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| Thread: What would be the maximum amount of lore-based factions in Heroes |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 3 · «PREV / NEXT» |
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baronus
Legendary Hero
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posted January 19, 2024 12:53 PM |
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Ot course conflux means nothing. First location was altair of elements. Conflux was not plannded before. As you know lack of Forge is only reason to make conflux. It was very fast work. 4 neutrals from RoO 2 neutrals from AB was fast reworked. 1 new never known before magic el. No terrain. It cant be named city. I think its rather 4 planes manifestation. Correctly look means 4 separate planes as I worked years ago plane of earth. Ive planned all planes but it was not realised.
Elements are opposite! Water el. and fire el. are enemies! One always destroy the second! The same air and earth!
...
Ot course we must change Conflux to have more logical factions. The same dwarves and centaurs.
Pixie and halfing to rampart. Dwarves to Mages centaurs to warlock eventually to barbarians. It gives more clean factions
Pixie halfing Pegasus elf ent unicorn gr. dragon
gremlin dwarv gargoyle golem mage genie titan
etc.
I like clean and logical factions not MM7 eg. goblins + liches it makes no sense. Or ghosts + gogs.
Dont like angels in Mages celeste only because flying. Harpies griphons or Rocs flying too... In this case all unit can be in all faction. Its major castle unit and very good fited.
For me using Erathian lore and mixing faction od biggest MM7 fail. My only wish to MM7 is copy paste from H3 excluding Conflux and some mistakes eg. centaurs . I want first person look RPG style Heroes III copy! Point by point! All innovation place is MM8...
Efereti as fire unit is rather not good option because only fire is a reason. Gogs are fire unit too. But all kregans looks like fire faction ... It shuold not be mixed. Demon look in this case is most important than fire using. Kreegans main motive od demon look so each demon is Kreegan.
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FirePaladin
Legendary Hero
DoR Modder
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posted January 19, 2024 03:52 PM |
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@NimoStar
It looks like we clearly do not understand each other, so it would be best to close this topic here. The only thing I'll answer is that only one of us is in contact with Gregory Fulton, and that Tolkien himself had a clearly distinct elf trinity. Just in case you believe I pull stuff from my hind, because that is hardly the case.
P.S. I have no idea why you went on a tangent about inter-game designs and are so insistent on groundless creature "duplication".
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Enshackling time itself, heralds of the Ancients among their heat-depleted land.... Who could they be, who could rally the beings of the East and the North and control the mortals' fate?
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AirikrStrife
Hired Hero
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posted January 19, 2024 08:25 PM |
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I obviously didn't intend to cause any conflict by starting this thread.
As a person with a huge interest in both fantasy and world building as well as history it comes natural to me to want to see a game world like Enroth in as much of a world that makes sense to me, more than just tropes. I think the games, especially when looking at all the games set in antagarich (H3+expansions, chronicles, MM7) does create a world which is to me more than a set of tropes, building backstories and lore, and I started this thread to investigate that a little bit more in the context of the most significant political units in the world (the strategy game factions), yet the tropes are the foundation of the game and then the world is built around them. The progress into this sort of world can also be seen partly through the development of the games, with H1 and H2 not having any world maps but just scenarios. Later retconned into the the Enroth map seen in MM6. Likewise as the antagarich games develop they develop more of a world, there goblins can live in deyja and angels can fly around in celeste, dwarves can have their own stone city etc.
That's why a Cathedral (sun/moon) faction makes sense to me as they have existed as a distinct political faction in the world, though I understand the criticism of Church of the sun as a castle 2.0.
About the elemental planes, I think in sense of lore building that they could have been their own factions, but for practical gameplay it makes little sense unless overloading on on factions. For me I just wish conflux had gotten it's proper development time and maybe felt more like a proper faction. Something tied into MM8 would imo have been the best, maybe going as far as having crystal dragons as their tier 7.
