Goblin Squad Member
|
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
I have a lot of information to compile here. I've tried to format this in such a way where you can just read the bolded lines for the short answers, but more details are given to cover any areas of concern.
Settlement: Talonguard
We're currently located at K in the land rush, and aim to keep this location. We've chosen this location because it will eventually be the likely first stop along the road for good aligned characters. The good aligned starting city (which is not yet implemented) will be to the NorthWest of the land rush map along the road. We wanted to make sure that good aligned characters' first experience in the game outside the starting area is a good one. Talonguard has themes of independence and protection and this location is in keeping with that.
Alignment: Neutral Good
We lean more towards law than chaos, and strive to keep a high reputation. There will be paladins and lawful good characters on our streets. As such, evil would be hard pressed to find a permanent home here and chaos is questionable. Lawful Neutral, and True Neutral are allowed but we prefer that they are more good-leaning than evil. Chaotic Good and Chaotic Neutral characters may be able to find a home here depending on how they live out those alignments. Desnans, for example, are often chaotic but not necessarily for reasons of violence. Our primary concern with Chaotic residents is that they do not keep a low reputation, and therefore stunt settlement development.
Chartered Companies: Magistry, Steel City Knights, Ash Knights, Dragonblade Mercenaries
Magistry - A tight knit group of settlement minded players dedicated to Talonguard's success
Steel City Knights - Another tight knit group of friends and adventurers
Ash Knights - A division of Magistry players. Participation in one guild does not represent participation in the other. The Ash Knights are an order of protectors and more PVP focused. They specialize in protection of Talonguard as well as its supporting Outposts & POIs, but may see to affairs outside the settlement's interests as well.
Dragonblade Mercenaries - "Your coin, is our promise" Mercenary guards for hire.
Settlement Focus: Protection/Fortification, Specific Craft Facilities, A Strong Economy, Arcane/Martial Training Facilities (See below for other class training)
Protection/Fortification - Our biggest aim is to protect our resident companies and citizens. We'll be aiming in general for settlement upgrades that help with the defense of the settlement as a priority.
Craft Facilities - We will try to support all crafts to some extent, with a specific focus on the crafts used in settlement construction, settlement defense and crafts that utilize highlands hex resources.
A Strong Economy - Not originally a focus, but being at a crossroads on the map we will certainly utilize our position for positive trade and economy.
Arcane/Martial Training Facilities - No settlement can have everything and so our focus will be on arcane and martial training facilities. However, we have secured diplomatic relations/training alliances with a settlement that focuses on divine/martial facilities.
Who We're Looking For!: Companies and independent characters that are either settlement or protection minded. If you are otherwise good-natured and want to make your home in a place like this, we're interested in you too.
Would-be members of any of the chartered companies listed are of course always welcome. We're also seeking more chartered companies to share our walls with for a strong society made up of independent companies and individuals. We want to provide the freedoms for each resident company to do its own thing without expectation. The only expectation we have is that you defend your home in time of need. We hope to see more settlement minded groups take up residence with us.
You can find our listing on the land rush here: Talonguard
Our New Forum is Here: Settlement Forum - (Mostly empty, will fill in as our various members start registering - this is being hosted on the Magistry website and registration is required to view most forums)
I also wanted to include a Q&A between Brother Zael and me from the previous thread:
How does Magistry feel about me, hmmm?
Mostly apathy, but I blame your plague doctor mask.
What do you have planned for diplomats (as in the skill training/buildings, not embassies and treaties and whatnot)?
PLANNED? Nothing quite yet. We aren't barring our gates though, and further can't really be determined until we know more about the in-game mechanics.
What is your objective size, both population and area (I understand exact boundaries will not be existent)?
We'll be seeking non-aggressive expansion for the most part, and our objective population will be whatever can efficiently operate the settlement and surrounding structures/POI. This will probably have a lot to do with how active the average member of the settlement is. Settlement protection is also a concern when it comes to population. Our primary concern, in fact.
What are taboos?
Sometimes we let Calistrians in... OH, OHHH, not what you meant. As a settlement laws/rules may pop up by popular opinion but Magistry rule #1 is just "be good to each other", and that's all. Other than that we don't really want to be policing people constantly.
Is there any sort of behavior (in-game rp stuff, not like grieving and whatnot) that you are against/won't allow?
Only alignment concerns come to mind. As a Neutral Good settlement (with more of a lawful leaning than a chaotic one) certain RP might clash with other characters at the settlement. I'm sure the settlement wouldn't take too kindly to one of its members putting out a contract on another.
What is your disposition of armed forces (be vague if you wish, I'm asking what you feel about mercs making up some guard slots)?
