[Strategy / Risk] Warcast - Strategy Board/Card game

[Sephalo]

Warcast
Strategic board game

Warcast is a strategic board game combining the core of popular games like Magic the Gathering, Hearthstone, Yu-Gi-Oh, Age of Wonders and Warhammer Fantasy into one multiplayer turn-based game inside Warcraft III.
It allows players to create their own decks consisting out of a number of cards; leading into various tactical choices into the game.
Trap aspects of MTG, HS and YGO work very well within a gaming board area like those of the combat in AoW (1 or 2). This combined with the army options from Warhammer and the player’s life (leading into a clear goal of the game) from the various card games gives the game various fun aspects; making it very addictive and fun to play.

Currently the maximum of deck cards is not decided yet, but there will be a variety of different cards available to be put into a deck.
There will be units, heroes, items, spells, resources and structures to be put into a deck. Each of them will have a different impact on the game itself.
Most unit cards will summon a regiment of the described unit allowing players to mass units; creating a big army. Those armies can be led by various heroes. These heroes can join the regiments to provide group buffs; resulting into stronger armies.
Players can also chose to take other approaches like using more spells, items or structures to lead them to victory.
The focus of the game is to defeat the opponent’s Grand Wizard.
This wizard has a life pool of 50 life and will be the main character of each player. Grand Wizards are vulnerable to physical contact and are there for kept at special locations on the edges of the battlefield area.

Cards are divided into loyalties and elements.
Certain units will only fight for a specific race and there for a player has to decide carefully which race he/she picks. An Orc Warrior might only serve an Orc or Troll leader and there for be unavailable for any Human Grand Wizard.
This works the same for elements, as certain spells only work if a player masters the required element.
A player can select only 1 race to play with but up to 5 elements. But for each selected element, the player will have to divide his mana pool by the amount of elements. A standard mana pool of 50 will become 25 when playing with 2 elements, or even only 10 when playing with 5 elements.

There are 8 races to chose from when selecting your Grand Wizard: Human, Wood Elf, High Elf, Dwarf, Undead, Orc, Troll and Naga. Remember that a unit can be loyal to multiple races and there for be playable in multiple totally different decks.
There are 6 different elements to chose from when giving your Grand Wizard magic powers: Earth, Air, Fire, Water, Life and Death. Life will only be available to Human, Wood Elf, High Elf and Dwarf players while Death will only be available to Undead, Orc, Troll and Naga players.

I have experience with playing with high success in Yu-Gi-Oh and Warhammer tournaments. Next to that I'm a multi-legend Hearthstone player and have recently started exploring the world of MTG on a side. Because of this I'm quite capable of creating a meta and expecting how a meta works. I already have typical rush, counter and control deck structures ready to be made for a first version of the game.

Unit Examples

 

[sonofjay]

Its finally here! One of the most refined map of its genre(which is pretty rare on the first place). It looks very smooth but I have a question, will there be an AI?

 

[Sephalo]

Its finally here! One of the most refined map of its genre(which is pretty rare on the first place). It looks very smooth but I have a question, will there be an AI?

I'm not sure yet about the AI.
It would be great to have one in the end. But my focus lies on making this a thrilling game for players vs players.

 

[sonofjay]

I'm not sure yet about the AI.
It would be great to have one in the end. But my focus lies on making this a thrilling game for players vs players.

AI will be great for testing your decks. I will sure play this with my friends a lot when its out since I have no doubt that they will like this.

 

[Sephalo]

Yes I know what you mean. AI is really a good addition. But it's also something that's very hard to make and will consume a lot of time.
Who knows. Maybe one day in a patch or something.

 

[sonofjay]

Yeah, it doesn't need to be put out quickly. This type of map have many top priorities like flexibility of decks and cards, balance, creating meta etc.

Anyway, good luck on this one.

 

[troylowyee]

When will this be out?!?!? IM SO EXCITED!!!!!

 

[Sephalo]

When will this be out?!?!? IM SO EXCITED!!!!!

When it's done. ;-)
Can't start working with deadlines.
For now I feel like there's still a lot to do.
Have to be patient.
But great to see you like it!

 

[MogulKahn]

Just subsribing so I can follow this !

 

[hiphop4eva]

Dammit, probably the hardest thing to do in W3 is AI. I probably will not play this till AI comes out because;
1. Internet slows down fast. Because of that I can't play in Wepla.
2. I only have 1 or 2 friends that play Warcraft, and I can't play with them often.

 

[Fingolfin]

Wait, what... how have i missed this? This looks amazing!!

