I have another question:

Are all factions going to have heroes of all classes? Or is it going to be like EL, where every faction only has one class? Or something in between?

Now that it seems we'll primarily be receiving heroes of our own faction, doing things the EL way sounds pretty limiting. I'm assuming that's not the case, but I figured I'd ask anyways.

tspeelman wrote:
The academy has to be quite a powerful entity in the galaxy, as all major heroes (which are now political leaders as well) are affiliated to them. Would give them a huge leverage to push their agenda (in theory). It would be nice to see the academy as a collaboration among interstellar species sort of a diplomatic entity like the citadel has in the ME universe, with education of the most prestigious only as one of it functions. For a galactic empire/republic it would make sense to have leaders affiliated with such an entity instead of giving roles as administrators, admirals and corporate leaders to random mercs, especially due to their new role as political leaders and the fact that the academy has its own agenda. As the united nations in Civ5, it ties in greatly with cooperative and competitive quests and would be nice as a visualisation for the diplomatic victory.



I like the idea of the admiral having more of a passive role in combat rather than the active role he would presume by taking part in a small fighter. It would be a nice way of drawing a distinction between an admiral and an adventurer. Where an adventurer leads into battle Han Solo-esque as an elite soldier, an admiral would render a fleet more capable with higher damage output and defence rating. It would however pose a difference in eliminating the hero for the enemy team, a fighter can be more easily singled out with concentrated fire. If the admiral is assumed to be part of the fleet itself and not have a specific ship it would mean that the admiral could only be eliminated by destroying the whole fleet, which gives the admiral some more unintended survivability.

Yes, I'm not sure how they plan on handling that aspect, it has me a little nervous if I'm being honest. I would've preferred to have seen a custom ship class for them so they were a good salvo from being taken out.

The academy has to be quite a powerful entity in the galaxy, as all major heroes (which are now political leaders as well) are affiliated to them. Would give them a huge leverage to push their agenda (in theory). It would be nice to see the academy as a collaboration among interstellar species sort of a diplomatic entity like the citadel has in the ME universe, with education of the most prestigious only as one of it functions. For a galactic empire/republic it would make sense to have leaders affiliated with such an entity instead of giving roles as administrators, admirals and corporate leaders to random mercs, especially due to their new role as political leaders and the fact that the academy has its own agenda. As the united nations in Civ5, it ties in greatly with cooperative and competitive quests and would be nice as a visualisation for the diplomatic victory.



I like the idea of the admiral having more of a passive role in combat rather than the active role he would presume by taking part in a small fighter. It would be a nice way of drawing a distinction between an admiral and an adventurer. Where an adventurer leads into battle Han Solo-esque as an elite soldier, an admiral would render a fleet more capable with higher damage output and defence rating. It would however pose a difference in eliminating the hero for the enemy team, a fighter can be more easily singled out with concentrated fire. If the admiral is assumed to be part of the fleet itself and not have a specific ship it would mean that the admiral could only be eliminated by destroying the whole fleet, which gives the admiral some more unintended survivability.

Mystic_A wrote:
to Admiral ships, I'm curious if simply making their ships a lot less active in combat would solve a lot of the issues?



The way I see it, an adventurer driving a small ship makes perfect sense. They're the kind of people who can be all Luke Skywalker and fly in close and take out the enemies biggest threat on their own.



I just can't imagine an Admiral directing tons of ships during battle, while also doing something like that.

I guess we don't know the details yet, but I'm assuming Admirals will give bonuses to all ships in their fleet, and that from a lore perspective those bonuses come from the Admiral leading and advising the other ships in the fleet. I know the player already sets the main strategy, but I imagine an Admiral issues orders like "reroute all power to weapons for 10 seconds", or "change the laser frequency to 258".

Maybe it would be logical to assign an admiral to a certain ship on the fleet or not have them in a fighter class ship of their own at all?



Adventurers in fighters or interceptors is a cool idea.

Metalynx wrote:
The maps in which we have neutral territory, say a spiral map, it would always be placed in the neutral territory. As for Cravers, I'm not sure if its just me, but I feel like they're being misrepresented a lot. They do have a 'sort of' organized government in ES1, with bishops making decisions and having actual plans in both development, science and warfare.

