Gaias Retaliation: Remastered

[Zwiebelchen]

With Patch 1.29 hitting the game and offering lots of changes to the editor, including brand new natives that are a complete game-changer for me, I'm planning to scrap most of the core game and battle mechanics and rebuild Gaias Retaliation from scratch.

Over the years, newly made systems and replaced mechanics have had a huge impact on the internal game mechanics. Many features have been updated and refactured partially, resulting in new and old systems co-existing with each other... this created a huge mess of spaghetti code that is hard to maintain and even harder to extend.

So with 1.29 offering new natives that will simplify lots of things (especially changing ability and attack stats, cooldowns, etc.), I finally have that golden opportunity to rewrite Gaias from scratch, making it not only easier to maintain, but also easier to create content.
At a certain point, its easier to cut a severed leg off and attaching a superior shiny cyber-robot leg than trying to fix the damage.


Among the changes I am going to implement are the following:

• Complete rewrite of the core battle system to use a behaviour-based approach with streamlined status effects (immobilize, slow, stun, freeze, silence, etc.) to make spell coding more efficient and less prone to bugs when certain spells are used in combination; but also to increase game performance
  
• Complete rewrite of equipment and weapon systems (weapons will now have different attack speed timers or different range depending on the weapon type; certain item stats will be changed or removed, new stats will be added)
• Complete rewrite of the minion system, making them actual ordinary units instead of applying exceptions and special rules to certain types of minions
• Remake of all class abilities using the new behaviour-approach and making them more modular and extendable
• All creeps and bosses in the game will now be hero units, which allows for mechanics that are exclusive to heroes to be applicable to any unit (like modifying hero stats, level, etc.)

Stuff that will most likely stay exactly as it is:

• Terrain and dungeon layouts
• Quests
  
• Threat system
• Boss mechanics (mostly)

Stuff that I'm still unsure if I will change it or not:

• Inventory system (this might be the perfect time to move away from the default WC3 inventory and use an on-screen interface)
• Class system (This might be the opportunity to move away from advanced classes and make all base classes more spec-based vs. rigid class choices)

Of course, all this will come at a price: the price of rebuilding the game from the core. This means that all existing content will be removed until I had the opportunity to rebuild it. The game will go back to vanilla state, so to speak: few classes, few abilities, limited content.

 

[VakarlanS]

Jesus christ my heart can only take so much dude.

 

[LordDz]

So.. 12 player version when?

Just be careful with rewriting from scratch..
Things You Should Never Do, Part I

 

[Wareditor]

Glad you have the motivation to do it!
Good luck and have fun!

 

[S0ulseeker]

Sounds wonderful zwiebel! ^_^

 

[Zwiebelchen]

So.. 12 player version when?

Just be careful with rewriting from scratch..
Things You Should Never Do, Part I

That comparison doesn't apply though:
- I will not throw away everything, just the item, combat and battle mechanics; quests, terrain, dungeons, music, etc. are very functional and will stay the same
- I'm not a team
- I've gained experience in coding (contrary to the article)
- I can actually fix gameplay issues while I'm at it

 

[LordDz]

Sounds like you know your shit and is confident with it.
Good luck!

 

[Zwiebelchen]

Here's some new stuff that the remaster will have:


Randomized Loot

With the ability to edit and change tooltips and names via JASS, I finally have the opportunity to move away from object-editor items and have the opportunity to auto-generate loot with algorithms.
There will still be hand-crafted items in the game, but these will be restricted to special items or legendary equipment.

Loot will not be uncoditional random as it was with souls. Instead, there will be a selection of 10 stat weight tables per item type so that items generated will always make sense for some classes. Think of Ethereals in the design, just with more variety and a static item level upon drop. Item appearances will be randomized aswell, but only higher grade items gain access to the later item models and skins, to maintain the sense of progression in terms of appearance.


Dualclassing

With the remake of all abilities and hero mechanics, I have the opportunity to allow for more freedom in character builds by moving away from the restricted class choices.
Instead of picking a base and advanced class, you will now be able to freely mix & match abilities from 2 selected skillsets.
To allow for this to work properly, I have to update the character models to provide all the required animations for different weapon types, which means that the selection of character models will be limited at first.


