[Role Playing Game] Traders of Tartarus - Grand strategy RPG

[vlekje5]

Traders of Tartarus

Introduction

Backstory

Factions

World Map

Screenshots

Trade Goods

Achievements
Changelog

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Introduction

Basic synopsis

Traders of Tartarus is a grand strategy Roleplay trade simulator. The core quirk of this map is the importance of
geography. The map is divided into 12 trade nodes and 10 different trade goods.
Win through conquest , strategically funnel goods into your empire or
use diplomacy to establish trade routes with other players.


Trade nodes

Each trade node has it's own stockpile of goods, anyone that builds in the node pulls resources from this stockpile.
Production buildings provide trade power to the owner. Each income term gold is handed out based on the node's total production.
This gold is divided to players present in the node proportional to their share of the nodes total trade power.


Node leader

A player can build a flag in a node to claim it ,
By default other players are blacklisted from accessing the node's stockpile.
The node leader can Whitelist players to access the stockpile as long as they have the flag.
A node can only have 1 flag on it. In order to break the claim you have to destroy the flag.

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Backstory

The world is a blank canvas. Kingdoms of old have long vanished from these lands.
Make a name for yourself Seek out legendary treasures, establish a nation.
Maybe even revive the old crimson empire.
It's up to you to create your legacy.

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Factions

Kingdom	Pirates	Nomads	Freelance Adventurers
Kingdom	Pirates	Nomads	Freelance Adventurers
Can vassalize other players. Best at building bases Recommended playstyle	Can steal from trade ships Relies mostly on gold Reduced production buildings	Can temporarily settle nodes Can pack up all buildings Herd production during travel	Only control one hero Work for other factions Hunt artifacts and legends

Spoiler: More info on Kingdom faction

Description​

The kingdom playstyle is the main way to play the game. You can start by choosing a start location. Building production buildings like mines or wood cutters add income to the trade node the building is built in.
Kingdoms start of slow but become the most powerful later on. They can vassalize other players by killing their main hall. When this happens that player is forced to join your alliance. and their trade power is partly funneled to you in nodes you are active.

Income​

Income is gained from buildings and is specific to the trade node you're in. in the example below a player is building things in trade node 1. other players in that node can access the same inventory pool.

Trade​

Trade between nodes can be done by kingdom players to get access to rare resources not available in your node. This video demonstrates how to setup a trade route.
First you set your home node and then you set your destination node. If you click the middle button your ship will start picking up items from your trade port and transporting them to the destination port.
This trigger isn't fully yet, item pickup and drop-off isn't automated yet, just like setting the trade resource for a ship needs to be implemented.

Buildings​

Building name	Building description	Max level
Hall	Main building, trains workers, adds 1 lumber to trade node inc and 20 to stock upon completion also provides 5 housing/lv	5
Lumber camp	Produces lumber	6
Stone mine	Produces stones [requires stone tile]	3
Trade port	Allows trade between two trade ports in different trade nodes [requires water nearby]	1
Ship Wharf	Allows creation of all types of ships [requires water nearby]	3
Blue stone mine	Allows mining of crude magic blue stones [requires bluestone vein]	3
iron mine	Allows mining of iron [requires iron ore vein]	3
Research facility	Contains various technology upgrades	3
Barracks	Allows training of units	3
House	Adds 1 housing / lv (food)	3
Horizontal wall	defensive structure	3
Vertical wall	Defensive structure	3
Trade depot	Similar to a trade port but for inland trade routes.	3
Lighthouse	Provides vision, and bonus vision during the night	1
Arrow tower	Defensive tower. Good against basic units	1
Canon tower	Long range defensive structure. Good against ships and vehicles. AOE damage.	1
Magic tower	Defensive tower. Strong against Elite and air units.	1
Workshop	allows creation of land and air vehicles, and canons for your ships.	2
Magic sanctum	Casts spells in exchange for blue stones - Unique Artifacts can be stored here to it more powerful spells	3
Aviation platform	Allows the creation of areal trade routes between two different trade nodes.	1
Church	Trains grave diggers, which can build graves for any player in the game. graves are used to revive heroes. Also grants passive life regen to nearby units.	1
barn	Can train various farm animals like sheep or cattle. (farm animals will lose health if not on green grass)	1
Horizontal fence	Prevents farm animals from wandering off	1
vertical fence	Prevents farm animals from wandering off	1
diagonal fence /	Prevents farm animals from wandering off
diagonal fence \	Prevents farm animals from wandering off
	more to be added

