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People of Elemental: the Empires

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People of Elemental: the Empires

from JoeUser Forums

The Empires of the East are dominated by races of beings collectively known as “The Fallen”. These are beings that bred by the Titans of old to be better than the mortal men and dragons and other “natural” creatures of the world.

There are lots of Fallen creatures in the world. The Empires are led by beings that are both sentient and social (dragons, are sentient but are solitary).

The Empires believe in the justice of raw strength and strive to increase their power.

 

The Empires of the Fallen

 

 

 F_Wizard_F[3]
The Empire of Umber (Urxen sometimes called “Goblins” in Common).[more]

 

F_Resolin_M[4]
The Empire of Resoln (“Wraiths” in the common tongue).

 

F_Warrior_F[3] 
The Empire of Yithril (“Trogs” in the common tongue)

 

 

 

 

F_DragonWarrior_M[3]
The Empire of Magnar (“Magnars” in common tongue, sometimes called “Demon Elves”).

 

 image
The Empire of Kraxis (“Krax” in common tongue, sometimes called “Blood Traitors”). They are the race of men who found themselves on the eastern side of the chasm after the cataclysm.

215,683 views 115 replies
Reply #51 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting docbates7, reply 34
Maybe an alignment system that doesn't paste everyone into a pure Kingdom=good Empire=bad light with events that will drive the story forward?

 

Let me add my voice here. I really, really hope we can have something a little more nuanced than kingdom good, empire eeeeeeevil. I recall reading references to kingdom factions using life magic and empire factions using death magic. If memory serves, at the time there were tantalizing hints that life wasn't neccessarily "good" while death wasn't neccessarily "bad." I'd love to see that followed up on in some way. I'm encouraged by the Tolkien analogies that point out that some of the "good" races were the LotR equivalent of "Fallen." Let's see some more movement along those lines.

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Reply #53 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Cauldyth, reply 48

Yeah, there were people complaining a while ago that there weren't going to be any elves or dwarves in the game.  Now there are other people complaining that some of the races are too similar to elves and dwarves.  You really can't win.

Everyone just needs to chill, not read too much into concept art, and worry more about the game mechanics.  That's what'll make the game.  Personally, I'll probably customize my own race every time I play.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding the purpose of this beta.  I thought it was for people to say what they liked/didn't like, and what they wanted/didn't want, and what works/doecsn't work, etc.

People saying they want elves and people saying they don't want elves is fine, it's not a problem.  There's no winning or losing, just folks expressing their opinions -- and isn't that what we're supposed to do?

Stardock aren't fragile kids, they can take constructive criticism/suggestions.

I agree with you about the customizing, so I'm not too concerned with this stuff -- as you say game mechanics are paramount (as that's hard to customize).

I see both sides of this -- the 'usual suspect' races are a bit overdone (heck, Tolkein copied much of that), but having completely new races just to be different is a bit overdone too.  And regarding the good/evil thing... I'd like the option to make it chaos/order as I think it's more interesting and different and offers a lot of storyline possibilities, but that's not a complaint, just an observation, and I'll enjoy the game regardless.

Reply #54 from Elemental Forums Top

Maybe I'm misunderstanding the purpose of this beta. I thought it was for people to say what they liked/didn't like, and what they wanted/didn't want, and what works/doecsn't work, etc.

I'm just saying not to read too much into concept art.  None of this is actually even in the beta yet (well, not our beta anyway).  I'd rather not render a verdict without having even played one of these factions.  This is just concept art of the sovereigns.

 

Reply #55 from Elemental Forums Top

Let me add my voice here. I really, really hope we can have something a little more nuanced than kingdom good, empire eeeeeeevil. I recall reading references to kingdom factions using life magic and empire factions using death magic. If memory serves, at the time there were tantalizing hints that life wasn't neccessarily "good" while death wasn't neccessarily "bad." I'd love to see that followed up on in some way. I'm encouraged by the Tolkien analogies that point out that some of the "good" races were the LotR equivalent of "Fallen." Let's see some more movement along those lines.

