Why the new faction names?

[irrevenant]

Hi.

I was just wondering why WTactics has come up with new names and compositions for the factions?

Wesnoth already has established factions with established history and flavour. I realise the rules etc. are different but the Wesnoth setting already has factions balanced at a high level (Northerners are cheap with high-offensive power and low toughness, Drakes have high power and speed but are expensive, etc.).

Loyallists vs Rebels seems like a good starting point for factions. They come with a built-in conflict, they're fairly standard units that don't require specialist play (like the Drakes, for example) while still being different enough to make play interesting.

Why reinvent the wheel?

P.S. IMO the name "Gaians" doesn't suit Wesnoth well since it has a lot of Earth-specific cultural baggage. The name "Sylvan" (meaning "of the forest") was bandied about on the Wesnoth forums and might be a better fit.

[Q_x]

We are separate project, even when we use their artwork and we are personally connected. There is very little "Wesnoth world" here.

[snowdrop]

Hi.

I was just wondering why WTactics has come up with new names and compositions for the factions?

Wesnoth already has established factions with established history and flavour. I realise the rules etc. are different but the Wesnoth setting already has factions balanced at a high level (Northerners are cheap with high-offensive power and low toughness, Drakes have high power and speed but are expensive, etc.).

Why reinvent the wheel?

balance is never inherited
The balance in BfW isn't relevant the second you change the rules or try to create an alltogether different game: It's not possible, nor desired or functional really , to port BfW the computer game into a card version. Thus, what appears to be working factions and perfect balance in BfW can't really ever be transferred into anything else but a more or less identical game and medium, which a CCG shouldn't be.

WT is set in the same universe, but not necessarily in the same timeline as BfW. It means there would be plenty of influences and connections between WT and BfW, and the same time it also means that WTs pirmary purpose isn't to replicate the world as we know it in BfW. Rather, it is to develop an image of its own, loosely based on that world and it's setup. This can already be seen in the Gaian story for example, where the rebel heritage is mentioned: It relates to BfW, but takes things into a different direction.

Lore explanation
The re-construction of factions depends on the situation being another one now than it was in the BfW timeline. What happened then happened, now there are new conflicts and other interests roaming around the world. That explains the new constellations: A faction only exists while it is legitimate and fills a function. Other interests would eventually result in new factions in most world settings. Also in the universe of Wesnoth.

Design explanation

Lack of art
From a designers point of view the new factions relate to not enough/evenly distributed quality art being around for each faction, leaving us with the option to either re-configure who goes where or to wait and also pay for new art being done, which is a bad idea given we have no income for the project.

Worth of BfW relations
A more important explanation for the faction re-vamp is that there is really no value in itself to keep the already existing factions (composition and/or names) beyond that being something which the BfW community happens to be able to relate to.

The only ones in the world that would ever get anything out of very straight forward BfW connections are of course the dedicated BfW players.

"The rebels" is a terminology that's only understood by the BfW players. Everyone else would have to learn the story to understand against who and why they rebelled. If so, there is no inherent value in that name, no shortcuts. They would know nothing, just as they know nothing when hearing "the gaia" for the first time.

I'd argue two things from my time in the BfW community and as the founder of it's MP ladder: a) The number of BfW players that know all the stories and the big picture aren't many b) BfW is a game with a very high stream through/flow of players. At any given time it seems as if 80-90% of it's community is made up of newcomers. The ones are dedicated are so very much and stay for very long, the rest however easily moves on from BfW to something else, for whatever reasons.

Even if I were wrong in my second assumption I would still argue that our playerbase for a CCG will not come from the BfW community. The people that will come to us with that background and that will try a CCG for it being BfW-universe only is a very limited amount.

Most would have a totally different background, coming in from other CCG:s. If so, the capitalization and usage we have of our BfW relations are really worth almost nothing, especially given that pretty much nobody from the BfW community has lifted a finger to help this project in any way in over a years time. Please don't get me wrong now: I'm not saying they should or must. I'm not bitter or hostile against the BfW community, on the contrary I think parts of it is great. I'm just stating what's a fact and I use that as an argument here to prove my point that there is/will likely be a very small playerbase for our CCG that will come from the BfW community.

With not so many words: Relating stuff to BfW brings very very few, if any, benefits and zero synergy work force and resource wise. Keeping all things as Wesnoth-like as possible has, because of that, limited value as I perceive it.

Branding, identity & social commentary
The BfW approach to naming factions seems to me to have been to keep them "realistic" in a fantasy sense. Elvish names sound like Tolkien and others have thought us that they should sound and so on. Add to that my notion that plenty of things are very stereotypical in the BfW would, even if there are some very good examples of the opposite.

I don't believe a card game should have hard to pronounce/spell/read names. I don't want the players to struggle or game play to slow down, even a second. It also makes names/cards harder to remember, and we will have way more cards/units than BfW has, making the relying on memory even more important.