Some of the other thigns mentioned that I wans't that aware of, is the relevance of Ardon. I haven't played any ardon games, but giving their generally poor reviews, the fact that they're not developed by NWC, seems to be quite rare (I only find crusaders on GOG) and even reading up on the lore of those games is kinda challenging. I find the idea thar Ardon also is on the planet of Enroth quite interesting. I will see if I can look into that more.
About Price of Loyalty, as I haven't played much of H1-2 I hadn't even played the expansion pack and not really looked into it. It actually takes place in a completely different 'world/continent' than Enroth. I'm a bit surprised that none of the efforts I seen to produce maps over the Enroth world has tried to incorporate the world from price of loyalt,y maybe because again it's not NWC who made the expansion? Or because the world is to inconsistent to build a map from?
Anyway, thanks for the comments.
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baronus
Legendary Hero
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posted January 19, 2024 11:05 PM |
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Edited by baronus at 23:10, 19 Jan 2024.
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baronus
MM7 is not a world development but cutting + mish masch. It must be based logic. If we have the same Queen Catherine and the same years it means we have the same units...
Opposite it MM8 is really great fantastic progress because its new continent not known and very good designed. Full off logical factions. Cristal is so great idea that I cant belive. Its so climatic if you enter Ravenshore!
Better option is add more new than mixing old. Because it wasted previous story.
Ardon has no potential. We have only 3 craps. Only 2 first named might and magic. But its only element of mm.
If you are interesting third part named Shifters is not MM.
Not nwc. Nothing similiar to rest. Poor content. It needs building all practically from 0.
Rather Vori or Karigor needs development.
I was discovered something like map for H1 and H2. We have world map there but topic has 0 replies so I abandoned it.
Heroes worlds maps.
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FirePaladin
Legendary Hero
DoR Modder
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posted January 19, 2024 11:32 PM |
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@AirikrStrife
Absolutely, I was starting to feel a bit guilty for it myself. =P
You put it in much better than words than I have: in H3 specifically, the factions were created from tropes, and then the rest followed.
Well, I'd repeat myself too much by saying that Conflux's concept was more or less set in stone. I doubt that even with one year of development we would have seen a significantly different faction (maybe only in terms of visual polish and some gameplay aspects). Personally, I like it as it is, it introduced some of the missing elements (not just creatures) from H2's Sorceress, and also answered the requests for more fairy tale-ish stuff. And both Sprites (at least in folklore) and Phoenixes are semi-elemental creatures.
MM8 was developed after AB was.
There is not very much regarding Ardon, but it has some really interesting lore and ties that can be made or used. Daria, Ravenwood, the elves of Ardon and so on. Really interesting. Also, shoutout to Necros, the Skeletor of Might and Magic.
PoL was developed as being "somewhere". In other words, it was developed in such a way that, if the devs of another MM game or expansion or whatever, wanted to use it again, on, say, perhaps Enroth, then they could do so without problems. But the same applies to using it on any other worlds (however, there was a crucial detail related to the Wizard in one game manual, mapmaking-related; but I don't recall the details of it).
Regarding mapmaking, it's just that there have been no nerds who have bothered to do so yet, nor with any reason to do that. Not only, but Virtually all the fanmade maps of the Enroth planet I have seen on the internet are also inherently flawed, as if the mapmaker did not compare the sizes and scales of every location in the games and many other things nerds do.
You're welcome!
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Enshackling time itself, heralds of the Ancients among their heat-depleted land.... Who could they be, who could rally the beings of the East and the North and control the mortals' fate?
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AirikrStrife
Hired Hero
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posted January 20, 2024 10:30 AM |
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@baronus
I don't agree with your problems with MM7, same thing can be said about H1-4 factions. Especially the H4 faction there they have mixed together after the reckoning in new constellations.
This is also of relevance to my field of study, ethnography and heritage, there are people who desire to see the world in discreet units but the reality is not so. People move and mix constantly. Looking at monster populations you can also compare to zoologi, you have many species spread out over huge disconected distances, so having a world which is not just a set of strict tropes (fire nation, forest dwellers etc) is actually more realistic.
