Lots of Tyrants Must Fall progress over the past two weeks, with a few more key steps towards launching a public playtest ticked off the list. Some things, like a Settings menu, aren’t particularly exciting to either build or to talk about, but are extremely critical for players. Other things, like some changes to how the metaprogression works and the addition of Event nodes are much more interesting, and I’ll talk about them more in future entries.
For today, though, I wanted to get to something I’ve been promising to do for quite a while now and dive into the details of some individual units. To start, I want to focus on the two units the player will become immediately familiar with as the members of their starting army.
Rebel With a Cause
First, meet the Rebel!
The Rebel is the core of Jairm’s army to start, with four of them available as loyal followers. Armed only with a pitchfork and a dream, the Rebel is the most basic melee unit available. Rebels are capable of fighting from the front row or the middle row, but only so long as they have a clear line to the enemy’s side of the battlefield. If a Rebel is in the middle row with another unit in front of them, they won’t be able to attack.
With only two HP and 1 ATK power, Rebels might not seem particularly imposing. Where they really shine, however, is when you take advantage of their special ability: Stand Together. If the player can arrange three or more Rebels side-by-side in a single column, all Rebels in the formation gain an additional HP. This might not sound like much, but early on when your army is still weak, that bonus HP can spell the difference between victory and defeat.
If you can manage to keep your Rebels alive for long enough and get them up a 3-star rank, you’ll have the opportunity to upgrade them at a Village. From here, you can choose which path your Rebel specializes in, which will help determine their later growth path. The basic Rebel can either upgrade into a Lineman or an Irregular.
Linemen are the start of the Defender path, and in addition to more HP, they will also gain the “Defensive Strike” ability which allows them to grant themselves armor immediately after striking the enemy. Progression down the Defender path leads (as you might expect) to units built to stand on the frontlines and soak up damage while protecting their comrades.
Irregulars mark the beginning of the Soldier path, and allow the unit to keep its Stand Together ability in addition to gaining a stronger base attack. Moving further down the Soldier path leads to more options for both enhancing damage-dealing abilities, but also more mobility and flexibility on the battlefield.
Putting An Arrow In the Knee
The other core unit of your starting forces is the humble Hunter. A simple peasant armed with a bow, Hunters can fight from the middle and rear, though are useless if left on the front line. As ranged units, they can attack regardless as to whether other units are in front of them. In fact, given their singular HP, you’ll want to keep them well protected behind your strong units.
Hunters have no unique special ability, but being your only ranged unit to start makes them extremely valuable. Ultimately, if you can grow them to 3-star ranking, you’ll be able to upgrade them into more unique specializations.
On one hand, you might choose to send your Hunter down the Skirmisher path by upgrading to a Scout. Skirmishers can ultimately become your most flexible units with the ability to attack both melee and ranged, sometimes with unique abilities depending on their placement.
On the other hand, you might continue to focus on pure ranged ability by upgrading to a Bowman and heading down the Marksman path. Marksmen specialize in dealing increasingly heavy damage at range, and eventually the ability to specifically target weaker enemies.
Know Thy Foe
Since we’re looking at early game units, it’s probably worth taking a moment to learn about some other units the player will see a lot of: enemies.
While the early game doesn’t feature the most threatening of the Tyrant King’s forces, they can still be enough to overwhelm an unprepared hero and his army.
Should you happen to be waylaid by bandits (extremely likely as the Tyrant King considers them “economic drivers”), you might find their forces feature the Rogue unit. These double dagger-wielding ne’er-do-wells are Skirmishers, meaning they have the ability to attack either at range or in melee. While they aren’t particularly strong, their flexibility means you need to keep constant track of them to make sure you aren’t overlooking an attack you didn’t realize was coming.
A little more on the wild side, you might happen to encounter one of the Beast Handlers in service to the King. These Beast Handlers have taken the previously harmless creatures of the realm and turned them into tools of war.
One of the weakest of beasts the Handlers might lead is the simple Slime. Despite its unimpressive stats and unassuming visage, don’t underestimate the threat of these gooey foes. Whenever a Slime takes damage, if they have more than 1 HP remaining they will split off into an additional Slime. If a player isn’t careful, they may accidentally find themselves suddenly outnumbered substantially when they thought victory was already assured. These newly-spawned Slimes can also disrupt battle plans, as what was an empty lane when a combat round begins suddenly clogs up.
From Humble Beginnings
What we’ve looked at today is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the variety of units Jairm will eventually encounter and command on his (repeated) attempts to overthrow the Tyrant King. As Jairm gains in experience and glory, the variety of units available to recruit or upgrade to will expand dramatically, opening up whole new tactics to unleash in battle. By the same token, as Jairm draws closer to his goal, so too will the enemy forces grow in strength and ability.
On a completely different note, I’ve taken some time out from feature development and bug fixing to work a bit on the soundtrack side of things, and have a rough draft of the title theme put together. While the background graphics are still obviously under development, you can hopefully get a sense of mood I’d like to set as players set out on this adventure.
Next Time: If all goes well, the launch of the first public playtest!
P.S. You can always join the conversation at our Porch Weather Games discord!
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