_theclamps_ wrote:
@Flybert in regards to The Sorex:



Let me start off by saying *ahem* "PRAISE THE SUN!" ;p



Now, moving on. You've obviously put a lot of thought into this Faction and really left nothing for easy critique. I like how the Sorex are so centered around their religious devotion to their Sun God that it defines everything that they create and interact with. It might be a possibility that they see other Factions as "heathens" that do not believe as they do, and they think it their holy duty to either convert the unbelieving or to cleanse Auriga of whatever "heretics" plague the land where the Sun touches. I might suggest, too, that they consider winter as a divine influence created by an opposite entity of their "true God" and that it is slowly gathering strength as the cold seasons lengthen. Any Factions that do moderately well in winter may be considered a servant to this opposite power and thus are mistrusted or despised by the Sorex, making negotiations untenable or impossible and conflict more likely.

Thanks for the feedback

The idea of their religion is that they believe there is only one god, Feros. Although there is an opposing force. The darkness is something which does exist, but is also something the Sorex won't acknowledge. Because if all prayers give force to Feros by praying, they also give force to the darkness when fearing them.

So in a way, they know the darkness is there, but they refuse to confirm it.

In regards to their relationship with other factions, I left it completely open. The reason behind is probably the same as the devs. It's a 4x, you make your own legend.



Now to return the favour

I like the feel of your faction, it's kinda like a blind between the silics and the wild walkers. I also like that you've thought about every detail. They are an old and slow race, so it is likely they make plans in years/decennia rather than months.

ResonanceMask wrote:
Huh, a lot of people are doing very long background info and such ._.; I was planning to try creating one myself as writing practice, but I'm getting intimidated here by amount of effort people have put into theirs. I'll check that my idea won't be too similar to upcoming factions we know off, but I'm not going to read every contest entry in detail just to avoid accidentally creating something similar. I mean, my own idea isn't as fancy as some of the ones I DID read...

Hey go for it! Don't be intimidated I'm worried now that I posted mine it'll not get any votes, but at least its now out there, whereas in past events in other games I never had the confidence to do it at all :P

Ok, I tried to write something up after all.

Hope it is ok. You'll have to forgive me if it seems a bit too... dunno, but it is the concept of two days of taking Cold&Flu and possibly a mild fever.

As inspiration and atmosphere you may want to picture a mixture of polynesian headhunters, aztec human sacrifices, the movie Apocalypto and even the Reavers from Serentiy/Firefly.

The faction name is of course debatable



To most the Flayers are a tale to scare children. To those who live close to Flayer territory they are a nightmare become reality – cannibalistic raiders who attack without warning to drag whole villages off to their death. Survivors of these attacks speak of primitive, barbaric tribesmen, with nightmare visages, who feast on still living, screaming victims. The rare souls that managed to escape captivity report a large city were thousands of victims are herded together, to be sacrificed and eaten.

And while it would be nice to report this all to be just tales about a misunderstood people, it is the truth. The Flayers are exactly that. It is the why that most do not know: the Flayers are afflicted by an aggressive hereditary disease or virus, something they themselves only refer to as the Curse. The Curse eats away at their skin, slowly killing them as their bodies are unable to regenerate the damaged tissue. There is only one thing that will halt this process and that is the consumption of new tissue samples, buying their bodies a slow reprieve in the constant battle of adapting to the Curse and the Curse adapting to their bodies’ changes. When the reprieve is over, the process kicks back in with excruciating pain. Affected by the Agony, Flayers can think of little other than hunting for a remedy.

While in times of hardship, stronger tribes will turn on weaker ones, it is non-afflicted victims that they crave the most. When finding other nations, the largest tribes are even known to raid for slaves, building large stockades to keep them in until such time as the Agony overtakes the tribe. These “feasts”, which may look like religious sacrifice to outsiders, are in fact pure practical necessity to allow the Flayer society to function. As a tribe feasts as one, the Curse will be staved off roughly for the same duration for all its members, creating a cycle of raiding and reprieve. If this was not so, the Flayers would live in constant fear that their own partners or children could succumb to the Agony and try to kill them.

Luckily, the necessary raiding of each other, when no other victims are available, has stopped Flayer tribes from becoming a threat to large, organized societies. If ever a Flayer should emerge though, who could fend off the Curse long enough to unite the various tribes and coordinate the onset of Agony, then woe upon the world.