In my OP I'm asking for polities that make sense as a faction within the game lore. So for example while there are many population of goblin-kith spread out across the world, with small kingdoms etc not every ogre king needs to be their own faction.
So there's nothing illogical about having goblins in deyja, or that some random demons (gogs) are running loose in different places, including a population settling in barrow downs.
You see in MM8 a world which seems to have small migrant populations. Minotaurs were created by warlocks and escaped and built a new home in jadame, they breed fast enough to have established a proper community but it's still small, trolls are on the move, having migrated several times before landing in ironsand desert. The human populations are very tied to a series of guilds, (dragon slayers, church of sun, necromancers). Only dark elves have a strong established presence in Jadame,
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baronus
Legendary Hero
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posted January 20, 2024 02:16 PM |
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No no no! We have any goblin migration in Deyja!
We have completly disorder!
We have goblin population mobs but in hauses we have necross!!! Additonally we have harpies? as monsters. Nighon.
Next we see William Setag's Tower (castle Heroes 3 lore)!!! In Pit we have the same necross houses goblin people necross enemies and... Behemoths and elementals! Kreewlod and Conflux.
Completly failed and wasted lore. No sense no logic. Its unaceptable.
50% or more game looks like that.
To compare we see fantastic look of Shadowspire dark climatic logical and the best! Real Deyia! We have dragon migration there and it fit!
Its good work. 'Deyja' MM7 is very bad work. Fit to nothing. And I tell about it! We must give correct rating for all element. If good 10 if bad 1.
So its the reason that for me MM8 lore od the best.
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AirikrStrife
Hired Hero
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posted January 20, 2024 08:02 PM |
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You can insist on discreet, trope based factions as your standard for how you want the games to be, but from a lore building perspective it isn't the only or imo best way of dealing with this. Besides your arguments become as subjective as any other. Why are harpies nighon? Because they are so in H3. Is there any reason every single harpy in existence needs to live in nighon? Can there be wild populations of Harpys in Deyja? Why are harpys an essential nighon creature? Because in H3 they felt that's were they fitted in, by H4 the devs thought they fitted stronghold better.
If it's so terrible of MM7 to have Harpys in Deyja, why isn't it equally bad that we see Gorgons and Wyverns (Foretress) in Ravage Roaming, Nagas (Tower) In Garrote Gorge, and an ogre foretress in Ravage roaming? Centaurs run around in Ravenshore and
ANd talking goblin.kith, as we see already in LOTR universe there after the fall of Morgoth they spread across middle earth forming many individual societies ranging from Gundabad to Mordor, most of which would unit with Sauron but not all, Likewise in MM universe every continent have their own small bands of goblins or ogres.
You see the real world is also not confined to clear tropes, you have wolves and canids spread out across various continents and biomes, nor is human culture. You might think of christianity as a european religion but the oldest christian communities in the world exists in the middle east, caucausus, horn of africa and India.
The purpose I guess of this thread was to explore the lore and world building of MM universe a bit beyond the tropes and into the actual history it developed. Which is why I'm happy that there are mods who try to do that, HotA with Cove and now DoR with Palace and forge and whichever their 3rd faction is. I just wanted to see what other possible ideas could come out of the game for just the fun of it.
I think we're still stuck on Conflux being controvertial, and maybe dwarves could be a faction. I found while googling that @firepaladin made a thread about it a few years ago http://heroescommunity.com/viewthread.php3?action=showpoll&TID=46368
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FirePaladin
Legendary Hero
DoR Modder
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posted January 20, 2024 08:10 PM |
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Whoa, you dug up that old stuff of mine haha, didn't expect anyone would bother reading it!
I wouldn't bother arguing with baronus on MM7 or the Forge, it's always like this, no offense (as if a Lightning Bolt or a Meteor Shower won't annihilate Tanks).
Anyway, if you wanted lore (and to be on-topic again), then I'll talk about it a bit. 