We hopefully won't need to use mercenaries to guard our settlement, but if it came down to it, the protection of our people comes first. (Answer is, not likely)
What is your look on alignments?
Neutral Good is the popular choice, Lawful good fully supported and appreciated. Chaotic good gets some wary eyebrows as troublemakers but should fit in okay with the right attitude. Lawful Neutral preferably good-leaning but fine either way. True Neutral the same as Lawful neutral, and Chaotic Neutral accepted with the same description as Chaotic Good. The evil alignments may have a tough time in our settlement as we'll have a fair bit of paladin traffic eventually.
Gov't type, how it was chosen, why, who is allowed to rule, how long that rule lasts, goal for leadership, and dessimination of orders throughout land (e.g. indefinite tyrant by nature of ownership, main guild and signed allies only, each "district" of settlement and owned lands has a subruler chosen by tyrant)?
We've been reluctant to label any of these since we really have no idea how they'll be implemented. We favor the oligarchy (ruling council), and we'll be getting input from companies and independent members of the settlement on as many issues as we can. We know that they'll only be implementing dictatorship to start, unfortunately. The specifics of when council members are changed and how it's done have not been worked out yet, and likely won't be until in-game mechanics are made available and we know how those work.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Alignment: Neutral Good
We lean more towards law than chaos, and strive to keep a high reputation. There will be paladins and lawful good characters on our streets. As such, evil would be hard pressed to find a permanent home here and chaos is questionable. Lawful Neutral, and True Neutral are allowed but we prefer that they are more good-leaning than evil. Chaotic Good and Chaotic Neutral characters may be able to find a home here depending on how they live out those alignments. Desnans, for example, are often chaotic but not necessarily for reasons of violence. Our primary concern with Chaotic residents is that they do not keep a low reputation, and therefore stunt settlement development.
I want to clear up some things here that you might not have noticed.
First off, all members of a settlement must be within one alignment step of the settlement, so that means you could have LG, NG, CG and TN members but not LN or CN. (this is based off of my understanding of the one step rule)Also, being Chaotic will not affect someone's Rep. Doing chaotic things will not lower someone's Rep. Doing things that will move you toward Evil often have a rep penalty however.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
To be fair, I don't think we know for sure exactly what actions will and won't affect rep. Some chaotic acts almost certainly won't, but if they are chaotic acts that affect other players, maybe they will. Like everything else, we don't know all the details.
That said, it's just more a general description than a nuts and bolts analysis of game mechanics.
Probably worth clarifying that the one-step restriction does apply to actual members of the settlement: Anyone good aligned, or True Neutral, and that's it. Thanks for pointing that out Raven
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Ohhh I'm finally a Goblin Squad member lol. I felt like posting that somewhere.
So, how do I register for the Settlement Forum?
I'm gonna let Ath answer any website related questions, as he set up the forums. And since I don't know what any problem might be. I signed up with no issue, but the forums JUST went up so there's nothing on them yet.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
I've added your Guild to the Guild Recruitment & Helpful Links list. If you have a brief description you'd like to appear there to let people know about your guild while they're browsing that list, just PM me or post a clear request here.
I really like the name, btw :)
Good stuff here. I'm part of OV myself but being that I'm playing an NG character (Paladin of Serenae) I'm glad we are neighbors and can't wait to hang with any rpers you guys might have.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Options are actually:
1) Any TWO roles with associated crafting (amount to about half the crafting buildings total)
OR
2) Pure gathering/refining/crafting/trading (amounts to all the crafting buildings plus an auction house; though curiously the Loom is missing from the list, possibly just an oversight)
This refers to the ability to _train_ the necessary abilities/feats as well as access to the respective crafting facilities. Any other training received elsewhere can be _supported_ as well.
In this context, I believe Talonguard will go for a Fighter/Wizard setup as has been said from the start. I'm in no position to make any promises, though :-)
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
I'm not a member of the settlement leadership, so I'm not directly involved in any negotiations regarding mutual training cooperation. But I'm sure there will be a way for the rogue-inclined in Talonguard to access apropriate facilities (and clerics as well, though those will likely be much more common).
Where are you based?
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
....
Where are you based?Where am I based?
I need a better idea of what the question is asking?
The question I was trying to ask was: what settlement is your character going to be based in? I can't place you and was wondering, if you were a local neighbor or just generally interested.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Oh, err, THAT close of a neighbor.... I should really learn who's going to be in a settlement with me :-).
Anyway, Cleric training shouldn't really be an issue, several neighboring settlements will offer that. I'll be playing a cleric myself, and I'm not worried.