Also maybe the Academy is too powerful to simply be bombarded? Who knows! We will all have to wait and see what Slowhands has in mind.

Thanks for the response! I understand all maps won't have neutral territory, so it's sometimes necessary to place it deep in someone's territory.

I do love the idea of having systems like that, which players will actually fight over, because of the bonuses rendered. I spent WAY too much time in ES trying to generate a map where Auriga was in the center for that exact reason.



Now that you say it, I agree the Cravers kinda get a bad rep. They are a lot more advanced and unique than the generic all-consuming evil space monsters they appear to be. That's one of the reasons I'm really looking forward to the expanded lore and storylines in ES2. The game has a lot of very cool ideas and factions, but we never really get to know them much beyond the introduction texts.



---



When it comes to Admiral ships, I'm curious if simply making their ships a lot less active in combat would solve a lot of the issues?



The way I see it, an adventurer driving a small ship makes perfect sense. They're the kind of people who can be all Luke Skywalker and fly in close and take out the enemies biggest threat on their own.



I just can't imagine an Admiral directing tons of ships during battle, while also doing something like that.

I guess we don't know the details yet, but I'm assuming Admirals will give bonuses to all ships in their fleet, and that from a lore perspective those bonuses come from the Admiral leading and advising the other ships in the fleet. I know the player already sets the main strategy, but I imagine an Admiral issues orders like "reroute all power to weapons for 10 seconds", or "change the laser frequency to 258".

Maybe we're all wrong and their bonuses are all because of dust Magic Science, in which case I'm sorry. In that case I guess it all does make sense, and the best solution might just be to change their names to avoid confusion.



This turned out a lot longer than I expected...My point is that I don't have any problem with Admirals being in small ships. As long as they're not in super close combat, dodging bullets and making precise shots at the enemy ships, while also keeping track of the whole battle, and giving orders to every other ship involved.

So I'm curious if simply limiting them to long-range weapons and having them stay in the back will fix the problem? What do people think?

uqcu wrote:
So... heroes will be influential senators who can influence entire empire, but aren't influential enough to be admirals of their own crewed battleships. Somehow that sounds completely illogical to me.

Yeah, I feel like there should be Fleet Commander Heroes, acting as Admirals commanding Fleets from the most powerful battleships and there should be Pilot Heroes who'd be flying Fighters, but I suppose that would also be really difficult to balance, like of course you don't want your Pilot Heroes putting proton torpedoes in the enemies exhaust ports to destroy their flagship because that'd be OP but you'd also want them to be sufficently powerful, same with Admirals, they'd also possible end up OP or be underpowered.

Hi guys and gals,



We're back with a new GDD on the topic of Heroes!





Heroes



Rationale & Definition

The general idea of heroes is to add some personality through characters that players can get attached to. To this end, each hero will have a story attached that will start out the same in each game, and that may evolve in one of a few possible directions over the course of the game.



A hero is defined as:

• A Name
• An "origin" faction (i.e. Sophons)
• A class
• A political party they support
  
  

As mentioned in the Space Battle GDD, heroes will appear in battles. Their ships will be of the academy visual style of ships and will be tied to their class. The gameplay and slot layout of their ship design can still be different between them.

Hero ships will work similarly to normal ship designs (which will be addressed further in an upcoming GDD), but like in our previous games we will give heroes special modules or other goodies to make them stand out!

In terms of gameplay, Heroes will function similarly to our previous games as players will assign them to different assignments. The current assignments are: Fleet Commander and Governor.







Acquisition

Like in our previous games, heroes are mercenaries that each player will take control of in their quest to world domination. A large difference, however, is that in this iteration heroes will no longer be bought, but unlocked through actions in the game.



This change is reflective of a slightly different perspective on the lore behind the Academy. The Academy will now have an agenda. This agenda is reflected in sending its heroes to empires to train them based on how much perceived influence (actions performed) the empire has. And the Academy will look for assistance from the empires, presented in the quests described in the next section.

Every action you perform will be tracked in the Academy Screen and will allow the unlocking of new heroes to progress. These actions will be split into each class, so that your actions will correspond to the likelihood of getting a certain class of hero. If you are avoiding war for instance, you will have a harder time getting an admiral!