Lore-wise, Bracaduun was some sort of Arabian wizards kingdom. They even had viziers. It was destroyed roughly around the time of the Silence. So such a kingdom would deserve an Arabian town, if you'd ask me. I'd debate that Karigor (the island, not kingdom) should also be represented by such a faction (Church of the Stars, MM8 cut content having a Church of the Stars Arabian lion-tiger man seer if I'm not wrong, Ishtar etc.).
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Enshackling time itself, heralds of the Ancients among their heat-depleted land.... Who could they be, who could rally the beings of the East and the North and control the mortals' fate?
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AirikrStrife
Hired Hero
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posted January 20, 2024 09:15 PM |
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Yeah I found that thread and then checked out some of the other threads you had been making.
Honestly a lot of the ideas you have had are very close to the ones I developed in the past month or so, including reworking the role of dwarves, reworking rampart, and making tower a desert faction.
I guess one of the reason I did enjoy H5 a lot was that factions made a lot of intuitative sense, though they ended up being too reptitive and visualy bland at some point. In the end I have returned fully to H3 and learning more of the lore developed more of an understanding of how the different factions work, what people make up the nations etc for example how Tatalia is a society of gnolls, lizardmen and some humans training the monsters living in the swamp. Playing the games as an 8 year old not speaking english back in 2000 these things were hard to grasp.
In contrast to some of the discussions in the threads I looked at, I would actually support better showing the identity of each factions political make up, while still maintaining the core of a mixed and diverse line-up- I would actually want stuff like berserkers, elf druids and human witches as bonus units for stronghold, rampart and fortress.
For tower part of the reason I see them as a potential desert faction is because of them being based in bracada desert and that I like their aestetics in the ashan universe. Especially if Vori/Palace is added and taking over the snow terrain.
At the same time I'm a little bit sceptical of letting dwarves be a snow faction as is often depicted (bastion mod, ashan universe), I feel maybe it's just trying to give dwarves a bit of a viking identity.
Anyway to the original question of what factions could exist in the Heroes world, besides the 9 established+cove+regna. I think lore-wise the most solid ones are Dwarves, but there should be an approach which isn't just 6 different dwarves and more tropes or identity should be developed with suitable creatures living in a dwarven society/realm.
That would make 12 factions and as 12 is an ideal number it could be left at that
I do still enjoy my own cathedral idea, though ofc it could be refined for sure, but I'm not so familiar with the church of the stars, will see what I can find
There are some small leftovers in the fringes I believe, fairy society is hinted at, halflings having had their kingdom destroyed. I do wish they had developed the contested lands/harmondale a bit more, maybe not into a faction but as proud lord of hamrondale I would have liked to see more of it (genuinly what I miss the most in MM7 is the possibility to actually do lord-stuff and manage your realm). Jadame.
I do wish that NWC might have stayed in enroth for H4-MM9, but maybe they decided to make the move as they created a whole new graphic style, and in a sense I do feel it makes sense like that. The Enroth games have such a distinct style peaking with the antagarich games that making a whole new art style in that same world could definitly have been feeling really weird, so going to axeoth was maybe the logical decisions.
But that's why I started having thoughts about having basically 2 of some factions, two dungeons representing some variation between Enroth and Antagarich, etc also I just really like the names of H4 factions (Haven, Asylum). I do admit though that as I wrote in OP about mercenaries and brigands of Enroth, while being a very noticable part of that continent's political landscape would have made for a terrible faction in a heroes game. Still though Cult of Baa is something that could have been a part of an alternative inferno faction
I also been thinking about playing MM1-5 to learn more about the universe as a whole but I do find it a bit of a challenge to go back to such old games.
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AirikrStrife
Hired Hero
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posted January 27, 2024 10:34 PM |
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So I guess concluding a bit what I last wrote. I did more digging around, first time I'm on this forum these past weeks and there's some really good content including a gregory fulton interview from 2018. The interview really highlights what we talked about with the tropes and story respectively, not only being something that sort of grew individually but even being designed by different people. And several different people even.