 

[hiphop4eva]

Bumping this awesome game.

 

[troylowyee]

Upload something so we can test it out soon I'll play it many many times!!! SO EXCITED!

 

[Sephalo]

I've been working a bit on the map again.

Conal and AoE spells have been added like:
Breath of Fire (active):
Allows the unit to breath fire on nearby enemies. The fire will hit targets in a cone up to 2 fields away dealing damage equal to the unit's attack damage. The damage caused by ‘Breath of Fire’ counts as if the caster has ‘Siege III’ and ‘Fire Strike’.

(Siege increases the damage against structures. Fire Strike makes the damage caused appear as fire which has effects against creatures that have fire weakness like treants per example.)


And now I've started on creating the Shop UI.
In the shop you can buy yourself card packs with the money you have earned on defeating other players. A funny shopkeeper will assist you with quotes like "Hurry, I got things to blow up!". ;-)

 

[troylowyee]

where can i download the game to try? im so excited for this omg

 

[Sephalo]

where can i download the game to try? im so excited for this omg

It's not available for download yet.
I'll only release it as a beta when the game actually functions. Now the game is in a way too early stage to be released, but I'm trying to speed things up.
Since I'm on my own, and not that good with vJASS I'm not fast at all, so it might still take some time for things to come around.

 

[Fingolfin]

Let me know if you need any help with vJass, i'd love to see this project finished.

 

[Sephalo]

Working on the deck editing menu.
The Blood Elf Spellthief will be helping you out with sounds like "very clever". He's a nice guy after all. I just need a modeler to help me with removing the red glow from the unit. The red glow is kinda ruining the entire UI effect.

I decided to go for a minimum/maximum size of 40 cards per deck. It's easier for me, and in the end makes fatigue decks a real thing too since every player will have the same amount of cards in their decks.

Check this out:

 

[KILLCIDE]

Subscribing to this thread!

 

[Sephalo]

Latest developments are shown in this movie: (uploading might still take around 20min from now)

 

[Sephalo]

Hey everyone!

I'm currently working on adding more 'character' to the races and their cards. I was wondering if people would like to help out a bit by brainstorming together. I need idea's for the basic strengths and weaknesses of the races. Here are some examples:

Dwarves:
Strengths: Infantry with high armor. All units can climb. Siege weapons are stronger than usual.
Weaknesses: No cavalry. Slow movement so vulnerable against ranged magic.

Humans:
Strengths: Strong cavalry. Fear resistant regiment leaders.
Weaknesses: No siege weapons. Vulnerable against pikes and spears.

Night Elves:
Strengths: Flexible movement. Strong ranged units. Strong ents.
Weaknesses: Low armor units. Ents are very slow. Fire weakness.


If there's anyone that would like to share his thoughts on how the races should be characterized let me know. You can also change my initial ideas if you feel like I'm wrong here.
The main races are: Orc, Troll, Undead, Naga (& Murloc), Human, High Elf, Night Elf, Dwarf. But you can also share some ideas on neutral races like Gnolls, Murloc, Tuskarr... etc

 

[Fingolfin]

I am not really sure how the combat mechanics work, but here is roughly what i think:

Trolls
Strengths: Can berserk, to move 1 square further at the cost of 50% extra damage taken the next turn. Regenerates life every turn. Witch doctors can cast "fear" spells on enemies. Lots of poison attacks, which deal damage over a second turn. Bat riders can set fire to the block underneath them, preventing ground units from moving there. Lasts 2 turns.
Weaknesses: Poorly armored. No cavalry.

High Elves
Strengths: Plenty of magic attacks. Can set up magical barriers to prevent units from moving on certain blocks. Strong resistance to magic. Strong vs undead units. Water Elementals can put out the fire from burning blocks. Mage commanders can teleport their group to avoid obstractles. Strong archers and spearmen.
Weaknesses: Few units in each group, but they can summon more. Spellcasters are very weak in melee.

Orcs
Strengths: Tanky units, and plenty of "spiritual", earth-based spells. Being adjacent to a kodo beast unit increases attack strength. Shamans are very strong vs ethereal units (such as banshees). War Cry spell reduces damage dealt to the group by 50% the next turn. Peon squads deal virtually no damage, but can be turned into burrows for static defense (non-revertable). The Grand Wizard (or some other unit) can cast "earthquake", to scramble the height of four blocks in the target area (destroys magical barriers and burrows).
Weaknesses: Few units with magic or ranged attacks. Units get more weary the more turns they spend out of combat (not sure of what effect).