Agreed wholeheartedly. I don't really care on the originality of them as long as we don't get the same old hackneyed good/evil duality. There's a lot more colors in the spectrum, and I want to be able to use them. I'd love to see some of the empires/kingdoms not really fit in from a moral standpoint with their counterparts or at least be able to not do so relatively easily. I love it when a game really makes me think about what the right thing to do in a situation, whether it's right to do something or when you can do absolutely horrible stuff that ends up having been the right thing to do. But most of all I love subverting the conventional black and white morality system. I want the option to use necromancy to return people to happy (maybe, or maybe just beneficial to everybody else enough that it outweighs the problems for the zombies) productive lives if I want to and I have the skills, rather than running around cackling and zapping things like a saturday morning cartoon villain.

tl;dr version: I really want to see options to use traditionally heinous skills like necromancy for good ends instead of being pigeonholed into the whole 'grotesque mockery of life' subset that's really only good for cannon fodder.

Reply #56 from Elemental Forums Top

I'm having trouble understanding the "way to rip off Tolkien crowd." The only real similarity that I can find is that the Fallen were created by powerful beings by modifying the natural sentient beings of the world - a parallel to most of Morgoth's/Sauron's forces being tortured mutations of elves, men, ents, etc. However, that people are complaining about that now would be silly, considering we've had that particular piece of information since pretty much the initial announcement of the game.

The Urxen look almost nothing like the goblins of Tolkien's world, and if Brad hadn't mentioned that they are sometimes called goblins I doubt anyone would really associate them with goblins, at least not Tolkien's. The Resoln, or "wraiths" - what makes a wraith? Do they have anything at all in common with Tolkien's besides the name? All we know about them is that they have pale complexions, and as far as we know that might be all they have in common with the stereotypical notion of a wraith!

The Ythril look completely unlike any Tolkien-related artwork I've seen. They stand out to me as having the least human-like form (their hips look like they're set pretty far apart. They look like they'd have crazy lower body strength. The Magnar look noble, intelligent, physically powerful and huge in stature, with some reptilian features. They don't look particularly cruel, malicious or slow-witted, and as such I can see no meaningful comparison to anything in Tolkien's world...

The Kraxis... I can see the comparison to the Easterlings in that they are both human groups on the side opposing the majority of humans. And that they both originate from "the East." Comparison ends there, and that's a pretty superficial likeness. The Easterlings are an aggressive and relatively primitive race of men that submitted to the will of a powerful evil being. The Kraxis don't appear to have subtmitted to any higher power, but to have made a practical allegiance with the Fallen for the sake of survival. If you found yourself on a continent alone with 4 hostile races, and all your friends across the sea, would you fight? Or ally yourself with your new neighbors. The Kraxis chose the latter, and whether out of survival, greed for power, or whatever, they don't serve any analogue to Sauron (as far as we know).

 

Likewise, we don't know if Fallen = Bad, Kingdom = Good. I get the impression that Stardock is trying pretty hard to prevent that from happening. And if they succeed, then the fact that the Kraxis didn't align themselves according to race becomes even more meaningful. I agree it would be pretty boring and overdone if the evil men go and join the evil monsters because... well, because why? What would they actually have in common? Maybe a desire to rule the world, or destroy the world, but the former wouldn't imply a healthy alliance, and the latter is trite.

If Fallen = Bad and Kingdom = Good, I'll be sorely disappointed, as will most other people I think.

This can be fixed with some game mechanics that create an actual difference between Kingdoms and Empires; and that actually make Empires "unnaturals" have some trully unatural quality other than simply starting with a Death Magic Book. Whooptido, Mr. Bluebird is sitting on my shoulder.  Give me an in game consequence for being unatural that will pervade my choices, make me truly understand that I am not truly in sync with the world.

And what makes you think they aren't planning to differentiate the races beyond cosmetics? To quote from the Kingdoms thread:

While of one species, each race is substantially different from one another in terms of culture, capability, and philosophy.

Straight from the horse's mouth. Not to mention that Stardock has stressed from the beginning that while there would only be two true playable races (not including custom content), the factions would nonetheless be as diverse as if each were its own distinct race.