Some smaller details that stood out to me though is that GF considers price of loyalty canon (I nee to play through that) and that redcap was considered for Tower. I do write some fairy-tale like stuff myself and I even used the redcap before so I have a hard time seeing it in tower, gremlin was the better choice but I still would have loved redcap as a neutral creature and to see how they would have designed it.
I would really love to learn if there were other creatures considered in early drafts
I did play around a bit with the idea of a dwarf faction, and it proved quite challenging, considering I didn't want to do anything reminiscent of Ubisoft or LOTR based games like battle for middle earth, i.e. just dwarves of different sizes with different weapons + some viking stuff + some fire stuff. I really wanted to focus on the trope of dwarves, which is caves, mining and forging. It took several hours even with my pretty decent grasp of folklore and fantasy fiction to hammer out a preliminary roundup:
Kobold or Gnome
Dwarf
Tiger Mole (MM4 creature)
Carbuncle
Tatzelwurm
Master Smith
Dragon Golem
Kobold or Gnome is a tossup, personally I'd prefer DoR calling their Nisse/tomte gnome (as a swedish native).
I imagine this line up to be especially defensivly oriented as well as excell in siege scenarios. At least the Tiger Mole, but maybe other creatures would instead of being flyers be burrowers that can travel underground. I could also see an upgraded Kobold be a sapper that can attack walls.
Carbuncle is so elusive in folklore that the design is really openended, but in final fantasy games they're always a defensive summon, so I imagine it it have defensive spells like stone skin or magic mirror.
There is a flier in the line up, even if it maybe doesn't look like it. It's the Master Smith. Here based on Weyland the Smith, who much like Daedallus and Icarus in greek mythology built himselves wings to escape imprisonment. The master smith is also able to repair war machines and the dragon golems
So I think for lore based factions:
In Antagarich
8 original + Forge + Vori + Dwarves (I don't like bastion as name)
Cove/Regna, Cathedral/Karigor makes sense. Jadame is complicated and there's Conflux (which in theory could be split into multiple factions but that'll be overkill)
Ignoring some minor possibilities like Fairy faction or Baa faction, or even a dragon faction. It brings a good core of 12-15 factions which I personally feel would have been fantastic and also perfect amount of factions, we could do with a little more than we have now, but more than 15 feels redundant for many reasons
If someone have additional ideas from what have been missed in maybe Enroth or perspectives on Jadame, please add to the discussion
We'll see wht DoR is cooking up for their third faction as speculations are ripe, but it would seem it would be a lore base faction from skimming through their announcement thread so I'd be excited to see it once it's announced.
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FirePaladin
Legendary Hero
DoR Modder
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posted January 28, 2024 06:35 PM |
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Quote:
I really wanted to focus on the trope of dwarves, which is caves, mining and forging.
Based.
Regarding DoR's Nisse/Tomte, I have also said it on reddit, there is actually one more, crucial reason why they are not called Gnomes, but you'll get to know that a bit later.
Anyway, back to these lore factions (and in this case, a Red Dwarf faction, I suppose). I have to admit that dwarves are pretty much my favorite faction in fantasy games, and that also applies to King's Bounty and HoMM5 (although, of course, I do consider their iteration in there to be quite lacking, having 7 dwarves and so on, but oh well - the 7th dwarf is a cursed dwarf turned dragon, as the T7, just like Fafnir hehe!).
Indeed, bringing the dwarves back (in the context of Ashan's dwarf weirdness) to their most tropey roots is the most optimal decision, if you'd ask me. Both H2 and H3 (in campaigns), as well H4 had them closer to said roots. These are mining, the forge and the caverns, the latter which is basically omnipresent with dwarves, whether they live in snowy mountains or not (and one more reason why I'm much more inclined towards an underground terrain as their native terrain).