Spoiler: More info on Pirate faction

coming soon

Spoiler: More info on Nomad faction

coming soon

Spoiler: More info on Adventurer faction

coming soon

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World Map

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Screenshots

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Trade Goods

Trade good	Description
Wood	Used in construction
Stone	Used in construction, especially for higher tier buildings
Iron	Needed for certain units, vehicles, and even buildings
Horses	Needed for cavalry units, and horse carts for land trade.
Leather	Gathered from livestock. Needed for medium tier units
cloth	Gathered from sheep needed for low tier units and ships
Sulfur	Used for science
Magic Dust	Used as a currency for research upgrades and magic
Gunpowder	Used for various late - game units structures and vehicles.
food	required for making houses and training units
Rot Gas	Used for chemical weapons and alchemy, and zeplins.
Copper	Needed for mechanical and end game air.
Housing	Basically vanilla wc3 food system, capped at 300
	more to be added

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Units

Unit	Cost	Description
Infantry
Light clubber	2 Wood, 2 cloth, 2 food, 1 Housing	Fast unit with low attack and low defense. Has a high swimming speed.
Light swordsman	2 iron, 2 cloth, 2 food, 1 housing	Fast unit with high attack, low defense, high swim speed
Light spearman	1 Iron,1 wood, 2 cloth, 2 food, 1 housing	Fast unit, medium attack, low defense, high swim speed +dmg to cavalry
Light archer	3 wood, 2 cloth, 2 food, 1 housing	Low defense, ranged attack, high speed, high swim speed.
Medium clubber	2 Wood, 4 leather, 2 food, 1 housing	Medium defense, low attack, medium speed.
medium swordsman	2 iron, 4 leather, 2 food, 1 housing	Medium defense, high attack, medium speed
medium pikeman	1 iron, 1 wood, 4 leather, 2 food, 1 housing.	Medium defense, medium attack, medium speed, +dmg to cavalry
medium archer	3 wood, 3 leather, 2 food, 1 housing	medium defense, ranged attack, medium speed
Heavy swordsman	5 iron, 2 food, 1 housing	High defense, high attack, low speed, low swim speed.
Heavy pikeman	4 iron, 2 food, 1 wood, 1 housing	High defense, medium attack, low speed, low swim speed, +dmg to cavalry
Cavalry
Light cavalry	1 Horse, 3 food, 3 cloth 2 wood, 1 housing	extremely fast, low defense, high health medium attack
medium cavalry	1 Horse, 3 food,3 leather 2 iron, 1 housing	very fast, medium defense, high health, high attack
heavy cavalry	1 horse, 3 food, 5 iron , 1 housing	fast, High defense, high health, high attack.
Light horseback archer	1 horse 3 food 3 wood, 3 cloth, 1 housing	extremely fast, low defense, high health, ranged attack [Nomad only]
Medium horseback archer	1 horse 3 food 3 wood, 3 leather, 1 housing	very fast, medium defense, high health , ranged attack [Nomad only]
Special
Mage	3 cloth, 1 food, 5 Magic dust, 1 housing	low health and defense, high splash dmg, +dmg to heavy armor.
Medic	3 cloth, 1 food, 3 rot gas, 1 housing	Heals units
Artilery	Artilery can not cross water
Catapult	Wood, Stone	Low hp, high range, low dmg, extremely SLOW.
Canon tank	Iron, Gunpowder, - sulfur	High range, high health, high defense, slow
flamethrower tank	Iron, Gunpowder, rotgas, sulfur	Low range infantry killer, slow, high health, high defense, masive aoe dmg.
Naval
Tradeship	wood, cloth	Can establish transport routes for transferring goods between two nodes.
Flying
Zepplin	leather, copper, rotgas, Sulfur , iron	can establish transport routes over air.

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Achievements
The map has a fully integrated achievement and progression system using save/load.
In this section I'll list some of the achievements that are going to be added.

Spoiler: show achievement table

Nr	Icon	Name	Description	reward
1		Participation trophy	You get this for doing absolutely nothing.	Hero - 'Dumpy'
2		One man army	Get 250 unit kills with your hero alone	Hero - Cleaver
3		Orange man happy	Have 50 walls of the highest tier.	Building_Skins - Walls
4		Don't tell Icarus	Have an aviation platform before 40 minutes have passed.	Unit_Skins - Zepplins
5		Poor man's pirate	Play an entire campaign as a pirate republic without stealing a single piece of loot.	Unit skin - White flagship
6		The Freest Man in the World	As a pirate republic, be the last remaining nation to not be vasalized. (Largest force has conquered at least 2 other nations)	Hero - Pirate king
7		Return of the crimson empire	Be the first to vasalize 3 players in the lobby and rename yourself to: 'crimson empire'	Hero - Empress Unit_skins - Crimson Empire
			With the current saving setup a maximum of 23 achievements can be added. All achievements are due to change during implementation

