Underworld town (Dungeon)

[Groovy]

I have finally figured out the nature of the mechanics for the Underworld (Dungeon) faction. In retrospect, it’s really obvious, but it has somehow eluded me until now.

Because the main theme of the faction is integration of personality – integrating the rejected/splintered aspects of one’s personality to become a whole person (a part of the process of individuation) – the mechanics basically consist of taking negative traits of units, artefacts, etc, and finding a way for them to support each other and benefit the player so that all of them work harmoniously for the common good, and give the player greater capability than he would have without them. So the mechanics will take a faction of nightmares and reveal it to be a benevolent faction without changing anything that made it appear nightmarish to begin with.

How to actually implement this? I have no idea. Black creatures from Magic the Gathering card game that deal damage to their own player (like Juzam Djinn) would be ideal, but there is nothing equivalent to a player’s life in Heroic. I’ll have to find some other way to portray seemingly negative traits that can be utilised to the player’s advantage.

I think this has the potential to be the most interesting faction. I just hope I can implement it properly.

[Panda Tar]

Interesting, Groovy.

[Elvin]

That almost sounds too.. convenient? That all weaknesses would work out in a way that they can prove beneficial. Would be interesting to see that in action though. Another approach would be that dungeon units are very efficient despite their individual flaws so they would excel in one field but have some serious weakness elsewhere.

For me dungeon is more about deception and opportunism so I would work with that as a basis. But there are more than a few ways of looking at it.

[Groovy]

I think you are spot on, Elvin. Leveraging collective strengths so that they outweigh individual weaknesses will probably work better, and is closer to what I'm trying to do.

If the faction is designed so that each unit, spell, ability, item of equipment, etc, is symbolic of a character trait that is typically viewed in a negative light, then each of those items will have both strength and weaknesses, but weaknesses will be pronounced/obvious while strengths will be subtle and more situational. The key to playing the faction will then be to find a way to combine the faction items in a way that their strengths add up while weaknesses do not.

I don't know how feasible this is, especially considering how randomised the faction lineup is. I agree, though, that finding workable combinations must require some effort. If it's easy/obvious, it will defeat the purpose of the faction.

I don't think that I can use deception and opportunism as a basis for the faction. I'm trying to portray all the factions in a positive light, and I don't think that deception for the sake of deception allows for this. On the other hand, they can work well as themes for mechanics, since both deception and opportunism can be seen as negative traits with the potential to be used positively. I'll probably need more than two, though, to account for randomisation.