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KickStarter Knights of the Chalice 2 Thread - Augury of Chaos

Mortmal

Arcane
Joined
Jun 15, 2009
Messages
9,502
We all know, when it comes to coding, he's a genius, he's the Salvador Dali of the Video games industry, except he put his mustache on his forehead.

Also, his description from twitter :

HeroicFantasyGames.Com
@HeroicFantasy

#indiedev studio creator of the Knights of the Chalice #turnbased #RPG series based on the OGL 3.5, the ruleset at the root of #DnD 3.5.
That has to be quoted in the codex official review.
 

Brozef

Savant
Patron
Joined
Aug 1, 2017
Messages
233
Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Solved the
challenge
If we can get a campaign to 8k then the codex could become a recurring villain in an RPG.
:troll:
If that isn't or poetry and art imitating life, then I don't know what is. I'll happily spend some shekels to make this happen :salute:
 

Rpguy

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Apr 9, 2013
Messages
1,169
Pathfinder: Wrath
If anyone is interested what Pierre has been doing lately, it looks like one of the things is play and write a review for the latest mod of temple of elemental evil.

Here is the review:

Notes on ToEE-Keep on the Borderlands final version
by BlueSalamander » Mon May 04, 2020 1:09 am
Keep on the Borderlands (KotB) is an adventure module for Temple of Elemental Evil (ToEE) created by the Circle of Eight. You can download the game there. I wrote a review of the KotB demo a long time ago. Years later, I played the final version and I wrote a bunch of notes. On the occasion of the Kickstarter campaign for Knights of the Chalice 2, due to be launched on 26 May 2020, I'm posting these notes about KotB. Click on a picture to enlarge it. Contains spoilers.

* In KotB, if you play a party of 4 party members, you will finish the game at level 6, so there's no need to take Metamagic feats or to plan for crafting Holy or Flaming weapons because you won't meet the level requirements for them. Instead, focus on Craft Wondrous Items, Craft Wand and Martial Proficiency (Glaive).

Craft Wondrous Items lets you craft +4 Belts of Strength which are very useful. Craft Wand gives you cheap Wands of Healing, cheap Wands of Identify and any other wand of a spell that you may want to cast several times before resting. Enchant Weapon is useful but not great because there are only a few masterwork items in the game and enchanting from masterwork to +1 only gives you a +1 bonus to damage. By the end of the game, you can craft +2 weapons, but by then you won't need them.

* You can use a trick to get all 18 scores. Click 'roll' then switch to 'point-buy' then increase a score to 18 then drag and drop the 18 to a certain empty spot a few pixels below the initial position. Then switch back to roll, the 18 appears as if it was rolled. Move the 18 to the top of your abilities. Repeat six times until you have all 18.

* For an easier and more pleasant time through KotB, give all your characters all 18 ability scores. That way you will meet all skill requirements, get all the possible dialogues and complete all of the quests. Give all social skills (including languages) to a single character because the game will only check social skills on a single character, the one who is talking. The game will sometimes check multiple skills on the same character, such as Speak Languages, Sense Motive and Diplomacy, so it can be frustrating if you have your skills distributed over several characters.

* Also, use the console command "levelup()" to immediately level-up your characters to level 2. This will allow you to bypass the 'grinding' part, where you have to look for easy encounters just to level up to level 2, because the game does not have any appropriate challenges for a level-1 party. There's a problem of challenge mismatch: you will encounter a Black Dragon and a Spider Queen when your party is very low level; and you will battle with Goblins and Kobolds towards the end of the game when your party is high level and these creatures no longer pose any challenge.

Similar to the RPG Age of Decadence, KotB can be absolutely brutal to first-level characters. There are no quests or encounters specifically geared for level-1 parties. This is not a game for D&D 3.5 neophytes. At level 1, the easiest encounters you could get are wilderness random encounters against pirates.

* All the characters in my party used Glaives, making them very powerful right from level 1. The party included a Fighter with Improved Trip, a Rogue, a Cleric with the Good and Law domains for crafting, a Cleric with the Sun and Law domains, and a Wizard who's a Conjuration specialist with the banned domains of Necromancy and Abjuration. All had strength 18 and Martial Proficiency (Glaive).

* I didn't like to use ranged weapons in KotB. It can be boring to watch long shooting animations, only to have most attacks miss or fail because of the penalties for shooting in a melee, or for shooting through soft cover, or because the target has Damage Reduction that can't he bypassed by piercing damage, and ranged weapons don't allow adding the strength bonus to damage.

* Reach weapons work very well, as well as Ready versus Approach. However, when attacking with a reach weapon, the game will have the character move to the first position from which an attack can be done. This is often not the best position, because to get Flanking bonuses you need to be adjacent to the target, not ten feet away from the enemy. Also, Ready versus Approach may have a bug, because sometimes it gave my characters two attacks in a row. A very effective tactic is to Trip someone as part of a Ready versus Approach action.