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Changelog

Spoiler: 1.0

1.05 Added all infantry, and all cavalry units, extended proof of concept triggers, added sheep farming system
1.04 Updated multiboard for all 15 nodes, optimized the function that does this to reduce lagg
1.03 Finished 97% of the terrain, Added regions for all but 2 nodes.
1.02 Added A lot of terrain, Finished trading system for wood. added 3 node regions. Created zone specific weather effects, added pathing blockers for mountain a lot of the mountains.
1.01 Updated world map, Added third zone, Added zone name variable array.
1.0 First version

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If you want to do suggestions for heroes to be added please go here.

Disclaimer: I made this thread mainly so i had a place too note down future ideas for this project. and stuff I want to add to it. I started a similar project a few years back but had to restart from scratch for this one.

 

[AMarkov]

The post is incredibly well-organized and stylish!

If the project is still in its early development stages, is it reasonable to spend time on achievements? Wouldn't it be more important to focus on building the core gameplay first?

I’m not sure if this will be helpful to you, but a long time ago I was thinking about a project where the main gameplay feature would be Trade. The idea was for players to create a trading cartel and establish trade routes on a procedurally generated map between resource points and consumers. I wanted to create a market system where supply and demand would drive price changes based on the balance.

In the first phase, players would seek out the most profitable trade routes, set up infrastructure, balance the volume of goods delivered with the prices they could fetch, and build roads to speed up transport (by swapping out tiles and adding speed auras to key points). Most of this would be done with minimal direct conflict between players. However, interactions between players would come through NPCs—for example, one player could focus on harvesting wood, while another focuses on processing the wood and delivering the final product to consumers.

In the second phase, players would use their profits to monopolize NPC production for themselves, creating distinct areas of influence.
By the third phase, all resource bases would be controlled by players, leading to more aggressive tactics—like oversaturating the market or causing inflation of certain resources to drive competitors into losses.

A few details:

1. Building roads: This would simply involve swapping out tiles in key locations, with a dummy unit providing a speed aura. Random landscape generation would also play a part—mountains, forests (with varying economic value), which could either be used as resources or cleared for road building.
2. Different types of transport: Basic carriers (like humans), horse caravans, ships, and air freight. Each would have its own hourly rate, so players couldn't always afford the best couriers; instead, they’d have to optimize for profit while outcompeting rivals.
3. Route setup: Units would have a set of waypoints and commands—move, pick up, or drop off goods. This would create a repeating cycle where a unit would follow the designated path and perform a sequence of commands before returning to the starting point.
4. Consumption system: A hypothetical city would have a hypothetical population (for instance, based on a unit’s HP). This would determine the speed at which the city consumes goods. The price for goods in that city would be based on how much stock they had—if there’s a surplus, they’ll buy for dirt cheap; if there’s a shortage, they’ll pay a premium. This would give the economy a dynamic feel.
5. Random events: A plague hits a city, the population drops sharply, and medicine prices skyrocket. Or bandits raid a warehouse, and goods are lost. Events like these would create opportunities for profit.
6. Profitability calculator: I also wanted to create a system to calculate the income and expenses of one unit after completing a full trade cycle, so players could evaluate its profitability.

Unfortunately, due to the ambitious scale of the project and my limited programming skills (especially in Jass), I had to abandon this idea at the time. I hope you find some of these small ideas useful, or maybe they will inspire you to come up with new ideas or solutions for your project.

Good luck with your development!

 

[vlekje5]

hey, thanks for commenting.

The post is incredibly well-organized and stylish!

If the project is still in its early development stages, is it reasonable to spend time on achievements? Wouldn't it be more important to focus on building the core gameplay first?

About achievements I'm not spending time on programming their requirements yet. I might do it for the first basic one as a proof of concept. I did spend time designing an achievement system. the framework for that is already in place luckily.

I tend to focus on big systems first as that's what i find the most fun (and if i cant figure those out the project is doomed). My node system is also operational for example but only for the first 3 nodes. However it's easy to expand.

I’m not sure if this will be helpful to you, but a long time ago I was thinking about a project where the main gameplay feature would be Trade. The idea was for players to create a trading cartel and establish trade routes on a procedurally generated map between resource points and consumers. I wanted to create a market system where supply and demand would drive price changes based on the balance.

