What mechanics would you like to see in a game where you play as a lich / necromancer? How do you imagine such a game?
You get one-shot by anything so you have to strategically rely on your summons
>>319994473
So it would be more of a strategy game, or turn based top down game where you have to carefully manage your summons?
It should be like VTMB + hitman + Spore.
You have to hide your identity from the common folk and assassinate key NPCs to steal their bodies.
When you steal their bodies, you can customize them like in Spore creature creator.
You use those bodies to raid dungeons and cities.
The game would be balanced around sneaking around cities to supply your army with powerful undead and destroying those cities in your quest for world domination (besieging cities only gives you weak undead mooks)
>>319994690
This is something I always imagined on how it should work. The game would revolve on multiple parts, preperation stage and the actual siege.
The preperation stage is you going into a city in some sort of disguise. Normal folk couldn't tell what you are, but specific NPCs, like paladins, priests or whatever could sense you and instantly attack. You would have to set up the city for your siege, which could involve poisoning food supplies and water, spreading infection, killing people and ressurecting them as puppets and so on.
After that, you could transition to a phase where you actually lay siege to the city. So the poisoning takes effect and X amount of people die, which can be used as corpses to ressurect, or maybe power your more powerful spells (harvest their bones, their souls etc.) Your puppets spring into action. Maybe you're able to set up a network of acolytes? Then it could switch to an xcom styled game, where you have to control the units that you built up during the preperation stage.
Before someone asks/mentions, Lichdom: Battlemage is ass
>>319995594
Lichdom had good spell mechanics, but literally no GAME in it. After a few minutes it became stale. The whole spell system wasnt bad tho and could work in a lich game
>>319994473
That depends on the rpg system.
In some worlds liches are crazy powerful and can kill you just by touching you.
>>319994473
So basically Chess.
>>319996997
This was something I always thoutght about while thinking of such games. You should be able to choose and follow a path for your lich. Is it something frail, that uses summons to fight? Powerful in magic, able to shrug of holy spells and deliver devastating spells of its own? Or something thats uses the souls and bones of its enemies, to reinforce his own body and generate armor, able to go on the battlefield and cleave everything in its path.
Swarm and destroy game.
Control them with the mouse (say it's because of your rod of liching).
Raid graveyards for more corpses and swarm shit.
I liked the Necromancer mechanics in Heroes of Might and Magic V.
The way the game works is that you have a "necromancy power" resource that fully recharges at the beginning of each week. Increasing your hero's level and his necromancy skill greatly increases the maximum cap on the resource.
As you fight and kill enemy groups you are allowed to resurrect some of the dead, and each enemy you resurrect costs this necromancy resource. There are 7 tiers of units and the cost increases exponentially, so you could resurrect a single tier 7 unit (a bone dragon) or a hundred skeletons for the same cost.
There are several maps in the campaign where you don't have a town, yet you end up with a massive army just from raising the enemies you kill.
>Think that my idea for a video game is original
>Get into this thread
>Loads of faggots with literally the same idea and similar vision to expand that, especially >>319994690
>>319995062
Personally, I have always imagined it to be rather similar to Mount and Blade + Dungeon Keeper 2 stealth missions. You know, the ones, in which you had to kill some key lord, before he realised he is being attacked. I would make it more RPG than Mount and Blade, though. More dialogue options. I would also have to give the protagonist some sort of motivation. Revange would probably suit well and the more I thought about it,the more I liked the concept of main protagonist being a woman. Some old grandma whose family has been just killed, got nothing to live for and tries to introduce justice into the world. It's an old concept, but old concepts can sell well, if they are told in an interesting way - see Max Payne for example.
I'm so starved of Lich games that I actually main the lich dude from Dominions 3 years ago. It's alright. I like how you can create a massive army of the dead.
>>319997912
Weird, do people actually want lich game where you can talk with people? Basically VTMB, rather where you just fight, sort of like overlord
It would resemble Overlord.
> be an indie dev
> want to make a game about playing as a lich
> find this thread
> all the ideas have huge scope and would be impossible to make for a two person team
It hurts guys. Wish you gave more concrete game mechanic ideas. Would love to whip someting up.
>>319998431
Evil Genius: Lich Version
>>319996781
>Spend all your time making a spell system in CryEngine
>Remember you forgot to make an actual game
I mean Far Cry was a better tech demo game
>>319994313
Guys you don't understand. The perfect genre for necromancer game would be a tycoon. Just imagine raising your own Tower from the scratch, accumulating special minions and workforce, as well as forbidden artifacts from all over the fantasy world.
