I’m not sure if CoG allows saves to be deleted. I remember that that option wasn’t avaliable, usually. Nowadays, most games that are part of a series only let you save your game when the next piece is close to release. So there’s that.
At this point my entire post history is “omg walked away from this game/forum for a while and came back and got re-obsessed and wow _____ is so great” and I’m sorry to inform you that this will be another one of those posts.
I love how the writing style throughout is so simple yet eloquent, graceful, and precise. Every time there is a word I have needed to look up, I’ve found the history/context fascinating and it has heightened my immersion into the world. I feel conflicted about finding such a dark and gruesome world so beautiful, but I can’t help it.
Also, I needed to procrastinate a project, so I read the discussion of the specifics of blood magic and the real sources of aether upthread and am now even more excited to learn more. I am such a nerd for discussions about/involving the intersection/blurring of science and magic and religion. There is so much I could say about this but really I came here to once again express my gratitude!
A reviewer upthread mentioned that this game helped them become a better person, and I think it’s done the same for me. My discovery of this game coincided with a lot of difficulties that occurred in my life, and strengthened my resolve to be the best person I can, and to learn as much as I can to help others.
I wish I could get more of my irl friends into this game, but fantasy and reading in general really isn’t their forte. Even if it was, I almost would hesitate to recommend this game because it’s targeted so precisely some of the the concepts/philosophies that matter most to me and I’d be scared to share!
I guess what I’m trying to say is thanks again Joel 
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In the second book that’s coming up Will there be more RO’s or are we stuck with the ones that we’ve already been introduced to?
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I think all of these characters (excluding the Diadoch) can be met in the next book, I’m unsure if they will be RO’s at that point though
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Awesome thank you 
@Havenstone I have a question about how I can keep the “foodstore” value static, because when I try to modify it, it changes and does not stay static
Many thanks to Kevrj for responding! Here’s something I just wrote about XoR for a friend that may add further detail of interest on the “inspiration” question:
Game and lore design for XoR 1
I started designing it in 2011, just after I read Choice of the Dragon and decided I needed to write my own CoG. Back in the late '90s and early '00s I had run a lengthy D&D campaign around the theme of a slave revolt against an evil fantasy empire, and decided to take the broad plot arc of Rebels from that game. But I carried over almost none of that gameworld’s lore; I didn’t want to use its orientalist tropes, its elves-dwarves-and-dragons Tolkien borrowings, its D&D-esque version of blood magic, or its nine cosmic threats held back by nine talismans (too many MacGuffins, and a distraction from the more interesting political themes). So the Rebels gameworld was written starting more or less from scratch.
I didn’t try to write all the lore from the outset in 2011! The game concept gave me my starting point: an evil empire that harvests the blood of its slave caste to fuel its tech/magic. The empire justifies this by pointing to the threats along its borders. I drew the basic world map with that in mind, also knowing that most people would be reading this game on a mobile, not able to see the map – so let’s just have one province in each of the cardinal directions, and a major threat also roughly corresponding to those directions, as that might be easier for readers to mentally keep track of.
Because the story started in the periphery of one province, I also knew I didn’t have to come up with everything all at once, but would have some chance to “discover” the world as I wrote it, along with the reader/main character.
The first advice I’d give anyone in game writing is to read nonfiction on topics you enjoy thinking about, and weave the real-world dynamics that you find interesting into your game – that can help you escape the trap of just repeating features from other fictional universes. I had decided the empire would draw heavily on Greek culture, so when I started deciding how the magic system would work, I thought of what I knew about Aristotle’s science and the concept of telos. I did a little more reading and research to help me develop a fantasy system with a tinge (not a lot!) of real-world philosophy. And as I’ve read history, philosophy, and politics books over the past decade, I’ve always kept one eye on what might fit well as part of the gameworld. That has helped me put more and more flesh on the bones of the original concept.
As for how progress is going: I’m afraid I have not yet finished my first draft of Chapter One of Game Two. COVID-19 has hit my productivity pretty hard this year; as I’ve said a couple other places, my day job at present is leading a $10m a year charity in Nepal that among other things runs two hospitals. As you can imagine, that job got a lot more complicated this year, with fever clinics and isolation wards and the need to fundraise to fill a gap created by the collapse of patient income during Nepal’s nationwide lockdown!
But my successor as director may be chosen earlier than expected – this week, potentially! – and that might allow me to hand over earlier than expected and switch to a lighter workload from mid-2021. That would open up more time for writing. And when my current term as a missionary is done, in 2022, I’m planning to write full-time until the Rebels series is done.
If Zvad is alive at the end of Book One, you can see him again from Book Three onwards.
Yes. Horion talks about this in Chapter Three, if you indulge him down the right conversational path.
You can find information on the wiki. Happy to answer any specific questions that brings to mind!
Yes! I’m going to do my best to make sure I don’t add any fundamental stats that might require me to update XoR 1 stats and void all old saves. 