Personally, I wouldn't shy away from including a bit of Norse and fire-element stuff here and there, but more as a flavor to complement the main themes. It's not like Tower, Conflux and Inferno do not have varying degrees of Arabian motifs, for example. In the context of DoR, I'd think of Palace as the main Norse faction, but that doesn't mean that other towns can't have just a bit of it.
Thus, I'd think of a Wyrm or Lindwurm as a T6, for several reasons. One is that they are greedy creatures hoarding riches, like the classic dragon, which is well-known to guard dwarven riches. It is also visually distinct from "another dragon" (just like Fortress' Wyvern). H5 actually had such a design planned for its T7, but unfortunately they scrapped it.
The other reason is that Fafnir, a Norse worm/dragon (it's fairly ambiguous) was, in some interpretations, a cursed dwarf. Just another tie. Besides, it nicely diversifies a lineup and brings another unrepresented creature into the game.
Otherwise, I'd also look at making the town closer to tech-but-fantasy, similar to what Factory wanted to achieve, to some extent. If asking me, it's just a bit odd to have no mechanisms in lower tiers, but suddenly the T7 is a true, sophisticated war machine mechanism. I agree with the defensive angle of it, and the same goes with sieges. A Cannon should 100% be the war machine.
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Enshackling time itself, heralds of the Ancients among their heat-depleted land.... Who could they be, who could rally the beings of the East and the North and control the mortals' fate?
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AirikrStrife
Hired Hero
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posted January 28, 2024 08:40 PM |
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Btw didn't realized we had talked on redddit, as I said, I'm completely new to the heroes online community, and it was partly through discovering HotA and DoR last year that got me interested in exploring this game even more in depth, as I keep coming back to every few years
Yes the concept of dwarves are very ambigous in the surviving norse sagas, and were probably never clearly defined in actual old norse religion either. They appeared where people wanted to put them in and the recorded poems and stories are not presenting a coherent worldview. Later on in scandinavian folklore dwarves became a typical underground creature, when looking at dwarves in 19th-early 20th century literature, for example the writings of Bernhard Ingemann or Sema Lagerlöf they're really different from both ancient norse concept of dwarves and the modern fantasy trope.
Modern dwarf depictions ows a lot to first wagner and the romanticist movement, which aimed at creating a more cohesive mythology so to say, a god of this or that and creatures associated with this or that (if that makes sense as a brief explenation). Later of course Tolkien came to define the modern fantasy dwarf, (I'm a huge tolkien fan, silmarillion is my favorite book) and then dwarves have grown through various iteration of fantasy litterature and games.
The ideal I had in mind is a generic dwarf faction for HoMM7Enroth, taking inspiration as much as possible form existing NWC canon
So creating new set of dwarves can build from any element mentioned, including having a norse/germanic origin, which I maintain with Kobolds, tatzelwurm and Master Smith/Weyland. But the most consistant trope and the ones which really define them as a culture or race is their preference for the subterranean and for being amazing smiths with a love for gold.
I would shy away though from the whole H7 einherjare and Valkyrie vibe. Seeing the Nowa Morisaku-Yu H5 valkyria in Palace/Vori makes more sense to me (anyone knows what faction it was supposed to belong to in the NWC H5?).
I did consider Lindworm, but for me that would have to be a tier 7 creature and I felt Dragon Golem made more sense for the angle I was pursuing. That's how the tatzelwurm became a thing instead, as it made sense as a lower unit while still being a dragon like creature associated with mines and mountains + a more unique design, but also the one maybe that fits the least, at least from current conceptualization of dwarves.
Furthermore, Tolkien established a fierce dwarf-dragon rivalry.
I get what you're saying about the dragon golem coming out of nowhere, ortier 6-7 being technical while nothing else is. There could definitly be some form of replacement in the line up, or moving the smith down a tier or two.
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yogi
Promising
Famous Hero
of picnics
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posted January 28, 2024 09:59 PM |
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Edited by yogi at 22:44, 28 Jan 2024.