You start as a living mage and only later you can choose your way of ascencion. Only later as you get fame church or other organisation starts to be interested in you and you have to defend your home. At this point you are forced for an open confrontation and have to use what you have gathered during exploration phase. Commit forbidden rituals, sacrifice villages to get rid of those pesky paladins and ultimately turn nearby vicinity into a quiet neighborhood where nobody dares to wander.
>>319998645
This is just basically that new cthulhu strategy game coming out soon.
Arcanum but with better graphics and mechanics
>>319998718
what game
>>319998645
that sounds like an amazing idea honestly. can't really imagine how it should look, besides going full xcom base building mode. basically seeing your tower from the side.
>>319998431
Sounds like you need to acquire dev skill
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgRDGWeaL80
>>319998718
I'd prefer more cenralized approach, when you are basicaly occupied with your own base and have other territories as distant pieces of map for sending your minions to accomplish different tasks. Just Imagine DK or Evil Genius with another setting and some sort of phase progression.
>>319998852
I can't find it on my wishlist. Anyways, /tg/ was talking about it awhile back. It got funded on Kickstarter.
You're some eldritch god from beyond space time (or whatever since you can pick and choose) and trying to break through whatever to get here. You manage your cult and stuff and make sure you don't attract the attention of high level heroes while you influence the world.
>>319999527
It is That Which Sleeps. Unfortunately, dev doesn't seem to be working on the project at full speed now. It was more than a month since last video on youtube as well.
>>319998101
I think it could lead to interesting decisions, maybe even find some sterno bum in the gutter that you can coerce/convince to help you further your goals either willingly or unknowingly.
>>319998101
>>319998101
I think they might like it. It's a new thing and Lich personality was never explored so far - as well as other undead. Unless you count lame ass Lich King of WoW.
>>319998564
Far Cry wasn't a tech demo, Far Cry was the best FPS ever made, but nobody understood that, not even CryTek.
>>319999840
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnGAuJz4dMU
It's alright.
>>319999840
It was literally a tech demo game, it just happens to also be an actually good game
>Think there is no story
>There actually is
>The fucking monkeys
>THE FUCKING MONKEYS
>>319999783
Makes me wonder what kind of a personality would a lich have. Then again, it could just be a normal person, that went down the path of power. Its not lick a lich HAS to be bones in a robe when you think about it. You could have the liches power slowly change his body. Or him doing it to himself as an upgrade.
I wonder how fun would the game be if it was more or less a carbon copy of VTMB, but as a lich. Maybe even starting out as a cultist first.
>>320000108
>that one video by the guy too dumb to play Far Cry
And people respect him as some e-celebrity.
>>320000187
I kind of hate how they spoiled them in a cutscene. The game was a mess writing and presentation-wise, but that's just how CryTek rolls.
>>319998852
Isometric view of each separate floor shall suffice, provided that there is some kind of reference map in right low corner of the screen where you can easily switch them.
As for outerworld gameplay, you can establish contacts with other dark mages, trade virgins, plot duke's assassinations or turning him in your puppet with the power of the magic tome you found by chance during excavation on some distant spot of the map. If you uncovered something different, you would have other options like start a plague or mass resurrecting city cemetary. Each important action you want to make costs you resourses and magic power, which is replenished by different means like human sacrifice, artifact disintegration or sucking force from sacred relics and places (but it will cast wrath of paladins on your home tower).
Even if you are only able to choose one main function for each floor (corpsee storage, ritual chamber, library), you still can decorate them spending your resourses and uncovered artifacts if you like their looks.
>>320000417
>hostiles can see you through cover
>boat can launch rockets even when rocketeer is dead
>hostiles alerted by seemingly random events
Thanks for the laughs, senpai.
>>320000327
> starting out as a cultist first
If talking about VTMB, you could play the game as a cultist, similarly on how you play as a fledgling vampire in VTMB. You would get orders from other cultist, first being in small walled of villages and progressing to big cities. Similarly to VTMB you could have different smaller regions to go to in the hubs. Such as catacombs and crypts, sewers, abandoned buildings and so on. Maybe even rivaling liches, that arent as discrete that youd have to deal with.
Basically enforcing your control and keeping the charade up, so your occult networks influence isnt discovered, similarly how the masquaeade worked. Using your powers where others could see could remove a point feom you. Whith each point missing, remplars would appear more and more that could hunt you down.