Besides the likelihood of class: the composition of your populations and the composition of your politics will decide the likelihood of gaining heroes of certain factions and politics. Essentially, if you have 100% Sophon populations, the system will usually provide you with a Sophon hero, if any such hero is available.

Upon unlocking a hero, you will be given 3 choices based on the three likelihood parameters: Class, Population factions and Politics distributions. These choices are chosen from the pool of remaining heroes.





Academy

The Academy is stepping into a larger role in Endless Space 2. The Academy is positioned in a node of the galaxy. Upon any empire discovers this node (See Discovery of curiosities in the Galaxy GDD) heroes start getting unlocked in the game for all empires. The Academy will have restrictions on the number of heroes they give to empires. This is a game-wide limit on heroes in the game. Doing competitive/cooperative quests for the academy will both gain favor with the Academy and allow for more heroes to enter the game for all empires!

If an empire owns the Academy node in the galaxy, that empire is able to gain information on all heroes in the game and what sort of assignment they have. This is the only advantage to owning the node, aside from it potentially working like an 'anomaly'.



Besides this, we of course have the same Screen as in previous games to give an overview of your own heroes, allow assignment and see your progress towards unlocking new heroes.



Classes & Assignments

Heroes come in 4 classes. Two are focused on fleet assignment: Admiral and Adventurer, and two focused on governor assignment: Corporate and Administrator.



There is a third "automatic" assignment -> Senator Assignment. The first hero you obtain within each politic will become the "visual" representative for that politics in the government and elections. If that politics is elected in and the hero is assigned -> that hero can have "senate" specific skills that will give empire wide bonuses.



The heroes will gain experience for being assigned to a fleet or system performing actions. Experience will of course translate into levels, which allows the hero to progress through a skill tree. The skill tree will be very familiar to players of any RPG. This skill tree will also, like in Endless Legend, have 3 branches: 1 general shared by all heroes, 1 for each class and 1 for each faction. The primary limitation for skills will be "level thresholds" and not connections to other skills. The goal is to allow players to pick whichever skill they have access to from any branch to help their hero plan, instead of being locked into one branch.







Visualization & Quests

Heroes will have animated portraits that will give some additional personality as well as of course their visualization in space battles.

Besides that, we will be designing quests specifically involving heroes to further develop the story line of heroes and differentiate them between games. Some of these will be unique to factions, some will be unique to specific heroes and some will be general for all heroes.



Finally, all of these changes in heroes will not affect our ability to use heroes in quests or give heroes as rewards, which breaks the 'normal restrictions' addressed above.



VIP Feedback

There appears to be an overall consensus among VIPs that they are happy with the overall direction the heroes are heading in.

Including the animated portraits. There is a hope that this will be moddable as well - I unfortunately do not know if that is or will be possible.



Questions regarding the 'senator' position

There are some questions about being able to choose which hero sits in the senate. But the overall goal is not to make the senator position something that players will min/max a lot, but an automated system that gives flavor to the government and a few empire bonuses.



Questions whether heroes will be more attuned to the faction

The academy is still a seperate entity from empires and heroes are linked to the academy as opposed to the empires in question. However, the acquisition process will use the distribution of politics and populations in your empire to define which heroes are more likely to join your empire.

There were also questions if heroes would exist that was not a part of the academy and the plan is to have heroes linked to quests that are not a part of the academy.



Question on 'finding the academy'

Question on whether being the empire to find the academy would provide a bonus. Currently we do not have a bonus linked to this, but it is something we find interesting and may add.



Clarification on 'game hero cap'

The hero cap is entirely based on the game and not each empire. This was brought up in the context of perhaps being a balance issue, i.e. as a strategy attempt to gain heroes to block other empires. This is something we're keeping an eye on - essentially the current way of getting heroes faster than other players is 'doing actions' (this means, having more 'stuff' that can do actions, mean you unlock heroes quicker) and doing the academy quests. Hopefully this will be an interesting point of competition between empires.



Questions regarding hero ship

There are some questions regarding the size of hero ships. Their scale is a little smaller than a 'small ship'. The reason for this is to make hero ships feel like 'fighters' - essentially heroes should feel powerful on their own merits, not because they have a large ship.