In the first phase, players would seek out the most profitable trade routes, set up infrastructure, balance the volume of goods delivered with the prices they could fetch, and build roads to speed up transport (by swapping out tiles and adding speed auras to key points). Most of this would be done with minimal direct conflict between players. However, interactions between players would come through NPCs—for example, one player could focus on harvesting wood, while another focuses on processing the wood and delivering the final product to consumers.

In the second phase, players would use their profits to monopolize NPC production for themselves, creating distinct areas of influence.
By the third phase, all resource bases would be controlled by players, leading to more aggressive tactics—like oversaturating the market or causing inflation of certain resources to drive competitors into losses.

What you're describing sounds one level more complex than what I'm planning. My first project was more complex than this one in scope. but i consciously want to keep it as simple as possible so that it's easy enough to pick up. Also I don't want to go too far into the simulation route as i enjoy it the most when i can build my base and have a certain amount of freedom regarding player fantasy. I really want a noob to be able to have fun right away. Which is also why i have factions like the Adventurers which is basically a single player hero.

Also I want no procedural generation at all. I love hard coded games, and consciously designed maps. Since i plan to have certain goods be only available in specific nodes I want players to be able to familiarize themselves with the map and think up strategies to build up their base and become the 'guy selling gunpowder' or the 'isolationist hermit kingdom in the mountains' etc. i LOVE that in games.

1. Building roads: This would simply involve swapping out tiles in key locations, with a dummy unit providing a speed aura. Random landscape generation would also play a part—mountains, forests (with varying economic value), which could either be used as resources or cleared for road building.

• This is actually a really good idea, i didn't consider roads yet but these might be great especially since you could build your roads where your trade route runs already

1. Different types of transport: Basic carriers (like humans), horse caravans, ships, and air freight. Each would have its own hourly rate, so players couldn't always afford the best couriers; instead, they’d have to optimize for profit while outcompeting rivals.

• I'm doing something similar with transport systems too, there'll be:
  • land routes (horse carriage
  • shipping routes
  • zepplin routes (endgame)

However for each of these there's only one type of transport, which can be upgraded too increase it's transported size (up to 6 slots per vehicle)

1. Route setup: Units would have a set of waypoints and commands—move, pick up, or drop off goods. This would create a repeating cycle where a unit would follow the designated path and perform a sequence of commands before returning to the starting point.

My trade system is very similar but between two points. A unit sets their home and destination port. Then they can select their trade good. And click the 'trade button'. doing this will put them in a loop where they move to home, there if the stock for example has wood and the trade good it's selected is wood it adds wood from the stockpile into the unit's inventory.

Once that unit's inventory is filled the trigger detects that and it automatically goes to the destination port. where i'll add a proximity trigger that auto unfills it. which loops it back too the home port.

I added a video under the 'kingdom' section where i show how trade works for them. the trigger is not fully done though as picking up the resources isn't coded in yet. only the cycling and setting up of home and destination point is done.

Each node only has income and stock. I've decided income will be only for local production. trade routes. (which currently are only set up for sea routes) add directly to the stock.

Drop off ports have an inventory and any good added is automatically added to the stock using a separate trigger.

Maybe i could add a waypoint building with an inventory that can hold items and function as a placebo for a home or destination port if pathing is too much of an issue on land routes. We'll see though. that's not a core gameplay requirement haha.

1. Consumption system: A hypothetical city would have a hypothetical population (for instance, based on a unit’s HP). This would determine the speed at which the city consumes goods. The price for goods in that city would be based on how much stock they had—if there’s a surplus, they’ll buy for dirt cheap; if there’s a shortage, they’ll pay a premium. This would give the economy a dynamic feel.

• this goes too much into the simulation route for me. I don't want selling to NPC's at all. the only trade is via trade routes, for which players should negotiate (or go to war to claim the nodes resources themselves))

1. Random events: A plague hits a city, the population drops sharply, and medicine prices skyrocket. Or bandits raid a warehouse, and goods are lost. Events like these would create opportunities for profit.

• I don't want random events but perhaps NPC bandits that are physically in the game and occcasionally train up enough units to launch an attack on a random player in the trade node. This would be a fun challenge for players or freelance heroes to clean up. and could allow me to balance regions with good resource access.

1. Profitability calculator: I also wanted to create a system to calculate the income and expenses of one unit after completing a full trade cycle, so players could evaluate its profitability.

• Probably not applicable to how i set things up.

Unfortunately, due to the project’s ambitious scope and my limited programming skills (especially in Jass), I had to abandon the idea. I hope you find some of these small ideas useful, or maybe they’ll inspire new ideas or solutions for your project.
Best of luck with your development!

• Yeah screw jass, i'm doing everything GUI hahaha