Location guardians - why they are a good idea

from Elemental Forums

Hi

As most of you probably know, MoM had guardians at important locations. Elemental doesn't go the guardian way but has some technology requirements. Very civ-like there.

I would like to have guardians at least a possibility in Elemental. I think they add to enjoyment because they provide intermediate goals. Right now if you see a lost library, you can just pop a settlement next to it. See a shard? Pop a settlement. I don't find that very exciting, the only thing that isn't evitable there is if an opponent gets there first. And what if you don't have any targets for quests or anything worth settling next to? Do research and something will randomly appear somewhere. Pop a settlement. Did that really reward good play from my part?

With guardians I would have to gather a force. With scouting intel, I could even make a tailored force to defeat them. This would be an additional goal for me, thereby increasing the amount of meaningful decisions available to me. Instead of having new locations appear randomly, I would have more knowledge and more goals available from an earlier point of time.

Pretty please?

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Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

You are right though it would be more exciting to have to battle for those locations, The main thing that would worry my about this is that it would mean Military research would quickly become far more important than any other. If you build a big army quickly you would then be able to grab all the important locations whilst your opponents were still trying to build lots of successful cities.

Also i never really understood the logic behind the whole guardian idea. Why would a monster guard a shard or a library?

 

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

I would like to see legendary monsters or groups of bandits, or whatever, defending locations. I do agree it's a bit "too easy" to take control of stuff like that. You want that Lost Library? Ok, defeat the evil archmage that currently lives there. Do you want that ruined caravan? Ok, maybe you have to deal with a group of bandits that raided it. Do you want that old keep that contains that horde of treasure? Ok, defeat the red dragon.

Ashes of the Singularity II
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

Actually, funny thing there about requiring a big army to claim an important point.   In MOM, one of the spots with the hardest guardians were the nodes; the places that added to your mana and power directly.  They often had nasty monsters.  One way to beat them was to get an army together, destroy the guardian, and then bind a guardian spirit to the node, making it yours.  If an opposing player could get a guardian spirit to that now unprotected node, they could essentially steal the node from you, so it required you to protect it as well, even after you took it.  An alternative method to take nodes was to move a guardian spirit close to the node, cast "plane shift" on it, move it over one spot on Myrror, then plane shift it back.  It didn't attack the nasty monsters that were originally guarding the node, and you could bind the node to you without having to take it over.

Armies aren't always the answer.  Magic and adventure ("The Naga hissed at Winnihym, it's eyes narrowing.  'Yessss....' it hissed, the guardian's eyes glowing blood red, 'thissss issss the lossst library of Asssstragar.   If you bring me a midnight sssstone, you may have accessss to its myriad tomesssss....'  Winnihym smiled.  'A midnight stone, you say?  I happen to have...erm...seven of them, right here.'") could equally well overcome the obstacles.

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

"As he reached out with the midnight stone Duke remembered that these things were worth 25G! Snatching his hand back, he drew his longsword shouting, 'HAVE A SWORD INSTEAD, BITCH'"

It would be awesome if you got choices in how to deal with creatures. Adventure techs could give you sneaky ways to bypass guardians or make fights easier. I really don't like how it just makes sites pop up. Also doesn't make sense that the Emperor of the World is too afraid to open a treasure chest even with a massive army at his back because his notable location level is only 1.

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

I never felt any real atmosphere from Age of Wonders... until they added site guardians.  Then I did.  Oddly, having monsters protecting / lairing in important and interesting (i.e. valuable) locations adds a lot to making a world feel 'real' - much more so than random spawns walking everywhere.  After all, everyone wants to live someplace cool, right?  Especially nodes:-)  Excellent point from the original poster about making resource harvesting a real decision, as well.

 

k1

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

Great additions, thank you everyone. I really like the idea that you'd be able to select from different approaches and the link-up with quests. Want to gain access to the library? Either defeat the archmage in combat or bring him a specific quest item.

Also, the mention of atmosphere by tanafres is very interesting. Surveying in GalCiv was interesting in the beginning, but after a few games I would leave my surveyor automated. If you compare this to HoMM or King's Bounty, it pales in comparison. The beginning game is very interesting because of the guardians. Random monster stacks in HoMM? Good for experience, nothing else. Monsters guarding something? Very interesting.

Reply #7 from Elemental Forums Top

I am used to Guardians from the Heroes of Might and Magic games. Since there already is a system for interacting/talking with NPC`s, we could make this quite advanced. When you talk to the bandits guarding the goldmine you could get options like:

1. Fight them and try to capture the mine

2. Pay their price for getting the mine with no fight (for example 150 Gildars)

3. Do a quest and get the goldmine as a prize from them

Reply #8 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting joasoze, reply 7
Since there already is a system for interacting/talking with NPC`s, we could make this quite advanced. When you talk to the bandits guarding the goldmine you could get options like:

1. Fight them and try to capture the mine

2. Pay their price for getting the mine with no fight (for example 150 Gildars)

3. Do a quest and get the goldmine as a prize from them
End of joasoze's quote

 

I love this thread:-)