Wednesday, March 02, 2016

The Humble Armory #1: Basics

This may never come to fruition.

The idea is a game called The Humble Armory. 

You're a blacksmith in a medieval town that is basically an adventurer's tourist trap. Adventuring groups come to you and you choose how to outfit them. You also negotiate a deposit for your equipment, plus a percentage of the treasure if the party comes back.

What would a typical turn be like? You'd be able to do any of these things (no "action point" constraints):
--craft (weapons/armor, and later, a bestiary where you can breed animals)
--review the adventuring parties that would like to rent your equipment
--choose a party/parties and outfit them. As part of that process, negotiate the deposit and the reward in treasure.
--when an adventuring party has departed, you'll be able to see their progress via a battle flag (it can change colors, depending on their status). You might also receive a desperate, hand-written note from the party. You can choose to help them (or not), depending on your whims. If you don't help them, they may not make it back alive.

What else?
--a social element where you get to know adventurers. You'll feel personally responsible for their successes/failures. Adventurers progress over time.
--if an adventuring party looks like it is incompetent, you can try to convert them to an expedition to gather raw materials instead.
--the ability to expand your operations to include a training academy for your adventurers.

No, really, what else?
--if your adventurers are too successful, the supply of evil they can fight dries up, and that will make the adventurers go somewhere else. This could destroy your town, so you have to manage the supply of both good adventurers and evil overlords. This may put you in a situation to some extremely morally dubious things to save the town.
--you have a moral compass, based on the kinds of decisions you're making. If you play as evil, the game gets progressively darker, both in the kinds of decisions you're faced with as well as weather/music. If you play as good, the weather is sunny as well as the music, and you'll be involved with entirely different (and less lethal) kinds of decisions.
--Some of the NPC's you'll meet have their own story arcs, which you can participate in if you wish. Some of these story arcs will be quite involved.

I'm leaving out quite a bit--I'd like to refine other elements--but those are the basics.

I'll have one big additional feature to share with you tomorrow, and it fits in with the concept of having a game that I could work on for yours and continue expanding.

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