>>320000724
>hostiles can see you through cover
Happens with some patch and only through a particular kind of cover (tents, mostly).
>boat can launch rockets even when rocketeer is dead
Literally never happened to me.
>hostiles alerted by seemingly random events
I'm not even sure what's that supposed to mean.
>>320000724
>hostiles alerted by seemingly random events
>Had a bug where car physics made 'em all bounce
>Sitting in some bush near a hill scanning for enemies
>See a jeep bouncin' as if someone modded the suspension
>One dude goes near and dies
>Suddenly i'm being fired at from like 500 meters away
>>319998718
what game is that?
>>320001396
That Which Sleeps, as one anon pointed out.
>>320001396
nvm
>Become a Necromancer
>Spooky as fuck
>Instead of using your skeleton army to do evil, use them to improve local infrastructure
>Build roads, schools, hospitals
>Keep the roads bandit free and have them escort merchant caravans
>Group of paladins come to smite you
>The people of the villages you've helped all join up to defeat the paladins to protect you
I think the problems with creating a game like this are the following:
a)As much as I strongly don't believe it, it seems that most people wouldn't want to play an evil-only, mustache-twirling experience, so not many medium-high aaa studios would try something like this.
Which is a big shame because I always love playing evil in games.
B) Being an evil overlord -as some anons pointed out- has different stages. There's preparation (could be sneaking in town, vtm type interactions), minion breeding and deploying for large scale battles -rts- and coming up and personal with the paladin and turning him to dust -action/rpg-.
I loved the overlord series, but you could see it was lacking in that department. You could just focus on combat with overlord and minions and ignore the rest, interactions where minimal, customisation in the tower and breeding was very simplistic and shallow.
Now, most companies barely give one type of decent gameplay, you think they're going to make a game with 3? Naaah. AAA won't spend dosh on that, medium -the few that exist- won't risk it and indie can't make it.
c)Being evil also involves the impact. Like, you got to be able to "enjoy" the suffering of the people. This either needs very clever/creative writing -which is rare- or decent animations, which means no indie because they can't afford it.
In conclusion, it's really hard to see it happen.
And it saddens me.
>>320001680
>Get asked to do a presentation at the school
>"We have a special presentation from Mr. DEATHEDGE THE INFERNAL LORD OF WORMS today, kids!"
>"Hurray!"
>Teach the kids about sustainable farming
>Have your skeletons pass out a small package of seeds to each child after the presentation so they can start their own crops
You should be able to sew together parts of different monsters to create a new undead super monster.
Also mass summons.
Games where you can only have 3 or 10, or 50 skeletons on screen, are shit.
You need atleast 1000 creatures on screen for the game to be good.
>become spooky skeleton lich
>you arent evil
>other skelington lich rises and wants to take over
>you decide to stop him
>you use your magical spells and undead army to fight him
>turn based rpg
>customize your skeleton
>save the world
>>320002314
>>320001993
Some games can still do power fantasy and 'lesser evil' without really going full evil.
Prototype - you're the goddamn Thing, but there's bigger problems you want to deal with.
A lich could find greater, more dangerous, evil that he feels he must defeat.
>>320001680
>>320002107
>>320001993
This is a very good point. A tripple A company wont do it because it feels really niche. Indies wont doit because it will need alot of work to do properly. The only viable option is That Which Sleeps game, which is basically a strategy game turn based. You cant have too many mechanics in the game, so you have to focus on one. Do you want your game to be all about armies and intrigue? Top down strategy is the most viable option, with text based events thrown in there that require you to make a choice.
Overlord is another good example, but like you said, it was shallow and it was like that for a reason. Its hard to expand such a game and basically make it have 2 or even 3 games in one.
VTMB like would be amazing, but again. The story wouldnt feel quite right if you could only be bad, and you should have the options of doing human sacrifices, torment and so on. Thats not something AAA likes. And an indie has no chance in making a game like that.
>>320000327
I think in DnD at least, liches are only skeletons because they usually don't care about mortal desires like hunger, to the point where their bodies become demiliches (just a super powerful skull) while their spirit fucks off in another dimension for more knowledge.
So besides those who went for power and conquest, they'd probably just be detached loners who might have a few things to care about, but otherwise too preoccupied with learning or whatever.
And I could see an escalating game, where you start as a cultist hiding from the world and learning, before becoming a lich and fighting armies with your own while growing more powerful by the day.
>>320002314
>>become spooky skeleton lich
>>you arent evil
I like this idea.