 

To look at some concept art and say "boring! they're all the same!" or to make off the wall comparisons to fantasy from other stories (again, based purely on some concept art of sovereigns), is pretty short-sighted and makes more assumptions than most people would feel comfortable if they would just take a moment to actually think about what they're saying.

Reply #57 from Elemental Forums Top

A few quick answers to some of the questions:

 

1. The Empires ARE NOT evil.  The Empires use death magic and that means the areas they control on the map visibly look different than the lands controlled by kingdoms.  We only have two such philosophies because it would become virtually impossible to have more than 2 cosmetically different sets of land tiles (not to mention cost prohibitive).

When players battle, if they're on land that is influenced by death magic and they're empire, they get a bonus. If they're on land influenced by life magic and they're kingdom, they'll get a bonus in that event. 

 

2. There are no undead races in the game (though summon spells can bring in all kinds of interesting things). 

3. I'm not sure what the person talking about dragons meant. Dragons weren't involved in the cataclysm nor did they ever rule over men. 

4. The factions will always be referred to in the UI by their official name. There won't be "demon elves" as an official name in the user interface for instance.

5. The Fallen are a classification of creatures that are unnatural, they're not "evil". Each faction behaves in its own way.

6. There are substantial differences between factions (they get their own tech trees for starters), they have their own strengths, weaknesses, and visuals.

7. All of the playable races are humanoid.  

8. I think people read in an awful lot from a shots of concept art and their name. :)

 

 

Reply #58 from Sins Forums Top

I prefer them to all be evil anyway. :(

 

It just bugs the hell out of me when I'm leading an empire of do gooder busy bodies and I get in a war with the other do gooder busy bodies.

 

When I'm death incarnate and out to reap life from the planet, it just feels right...

Reply #59 from Elemental Forums Top

I should clarify there: Being an Empire does not make one inherently evil.

By most moral human standards, the Magnar, Urxen, and Trogs are pretty evil though to varying degrees (I'd say the Magnar are the ones who would be most classically "evil").

Reply #60 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Splitshadow, reply 47

People give organized, well thought out, constructive criticism, and you just shoot it down with your fanboy antics. Considering Elemental is in beta, maybe Stardock would like constructive criticism to make sure the game is as successful as possible. That's not to say you shouldn't laud SD for its achievements, but dear sir, if you could stop drooling it would help.

</rant>

Err, fanboy antics?  I was actually expressing a legitimate liking for the direction the creative team is taking the game.  This the first Stardock game I've taken a vested interest in, I don't even have Impulse installed. 

Apparently I came across as sounding harsh, which was not my intention at all.  As a developer myself I know how hard it is to hear people telling you your hard work is stupid.  Comments like "Stardock doesn't have any creative writers?" "Each of these races are very bland and non interesting." and "so did we just completely rip off all of Tolkien and MoM ideas and pass them off as Fallen/Kingdoms?" don't strike me as particularly constructive.

As others have said lets be honest here, it's pretty hard to come up with an original sounding fantasy name these days that hasn't already been used and re-spelled by 100 dungeon masters and fantasy writers 100 times.  I'm just fine with content inspired by other content that I like.

Reply #62 from Elemental Forums Top

Very cool!  I already want to try out the Yithril and Resoln based on the artwork alone.  :grin:  

 

 

Reply #63 from Elemental Forums Top

Is it just me or most of the Empires have a much cooler looking armor? :grin:

 

Also, I don't know if this was discussed already, but if you are not undead shouldn't living in the lands of death magic make it disadvantageous for everybody? You know like awefull weather, failing crops, bad birth rates, low morale. Even if you are good at using it death magic it is still death magic. Not good for your health. Is there an explanation for why Empires like its climate so much, or is it simply "we are death magic users so, like, we love everything dead"?

Reply #64 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 59
I should clarify there: Being an Empire does not make one inherently evil.

By most moral human standards, the Magnar, Urxen, and Trogs are pretty evil though to varying degrees (I'd say the Magnar are the ones who would be most classically "evil").