Rogue training, I don't know for sure. TAI had mentioned going there, but I'm not sure if they'll ever be able to hold enough towers to offer better training than the starter settlements.
Other than that, your best chance for an answer about behind the scenes agreements lies with Toombs or Athansor, both of whom are unfortunately currently occupied with real life ;-). Sorry, I'm not involved in these dealings.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Current Known Alliance and Training map.
Early Enrollment is also coming quick it would be nice to have a forum ready to talk things out for ALL of Talonguard.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
I believe we are at least friendly with many of the Free Highlanders and might join up. But really, since that is just a formal declaration of an existing informal understanding, i.e. we are friendly with and don't want to hurt our neighbors, whether we publicly declare it, or not doesn't make that much of a difference.
I don't think there is any intention to join the Everbloom Alliance; that is just to far away. Still, we are very likely going to have friendly relations with them as well.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Hi, I'm kinda new to this section of the forums. I've paid enough attention to the goblinworks blog and that's where I got most of the information on the game. Anyway I'm looking for a Settlement to join when Early Enrollment starts. I intend to be a LG Wizard specializing in Abjuration and I would be interested in helping run the city as well PvP elements of the game. I was kinda told this would be a good settlement to join so I was curious if there was anyone I should talk to or anything I might need to do join (such as join a forum).
Thanks.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Caldeathe's Excellent Spreadsheet is likely to be a resource that'll help you. You'll find all the Land Rush winners with some basic information about their Settlements, and the second tab has contact-names for their Companies.
Advertising a bit for friends: Ozem's Vigil and Blackfeather Keep are the two Lawful Good Settlements, but you'll also fit in with any Settlement that's Lawful Neutral or Neutral Good, so that covers at least 22 of the 33.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Caldeathe's Excellent Spreadsheet is likely to be a resource that'll help you. You'll find all the Land Rush winners with some basic information about their Settlements, and the second tab has contact-names for their Companies.
Advertising a bit for friends: Ozem's Vigil and Blackfeather Keep are the two Lawful Good Settlements, but you'll also fit in with any Settlement that's Lawful Neutral or Neutral Good, so that covers at least 22 of the 33.
Even if it's for other groups it's extremely bad form to advertise in someone else's recruitment topic.
Talonguard is active and a great place to be so let's not poach their recruits in their own topic please.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Oops! I didn't pay attention to what thread we were in!
Athansor, Toombstone, and the rest of Talonguard, I'm sorry I posted for other Settlements in your thread.
xevious, please don't take my previous comments as a reason to look elsewhere than Talonguard as the first Settlement you consider. As Andius says, they're great folk, quite active in recruiting and presence on the boards, and they've an excellent Settlement location as well.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Hi Xevious,
We'd be happy to talk about your interest in the game and offer you a home. You can follow-up with us on the following forums; you'll have to register for access:
RHMG mentioned us becoming a crafting settlement which is true but kind of misleading from our end-game goals. We've chosen crafting as our settlement type for the War of the Towers to round out our involvement with our neighbors. Since we're on the crossroads we have quite a few Taverns going up around us and the auction house will suit our location. We have Fighter/Wizard/Cleric/Rogue training all available from close-by neighbors that we have great relationships with so all "role" training will be covered for our members. The auction house lets us offer our neighbors something worthwhile in return.
War of the Towers will only last so long though, and once settlements offer a better level of control over the buildings within them Talonguard will offer class training. Post-War settlement focus will stick to our original plan for development of those things best suited to protection of the settlement first, class training with a focus on Fighter/Wizard and the auction house will probably remain a staple of our settlement just based on our location near the road.
Andius: Thanks for looking out for us!
Jazz: No worries!
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
I tried taking it solo, and quickly realised how many folks you need to break even one of the pillars of the escalation.
You need a full party of 6 as a bare minimum.
Two full parties of 6 would be recommended to go through the escalation as a minimum.
you would also need to use your most powerful attacks on the pillars, if you want to damage it.
I think we might group up Wed Night or Friday Night.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
It's the reinforcements that will get you down, if you let them. Buni and I by ourselves, while being pretty casual about it, took it down a total 15-20% damage, but reinforcements would top it up pretty quickly before it got lower than 97% so you don't really appreciate the dent you're making. One of the devs (Stephen I think) posted a couple strategies for tackling multihex escalations recently, taking into account group size, and capability of the escalation to reinforce. Been meaning to dig it up and post it in the Kabal forums. I'll post the thread here if I find it later today.
|
Goblin Squad Member
|
Ok, sorry for wall of text, was going to just link to the thread, but there was enough "discussion" in it between various groups that not fun to wade through. So here are the relevant quotes from Bob Settles (not Stephen as I originally thought, sorry Bob ;) )
The escalations have been designed so that a party of 4-6 characters can drop the escalation strength by one phase (usually about 20%) in 2-3 hours of dedicated play. That assumes the party is strong enough to clear even the large encounters reasonably quickly and without constantly taking losses. Most new escalations start out at about 20% strength, so a party should be able to wipe out a fresh escalation in one evening. If the escalation reached 100%, it should take 5 times as long, or 5 parties spreading out the work.