As we have no gain from the BfW lore and bg story we might as well partially re-brand, simplify and also in that process rename whatever in it to simpler and easier forms.

That will:

• Allow us to not only be a mere replica of the BfW world, but to put more dimensions and depth and variation into the game, developing a broader understanding of the Wesnoth universe and allowing us to get a unique identity.
• Make it easier to reach our target groups on the market. (A poor example: While no normal person knows what "Knaalgans" are all would know what a "Dwarvish x" would be, at least in comparison.)
• Relate our naming to our story and it's modern type of conflicts and new challanges the wesnoth universe is confronting, such as over-population, scarcity, class war etc.
• As a bonus, and through that, allow us to also use the game as a social commentary of contemporary problems, adding a more serious and subtle layer to the game where it's used to catch peoples interest on certain topics and open up discussions.
• Notice that all of this isn't in our general design document, but rather something I imagine as a possibility for the ORC. If somebody would rather create a CCG using identical setup as BfW when it comes to faction and names that person is free to do so.

[pennomi]

I was a bit confused at the beginning too about why there were such different factions. The longer I look at them, though, the more I'm convinced that they are put together in a way that not only supports gameplay (dividing units into factions with similar "combat styles"), but also keeps the traditional Wesnoth feeling. You might have a few Human rogues mixed in with the Orcs or Dwarves and Aristocrats working together, but basically it all works out okay.

[irrevenant]

Wow, thank you for the detailed reply, Snowdrop!

A couple of questions/clarifications:

The balance in BfW isn't relevant the second you change the rules or try to create an alltogether different game

True. What I probably should have said is that Wesnoth already has a well thought out diversity of factions.

From a designers point of view the new factions relate to not enough/evenly distributed quality art being around for each faction, leaving us with the option to either re-configure who goes where or to wait and also pay for new art being done, which is a bad idea given we have no income for the project.

I understood Wesnoth to now have art for the vast majority of units. Certainly it has art for all the most commonly used factions and units (and hopefully would have the rest by the time you needed them).

A more important explanation for the faction re-vamp is that there is really no value in itself to keep the already existing factions (composition and/or names) beyond that being something which the BfW community happens to be able to relate to.

As I see it, the advantage of using the existing Wesnoth setting isn't that it appeals to Wesnoth players. The advantage of using the Wesnoth setting is that a lot of time and effort has gone into developing it and ironing out the kinks in the setting and storyline.

In short, the advantage in using the Wesnoth setting is that the bulk of the work has already been done.

Add to that my notion that plenty of things are very stereotypical in the BfW would, even if there are some very good examples of the opposite.

It should be noted that Wesnoth is deliberately stereotypical for a reason: it makes the setting immediately comprehensible to anyone who's familiar with fantasy literature. The further you diverge from stereotype, the steeper the learning curve.

Anyway, looks like it's going to be a brilliant game. I look forward to being able to play it.

Thanks.

[snowdrop]

I understood Wesnoth to now have art for the vast majority of units. Certainly it has art for all the most commonly used factions and units (and hopefully would have the rest by the time you needed them).

It has, indeed.

At the same time it has almost nothing at all of the Drakes currently. Now I'm also writing about the new improved portrait style, not just any portrait in the BfW trunk that has been around since forever: Much of the artwork found in the BfW project is still of poor quality compared to the latest ones. In WT we're trying to set the standard as high as possible within the given budget (kind of zero).

In short, the advantage in using the Wesnoth setting is that the bulk of the work has already been done.

Yes, it would reduce work for us somewhat, if I'd think that specific story and setup is good enough for a CCG. I don't think it is for several reasons, as I suggested in previous reply.

[Ravenchild]

The current plan is to let dwarfs and the House of Nobles be allies. While both share the motive of greed, dwarfs are not as treacherous as the nobles.
Dwarfes honor treaties and agreements while the nobles don't hesitate to ignore them. This will inevitably result in bad blood between the two factions.

On the other hand Drakes would be good allies for HoN. They are rather dumb but nevertheless selfish. They can easiliy be persuaded by the nobles to serve their intentions.
And isn't an ally that conquers the air far more attractive to a nobleman than a dwarf that diggs in the ground?

The dwarfs would be a great addition to the Empire. Pride and wealth are attractive factors for dwarfs to fight for. The humans control the land and the sea and the dwarfs take care of the mountains and the underworld.



The big problem is that I'm combining the two groups for which we have the least amount of art.
There are only 2-3 drakes/dragon images in the pool and a couple of humans that can be used as nobles.
This will mean that we can hardly release any HoN cards in the near future and we need to wait for better art to be created. That's bad but on the other hand I really don't think that Dwarfs+HoN would be a good combination.