WIP Battlemage Correspondence Course Closed for Beta

Hi everyone, chapter 7 has been uploaded! It’s got a lot of branches, making it over 20k words (!) so any help in finding issues is much appreciated. I’ll be doing a big edit I think before moving on to the next chapters, which should be finished more quickly than this one. Thanks again everyone for your help!

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Chapters 8, 9, 10 uploaded! That means we’re at the penultimate chapter - all that’s left is the final chapter and epilogue. But there is still quite a lot of work to do. Chapter 10, like Chapter 7, is a particularly complex chapter with many branches. Aside from editing all the rough language into something more readable, I will need to go through and make sure each branch is working as intended, so any feedback is much appreciated as always. I am definitely looking out for any opportunities to improve this to make a great ending, and I’ve incorporated almost every bit of feedback given in this thread (except saves, sorry) so please don’t be shy with suggestions!

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In Chapter 7, there is a ‘*set cano %+10’ in the middle of the text.

"Back in your room, you yawn and stretch. That’s when you remember El Cano’s assignment. *set cano %+10 You think you fulfilled it well enough. It should be no problem to write down some convincing results. You sit down and write your letter. "

Thank you, I see the problem. I’ll fix it right now!

Edit: Okay, should be fixed now.

There is a problem with the Chapter 10. I joined the last tournament in Chapter 10 and won it all alone without going for Sir Kelton or aaking someone to watch my tournament but all my first places was took by other npcs even though I clearly won it all with the highest score and I only received a golden bow and after there is a loop at the ending.

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Hi thanks for taking the time to write this up. You need to beat the combined score of the winners through all of the tournaments in the game, not just win the final one. I can make that more clear in the next edit. Also, there still might be balance issues I can adjust if you want to tell me more about the scores you got in any/all tournaments you participated in? Finally, the end of Chapter 10 should loop back to the beginning of the book since that’s all there is right now (it’s not finished).

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I have really grown to like this.
Though I find the Tournaments to be pretty tough

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Thanks, I am actively looking for ways to tweak this. It’s hard to find the fine line between a narrative that makes the first tournament difficult because you’re a beginner squire, and the expectation we all have about games being possible to beat with enough skill and effort.

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So how do you win any of the tournaments? I’m using the quarter staff and I’m getting my ass handed to me in the first round

You need to read the choices for stat tests. Basically there’s probably going to be at least one agility choice, one strength, and often a magic cheat. Choose your strongest stat, but keep in mind they also telegraph different points. So, overhead blow is a high test of power with a high payoff of thirty points but high risk of losing immediately. I believe with staff I also wrote some that test strength and agility simultaneously, which are easier if I remember correctly. I recommend either cheating or chipping away ten points at a time. Let me know if it’s too hard.

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I dont have screenshots for it but I remember that I joined 3 tournaments and my overall scores is 79 in archery, 60 in melee and I forgot what is the perfect score for joust but Im pretty sure I got a perfect score in three joust tournament. To get the highest scores in all tournaments I focus my stats in heal and agi only. In melee, I used sword.

Okay, thank you for letting me know. I think archery is in a good place, but I might adjust the others a little. But you almost got a rank in combat, and keep in mind that the most points you can get in one tournament in combat is technically 50 (150 total for all three) and for joust it’s 120 (360 for all three tournaments). The scores you need to win are not nearly that high, I’m just letting you know it’s possible to get a much higher score. Archery is a lot lower though, the max you can get with all three tournaments is 90, but the score you need to win is also much lower.

I dont think so coz from based from what I know in my prev playthrough. In archer tournament, you only get less than 8(or 9 Im not sure) but never 10pts even if your agi is high. In melee, you only get 3 hits never 5 and in every perfect hit, you only get 10pts so its impossible to get a 50 pts and I only missed one melee tournament and for joust. You only get 3 hits and for every perfect hits you get 30pts so you only get 90 pts in each joust tournament.

In archery, it is possible to get a 10, it just doesn’t always happen. In combat, you can score 10, 10, then to finish it you can go for 30. Same with the joust - two head hits is 30 each (60 total), then go for a dismount in the third round for 60 points (120 total). Even though the max hit will end the round, if you get points before going for a max hit you can get more total points.

Idk thats never happen to me :thinking: but I will try btw I suggest that you add rankings for tournaments so we can track our scores.

That sounds like a really cool feature but might be a lot of work. I’ll think about it!

Hey everyone, I’ve done a balance update to make the tournaments easier, make the winning conditions a little clearer, and make the final tournament categories easier to win. I’ve also made a couple of other things slightly easier to try to encourage people to take different story paths (I’ve seen a lot of talk about the tournaments in this thread but not a lot about the other paths you can take). As always, thanks everyone for your help!

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Hi again. My playtests just weren’t satisfying still, so I decided to do another major balance update. I decided that making the bar lower and lower on things wasn’t the right approach. I never felt like the player got to feel powerful and discover all the interesting things I’d written for them to do. So, I decided to significantly increase the stat changes. Now, the playtests feel much better, in my opinion. Let me know what you think!

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I encountered an infinite loop bug during the tournament:

No matter how many times I press next, it still gives me the same scene

Edit: It also says the special reward for the winner is a bow, but the scene is for a joust.

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Thanks for finding this. I found the problem, and it should be fixed now (you won the joust, congratulations!).

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