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the "dwarf faction" i designed back in 2017 for a game im working on:
class: alchemist - town: forge
rank name(movement) gender
1 gremlin(r) m
2 zeppelin(f) f
3 robot(m) m
4 dwarf(m) m
5 cannoneer(r) m
6 templar(m) f
7 valkyrie(f) f
8 juggernaut(m) f
r:ranged, f:flyer, m:melee
juggernaut = "tank/mech"
think alchemy/steampunk/enchanting.
note to other devs or modders - please dont plagiarize this faction ty
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yogi - class: monk | status: healthy
"Lol we are HC'ers.. The same tribe.. Guy!" ~Ghost
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FirePaladin
Legendary Hero
DoR Modder
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posted January 28, 2024 10:24 PM |
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@yogi
No need to worry at least from DoR's side, half of your lineup is in other towns. =p
(Templar - Castle, Valkyrie - Palace, Gremlin - Tower, Juggernaut - Forge)
I find it fine outside of the Valkyrie and Templar. Was the Cannoneer inspired by King's Bounty's dwarf creature of the same name?
Alchemy is also nice, though for better or worse, I wouldn't add it on top of MM's techy dwarves (Red Dwarves), in H3. Not as a main thing at least. There's plenty going on with mining, forging, bits of tech and so on.
@AirikrStrife
True enough. There is an overlap with the gnome, too, who is an earth creature at least going by Paracelsus, and has influenced the modern dwarf. But I think you already implied it.
Also, just to be sure, was Svartalfheim seen as an underground world?
Yeah, I never liked the overtly Asgardian angle given to the dwarves in H7, it was a bit odd. I mean, sure, they can be Norse inspired to some extent, but giving them fair maidens like valkyries is odd if you ask me, especially in an underground town. I liked the Fire Giant, though, but I would have named the upgrade Jotun or Eldjotun instead of Einheri.
In NWC's H5, the Valkyries were meant to be part of Stronghold. There's a bit of bridging and tying that we're doing on that front with DoR, actually, with the Vikings as a creature in Palace, Stronghold as non-affiliated barbarians of Vori, as well as Krewlod's (human) ancestors having roots in Vori and thus the very slight Norse motif with the Halls of Valhalla building. But there's plenty on this subject and it cannot really be compressed much.
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Enshackling time itself, heralds of the Ancients among their heat-depleted land.... Who could they be, who could rally the beings of the East and the North and control the mortals' fate?
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yogi
Promising
Famous Hero
of picnics
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posted January 28, 2024 10:39 PM |
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FirePaladin said:
Was the Cannoneer inspired by King's Bounty's dwarf creature of the same name?
actually no
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yogi - class: monk | status: healthy
"Lol we are HC'ers.. The same tribe.. Guy!" ~Ghost
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AirikrStrife
Hired Hero
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posted January 28, 2024 11:11 PM |
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@firepaladin
Snorri Sturlason who is the only source for svatalfheimr places it as an underworld realm. But Snorri is generally regarded as a less reliable source, and also guilty of wanting to make as much sense and classification of norse myths as possible. In a way it goes back to the debate with Baronus about having very clearly delineated factions and lore without overlap, neat categorizations of everything.
I could see stronghold turning into a viking town, in the same way dungeon turned into a dark elf town, but I can't see a good mix of old school goblins and orcs with vikings and valkyries.
Likewise if there's gonna be giants as in norse jotunn, I don't see it work with a dwarf faction, a more generic norse inspired faction or some other alternatives but not like H7 did it.
One aspect which is largely lost in the modern dwarf is their association with magic. Old norse Elves and Dwarves were quite esoteric beings, and their association with smithing was not simply being skilled workers by hand or how to phrase it, but actually creating magic artifacts. Again later folklore saw dwarves as largely magical/supernatural beings. There's a somewhat obscure 19th century danish book about dwarves there they have some similarities to alchemists (as yogi used them) and even the villain of the story trades his firstborn son for a mandrake from them which becomes the source of his magic powers. They're also typically invisible to humans
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yogi
Promising
Famous Hero
of picnics
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posted January 30, 2024 08:12 AM |
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Edited by yogi at 22:45, 30 Jan 2024.