Possible skillsets could be:

Warrior (melee, tank and protection, shields, heavy weapons)
Rogue (melee, mobility, small weapons, utility, weapon enchantments, dual-wield)
Ranger (ranged abilities, utility, nature spells, spirits, healing abilities)
Mage (elemental damage, weapon enchantments, elemental summons)
Mystic (shadow damage, debuffs, utility, dark summons)
Cleric (holy damage, healing, buffs)


For example, a Warrior/Cleric combination will allow to build a Paladin, while a Warrior/Mystic will create some kind of Death Knight.
A Ranger/Rogue could be built as a pure archer class, while a Warrior/Ranger could play as a melee that is allowed to summon spirits to his assistance.
Of course, you will not be forced to actually match abilities. If you want, you can select any combination and only use abilities of one of your classes.

All skillsets will be made in a way that they have abilities that might be beneficial for almost any class. But there will also be abilities that require equipping a certain type of weapon or armor before you can use them.
For example, while its possible to create some kind of elemental based tank as a Warrior/Mage, some of the strongest mage set skills can only be used with cloth armor equipped. This allows for smoother balancing, as I can put on or release restrictions on popular or less popular skills to make them more or less viable.

 

[Jumbo]

This is amazing Zwiebel! I would suggest a kind of team system so that player cap can be increased, while still keeping the dungeon limit (or maybe upping it to 6 players for more dynamical teamplay - of course dungeon content scaled to account for an extra player slot).


On player limits:
It always annoyed me how limited we were regarding player limits in game, especially since people cannot join a game that is already running. A 10 player limit would be a good change, I think, within the current map limits.
My dream, however, is 22 player limit to allow for a true online-RPG feel. This would not make sense with the current layout obviously, as every open area is too small to host more than 10 players at the moment. Well it is my right to dream isn't it? (to paraphrase Uther).
I think, if I remember correctly, you once told me that terraining doesn't take a long time. What about making the areas like Riversdale, Ankhmaron forest, Foothills, and Whitepine a lot bigger to allow for more players playing at the same time? This would be a dream come true for me. Dungeons would still be scaled to 5 players, but you would also have the opportunity to make real raids (+10 players) further down the line. This would also require a party system, so you only get experience and shared loot within your party - not with all the other 21 players! I don't think I have to explain this in too much detail, as such a party system is basically similar to Wow vanilla's (i.e. too many players fighting together = no xp for example).


On Dualclassing:
Personally, I think more class dynamics is a great idea, it appears in your above post to be kinda like Guild Wars 1 - which is a great approach in my opinion!

 

[Zwiebelchen]

Opening the map up to more players will open a can of worms if you ask me. Besides, the game interface wasn't made for this, which would make it clunky at best (well too bad, you can only see 5 people in the quickslots)... I'll think about it, but I make no promises on that front.

 

[Jumbo]

The quickslot issue isnt too bad if you make an ingame party (as opposed to player) limit to 5-6 players .

I guess this would be doable with some kind of editing of the shared unit advanced stuff.

 

[BoxOfFaith]

All of this sounds amazing! Are you still looking for donations or would more donations be able to help in any way?

Secondly.. Randomized loot sort of scares me. While I really enjoy the concept behind it isn't there some worry about high levels looking for marginal upgrades and taking the items from people who don't have an item of equal level yet? Gearing up could take ages with nearly everyone constantly looking for the same items but with different stats. Would personal loot chests potentially be an option now? Finding items with perfect stats should still take a long time due to RNG, and there'd still be a lot of useless items created but I think it'd be better than fighting over a singular drop each time.

 

[Zwiebelchen]

There will be no trash items. Stat layouts are pre-determined by item type. So you won't have random mixes like Str and Int on the same weapon. That should greatly reduce the number of useless items dropping.

 

[BoxOfFaith]

I meant hypothetically if we were to get a personal loot chest on kill we could perhaps get a staff drop even if we're on our assassin. This would be considered a trash drop.

We had this problem at Zharo where everyone wanted to play Bard for lightning core, and that was just one legendary material. If people start hunting meta simple blue drops then I dunno.

 

[oger-lord]

Is it time for Wurst?

 

[fifek556]

So the next patch for 1.2D(5) is gonna be the last?

I like how the classes can be mixed, it solves the eternal issue of “one and only way to go”.

What about the legendary items though? Since the wipe is coming, is it gonna be the same workload to get current craftable legendaries like right now?

 

[styles]

*heart beating stops*
thats nice to hear!

idk if it is forbidden to ask but did you ever consider coding the game in sc2 or dota2?

 

[Jumbo]

*heart beating stops*
thats nice to hear!

idk if it is forbidden to ask but did you ever consider coding the game in sc2 or dota2?

Yeah, he did. But luckily there is no need for that now.