* I enjoyed KotB a lot more than Drakensang River of Time. Drakensang suffers from slow loading / slow movement / slow combat, limited party-creation freedom and an uninspiring storyline.

* The AI seemed to be rather sadistic in ToEE / KotB. It often attacked dying characters, rather than standing ones. I also noticed that the AI never uses Five-Foot Step and it always triggers AOOs even when it only needs to move by five feet. As a result, it also fails to use Full Attacks properly. You can use this to your advantage: see how to fight the Black Dragon, below. I thought that animal companions, and thus Druids, are very difficult to use. Most of the time animal companions just stood idle in combat, regardless of what combat setting they had been given; or else they kept triggering AOOs by not taking a path that would avoid them.

* As a non-native English speaker, I found this riddle to be too difficult: 'a gift of water and salt'. Firstly, six words is too short for a riddle. Some NPCs, like the Witch/Seer in the merchant's square, should provide further clues. Secondly, the pearl item is far from the wizard's tower, and it is an item that you would expect the party to sell for money. The fact that this is not a stand-alone riddle, but a riddle combined with many other riddles, makes it more difficult.

* I liked the multiplicity of secret passages in the Caves of Chaos.

* I think that the mad wizard battle has a problem of encounter design. This battle should not allow the player to retreat behind the door, making the enemy much less effective. It should happen at the top or at the bottom of a stairway, where the player cannot retreat to a narrow passage. This would have made the battle much more interesting, like the ToEE guard tower battle where you can't retreat and you are surrounded by enemies.

* The final battle was rather anticlimactic. It would have been great if there had been 10 evil clerics and four chaos beasts. In my opinion, RPG games like Dark Sun, Neverwinter Nights 2, ToEE, Baldur's Gate, NWN 2 Mask of the Betrayer, Champions of Krynn and KotC are made memorable not by having many battles, but by having a few very challenging, very entertaining battles.

* One of the most interesting fights, the one against the caravan guarded by samurais, is reserved to evil parties; I think that it should not.

* Here are some tips for defeating the Black Dragon: 1) let your Cleric cast Resist Element (Acid) on party members. 2) let your strongest character wield a Glaive. 3) let your wizard cast Enlarge on your Glaive wielder. 4) provide any additional magic support to the Glaive wielder, such as Magic Weapon, Shield of Faith, or Bless. 5) let the Glaive wielder approach the dragon and use Ready Versus Approach on the first round. 6) let your wizard cast Ray of Clumsiness and/or Ray of Enfeeblement on the dragon, to reduce its AC and attack bonus. You can easily reduce its AC by three points or so. 7) When the dragon is within reach, let the Glaive wielder attack it and take a 5-foot step back in order to deny the dragon its full attack on the next round. 8) Repeat the last step until the dragon is killed, while using other characters to cure the Glaive wielder as needed. Once the dragon's Hit Points are low, you may consider using all of your characters to attack it, but that is risky.

* The game only allowed three party alignments, including Neutral Good and Lawful Neutral. This wasn't made clear upon installation and it can be frustrating to find it out after you've created a Lawful Good party.

* I found some bugs (these may have been fixed by now). There was a bug with the merchant scales and glasses. The glasses disappear when you move the scales. No 'mark' could be obtained from the Kobold tribe when the Dwarves had already wiped them out by the time you arrive in the Caves of Chaos. There was a bug when talking with the leader of the Dwarves. It was suggested that we could sell gems to the merchant guild master, yet this character does not trade with the player.

You can get an infinite number of times the 300 gold reward from the bailiff for having killed the mad wizard. In the quest to knock out the berserk Ranger, the only way to leave the place (the battlements) after doing the job was to use the world map; this was very confusing as there is a nearby door icon but it is not accessible by the party. The party gold gets randomised on reload during the intro sequence where you can equip your characters. The Black Dragon in KotB was immune to tripping, but not immune to the Grease spell.

In the suffragette quest, in one situation, you can make the woman NPC a honorary member of the merchant's guild, yet the woman will not react to it and you cannot complete the quest. The rogue character Cantrall re-appeared in his former prison cell soon after I freed him as part of a quest. The Hextor Cleric asks for 20 longswords, I brought him 20 longswords, he took them from my inventory and he also took away the +1 Longsword that my fighter was using. That Cleric should not seize equipped items, only inventory items.

* ToEE doesn't centre / zoom in on the acting character in combat, so sometimes it's hard to follow the action when there are far-away shooters like in the jungle map where you fight with spear-throwing lizardmen.

To conclude this post, I'm adding a couple of ToEE ending-slide images, just because I saw them today and they look nice.
icon_e_biggrin.gif
Thank you for reading!