Gameplay:

The Flayers require an extremely aggressive play style. The main reason for this is that their most important resource is not food, industry or dust, but population, as their society is based on (organized) cannibalism. To reflect this, unit upkeep, while nominally lower than that of other factions, also includes a population cost. Whenever a Flayer unit kills an enemy unit, it gains an exemption from this upkeep – the more battles a Flayer player fights, the less upkeep they will have to pay, while a peaceful Flayer will end up cannibalizing their own population.

Of course, as not only armies suffer from the Curse, a population-upkeepcost would also make sense for Flayer cities. To prevent the population of cities to go berserk through Agony and turn on itself, cities would be linked to tributes from conquered minor factions. Unless in a constant war, Flayer players would have to thus balance their expansion with the population their assimilated factions could support.

To reflect minor skirmishes, a general state of war could slightly reduce the general upkeep costs. While no contact with other factions or only peaceful relations would increase it.

To allow at least some sort of peaceful coexistence, Flayers gain a new option in diplomacy: population tribute. By feeding their Curse, callous neighbors can make a tentative peace or even alliance with the Flayers, and even get rid of undesirables in their own society.

Of course minor factions are also mainly seen as a source of victims by the Flayers.

For assimilated minor factions, as this is not a positive assimilation, but predators keeping a herd, there could be a rebellion mechanic.

Units could gain abilities were, if they do not move or fight in a turn, they raid the area for victims, deducting the population upkeep cost from the domain’s controlling player, thus weakening opponents when in lands they control.



Minor Faction Interaction:

The Flayers see minor factions primarily as easy targets. They need a constant pool of victims, and if these victims are not powerful enough to oppose them, so much the better. As such, a minor faction's primary function is to pay the population upkeep cost of Flayer units and cities.

As Flayer society becomes more organized, when the player takes control, grows in size and becomes a large scale empire, the Flayers are confronted with the logistics of keeping the Curse and Agony in check - they can no longer simply raid villages, as they no longr are small tribes looking out just for themselves. The interaction with minor factions would reflect that and, idealy, would depend on faction quests and specific directions the player takes the faction in, morally, ethically, culturally.

This could directly affect what the Flayers are provided with by the minor factions - the more brutal and inhuman the suppression, the greater the immediate gain could be when it comes to victims, and maybe the lower the danger of a successfull rebelion. On the other hand, a minor faction, subjugated but largely allowed to live in "peace", with victims disguised as tributes or culled through law enforcement, could allow for a more balanced resource gain (knowledge, food etc), possibly better units (an ugly ugly term, but in effect: race traitors - those who sold out their minor faction to serve the Flayers for privileges), but also a higher chance of rebellion.

Could careless Flayer play exhaust a minor faction population?





First thoughts on quests:

Quests would probably revolve around how the new large scale Flayer society handles the Curse and their growing influence. Do they arbitrarily choose victims from the minor factions they “assimilate”, do they only feast on criminals or do they create a whole tradition of sacrifice?

On a larger scale, do the Flayers try to find a way to lift the Curse? Do they try to find its origins?



Open questions:

How exactly did they get afflicted? Did their ancestors seek shelter in an abandoned Endless laboratory and get exposed there?

Do captives and assimilated minor factions also run the danger of becoming afflicted?

What keeps the Curse from dying out? What keeps Flayer society afflicted? Do they unknowingly carry the pathogen with them through what they perceive as totems or artifacts?

Are Flayers affected by what they consume? Does an Ettin give the same reprieve as a Vaulter? If in fact we are talking about reapeated countless minor mutations, will the creatures consumed affect their biology until the Curse overcomes their immune system again?





Racial Type:

Are Flayers humanoid? If they are, are they human, reptilian, avian, whateverian? Honestly, it matters little to me and I did on purpose not make a specific reference to this. I know it is something that is important to many people, but for me personally the fun is in creating a society. Race type to a large part comes down to aesthetics, and that I am happy with every person projecting their own preference. Also, while I doubt it will make it into the vote, what with there being so many great entries (not that I think mine is worse, just that all are good), I would for example find it a waste if for example no reptilian faction was represented, when so many people would love one. An unspecified race faction would then allow to at least integrate that aspect.

So I'll stick with Nosferatiel's wording: Unspecified

PANCZASU wrote:
I fear that during a vote, most people may vote on something more ridiculous instead.