I think that most of the people will think about the Empires being evil because of death magic. :) Either way I really like this Kingdoms - Life magic, Empires - Death magic concept in the vanilla game. :thumbsup:

Reply #65 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 57

2. There are no undead races in the game.

If it's not giving too much away, then, what is the context for the 'Wraiths'/Resoln?

Reply #66 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting MTCason, reply 65

Quoting Frogboy, reply 57
2. There are no undead races in the game.
If it's not giving too much away, then, what is the context for the 'Wraiths'/Resoln?

 

You know the ghosts in starcraft?

They aren't actualy ghosts.

Reply #67 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting MTCason, reply 65

If it's not giving too much away, then, what is the context for the 'Wraiths'/Resoln?
Stargate Atlantis?

Reply #68 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Cauldyth, reply 54

Maybe I'm misunderstanding the purpose of this beta. I thought it was for people to say what they liked/didn't like, and what they wanted/didn't want, and what works/doecsn't work, etc.
I'm just saying not to read too much into concept art.  None of this is actually even in the beta yet (well, not our beta anyway).  I'd rather not render a verdict without having even played one of these factions.  This is just concept art of the sovereigns.

 

Well, so far, and in spite of all the respect I have acquired for Stardock those past few games, I must say agree with the criticism: the fantasy aspects are starting to look dreadfully cliche. I'm not sure it serves the game, and I'm afraid it's going to make it difficult to be remembered for its universe (it might still be fondly remembered for its gameplay, don't get me wrong). Stardock isn't TSR/WotC, and don't own an already renowned "classic fantasy" IP such as the forgotten realms.

A fantasy setting people will remember is easier to obtain by going radically different. The best way to give it a soul is to make sure people won't say "this is standard fantasy setting #890". For instance, Dragon Age, although it does have elves and dwarves, rearranged the way things worked completely so as to surprise its players (elves being slaves, dwarves being prone to corruption and political disorder, etc.). And that's the least original I can think of - Torment, the Elder Scrolls (even though I don't like that universe, it does stray away in many respects from the generic Tolkien fantasy), Arcanum, etc.

Even World of Warcraft had to depart from the classical fantasy (warcraft II was basically that: boringly generic fantasy) by introducing its own elements (steampunk, cartoon-ish elements, avoiding the standard racial stereotypes...)

Right now, I don't mean to offend Stardock's people - I admire them, and besides they're fellow Michiganians - but the few bits I've seen from their fantasy world makes me doubt it'll be impressive or memorable.

Reply #69 from Sins Forums Top

Im sorry but Dragon Age simply copied stuff like the Witcher for its races (and they go further back). Which is just human traits and situations doled out on a per race function anyway. Nothing 'original' there. You would only think so because they marketed the 'new' shit out of it so its more popular. High popularity dosn't not make it more original.

WoW copied games workshop almost wholesale for its base style then diverged with minataurs bred with native americans and stoners for trolls plus some advanced technology with terrible build quality (like a Xbox 360). They only learned how to make a good MMO in the last two years and WoW is five years old, thats the important thing to remember.

 

The point being nothing is original anymore. Nothing. Its all about how it fits your universe and how well you write the storys. The above two do it well - but all they really did was bring something a little obscure to a new audience.

 

I mean maybe if they have a book with all the backstory in it and its a word for word copy of something else, maybe you got a point. But criticizing for unoriginal design today is like trying to find a virgin in a room full of prostitues.

 

Very Expensive. What were we tlaking about again?

Oh yeah, people have different tastes in working girls. Some like it hot. Others like ginger hair. They arn't very original in their apperance or techniques of err 'storytelling' but customers still line up to get some of what they fancy.

 

Ultimately if your creating a game to have a 'WOW!' factor then I personally think you already kinda failed. If people are impressed by your world and storytelling, technology or execution then grats but if you need to be different to stand out, the rest probably isn't good enough? (marketing budget and press coverage being equal - which it isn't).

(At this point I don't even remember why I started typeing anymore)

Reply #70 from Elemental Forums Top

Big fact of the day: it's absolutely impossible to have everybody to agree on something. Ergo Stardock shouldn't give a damn about we think about ripping off Tolkien, Warcraft, Big Brother, Doctor Who, Aliens or Bambi. Just use a very sharp scalpel to cut away all the bs in our posts and get the useful tiny bits that could be used to improve their vision of the lore/factions... Most probably, they are already doing just that since day 0.