There was also some questions on modifying the texture of these ships based on the heroes faction. This is currently not planned, but we will be keeping an eye on feedback on this.



Questions regarding Academy Lore

There are some questions if the reason the Academy is its own separate entity has lore related to it. I cannot go into any specifics, but I can say that there is indeed lore to explain that.



On the topic of 'hero skills'

There was a wish to have 'active' skills on heroes, compared to the passive nature of skills in ES1 and EL. We understand the wish for this and we may be able to add a couple, but overall due to how the game functions and how active skills would add to the GUI, it is unfortunately not something we will be able to add a lot of.





We're looking forward to hearing your feedback on the topic!

Even if it don't seems to have an effect on the gameplay, the idea of a dynamic biographie is awesome.

Brazilian_Joe wrote:
Inspiration from Dungeon Of The Endless:



Imagine Time is a möbius strip.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%B6bius_strip



Endless Survivors:



...

Wow. Mind. Blown.



Pretty much impossible to do, but now I want to!

Metalynx wrote:
The maps in which we have neutral territory, say a spiral map, it would always be placed in the neutral territory.

That sounds nice, but, on the other hand, won't it potentially slow down the game by making heroes unlock for everyone later due to requiring someone to get ES2s version of Casimir Effect and some exploration after that?

3. I'm a part of 'everyone' right?! I just wanted to say that this is something I've been pushing for - adding more tools for 'information gathering'. I hope players will find use for it without it being overpowered!

4. Currently it will simply show the 'hero information'. That is, class/faction/politics of the hero and his current assignment. This assignment would be something like 'Is assigned to the system X', or 'Is assigned to the fleet Y'. It will not give access to the heroes vision radius.

Thanks!



Of course you're part of everyone! That's just in this question I was thinking if you can exploit it someway. From what you say en point 4. I think that will be difficult take a big advantage with this info, but once you know all heroes (or look for them in the wiki) It can give you an idea of what bonus is the owner empire receiving (although in a very general way, because won't know what abilities are unlocked).



Good job. Eager to see it!

Time to respond to a couple of questions!



So firstly, the elephant in the room, the thing pretty much all of you brought up.. Admiral class ship size.

I do not think we will be able to change the size, as we are in production already. In terms of lore, I do think it sort of makes sense. The class is simple a representation of gameplay. You, the player, selects the strategy and assigns fleet, those would be the things an admiral would be doing. So the class representation is more in terms of focus of bonuses (i.e. fleet wide battle bonuses) as opposed to being the 'admiral'. I think the hero being in a fighter overall fits well with the idea that the hero is sent from the Academy and is not directly leading a lot of your empires troops.

Alas, I understand the concern. I will ask the production and creative direction to see if it is still possible to address this and if it is something we want to.



Finally I will say though, that a heroes ship is simply a ship design assigned to the hero. Simple modding can apply any ship to a hero, however, in terms of official lore, we want heroes to sport 'academy visual' ships, which are only currently being made in the small size range.

Themios wrote:
1.How much are hero skill trees going to be developed? Will it be about the same number as in EL? Less? More?

2.Will heroes of different political factions interact with each other? Say I have a Sophon hero of the pacifist party and a craver hero of the militarist party, is there going to be any rivalry between them?

3.What kind of Equipment can heroes have? Is it both Items for them and their ships, or just their ships?

4. Conitinuing from question 2, will heroes ,who don´t agree with the politics of the empire, leave it or show discontent?

5.Can Heroes die or just get wounded in battle?

1. The hero tree will contain a few more skills than in EL. The current aim is 6-7 skills per branch with each hero having 3 branches. The majority of these skills will come in 2 levels.

2. This is something that is more aimed towards Quaedam or Slowhands, the narration/quest people. Though I cannot imagine them not doing something like this! ^^ I will let them answer that if they have something new to say.

3. Just ships. Though the 'ship equipment' could affect other parameters, but in terms of GUI, it would be attached to the ship.

4. They will not leave. I guess they will show 'discontent' by not being able to participate in the senate ^^ But no, we don't want to punish players for changing politics in terms of hero gameplay.

5. Currently they only get wounded like in EL, but we have talked about some plans to perhaps break this rule a little. Though I cannot promise anything.

