kobolds, and 3. the firedrake riders being too reminiscent of Agarthan caveknights.
^ = 1 time use only ranged weapon
@ = Capital Only



As for their idiosyncrasies and things to consider;
1. It should be noted they have no sacred recruitables, though they have a potent early sacred summon that about 30% of their Glaurung Scions can cast. Large sacred armies should still be quite a rarity nonetheless.
2. They also possess some potent farsummons, which definitely help in the ambush concept.
3. The sorcerors can combatsummon skirmishers on the edge of the map (a la the howl spell), for even more ambush feel.
3. While they have no archers per se, the firebrands are more of a close-range artillery, though they are very fragile and as often as not, get themselves, or other kobolds killed.
4. The ranger is an incredible commander (spy, 3 mapmove leader/raider, and patroller), though it suffers from over-generalization and thus is somewhat expensive for any of the various roles it could fill.
5. They are highly mobile. With a mapmove spread of 2 to 3 (& mountain survival) they generally are fast responders.
6. Powerful battlemage thugs in the form of the two scions, should be on par (or almost there) with both Neifel Jarls, and Yomi's Dai Oni.
7. The cheapest mage has only 1 random, and no base magic, and so can be recruited without a lab.
8. While all kobolds possess natural armor, most units don't wear any normal armor, so most earth-based protection boosters won't benefit much.
9. Summoners are not sacred, and quite expensive, but Ash wyverns have no upkeep, and the summoners themselves possess a very good ranged attack (at least in the early game).
10. They start off with 2 fire, 2 earth, and 1 death gems. This is less than the usual early age 6, but it is more than made up for by a gold and resource bonus site, and a death magic scry site "The Obsidian Sphere". Both of which go hand in hand with kobolds industrious/mining nature, and their stealth/spying concept. For RP purposes, one can call the latter an artifact from a long lost dragon's horde.
11. An extrapolation of #2 and #10, the precision scrying works wonders with the farsummons, for precision raids on unguarded or lightly guarded areas.
12. Cursed Ones possess both melee and ranged strength draining attacks, this is effective at whittling away small/tough armies, and can combine quite well with firetrap spamming sorcerors.
13. Due to their poor encumbrance, battles involving lots of kobolds tend to be won quickly or not at all.

As a bit of a preview, I put together an image of some of the recruitable kobold units.


Edit1: Here's some more units, as promised:
Glad to hear all the positive responses, more unit stats will come later.



Edit2: Here's some unit stats as promised:

Glaurung Ascendant (size 3) (sword/firebreath/helmet/plate/towershield) + sacred + fire imm. + neednoteat

Cursed One (steal strength/curse/weakness/weakness) + ethereal + cold/poison imm. + amphibian + magic being + lifeless + stealthy + neednoteat + blind + affliction chance

Ancient Gargoyle (size 5) (claw/claw) + flying + blind + lifeless + magicbeing + noheal + neednoteat + fire/cold/shock res. + poison imm.

Dragon Ancestor (size 6) (lifedrain) + 3 holy + sacred + immobile + heat + neednoteat + spreaddom + incunrest-2 + nobadevents5 + fire/poison imm. + lifeless + noheal + blind + (smallgoldupkeep)

As for the rest about the Draconic Demilich, I think I'll save it as a bit of a surprise in the mod.

[Kristoffer O]

Looks great!

Finished soon?

[Saulot]

Thanks!

Well... I suppose I should mention what still needs to be done:
1. Some attack sprites
2. Unit stat/cost balancing
3. Summons stat/gems balancing
4. Adding/Removing/Adjusting national spells
5. Improving a few unit descriptions
6. Reading suggestions that I imagine will be posted here

Once that is done I suppose it will be ready for beta release (and ready for yet more balancing), though like Dominions itself, it is never truly finished.

[dmentd]

Saulot, what program do you use to make and modify your sprites? I like the kobold images. Thanks.

[jutetrea]

Looks well thought out.

I like the summoning a lot - summon allies or domsummons or similar to maened summoning?

Are the scions beefy? a la thuggable?

So high magic potential is:
5F on glaurung
4E on sirrush
3D on sorceror
1N or 1W on the waterborn

Do you have thoughts on the stats of the summons yet? For instance, what is the draconic demilich? Mage, thug? How does he compare to the 30 gem demilich at ench 7(?)? What's the ancestor? Cursed? Is ancient gargoyle a beefier gargoyle?

Yup I like it, very themed - lots of small, low-mid quality sneaky troops. Limited but relatively powerful magic. I think the commanders, summons and firebrand/hellion will make or break it though (i.e. make more fun for ME). Commanders all seem very nice, will be a big decision on what to make each turn (why the -research, btw?) which is a good thing.

Looking forward to seeing it.

[BandarLover]

Yay another modder! Awesome graphics you've shown so far. Though they look like they should be bigger than size 1.

Very cool concept, looking forward to the first release.

[Saulot]

@dmentd
I use gimp for almost all my graphics now. Back in the day I used good old reliable paint. My sprite experience comes from using paint along with a gif-animator and making aim icons for all my friends.

@jutetrea
I wish I could do maenad summons, but instead do regular kobolds, with special kobolds appearing in fort provinces/temple provinces, but as it is now, just two units autosummon (warchief/firelord) 5 and 1 units respectively. And the Summoner uses the makemonster (or summon allies action). I may still give an autosummon to the summoner. I considered giving the Ranger an autosummon of skirmishers/raiders but it would kind of give them away when they're sneaking/spying in enemy territory, and they're chock full of abilities as is.

All the stats and descriptions of all units mentioned are already in the mod.
The scions are quite beefy. They're size 4 half-dragons, with the stats to match. Their slots are not quite standard though. Missing some, and an extra misc. slot to somewhat make up for it. The scions are meant to be powerful/rare (as in cap-only), warriormages for use in battle. They will of course be doing some summoning/forging as well, but doing mundane research is beneath them, and they don't much care for it.

The Demilich is one of my favorite units (immortal flying undead mage with lots of death magic and fear), and could be one of the summons to focus a strategy around. Same with the Ancient Gargoyle. Essentially a much larger, tougher, element resistant gargoyle. It should be relatively difficult to get the E3A1 mage for Urdheim however. I'll throw in another group image in the first post soon, with some more units. I'll also add some more stats of the other units mentioned in the first post.

@BandarLover
Thanks!
You're absolutely right about their appearance, and I have two avenues for responding.

1. Heightwise, they are almost human. But they are very thin, and they like to swarm/fight in close proximity. Important for tunnel/cave fighting, and just as useful above ground.

2. At the beginning, I tried making the first kobold much smaller. But you couldn't tell it was a kobold, or even a lizard. It looked like a brown pixie with a tail. Making sprites is difficult enough, and almost impossible when trying for 16x16 pixel units with any detail. For the sake of appearance, I prefer them this size.

[Foodstamp]

Very impressive. I especially love the shield on the infantries. Keep up the excellent work on this visually stunning mod.

[Sombre]

Visually stunning is a bit much.

I like the idea of a kobold nation though. If you want partial darkvision without armour you could copystats from a 'hiem dwarf, who has darkvision 50 and mountainsurvival. You'd have to use clearmagic though.

[Ballbarian]

Looks very cool Saulot! I have always had a soft spot for the old D&D kobolds.

Optically amazing!