Undead
Strengths: Strong commander units (demons). Crypt fiends can web enemies, preventing them from moving for one round. Resistent to death spells. Infernals can summon anywhere on the map. Banshees can only take damage from magic attacks. Nerubian units can burrow. When a nerubian group dies, it spawns a small group of spiders.
Weaknesses: Weak (but numerous) units. Weak against life spells and AoE attacks.

Finally, a question: Will you have a trackable system for those menus? Typing "click" everytime you want to select something seems a bit cheap. Also, if trolls are a race of their own, you should also have goblins (or alternatively let them be part of the troll race). Suicidal units could be fun.

 

[Sephalo]

I am not really sure how the combat mechanics work, but here is roughly what i think:

Trolls
Strengths: Can berserk, to move 1 square further at the cost of 50% extra damage taken the next turn. Regenerates life every turn. Witch doctors can cast "fear" spells on enemies. Lots of poison attacks, which deal damage over a second turn. Bat riders can set fire to the block underneath them, preventing ground units from moving there. Lasts 2 turns.
Weaknesses: Poorly armored. No cavalry.

High Elves
Strengths: Plenty of magic attacks. Can set up magical barriers to prevent units from moving on certain blocks. Strong resistance to magic. Strong vs undead units. Water Elementals can put out the fire from burning blocks. Mage commanders can teleport their group to avoid obstractles. Strong archers and spearmen.
Weaknesses: Few units in each group, but they can summon more. Spellcasters are very weak in melee.

Orcs
Strengths: Tanky units, and plenty of "spiritual", earth-based spells. Being adjacent to a kodo beast unit increases attack strength. Shamans are very strong vs ethereal units (such as banshees). War Cry spell reduces damage dealt to the group by 50% the next turn. Peon squads deal virtually no damage, but can be turned into burrows for static defense (non-revertable). The Grand Wizard (or some other unit) can cast "earthquake", to scramble the height of four blocks in the target area (destroys magical barriers and burrows).
Weaknesses: Few units with magic or ranged attacks. Units get more weary the more turns they spend out of combat (not sure of what effect).

Undead
Strengths: Strong commander units (demons). Crypt fiends can web enemies, preventing them from moving for one round. Resistent to death spells. Infernals can summon anywhere on the map. Banshees can only take damage from magic attacks. Nerubian units can burrow. When a nerubian group dies, it spawns a small group of spiders.
Weaknesses: Weak (but numerous) units. Weak against life spells and AoE attacks.

Finally, a question: Will you have a trackable system for those menus? Typing "click" everytime you want to select something seems a bit cheap. Also, if trolls are a race of their own, you should also have goblins (or alternatively let them be part of the troll race). Suicidal units could be fun.

Well. Maybe it's better if I first release the rulebook file I've made. I quickly check if it's still up-to-date with the latest rule changes so far, but when I post it it might give a better overview of the basics of the game.

Currently I don't need very specific idea's like yours of Berserk from trolls (altough it's a good one!) but I just want to know how people define the trolls.
So in your opinion you see trolls as low armored, cunning units with poisons and good passive life regeneration. That's something I also had in mind!

You see orcs as tanky but spiritual units focussed on melee. A bit typical like a character like Thrall per example. Wise and strong. I personally would like to put orcs in a different more ferocious spot than the classic WCIII orcs. I was thinking of strong melee fighters and various greater creatures like tamed dragons or kodo riders. A few shamans, but mostly ferocious melee fighters.
But there's no right or wrong here. I need to know what your thoughts are.

Undead is also something I had the same idea about. Many (easily replaceable) cheap units and various units that work well by sacrificing others. Think of 'Dark Pact'.

High Elves currently have strong dark magic resistance, strong pikemen and decent cavalry. They excell at magic. A bit like the High Elves from Warhammer perhaps.


I'm very interested to see what you'd think of the Naga, since they're difficult to create with not many models to chose from. Therefor I decided to add murlocs and sea giants and most of the Sunken Ruins units to the naga as if they're enslaved. They don't have cavalry or something, but obviously have the strengths on water terrain. But I'm a bit stuck on this race.

I'll be posting the rulebook file soon, for people to have a closer insight on what it's going to be like. Keep in mind that this will be the current WIP version of the book, and it's by far not settled yet.