 

[S0ulseeker]

would a complete rework of the classes into duel specing result in a code wipe? I personally wouldn't mind creating a new character with these mechanics but I know some people may be sad to press the restart button after farming their chars for so long. I don't really see any way around not having a code wipe though seeing as the fundamental classes will be drastically different

 

[SaikoDeMoN]

I've put plenty of time into my codes but I'd be happy to restart with all these system changes. Also, we won't have sufficient test data if everyone doesn't play through from lvl1.

What I'm curious about is how you fit random items into the code system. Don't you have limited space in the code for items?

 

[Barwat]

This is amazing !! Can we have an ETA on the beta of this project ?

Very good work as always !

 

[muzzel]

sweet

 

[_lycan]

Hype, we just started leveling again after years of not playing

 

[Zwiebelchen]

I have to back out of this. After giving it a serious thought, I fear this might destroy what people actually like about Gaias Retaliation, which imho are the classes and the identity they have.

I will, however, remaster the item system, simply because I can now can and it will save me a lot of time in the future.

 

[_lycan]

I have to back out of this. After giving it a serious thought, I fear this might destroy what people actually like about Gaias Retaliation, which imho are the classes and the identity they have.

I will, however, remaster the item system, simply because I can now can and it will save me a lot of time in the future.

I agree on it somewhat, The old system where we got scrolls for abilities was really nice and I *somewhat* miss it as it gave classes like thieves more incentive to stealing.


Doing small bosses and such, I'm not saying I dislike the new system, it just needs more ability diversity for it to work instead of getting them from drops as you get your late game stuff fairly quickly.



Same thing could happen if you change stuff like creeps and so on, it could end up making the game too different, better go for the safe route and keep improving from there, not only that but it will also give you time to finish stuff that people actually wanted like D4 and abilities.


Maybe somewhere in the future we can get a higher level cap, if you do decide to do so, maybe consider raising the level of the trade route and consequent areas as to force the player to kill Firelord a couple of times before he can advance.


People who are used to 1.1 remember D3 being a must, but newer players don't do D3 until like they're level 50 or so.


This will also force people into having to do D2 before D3, giving both dungeons an actual meaning.




I suppose a way would be to have all the areas and quests after D3 be at least 5 levels above content before D3/with D3 except bosses, that way you can only level up with bosses and at least 1 level would be FL only.




//////////


I recently came back to playing after a few years, I had forgotten most of the stuff and a lot of stuff had changed (I left when Alchemist got added as a boss, did it and quit).




The game has indeed become easier for solo/duos/trios due to mercenaries, but even that is acceptable, what isn't acceptable is my friends not doing D3 at all, they just avoided D3 and went to Trade routes+ altogether...


Either make it what I suggested above, or make the path only open if you get an item dropped from Firelord called "Casimir's Quest" (Not saveable, and 10% or so drop rate from FL), only when he moves the path opens and you can move forward.

 

[khj]

Either make it what I suggested above, or make the path only open if you get an item dropped from Firelord called "Casimir's Quest" (Not saveable, and 10% or so drop rate from FL), only when he moves the path opens and you can move forward.

For a player who passed D3, it sounds really cool.
But many players wouldn't be able to pass further D3 then because there are lots of people who play solo and don't want to look for other players.
Well, I agree that Gaias is a team-based game and there are plenty of milestones in the game, that can't be reached w/o other players' help at the level they're supposed to be reached. But there is no need for adding another milestone which people wouldn't be able to pass through alone.

Also, I like the idea of stealing spell scrolls or getting spells any other way than just pressing two buttons (first that comes to mind is a repeatable Q that gives a random spell scroll). It'd make sins and bards more valuable, even though they aren't bad right now. And I'm not saying that people have to get a scroll to learn a spell at, let's say, level 33 and w/o the scroll they wouldn't have a spell at that level. I mean, those scrolls might be alternatives for spells after level 25.



Either way, Zwieb, if you feel like you want to rework characters or to do some other changes that require codewipe - don't hesitate, because it wouldn't kill your map, it would make players more active. Adding D4 will only bring like 15-25 hours of gameplay total for most of the players and in the end, they are gonna be helping newbies getting their items, which is not really interesting. When codewipe will enforce people to start from scratch w/o any advantages and make the game more interesting for newcomers. (Though, it's only my own view of the situation)

 

[Jumbo]

Agree with Khj.

 

[SaikoDeMoN]

I'm not personally against code-wipes, but if there's no technical reason that forces it, it's a bad idea. Playing through the same content you played through before to get to the same point you were is not fun at all. Ofcourse, it will mean more play time for older players but it's not particularly interesting play, just a grind.