>become lich
>summon a bunch of skellingtons
>go into town
>use the skellingtons for agriculture and constructions
>its not a farming simulator
I just want customisable skeleton generals
Give them nazi hats or something
A dedicated abomination creation menu.
Something that would allow you to put together flesh, bones, and other miscellaneous body parts to create your own unique creatures and send them out to kill and pillage.
Send your old abominations to kill rarer creatures to collect new body parts to create new abominations. Eventually culminating in things like dracoliches and undead giants all warped and twisted to your imagination.
Add skill trees for that unlock skills for greater range of manipulation of body parts and new skills ranging from magical like breathing fire or the creation of armor for your abomination.
But this is something I mostly imagine as a cherry on top of a lich game. Something of a bonus to accompany the regular skeletons, walking armors, and poltergeists, not a game in and of itself.
Also, while a lot of liches do focus on conquest and destruction, I want a game that simulates the scientific curiousities of lichdom with experiments and laboratories and dissecting and exploring new magical theories and shit.
>>320002314
>>320002107
>>320001680
This is amazing. No idea why but I can see it working.
> rather that doing bad deeds, you helpp people in disguise
> you take care of crops
> haave to stealth sneak in to heal people
> summon skeletons to defend against bandits
>>320002710
>Now there's a sight for these old bones
>>320002786
I think I saw a game like this already where you're a skeleton and helping people out.
>>320001993
Dude, just look at Eador:Genesis. It's a very good game and it is even more complex than what has been described in the thread.
The only factor which prevent indie devs from creating such type of game is that they want to deliver up-to-date graphics and they can't do this. But if graphical fidelity is not a priority, then such a game become quite managable to create. You can even use text-based quests to make your game more fleshed out in terms of plot if you can't do it otherwise.
>>320002775
damn a new nakamura?
for a second there I mistook it for a niku drill how embarrassing
>>320002595
>>320003023
Today, graphical fidelity is what matters. People just wont play a game where text is the main way of passing events and completing them. Maybe a few people would like it but thats it.
>>319994313
In my opinion no game has handled high level spells as great as Baldur's Gate 2.
>>320003023
Basically this. Graphics shouldnt be the major factor for such a game. Neither should it be procedural. Just a "simpe" top down simulator where you slowly expand your reach. You could easaly start as a simple bloke with power in a small village, start collecting artifacts, diving into magic and hastening the death of people in your village to build up your empire.
>>319994313
You fight and engage in combat with a more refined and improved system similar to sacrificed.
You can create minions from body parts in a spore like system, who can do other things than combat like transportation, storage, and material gathering.
>>320003023
>>320003625
I wouldnt be opposed to text based but if im playing this cool badass skeleton id like to see everything hat happens.
>>320003985
And this is the point why such a game is hard to make. An indie or a small indie team just wont be able to create all of the game mechanics and the art that people would enjoy looking it. Its upsetting.
>>320001680
I remember reading a copypasta about some D&D anon who did exactly this.
The DMsent another party of players to kill him in the end.
>>320003985
Heh, would this suffice?
>>320004159
I don't think so just imagine shadowrun where you play as lich.
>>320002314
Benevolent undead is always more interesting. It can't work with D&D very well though because it's stupid.
>>320004558
Good liches aren't common in DnD but they do exist these are called archliches. They generally stay away from people which is why they arent common.
>>319994313
I want to be able to summon dozens and dozens of skeletons and fight with them. Kind of like Diablo II: LOD, but with the skeleton cap removed
Weren't Necromancers huge in Diablo II?
Why not extrapolate that with a mechanic that you have to kill enemies to replinish minions.
Build it with a Totem Concept:
Beating Bosses and misions lets you collect special ingridients and materials (Mammoth Fur, Dragon Scales, Lion Teeth? Etc) and by killing several minions it allows you to summon Bigger Minions.
Morality should not be a factor other than sensibly letting you know that if you overconsume materials, it's game over.
So you got to let the beasts, nature and humanity thrive as well.
In game you're viewed as an Evil Plague that can either be the "Bane of the Wicked" or "End Times for All"
And all you want to do is chill out in your castle drinking booze and getting a blowjob from an elf with a huge rack.
We need some more recommendations. Even if they don't fit the theme 100%. I don't know what to play and looking for some ideas.
Sacrifice had some pretty similar gameplay, you kill enemy units for their souls and use the souls to build your own army.