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I have a bit more time now so can deliver a more deserved response:
FirePaladin said:
@yogi
No need to worry at least from DoR's side, half of your lineup is in other towns. =p
(Templar - Castle, Valkyrie - Palace, Gremlin - Tower, Juggernaut - Forge)
I brought paladins back to castle, a faction i see deriving its "magic" from service to church beckoning for divine intervention; in contrast with forge deriving its magic from a traditional temple fire of ingenuity: hence the "templars". Im also incorporating the historical schism between the church and templars; who purportedly survived by migrating with the vikings in their expeditions to the new world predating columbus. My forge faction obviously associates dwarves with viking culture, and their notoriety as smiths constitutes the faction.
I replaced gremlins with gnomes in tower, a faction i discern more represents creatures of magic than magical servitude. Gremlins tendency towards tinkering suits forge perfectly.
FirePaladin said:
I find it fine outside of the Valkyrie and Templar.
As noted above, my templars serve their temple rather than a church, and they don enchanted suits of armor.
My valkyries are similar but winged, donning massive shields.
FirePaladin said:
Was the Cannoneer inspired by King's Bounty's dwarf creature of the same name?
Havent played kb since the original, the art style of the new games turns me off.
Reminds me - hammer of the gods was great!
Cannoneers were just an apparent pinnacle of alchemic forge culture (early materialistic sciences).
FirePaladin said:
Alchemy is also nice, though for better or worse, I wouldn't add it on top of MM's techy dwarves (Red Dwarves), in H3.
The game im working on is obviously heavily inspired by homm but not restricted by the lore of mm as i havent actually been able to finish any of the first person rpg's, and am more interested in refining mythologically based factions.
Addition: i should also add that my game is based on a similar faction paradigm to the heroes games, with 8 core factions, a factions worth of neutrals, and 2 "expansion factions". The forge is one of the expansion factions, contrasting with another more natural, aquatic one. The underlying paradigm was developed over decades of playing all of the heroes games as they were released, and diligently studying the evolution of their design philosophies. It drives every aspect of my factions, and the logic behind their unit lineups.
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yogi - class: monk | status: healthy
"Lol we are HC'ers.. The same tribe.. Guy!" ~Ghost
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FirePaladin
Legendary Hero
DoR Modder
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posted February 03, 2024 03:20 PM |
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@AirikrStrife
Aha, gotcha.
Yes, it's true that the dwarves were interpreted like that depending on the work, myth and so on. Personally, at least as far as MM goes, I'd separate those interpretations into various "midget" races, just like MM and DnD did (like gnome and dwarf). But otherwise, yes, it's indeed true.
@yogi
Can't relate on the art style, it's 3D HoMM-like done right if you'd ask me (unlike HoMM5 and others).
Well, all of that makes sense, even if it's still a bit odd for me, at least if taking the stereotypical images of those creatures and putting them into an otherwise alchemical-smithing faction. Also, why really bring it up if you don't want people copying you? I get that people could avoid doing that, but it's a bit awkward all-around, especially if someone also had a similar idea beforehand. No offense intended, just curious. And otherwise, good luck on the project! (is it 2D or 3D?)
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Enshackling time itself, heralds of the Ancients among their heat-depleted land.... Who could they be, who could rally the beings of the East and the North and control the mortals' fate?
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AirikrStrife
Hired Hero
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posted February 03, 2024 05:07 PM |
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@firepaladin
there's a hilarious segment in one of the dragon lance novels which describes the formation of different midget races.
But yeah, there are a lot of possibilities and then formation of different lore-tropes in popular conciousness based on various work. Dwarves are primarily smiths, and the magical elements of smithing we see in norse myth or even partially in tolkien (thinking more feanor than the dwarves) is sort of forgotten down the line
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