EDIT:
Also to answer your questions:
- I won't be using the chat command 'click' in the menu. I'll be using with a spacebar function where you just press your spacebar instead. It's just not working correctly yet so in the meantime I use a typing command to test it myself.
- As for different races. In the map all races somehow cross eachother a bit. Goblins will be available to various races since in my game they're somehow neutral. A goblin sapper could (per example) end up being loyal to orcs, trolls, humans and dwarves. Just like per example a troll warrior doesn't only want to join a troll army but maybe also feels like assisting the naga armies. This is all shown in the tooltips. So eventually an orc player will most likely have the majority of orcs in his army, but might also have trolls, goblins, tauren or maybe even neutrals like gnolls in its own army.

 

[MogulKahn]

Well, you can add "Hit and Run" tactic, where you can first attack then move, for a penalty of course. For Night Elves

For Orcs, something like, "As One", +1 attack for every nearby infantry unit. Something like that.

For Naga, I would go with something sneaky, like some traps, flanking(bonus damage from the rear, even more from the back), watery illusions, annoying(like Hydras in wc3, when they die, 2 weaker are spawned) etc. You can also go with some kind of evolution. Let's say, when Myrmidon kills 4 units, you can choose one of the upgrades: Royal Guard or Mutant. One is more damage based, another one is more based on tanking. Something like that.

For Tuskarrs, maybe "Magnataur Hunters", specialized in fighting beasts, dealing 10% more damage to big creatures. "Tribal Bond", when one of their allied Tuskarrs dies, all other Tuskarrs are also damaged for 5% of his maximum health.

 

[Sephalo]

Well, you can add "Hit and Run" tactic, where you can first attack then move, for a penalty of course. For Night Elves

For Orcs, something like, "As One", +1 attack for every nearby infantry unit. Something like that.

For Naga, I would go with something sneaky, like some traps, flanking(bonus damage from the rear, even more from the back), watery illusions, annoying(like Hydras in wc3, when they die, 2 weaker are spawned) etc. You can also go with some kind of evolution. Let's say, when Myrmidon kills 4 units, you can choose one of the upgrades: Royal Guard or Mutant. One is more damage based, another one is more based on tanking. Something like that.

For Tuskarrs, maybe "Magnataur Hunters", specialized in fighting beasts, dealing 10% more damage to big creatures. "Tribal Bond", when one of their allied Tuskarrs dies, all other Tuskarrs are also damaged for 5% of his maximum health.

That's nice. I like the idea of focussing orcs more on 'hordes'; making them stronger in groups. Altough maybe I actually feel like using that for way more scenarios. Like human soldiers that are more resistant to fear if they're in bigger groups. Or pikemen that deal more damage to cavalry if they're in bigger groups. Very helpful with that!

And I also like the sneaky aspect of the naga. Maybe I'll try to work around that a bit with traps or more flanking possibilities.

And you seem to see the Tuskarr's as hunters that are connected to eachother so also seem to do better in groups. That's interesting.
Right now I gave Tuskarr cold resistance (immunity for frost spells) and swimming. Swimming is actually a huge thing in the map, since if you happen to end up on water (by a spell of some kind) and can't swim, you're really in big trouble. Having a few units that can swim is great, so some neutral units like Tuskarr make it possible for non-naga players to compete since a naga player will most likely try to summon much water on the battlefield. But maybe I'll try to add the hunting aspect to Tuskarr's too. Creating a few more units that have Beastslaying (bonus dmg vs beasts) or something.

I also don't want to make things too complicated so I try to make a lot of 'basic infantry' units, but all with a small difference.
An orc warrior might (per example) have 'Charge'; giving him more damage when attacking. But a human soldier might have 'Bravery'; giving him more fear resistance. A tuskarr warrior has cold resistance and swimming, and a ghoul can move further while having less armor. A high elf soldier has holy strike, and a naga warrior has above average damage while having a very slow attack speed.

 

[Sephalo]

Currently a bit stuck on the attack system. I'm working on that since half a year now and I keep failing and starting over again to see if a new idea pops up.

Here's what the map and UI looks like right now. Still not totally done, but also working on that. I'm just putting my focus on the attack system (and buff system) right now.

 

[MogulKahn]

It is set to private.

 

[Sephalo]

It is set to private.

Oh, weird.
It should be public now.

 

[Fingolfin]

Any news on this map? I've been waiting for it for a long time!

 

[Emm-A-]

wow, I am surprised once more how I could miss this. Look really good and I would like to play this as well!

 

[troylowyee]

Is this still continuing? Would be so sad to see it stop halfway like this

 

[Fingolfin]

Sephalo hasn't been online since last year, so unfortunately i'd say this is dead.