Dorf Fortress lets you become a necromancer in adventure mode, and the mastework mod even lets you play a necromancer faction in fortress mode, though the lack of graphics and the mechanics can be a turn-off for most.
>>319994313
Make-your-own skeleton golems by mish-mashing bones from various creature
>>319994473
>how to make a shit game
>>320004385
Can't see shit, cap'n
>Walk like a haggard old man outside of combat, using your staff for support
>Levitate in combat
I had a dream of a game where you play 3 separate stratas of a Necromancer.
1st is you in your town or city, just a diablo like overworld where you start out as a mage and have to research / discover a tome from which you develop your necromancy powers, obviously you have some limited necro powers at this level and it introduces you to the basics and you choose one path of necromancy (Plague, Skeletons, Puppetry), plague and skeletons are obvious but puppetry is just killing someone and reanimating them really well, so no one realizes they're dead, you do this to take control of the leaders of a city (and in later stages kingdoms and countries). The end of this first strata is you settling a lair Dungeon Keeper style.and becoming a true Necromancer.
2nd is a Kingdom level. Now you must spread your Necromantic influence throughout your kingdom to recover ancient necromancy artifacts hidden by the king, you can focus on any of the 3 styles of Necromancy to do this (plague bombing / zombifying towns and cities, summoning marauding combat oriented skeletons, or killing and resurrecting key people), once you have complete control and discover the artifact you become a lich.
3rd and final is the continental level. Multiple kingdoms, combat is abstracted to Total War style, and each kingdom reacts differently to different methods, you can control the flow of your plague through the overworld as well as command ground forces in either huge battles (total war) or smaller skirmishes utilizing your lich magic.
Then DLC other continents which is just the 3rd level over again with different countries and challenges.
Could be neat.
It's weird. Do people prefer a more strategy focused lich game, where you manage your influence, empire and occultists in a 4k style, with events being text based nd alot of indepth strategical decisions on manipulation and conquest or more of an action orientated game, be it like diablo, overlord or a mix and match like xcom?
>>320007553
That's a very nice idea, but you need to realise that you're basically describing 3 different games in one. Trust me when I say making just one good game is hard enough. Unless you sacrifice alot of focus on all of them.
>>320007778
Spore did it just fi-- hahAHha yeah you're right.
Of the two i'd prefer the overworld empire style.
>>320007553
>>320007778
Well, it's possible to make 2 states of power level in a strategy game fairly easily. RTS games like Starcraft and TBS like Heroes do it all the time.
On the first level, it's just your hero using his necromantic abilities to slowly raise minions. In other words, those strategy maps where you don't have a base. Here you would have to avoid enemy armies and slowly gather your power. You could even implement a smaller "lair" where you're limited to a single unit production and another research building to slowly increase your influence.
Then on the second level you would get your base, an upgradeable necromancer tower and you could start going all-out. Your buildings could empower your innate necromantic abilities, letting you start raising the dead in much larger scope.
Could work really well in a Dragon's Dogma-like setting.
You start as a novice mage in an open world, gradually becoming more lich-like as you level up. There's cities and everything and you belong to some underground cult/organisation. Your motivation is to revive some long lost loved one, though it's left open as to who that is for role-playing purposes.
There's an open world and dungeons to explore/plunder for secrets and materials. You have an undead servant which you can customise and send to other players/hire others. They end up being your captains, and you summon skeletons/zombies/ghosts for them to command.
You can be a squishy mage, death knight or a sort of rogue-ish reaper class that's more mobile, as can your servants.
As things escalate, the hub worlds you once visited freely become hostile and you have to start taking them over and fighting in them. Regardless of how you play, you're the bad guy so you're eventually defeated in the final battle by the hero of the world.
Then you go to hell and that becomes the end-game dungeon.
Would be pretty dope.
>>320008216
And then you conquer hell, and invade the land of the living with a mixed undead-demon army. Once you conquered the earth, you invade heaven and challenge God himself.
>>320008058
> Spore did it just fi-- hahAHha yeah you're right.
haha, this is exactly what I meant. Admit it, spore would of been an amazing game, but it just had to shove so many radically different game mechanics into one. Then all of them felt shallow and unfinished.
>>320008187
Two states could work, since as you said, they could all be strategy based in one way or another. With one you focus more on yourself, and build up small bases of operation, while on the second stage, you focus on your base, territory and eventually empire as a whole.
Honestly, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qb2uub1wn0s looks as a good example on how such a game could be played, as someone already pointed out in the thread. It's based on lovecraftian old golds, but it's more or less same shit.