Sinnaj63 wrote:
This sounds really good. I like the concept of the Academy being a seperate institutution, though I feel like it being localized could be kinda unbalanced anyway if players get too much intel.

This is actually the reason why we decided it should only give 'information' and not strong gameplay bonuses. We will of course keep an eye on balancing as we go into early access.

Mystic_A wrote:
I'm also a little cautious about having the academy as a separate node on the map. But as long as it's always generated in a fairly neutral accessible point it should be fine.

Although it does raise the question of why a super-aggressive craver faction wouldn't just bomb the place and eat everyone there..

The maps in which we have neutral territory, say a spiral map, it would always be placed in the neutral territory. As for Cravers, I'm not sure if its just me, but I feel like they're being misrepresented a lot. They do have a 'sort of' organized government in ES1, with bishops making decisions and having actual plans in both development, science and warfare.

Also maybe the Academy is too powerful to simply be bombarded? Who knows! We will all have to wait and see what Slowhands has in mind.

Brazilian_Joe wrote:
Gives us cosmetics: hats, gizmos & other collectibles for the heroes.

There should be quests to unlock heroes, but also hero quests to unlock extra bonuses for the current gameplay.

As for hero cosmetics, this is something that I do not think would even be possible, due to the way animated portraits are done.

Unlocking additional bonuses is not something we've talked about directly, but there has been discussions of the Games2Gether system playing a bigger role. But I cannot promise anything, nor do I know any specific plans about this.

Garak wrote:
Regarding active hero skills in particular, because this is something that I would really like and I've put some thought into it. I think that there's room for "active-ish" abilities that don't complicate the interface, by making use of the existing systems of Infinite Improvements, and Social Policies. They're not quite as "active" as a shiny new button to press, but the main thing that I want out of activated abilities is that the Hero feels more interactive than just a passive stat bonus and I think that want would be satisfied by Infinite Improvements and Social Policies.



For example, here's an easy one: A system can always broadcast propaganda for the political alignment of its Governor, even if that faction isn't in the Senate. This isn't even a new ability, really, it's just giving me access to an existing ability that I wouldn't otherwise have. But it would make me feel like using an ability of the Hero. And it could have a big strategic impact on the game, because now that Hero can get you access to a political ideology that you didn't have yet.



Just some other ideas for Infinite Improvements that could be Hero skills, off the top of my head:

* Fleet Repairs: Converts industry to ship HP (instead of spending Dust)

* Fleet Drills: Converts industry to ship XP

* Arm the Rebels: Converts industry into bad things happening to nearby enemy systems (damage? happiness?)

* Bread and Circuses: Converts industry into Happiness

* Export Goods: Bonuses to Trade Routes in/through the system

This is an interesting idea. When it comes to allowing to use a certain propaganda, that would be something we could easily do with a pre-requisite.

The general idea of 'modifying an existing action' is something we already have in mind, such as making propaganda stronger due to heroes. But anything adding new 'elements' in the GUI (even if these elements could come from other system) is something we are being very careful with. Though your ideas are not completely unfeasible.



Though the general concept of adding new unique active abilities only existing to heroes will be highly highly limited.

lo_fabre wrote:
-The ship will be the same for all heroes? Would be cool have different ships and have it representing the fleet on the screen as the hero does with the army in EL. Said that it's not a main feature for me, only something visually good.

- Have you considered a fourth abilities tree related to political ideology? And if you had, did you found it will add an unnecessary complexity to the game?

- I'm sure some players will be able to take and advantage of this info. This time not asking only to Amplitude, but to everyone: have you thought a way to take and advantage with this info?

- Related to the previous: will it give clues about what other players are doing? Will you be able to see heroes in nodes you hadn't explored or on fleets out of your vision radius?

1. Each hero class will have a unique ship. But two heroes of the same class will have the same ship. Though as stated in the VIP feedback part - we are looking at feedback on this and may be looking into textures on a hero faction basis.

2. We considered it yes. We felt it sort of 'doubled' as a seperate class, which we weren't too fond of. Instead we created an architecture where we can change skills in each hero skill tree on a basis of politics. This is not being used yet, but is something I want to spend some time on, when I find time for it!