That's what I fear as well. Not many will vote for a faction of something simple, yet elegant when they could also have giant purple fire-spouting bananas with moustaches (exaggeration of course ). So to speak

PANCZASU wrote:
If I were forced to criticize anything, it would be their look - I'm not a big fan of yet another bipedal species, especially when we already have so many of them in game :3

I think the majority of proposed factions will be bipedal, it's maybe less exotic as floating squid for example, but it's easier to immerse yourself in it.

Flybert wrote:
That's what I fear as well. Not many will vote for a faction of something simple, yet elegant when they could also have giant purple fire-spouting bananas with moustaches (exaggeration of course ). So to speak

We can make a pact to vote for elegance of banananess

Flybert wrote:
I think the majority of proposed factions will be bipedal, it's maybe less exotic as floating squid for example, but it's easier to immerse yourself in it.

I have to disagree. I'm quite immersed with Mesaima and they do look like tiny pebbles. At least for now. Wanna see them when they grow up? Sure, here, hold this tiny fella for a second aaaaand









...

Yeah, I would say I'm indeed immersed :3



Btw, since we're on the topic of Mesaima anyway (well, NOW we are :3 ) do you think I should give them at least a little bit of history? Their adaptability is what made me not do so, but I could describe how they were doing before the winters became harsher

A lot of what others would write as history you already have when describing how their society is organized. You don't need to write anything more. On the other hand if you want to...

So, since we are apparently giving advise on factions now, could someone be so kind as to take a look at mine? I'm new to this and might need some help... (Link in signature)

RariShyZealot wrote:
So, since we are apparently giving advise on factions now, could someone be so kind as to take a look at mine? I'm new to this and might need some help... (Link in signature)

I must confess, I prefer the name alternative you suggested: "Council of Three", even though the Federation probably fits the concept better.

I like factions that are based on more than just being a single species. The concept of cooperation suggests a strong diplomatic playstyle. The idea of the various separatist movements inside the faction could allow for some interesting quests with strong effect on what units the faction produces late game - allowing for teh faction to change in nature as the game progresses. But I am not sure how that would be realistic resource-wise when it comes to the devs implementing it.

RariShyZealot wrote:
So, since we are apparently giving advise on factions now, could someone be so kind as to take a look at mine? I'm new to this and might need some help... (Link in signature)

Original concept. A federation of 3 different races (not just 3 factions of 1 race)

Maybe you could add some more fluff as to how this alliance formed and why?

But wouldn't it be a good idea to play "as" Auriga and not "on" her ?

VieuxChat wrote:
But wouldn't it be a good idea to play "as" Auriga and not "on" her ?

I was thinking that as well. Just couldn't get it to work

melkathi wrote:
I was thinking that as well. Just couldn't get it to work

I tried at least. (see link in my signature)

melkathi wrote:
A lot of what others would write as history you already have when describing how their society is organized. You don't need to write anything more. On the other hand if you want to...

Hehe, I see what you mean. I actually have an idea now on how to make Mesaima unique in the way they responded to climate degradation. You know, since they need to be even more unusual, weird and cool

VieuxChat wrote:
But wouldn't it be a good idea to play "as" Auriga and not "on" her ?

Why not "in" her?



#JournyToTheCenterOfAuriga #Innuendos

VieuxChat wrote:
I tried at least. (see link in my signature)

I saw

Very ambitious

So many interesting concepts and only one vote. And there are still five days left.

Now I have the feeling my concept is quit boring or rather not that focused at Minor Factions as other are.

Teslaflux wrote:
So many interesting concepts and only one vote.

If you need some help, I can help you choose





(Just kidding)

Teslaflux wrote:
So many interesting concepts and only one vote. And there are still five days left.

Yeah, I'm starting to think that

a) We were given too much time xD

b) Amplitude really should pick 3 winners. One of them will get his faction in before EL release and he'll get to visit gamescom as well. Meanwhile the two runner-ups will see their faction implemented post-release in an expansion. That would be soooooooooo cool

Flybert wrote:
If you need some help, I can help you choose

(Just kidding)

Funny, I really like reptilian races.

I really hope that the devs consider the vote model nightbasilisk suggested at page 3.

PANCZASU wrote:
Yeah, I'm starting to think that

a) We were given too much time xD

b) Amplitude really should pick 3 winners. One of them will get his faction in before EL release and he'll get to visit gamescom as well. Meanwhile the two runner-ups will see their faction implemented post-release in an expansion. That would be soooooooooo cool

And if you think about it. All the major factions of EL could possibly show up in ES too like the Vaulters(as own faction) or the Broken Lord( there is a hero of them) are doing.