ToEE_EndingSlide_1.jpg


ToEE_EndingSlide_2.jpg
 

Darth Canoli

Arcane
Joined
Jun 8, 2018
Messages
5,737
Location
Perched on a tree
If anyone is interested what Pierre has been doing lately, it looks like one of the things is play and write a review for the latest mod of temple of elemental evil.

I wrote a review of the KotB demo a long time ago. Years later, I played the final version and I wrote a bunch of notes. On the occasion of the Kickstarter campaign for Knights of the Chalice 2, due to be launched on 26 May 2020, I'm posting these notes about KotB.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Patron
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
99,687
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
The vacation continues:



I've made a series of five short travel videos to upload before the 26 May launch of the Knights of the Chalice 2 Kickstarter campaign, just to keep things lively and show some of the places I've been staying at. Please visit www.heroicfantasygames.com for more on KotC 2. For today's relaxing video, I've added some of the music from KotC 1. Cheers :)
 
Joined
Jul 8, 2006
Messages
3,028
lol wth



I've made a series of five short travel videos to post before the launch of the Knights of the Chalice 2 Kickstarter campaign, just to keep things lively and show some of the places I've been staying at. Apologies for the less-than-perfect quality. Please visit www.heroicfantasygames.com for more on KotC 2.

so malta just not into the whole coronavirus thing? How is he traveling around like this now?
 

BlueSalamander

Heroic Fantasy Games
Developer
Joined
Apr 5, 2009
Messages
48
Now, incline has a price too!
Well... Yes. The reasoning for Champion and Paladin is that I'd like for people to up their pledge, and a Steam key may be the clincher for that. More money raised is good for me, obviously, but it also means better graphics, better music, more monsters, more character classes, more adventure modules, more everything really. I'm not suspicious of Steam or GOG.

This certainly smell success, a good 20k collected at best.
Well, we'll see. Even if it raises only 20k I'll be happy with it and I'll be happy in the knowledge that I did everything I could to promote the KS.

He just hates money
You really don't like the announcement video? It's just a simple video. The main one is the one on the KS page and at https://youtu.be/P7D5mhcLQH0.

How is he traveling around like this now?
I have a bunch of photos and videos from various places but I'm not travelling at the moment.

It's a sad day when a king has to bow down to his lessers.
Ah, we'll see if I'm the King after the KS. Or someone just a little bit lower in the hierarchy. :)

By the gods, my eyes.
But the scroll artwork is intended to bring back the good feeling of watching the Bard's Tale scroll enumerating your party's combat damage. ;)

On one hand, it was fairly easy. On the other: what the fuck, Pierre?
You mean you'd like harder puzzles? But it's intended to be fun for lots of people, and some of the later ones may be more difficult.

Is Pierre the artist for the game, too? If I didn't already know the name of the game, I wouldn't guess it from this image. I really want this game to succeed, but stuff like this makes me worry.
Actually, there are two KotC 2 logos and the one with the weird reading order was made by the artist, Roman. I agree it's a bit weird but it looks nice to me, still.

Modding will fix the visuals anyway. The exciting thing about this is the game mechanics engine / custom adventure potential. Honestly I wouldn't mind if it was 100% ASCII, as long as it delivers the true turn-based D&D experience.
Thank you, I hope you won't be disappointed. Also, Kickstarter funds can go a long way towards improving the game's appearance.

In a sea of shit RPGs and early access 1/2 finished shit, gems like this are few and far between. I haven't looked forward to any CRPG more than this one.
Thank you for your great support! Cheers everyone :)
 

AdolfSatan

Arcane
Joined
Dec 27, 2017
Messages
2,028
Oh, I wasn't being serious, it's just that letter sudokus always felt awkward to me. I'm actually quite thrilled about the upcoming puzzles, don't wanna miss the chance to get an item in there.

The thing with your videos (and the general feelings expressed towards them), is that us codexers know that you can deliver the game and don't mind the presentation, but we also want you get the most crowdfunding money you can make, and to do so you need to reach a wider audience. Thing is, marketing tactics and production levels have changed a lot and at breakneck speeds in these last years, and you won't receive the same levels of attention if your game's not up to the standards. Watch at the most successful game KS, take note of the design choices in the written presentation, the cut and timing for the videos, how the information is portrayed, it matters a lot.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Patron
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
99,687
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth


I've made a series of five short travel videos to post before the launch of the Knights of the Chalice 2 Kickstarter campaign, just to keep things lively and show some of the places I've been staying at. This video features KotC 2 Tavern Music. Visit www.heroicfantasygames.com for more on KotC 2. Take care :)
 

Rpguy

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Apr 9, 2013
Messages
1,169
Pathfinder: Wrath
He also posted on twitter and facebook:
https://twitter.com/HeroicFantasy
https://twitter.com/i/status/1258785101690875906


HeroicFantasyGames.Com

@HeroicFantasy


Sharpen your Swords, and Prepare your Spells, for Knights of the Chalice 2 is coming! Today I posted a video of Hong Kong at https://youtu.be/cqY6DYeazI4 and images from comic book Thorgal at https://facebook.com/HeroicFantasyGames…. Here's a GIF from the KotC 2 Kickstarter. Enjoy! #RPG #indiegame





On the occasion of the Knights of the Chalice 2 Kickstarter campaign, due to be launched on 26 May 2020, I'm going to post a number of images which I consider to be a good source of inspiration for RPG design.

