The Dark Order [updated 30/06/2022]

[nocturno]

Interest check thread original post here

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Welcome to Kindorius, a territory isolated by sea, desert and mountains, where various races coexist in a tenuous peace maintained by humans, once conquerors and now monarchs.

The wars are long over, and although they have their differences, there are no significant quarrels between the races of Kindorius: Dwarves, elves, humans, halflings and drakorians just live their lives under the banner of the human King Hartair.

But now something is changing.

Zoon, a mysterious necromancer, has secured a place of power as an advisor to King Hartair, at the same time as hordes of previously unknown creatures have begun to invade and destroy various villages for unknown purposes, and entire communities disappear without a trace.

Strange energies emanate from various points in the territory and events line up in the direction of an ancient prophecy, of which only fragments are known. And at the centre of it all, an unlikely hero emerges.

You.

In the quest to discover the reasons behind a new evil, whether it is for revenge, power or wealth, you will have important choices to make and a long way to go to fulfil your destiny. Who is Zoon? Where do the mysterious creatures come from? Who are really the people who cross your path?

Welcome to Kindorius, a land where the truth is never what it seems to be.

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Grab your swords/bows/daggers/fireballs and come help defeat (or join, for that matter) a new evil who wants to conquer Kindorius and the rest of the world’s territories.

Features:

• D&D-based rules (note: it will not be necessary to know how to play, or have ever played, D&D to enjoy this game);
• The choice of class and subclass does not change the difficulty of the game, but it does lead to different dialogues/experiences/endings;
• Alignment mechanics (good/evil, lawful/chaotic) that influences the player’s journey;
• Partially non-linear story;
• Use different combinations of weapons/armor/shield (no restrictions, although it is best to choose accordingly to your class - sorry, a wizard with a sword and shield will not fight very well…);
• Adjustable ability scores;
• Available classes (may change): warrior, ranger, rogue and wizard.

This game is in development (approximately 21000 words so far). You can now read and play a prologue, an interlude and two chapters. Being a work in progress, it is likely that even the contents now presented will have changes.

In the meantime, I would like input from the community (players and writers) so I can improve my work and be able to create a memorable experience. I would really appreciate your feedback (bugs, suggestions or just an hello) at ruicoelho@vivaldi.net.

To play the demo, go here: https://dashingdon.com/go/9382

Thanks!

P.S.: Thanks to @Sargent for his awesome ChoiceScript extension for VS Code.

[Valixon]

@nocturno spotted a word that doesn’t make sense to me at least near the start where haldar and Thora are speaking and Thora is speaking of seeing fear amongst the warriors eyes you have the word " avenged " used makes no sense to me since that word means essentially having righted a wrong done. Yet in the context of them talking doesn’t work yet even with a breif glance so far looking good over all and I’m looking forward to seeing more

[Celerity]

I would love Sorcerer class to be able to use Char instead of Int for magic casting

[nocturno]

@valixon Even though it’s not common, in this case avenged can be used instead of prevail, for example. But I changed it because I agree with you, it doesn’t sound good in that sentence.

@Celerity I wish I had more classes, but in this game each class has two subclasses, which means I’ll already have eight different perspectives throughout the narrative. I can’t promise anything, but the game is still in its early stages and maybe I can include another class later on.

[Shadyaddams]

Love this so far! Will rangers get a soul bond beast companion? And will they be able too gain a few nature spells? Definitely hoping for a beast companion. Then my halfling ranger can also use it as a mount lol

[Thanatos]

U know when i read DnD in the middle of something, i know i’ll have to keep my eyes on it, through i would have liked the paladin class xD

Ps; its a sugestion, however i i’ll read the wip still

[Harley_Robin_Evans]

Sounds interesting

[Mistyleaf123]

Strength

[JBento]

Ooooh, DnD. With +1 to all stats for humans, this looks like 5E rules at first, let’s check it out.