The numbers seem to meet that goal in the early stages of an escalation, but are getting out of whack when escalations hit 100% in lots of hexes. I'm reviewing the reinforcement numbers to bring things back in line, hopefully without slowing the spread of escalations too much.
Addressing one of Bluddwolf's points, three of us from Tavernhold tried fighting an escalation a couple of weeks ago. We definitely spent more time crisscrossing the hex looking for escalation event groups than fighting them. Plus, it seemed like whenever we'd start to make some progress on one escalation event, groups for that event would dry up, and groups for the other event would start popping up. It got really frustrating when we got close to finishing one quest, only to have it expire before we could turn in the items to the quest-giver.There's an issue right now with the event encounters not spawning until some room is cleared for them. We hope to address this by removing existing out-of-sight encounters as necessary, but until then it's important to be clearing out non-event encounters of all sizes to make room available.
Fortunately, while dealing with events is the most efficient way to lower an escalation's strength, just plain killing escalation monsters is pretty effective on its own.
The Concerned Citizens' De-Escalation Committee sallied forth from Alderwag last night to beat down a 100% escalated hex. Sack upon sack of dark onyxes were returned to the Loitering Wizards, and after many hours of glorious combat and heroic retreats, victory was declared when the escalation was reduced to a paltry 97%. Huzzah!My guess is that this was because the hex was being reinforced by neighboring hexes that were also at 100%. If that's the case, you'd see steady progress, but then every hour on the hour, the escalation strength would go back up to about 100%. I've reduced the reinforcement numbers pretty drastically, so this should get better in an upcoming build.
That said, picking the best hex to attack will always be an important part of defeating an escalation that's managed to spread out. If you can bring overwhelming force to bear, it may be best to attack the source hex, regardless of how many reinforcing neighbors it has. The regular reinforcements will make that hex harder to beat, but once you beat the boss and clear the source, the remaining hexes will have lost a major source of reinforcements and cleaning them up will go much more quickly.
However, if you only have enough forces to whittle away at the escalation, you may be best off finding the hex that has the least sources of reinforcements, so that your contributions aren't being overwhelmed by the reinforcements each hour. You might even pick a hex that's under attack from a neighboring escalation, where the reinforcements are balanced out by the attacking neighbor. These types of tactics will slowly remove hexes from the escalation until the source hex is isolated and vulnerable.
Worth noting, we saw reinforcements it seemed about every 10-15 minutes, not hourly, unless it was a different mechanism.
How do you determine in game by looking at the map or at your surroundings what is a "main escalation hex" and what is a "surrounding escalation hex"; and which is effecting which?Yeah, the older maps showed the lion symbol on the source (monster) hexes, but the new prettier map doesn't include those. The longer-term plans for the map call for it to give you access to a variety of information, but for now it's pretty limited.
Meanwhile, you can sort of spot the monster hexes if you look closely. If the road goes around the edges of the hex instead of through the center, it's probably a monster hex.
Once you're in a monster hex, the symbol beside the mini-map will be yellow with three lines like hills on it. Basically, it's showing the hex type, as Nihimon said, but it's using terrain symbols as placeholder icons. Not exactly intuitive ;)
And Nihimon's post as referenced above is neat knowledge too, though Bob clarified the main hex issue above:
@Giorgio,
I don't believe there's anyway to know in-game (right now) which Hex would be the main escalation hex.
There are two icons that appear next to the mini-map (in the top 1/3 of the map, anyway).
The left-most is always present at around 10 o'clock on mini-map, and indicates Hex Type (not Terrain Type). I believe the background color is also meant to indicate the "challenge level" of the Hex, in essence telling you how tough the mobs there will be.
NPC Hexes are usually grey with some broken lines on them.
Wilderness Hexes are usually green with a tree and a hill on them.
Badlands Hexes are usually checkered green and light green.
Escalation Hexes are usually yellow with three lines that remind me of hills.The other icon represents an active Escalation, and again the color indicates the challenge level.
Again, sorry for the wall but hope it helps a bit should you make a big drive to clear. Give a call out if so, we Kaballers would likely jump at another chance to show those buggers what for!