And thanks for your kind words about the game; and I also love how active this thread is.
@Bluebirb, I’m speechless. Thanks so much for sharing such wonderful encouragement.
I’m afraid I have a policy of not helping with mods, amigo – not because I have any objection to players modding XoR, but because it takes me enough time to figure out how to make my code do what I want it to do, let alone what other people might want it to do! Best of luck.
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I just wanted to say thank you for your service. That is a hardcore calling, and harder this year of all years.
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@Havenstone hello, i don’t want to make mods, is for personal use but thanks anyway
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Hey guys, this pandemic has been nightmarish and I was on hospitalist service during multiple surges, but I’ve got more free time now…I’ve been working on a few more guides, which will be as thorough as my Steam guide. I’m writing the following:
2COM/1INT Ruth/Dev/Home Low Anarchy Aristo
2COM/1CHA Ruth/Dev/Home High Anarchy Helot
2CHA/1INT Comp/Dev/Cosm Pacifist Aristo
You might think that I write too many 2COM guides. There are reasons for that: 2COM is more finicky to play than the other attributes, and has a more limited range of strong strategies. I’ve done the experimenting so everyone else doesn’t have to. The most successful playstyle I’ve found does either just the Architelone raid (Low Anarchy) or Architelone and de Merre, or Architelone and 3x Caravan Raids (High Anarchy). You’ll set up 150 traps in weeks 8/9/10, and balance Radmar and Breden recruitment runs (do a few more with Radmar.)
Once you’ve gotten a handle on 2COM builds where you stop the Harrowing, you can fairly easily transpose the strategies to every other build.
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Thanks Hugh!
While I’m afraid I still can’t offer a Xthonosmas gift of a playable demo, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that 2021 will be the year that XoR2 gets at least its first chapter out on the forums for you all to play. My successor has been recruited, and I’ll plan to hand over much of my responsibility by June-Aug, which will give me more time to write.
Meanwhile, thanks to Laguz, I’ve been introduced to the core song on the XoR soundtrack:
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Delighted to find today that MathBrush has reviewed XoR over at IFDB. His reviews are always concise and thoughtful, and in this case he captures something about the use of stats in Rebels that I’d not articulated even to myself.
Happy New Year, all! For what it’s worth , I’ve got another 5000 words of Stormwright written during the holidays.
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Thats awesome! I read the review and its pretty good, really exemplifies the good things of your game. Congrats!
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Wow, this is amazing!
I would also like to add that a few days ago on the Discord, a challenge was posted as follows:
- Play a High Anarchy Helot
- Have > 75 in Ruthless, Skeptical, and Homelander
- Defeat the Archon’s Army with all lieutenants alive
Two people successfully completed the challenge, myself and Ledd. I took the strategy in my Steam guide and adapted it to a Skeptical run by changing a Breden recruitment run to a Radmar one to compensate for losing Eclect’s loyalty bonus, and made some edits to get over 75 in all stats (Skeptical is hardmode!).
Ledd played and posted a entirely different strategy for Acts 2 and 3. I wonder how he arrived at it, whether he drafted it from scratch or adapted an existing run.
I think it’s a testament to how amazing XoR is that two players can independently evolve diverse strategies to complete a challenge, and still come away with different stories (I ran a despotic rebellion, he formed the Moot and attacked Hector.)
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Can someone link the COR discord?
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The link doesent lead to the server
Ok try this. You may have to make an account first.
As an aside, I will post an edited list of my own Challenge Achievements below, since there has been some more interest in the game as of late, with some hints and commentary.
Run with the Hares and Hunt with the Hounds : Obtain both your family sword and Mikal de Rose’s assistance.
(Sometimes, intentions matter more than consequences.)
Come and Take a Ride With Me: Finish the game with 7 lieutenants in your rebellion (as demonstrated on the Notable Members screen).
(Not too hard if you get Bleys and keep Zvad.)
Down But Not Out: Finish the game with less than 10 rebels (including children).
(You have to deliberately try to fail to get this ending. It’s much easier if you had a winter mutiny, but can be done without it.)
Don’t Know What I Want, But I Know How to Get It: Finish the game with over 70 Anarchy
(Not too hard, but cannot be done if you are optimizing your Winter.)
I Have Seen a Security Hologram… : Give the order to kill the deserters’ children, and have it obeyed.
(Can you think of a way to keep morale low while keeping people fed?)
Defeat the Running Dogs of Capitalism : Anger the merchants so much that they offer two chests of gold for your head.
(I did this a long time ago and cannot replicate the run! You have to go well out of your way to piss off the Merchants.)
You are in Command Now, Admiral Piett: Find out Alira’s surname by having her listed as a Notable Rebel.
(Think about what the speaker of this quote did, try to replicate it, and end the game on your own terms.)
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Hold up how do you get your family sword