You ABSOLUTELY need to tell people the effects of each ability score during character creation, for people who aren’t familiar with the system.

So, I have 14 Dex, which should theoretically bump my AC to 12, but in the first fight it’s a 10? It also doesn’t impact my AC in any other battle.

It still wouldn’t save me from that specific hit, but I thought it worth mentioning.

Alright, we got a prof bonus of +2, so def 5E in the house.

“mage” doesn’t really tell anyone much, and you need to tell people the meaning of that choice. Same for “protector of the mortal realms”. Anyway, I found out that by “mage” you meant “evoker”, which is a waste of a wizard, so lol no. Guess I’m necro’ing through (haha) life!

I suppose it’s on purpose I can’t take both books? Feels a bit unfair, as I presume fighters can take both a weapon and an armour.

You don’t tell people what Perception is based on.

I’m curious to see where this goes.

[nocturno]

@Shadyaddams I’m open to suggestions, and given that we can play as a ranger there will definitely be the opportunity to have a companion!

@Mistyleaf123 Thanks! How did I miss tath?

@Thanatos Same answer I gave to Celerity.

@JBento Wow! You’ll have to give me some time to answer to all the comments/suggestions. I’ve already identified some bugs that I’m fixing. Thanks for the feedback!

I plan to update the game every Sunday.

Meanwhile, for those who are interested, I’m also making available some of the code I’m writing for the game, like the inventory module I’m using and that can easily be used for other projects.

[Verdancer]

I love this game so far (despite not having even left the customisation part yet), I’d like to keep an eye on this as it develops but for the meantime. I just wanted to let you know that opening the stats screen infinitely soft locks the game - before you choose a name that is.

Edit: And now I realise this was already known as after choosing a name it lets you know about just that, sorry! xD

Edit, the second coming: Okay, this time I’m certain I came across a bug. After the clearing scene, which I won’t elaborate on because I can’t remember how to spoiler words, I somehow ended up back at the Zworg scene for being bait?! Not to mention reselecting my name to boot.

[Shadyaddams]

My only suggestion would be something unique like the spells cast are cast through the best companion. Like a psudodragon, casting a healing spell would be it breathing a healing mist, an attack spell would be it breathing acid or fire or something like that. Being able too see through its eyes and hear what it hears. Stuff like that. It only dying when we die

[Munkee]

If possible, I (and probably some other people) would appreciate a monk class. Even if it’s harder from not having sufficient gear or magic ability

[nocturno]

@JBento The AC bug was fixed, thanks for the tip! I’ve also revamped the stats screen and I’m improving the spell system.

@Celerity @Thanatos @JBento @Munkee I’m considering removing the subclasses and adding a fifth class (people here have already mentioned sorcerer, paladin and monk) and/or another race (I’ve already been asked to make drakorian available as an option).

For now, I am working on the third chapter. From the fourth, the story will become non-linear. Thank you all for the feedback!

[nocturno]

@Shadyaddams Thanks, that’s a very interesting idea, I’ll think about how it could be implemented in the story.

[nocturno]

@Verdancer Thanks for the feedback! I couldn’t replicate that bug yet. Is it possible that I was updating the game at the same time and you had that effect? I’ll run more tests to try and figure out what happened.

[Suryaansh_mokta]

Played the demo and it was pretty nice. I hope you continue with your progress without any problems

[Mercz94]

Is this genderlocked male? There was one point where your character was referred to as “he” right after the fight at the end of the demo… but not sure if that was intended or not, since both before and after that it seems like you intentionally wrote it to be ambiguous, at least for now.

[nocturno]

It’s supposed to be ambiguous, the reader can imagine a main character of any genre. I haven’t managed to find that “he” yet, but it definitely has to be exterminated. Do you remember any part of the sentence where it appeared?

EDIT: I do however have some doubts about the word “hero”. Despite being considered gender-neutral by many, the word “heroine” still exists.

[Mercz94]

Right here at the bottom