Today, I am uploading some of my favourite images from fantasy comic book Thorgal. These images were created by Grzegorz Rosiński.

Today I have also posted a video about Hong Kong featuring some KotC 2 music, so I'm adding a couple of images from the video, too. Feel free to check it out at https\://youtu.be/cqY6DYeazI4. Best regards everyone!
 

Xoanon44

Literate
Joined
May 9, 2020
Messages
8
Now, incline has a price too!
Well... Yes. The reasoning for Champion and Paladin is that I'd like for people to up their pledge, and a Steam key may be the clincher for that. More money raised is good for me, obviously, but it also means better graphics, better music, more monsters, more character classes, more adventure modules, more everything really. I'm not suspicious of Steam or GOG.

This certainly smell success, a good 20k collected at best.
Well, we'll see. Even if it raises only 20k I'll be happy with it and I'll be happy in the knowledge that I did everything I could to promote the KS.

He just hates money
You really don't like the announcement video? It's just a simple video. The main one is the one on the KS page and at https://youtu.be/P7D5mhcLQH0.

How is he traveling around like this now?
I have a bunch of photos and videos from various places but I'm not travelling at the moment.

It's a sad day when a king has to bow down to his lessers.
Ah, we'll see if I'm the King after the KS. Or someone just a little bit lower in the hierarchy. :)

By the gods, my eyes.
But the scroll artwork is intended to bring back the good feeling of watching the Bard's Tale scroll enumerating your party's combat damage. ;)

On one hand, it was fairly easy. On the other: what the fuck, Pierre?
You mean you'd like harder puzzles? But it's intended to be fun for lots of people, and some of the later ones may be more difficult.

Is Pierre the artist for the game, too? If I didn't already know the name of the game, I wouldn't guess it from this image. I really want this game to succeed, but stuff like this makes me worry.
Actually, there are two KotC 2 logos and the one with the weird reading order was made by the artist, Roman. I agree it's a bit weird but it looks nice to me, still.

Modding will fix the visuals anyway. The exciting thing about this is the game mechanics engine / custom adventure potential. Honestly I wouldn't mind if it was 100% ASCII, as long as it delivers the true turn-based D&D experience.
Thank you, I hope you won't be disappointed. Also, Kickstarter funds can go a long way towards improving the game's appearance.

In a sea of shit RPGs and early access 1/2 finished shit, gems like this are few and far between. I haven't looked forward to any CRPG more than this one.
Thank you for your great support! Cheers everyone :)

Hello, your game looks great. Do you plan on supporting any of the software that is currently out there for making VTT battle maps? Dungeondraft for instance is a new programme that exports the data for LOS and wall collisions, which is a huge time-saver for map makers.
 

BlueSalamander

Heroic Fantasy Games
Developer
Joined
Apr 5, 2009
Messages
48
I'm actually quite thrilled about the upcoming puzzles, don't wanna miss the chance to get an item in there.
Glad to hear that! :D

Watch at the most successful game KS, take note of the design choices in the written presentation, the cut and timing for the videos, how the information is portrayed, it matters a lot.
Yes, that's true. It's hard. Thank you for the tips :)

Hello, your game looks great. Do you plan on supporting any of the software that is currently out there for making VTT battle maps? Dungeondraft for instance is a new programme that exports the data for LOS and wall collisions, which is a huge time-saver for map makers.
Thank you for your support! I hope that KotC 2 will facilitate the creation of tabletop battle maps. Right now, the map editor of KotC 2 has a few export options: Export image to PNG, Export tile map as JPG, and Export the map's zones to PNG. We can discuss the addition of more export options after the KS. Take care all! :)
 

Bara

Arcane
Joined
Apr 2, 2018
Messages
1,335
Huh this is probably old hat but apparently Pierre's scheduled a AMA on June 11 at 9 AM EST on r/ games for KoTC2.
 

Rpguy

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Apr 9, 2013
Messages
1,169
Pathfinder: Wrath


What are your favourite #RPG antagonists: dragons, slavers, mind-flayers, mad wizards, mad kings, dark elves, giants, orcs, liches, vampires, necromancers, demons, devils, evil clerics, evil armies, constructs, celestials, yourself from previous lives, evil gods? #indiegame

EXwk3UxWsAIiTag
 
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