Someone should sue Stardock for ripping off the real world. Do I need to point to the different evidences available for such accusation? In adition of a fantasy world being supposed to be fantastic, so mundane things are a negative that should be avoided at all cost. Cities? Totally unoriginal!!!

I can enjoy fantasy without the usual suspects. In fact, I enjoy more the ones focused on humans, putting all the bs right were it belongs instead of expressing it through elves, dwarves and company. Focusing in how screwed as species we are. As I said somehwre, I don't need elves for having aristocrat-like people. Neither do I need elves to have humans that by tradition/evolution dwell in forests. It's not like that has happened in real life... right?

So Elemental will have some similarities to "elves, goblins, dwarves...", so what? Many are just expressions of our own nature (like Greek gods, for example), and you can find examples in the real world anyway. So if in Elemental men are "men", I'd expect some similarities between them and us.

Fallen... The unnatural term seems somehow wrong. Especially used by some people. I'd say of artificial origin (in their Origins story) but they are natural in the sense that they live like the rest of natural beings, can reproduce (giving natural births to the next generations) and are not extraplanar creatures (you cannot exile them to their plane of origin because they are already living in it!). But it's not important in any way so nevermind.

There is no need to be a copy cat or to create a totally new universe. Only the story matters. The story, how it develops, what it tells us, how it tells us... Everything else are tools for the goal of a good story. If the story requires Stardock to be original in some parts and unoriginal in others, so be it. The relation with the TBS? Well, most people won't give a damn about the lore and/or the factions given by Stardock anyway, except for a few lore freaks.

Dragon Age or Mass Effect are good for their stories. Everything else are bonuses. (gameplay elements not considered; only talking about background/lore)

Reply #71 from Sins Forums Top

Too many walls of text, Ill do a shot post to break it up! I like elves but only because you can make them absurdly sexual (usualy dark elves) and just say "Its elves... thats what they are LIKE!" to justify it to the sillys. :)

Reply #72 from Elemental Forums Top

Good pictures and good descriptions and very interesting information in the reply, thank you.

I would like to comment on the use of new versus derivative names.  I believe that the presentation was very well done.  We have pictures which are not derivative of Tolkien.  We have NEW names for each type of playable creatures.  However, I also like how we are given familiar names/descriptors in addition to the new (game) title.  This allows us a mental link to our own fantasy memories. 

If I wish, I can totally ignore the 'dwarf, goblin....' common designation and just use the new game name.  Or, if I prefer, I can think of them in terms I am familiar with...such as dwarf and goblin...so both options are open to us as players and we can play as we enjoy the most.

Thanks.

Reply #73 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 59
I should clarify there: Being an Empire does not make one inherently evil.

By most moral human standards, the Magnar, Urxen, and Trogs are pretty evil though to varying degrees (I'd say the Magnar are the ones who would be most classically "evil").

In my opinion there is nothing wrong with dark scary evil empires vs. shining light good kingoms. I think that if you try to get away from that it's clunky. Fall from Heaven allows this, and the result is that you have civs going completely against their nature and avoiding their strategic strengths. It's one thing when you allow the player to turn a race of vampires towards serving the common good, but if the AI does it things get really goofy.

I've played a few FfH games where I got an early religion of 'Fellowship of Leaves', and before long everyone adopted my religion, including the orcs and vampires, and we were allllll friends. Boooooriiiiiing. 

I say make the Fallen irretrevably evil, and let the kingoms win by banding together to defeat evil. That works in my opinion.

Reply #74 from Elemental Forums Top

Simply Love em! I'm no fanboy, in fact I critised the artwork from day one...but I like the selection presented to us.

Great work Stardock, keep them coming.

(Hoping to get into the next beta - so cant wait to try them out for size)

Reply #75 from Elemental Forums Top

I am now playing the "demon elves" just from how amazingly awesome they look

Don't mess with em...nuff said.