3. I'm a part of 'everyone' right?! I just wanted to say that this is something I've been pushing for - adding more tools for 'information gathering'. I hope players will find use for it without it being overpowered!

4. Currently it will simply show the 'hero information'. That is, class/faction/politics of the hero and his current assignment. This assignment would be something like 'Is assigned to the system X', or 'Is assigned to the fleet Y'. It will not give access to the heroes vision radius.

SireTriste wrote:


- Can a hero die? I mean the same way heroes die in DotE?

- What if I don't find the Academy? Or if it is far behind an empire I'm at war with?

I think that maybe the Academy should be revealed after a certain number of turns to every empire. With a bonus to the first empire to discover it.

- Will some heroes come with their own ship?

- Will there be different types of ships that could be used by our heroes? [/B]

For instance, when we get a hero, we choose which flagship type he will have, depending on which models we have already unlocked through research.

- Will there be a Galaxy Congress, where we will have to assign a hero of our faction, more precisely a Senator?

- What about independant heroes that can be mercenaries



And finally I've got a crazy idea, inspired by the army management system of Rome Total War 2.

Basically each fleet gain xp with each battle, as well as the units that compose it. This xp earned by the fleet can be used to develop a skill tree that is only efficient for the fleet, the only condition being that this fleet has a hero. In a flagship! Because this flagship will be the core of the fleet. If it dies, all the bonuses accumulated by the fleet vanishes.

All we need are flagships for our heroes lol (it really is something important to me ^^)



Sorry for my english (I tried my best) and for the looooooooooong post. I tried to make things as clear as I could.

1. A hero currently does not die. As mentioned earlier in this post, we are thinking about messing with this rule a little, but overall it simply does not follow the lore of the universe. Having repeat hero cross between our games gives the impression that they are immortal. I dont know exactly how heroes function in terms of the lore, but them dying is very punishing in terms of gameplay and most players would be quite upset if their favorite hero dies without them having any means to stop it.

2. Maybe I weren't clear enough, but when the first empire discovers the academy, it is revealed for everyone. The first player who discovers it naturally has an advantage by being closer or at least having a ship there. And we've talked about giving a small bonus to discovering it. However, you will not be forced to find it yourself in the games where its unfortunately generated in relation to you!

3. Read previous responses ^^

4. Heroes will have their own ships they are very attached to. You will not be able to select another ship for them ^^

5. There are currently no plans for a galatic congress. Expansions maybe?

6. Academy heroes are 'mercenaries', but they are not specifically tied in that way. That sort of gameplay is not planned.

7. The flagship idea is interesting, but not something we are currently looking into.

8. Your English is fine!

PsiCorps wrote:
Hi all, new to the forums here and this is my first post, so I'll try and make it a good one. Although I'll apologize in advance if I come across as disorganized, I write things down as I think of them and rarely go back to see if it all makes coherent sense.

Anyway, this would be what I would like to see in Endless Space 2 but having read the OP, it would seem that the system isn't going to change much from the current game but it won't stop me playing.

Thank you for reading.

Welcome and thank you for the very indepth reponse! However, as you stated yourself, the design of heroes is already implemented and fundamentally changing everything will obviously not be possible. It was an interesting read regardless!

drewwest wrote:
Sounds awesome, one question... will the heros sport their player's chosen colour like how the faction leaders do in the diplomacy screen in EL???

Heroes are very vain and attached to their own visuals! So unfortunately no, but their ships will likely have some faction coloring going on.



That will be it for this round! Thank you all for your interest and great responses! We are hearing you on the admiral ship size and I will run it by a few poeple to check on it.

If we ever have domestic trade routes - I propose to have domestic trade being able to shift food and industry between adjacent systems (connected by a lane) - trade/corporate focused heroes should have skills specializing on each type of trade. long trades would give dust and science bonuses, domestic trades are just to shift surplus - but a domestic trade focus could give a % bonus on the imported/exported food and industry, and the % cap on how much surplus can be moved.

I wonder how a corporate hero interacts with trade companies. I hope it will be something a bit more than increasing trade routes or income. Something like being a representative of their interests politically, or gaining exp the more they interact with companies...etc

Sounds awesome, one question... will the heros sport their player's chosen colour like how the faction leaders do in the diplomacy screen in EL???