Man, I just want D4. Can't we just table discussions of classes and whatnot and get more bosses to fight and complete the story? If zwieb wants a new item system that's perfectly fine (so we can just easily have random-generated blue drops to test D4), then we just need the 25+ spells and start testing bosses. Everything else is fluff. Trying to put shine on a product that isn't complete yet is a lesson in futility.

 

[VakarlanS]

I'm not personally against code-wipes, but if there's no technical reason that forces it, it's a bad idea. Playing through the same content you played through before to get to the same point you were is not fun at all. Ofcourse, it will mean more play time for older players but it's not particularly interesting play, just a grind.

Man, I just want D4. Can't we just table discussions of classes and whatnot and get more bosses to fight and complete the story? If zwieb wants a new item system that's perfectly fine (so we can just easily have random-generated blue drops to test D4), then we just need the 25+ spells and start testing bosses. Everything else is fluff. Trying to put shine on a product that isn't complete yet is a lesson in futility.

I guess time will tell, I would like to have D4 too, but if the code wipe comes together with an interesting rework (like mechanics , class roles), I will take it.

For a player who passed D3, it sounds really cool.
But many players wouldn't be able to pass further D3 then because there are lots of people who play solo and don't want to look for other players.
Well, I agree that Gaias is a team-based game and there are plenty of milestones in the game, that can't be reached w/o other players' help at the level they're supposed to be reached. But there is no need for adding another milestone which people wouldn't be able to pass through alone.

Also, I like the idea of stealing spell scrolls or getting spells any other way than just pressing two buttons (first that comes to mind is a repeatable Q that gives a random spell scroll). It'd make sins and bards more valuable, even though they aren't bad right now. And I'm not saying that people have to get a scroll to learn a spell at, let's say, level 33 and w/o the scroll they wouldn't have a spell at that level. I mean, those scrolls might be alternatives for spells after level 25.



Either way, Zwieb, if you feel like you want to rework characters or to do some other changes that require codewipe - don't hesitate, because it wouldn't kill your map, it would make players more active. Adding D4 will only bring like 15-25 hours of gameplay total for most of the players and in the end, they are gonna be helping newbies getting their items, which is not really interesting. When codewipe will enforce people to start from scratch w/o any advantages and make the game more interesting for newcomers. (Though, it's only my own view of the situation)

Took the words right out of my mouth, personally I don't mind helping newbies to gear up and teach them about bossing, cause they will in turn teach others to do so, of course not all of them.

 

[Zwiebelchen]

A friend of mine constantly tells me "don't fix it if it isn't broken" when I start talking about coding stuff. And he's right about this. The current game works well and everything it needs are bugfixes and more content.

Reworking the item system is still the way to go, though, simply because it makes adding new content a lot faster to do and allows for more visual variety at the same time.

Holidays incoming. I hope I can fix all the remaining bugs within that week of easter holidays so that I can finally start coding new bosses.

 

[mr po]

If the game will be updated by using version 1.29, how many percent of players that don't have battlenet cannot play it?

 

[VakarlanS]

If the game will be updated by using version 1.29, how many percent of players that don't have battlenet cannot play it?

You can bet Eurobattle will be working over time for this, there are tons of players from EU that don't have legit wc3 ver. But this is not the topic on hand.

 

[Jumbo]

@Zwiebelchen
Can we still have the old 8 player limit back though ?
Please .

 

[Zwiebelchen]

Not possible; too many systems hardcoded for 6 players.

 

[Jumbo]

Alright. Well, not your fault that Wc3 doesn't allow joining maps on the fly. :-/

 

[JuanShadows]

Still working on the map, or is it dead? I didn’t see any other contents in awhile

 

[khj]

@JuanShadows don't worry, the map is still being developed. There are no many updates lately because Zwiebelchen is a busy person. Though, as he said, he's going to work on bugfixes within next few weeks.

 

[S0ulseeker]

Also from what I've noticed is Zweibel has gotten away from using the forums as a source of update (mostly, he still does some stuff here) but the majority of discussions etc. all seem to happen on the offical gaias discord now

 

[JuanShadows]

Thanks, guys!

 

[Freelancah]

Also from what I've noticed is Zweibel has gotten away from using the forums as a source of update (mostly, he still does some stuff here) but the majority of discussions etc. all seem to happen on the offical gaias discord now

Could you share the link for it? I am surprised somebody bothers to still update this game in 2018. It's awesome and sad at the same time ?

 

[S0ulseeker]

Sure! The discord is:
Discord - Free voice and text chat for gamers