[Suggestion] Improvements to Dynasties

from Elemental Forums

I apologize for any redundancies, that being said, I love the idea of Dynasties but as currently implemented they fall far short of their potential.

1.  Succession:  Others have posted on the possibility of succession (as a toggleable feature at game setup) with heirs succeeding to the throne on the death of parents.  Many of these proposals involve making royalty age and eventually die of old age.  Others think that  a succession system will result in never-ending games, while proponents of change make the argument that a sovereign's death shouldn't cause the magical disappearance of their entire kingdom.  Here's my solution:

  • Succession toggle at game start
  • Speed of aging of sovereign set as an option (e.g. 30 turns = 1 year)
  • Rare high-level quests or spells which require essence sacrifice to restore youth to the Sovereign
  • Penalty for succession:  when your sovereign dies the next in line to the throne has some problem to deal with - maybe several cities have revolted and gone neutral, or perhaps a sibling and several army units try and stage a coup forcing a battle, or another faction opposes the succession and declares war - this would act as penalty for succession but also add verisimilitude to the game

2.  Daughter/Son Inequities:  many people pointed out that in the current build sons are preferable since the female in a marriage goes to the faction of the husband.  The best solution to balance this out that I've heard is implementation of a dowry based on the female's level.

3.  Internal Marriage:  many people have suggested that we should be able to arrange marriages between champions and our offspring, this is a great idea and would not make royal matches obsolete because it is expected that better offspring will result from royal marriages (e.g. if I marry my channeler daughter to a mundane champion maybe there is a 50% chance per child that they are a channeler, vs. 100% with two channeler scions of a royal family).

4.  Long-Distance Reproduction? Does it bother anyone else that even if my sovereign and his spouse are never in the same place they can still have kids?  The chance of offspring should increase the longer the couple are located in the same square as each other (e.g. both in a city, or could be traveling together).  I know there are gameplay issues for the way it currently works, but c'mon, do we really need to explain the birds and the bees to the folks at Stardock?

5.  Blood Magic:  What if Empires could sacrifice their children to fuel potent Worldwide spells?

6.  Marrying for Wealth:  In certain historical periods it wasn't uncommon for the noveau riche to marry those with titles but no money, perhaps you could match a child with a suitor that would be useless as a unit and give bad children in return for gold or some other resource - could be implemented as a location specific quest.

7.  Option to start the game married:  AI players start the game married and players should have the option of doing so as well.

8.  Offspring as Governors:  what if you could appoint a child or grandchild to oversee a "province" of your empire/kingdom and receive a province-wide bonus to some production chain like materials, military training time, etc. based on the child's abilities?

 

Ok, that's all I can think of right now.  All this being said I enjoy Elemental although it sometimes feels like a very advanced beta.  I'm looking forward to the game growing and changing over the next couple years.

 

 

9,843 views 12 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

I definitely think there should be a succession feature. Not only would it solve the magical disappearing kingdoms (which to me is a game breaker) but it would make the game narratives more interesting. And to me, the idea of a never-ending game is actually quite appealing, particularly if it was on a huge map with many factions whose borders changed frequently.

In the event of no heirs to the throne I think the magical disappearing kingdoms should be replaced with the cities falling into disorder and disrepair so that neighbouring empires can fight over the scraps. Perhaps (more ambitiously) the remaining champions of the defunct empire could fight a civil war to the throne. I love those sort of dynamic narratives that can emerge. The revolutions mod for Civ 4 is a good example.

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

Excellent suggestions. This would certainly expand upon the dynasty gameplay and make it more interesting.

And, agreed, the fun dynamics from Civ 4 Revolutions Mod REALLY made the game more interesting. I also think of the Medieval Total War series as a direction for future Elemental dynasties and traits, always enjoyed the way they did it.

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Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

I think Sovereigns should be immortal - they do not age. That should compensate for their wimpy stats - they have forever to get up to level 300.

Everybody else, though, spouses, children, champions, have a best by date. They will grow old and feeble and die.

You could have a spell to store your best champions for when you need them. Like Merlin did with Arthur. Cryofreeze Champion.

I also agree with the idea of succession. Just because I blow up the main city with the sovereign in it doesn't mean the garbage won't be collected and the milk delivered. Someone will take over. A spouse, a child, a champion. If none of these is there, the highest ranking unit should do that (quite possibly badly). In Civ, if you took out the captial of an enemy, if the country was big enough you would get a civil war and two different countries.

Oh, and I would love to be able to marry my children to champions.

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

Several excellent ideas. The storyline suggests that channelers aren't immortal but that doesn't mean they don't have extreme longevity or ways to achieve such.

 

I really like the idea of Governors enhanced local activity much like the early champions do globally.

 

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

Can we see some of this addressed in 1.3 (or 1.4)? Also, I know there was mention of being able to look at every dynasty's Tree, could we get that too, or at least one big tree that includes every team? Please? .... Pretty please?

:meow:

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

1.3 is supposed to include a system were upon the death of a sovereign his property will go to the faction with the best dynasty relation. However the details haven't been worked out yet, and 1.3's content is very fluid.

I like your ideas, I would like to see a system were you appoint your children governors of cities, so that upon your death the cities go to their spouses parent. Your heirs spouses parent would get everything else unclaimed. This would allow for more interesting divisions of factions upon death. You also definitely need to be able to ask for or have to pay dowries. Everything from treaties to cities should be available as a dowry. It would be awesome if factions for instance offered their daughter for marriage in order to end a war or seal a alliance.

Reply #7 from Stardock Forums Top

Quoting DsRaider, reply 6
1.3 is supposed to include a system were upon the death of a sovereign his property will go to the faction with the best dynasty relation. However the details haven't been worked out yet, and 1.3's content is very fluid.
...
 

About that.

Are they going to change the mechanic where the Sov warps out at the end of a losing battle?

In my experience the Sov usually only dies when his last city is conquered. That defeats the purpose.

Rarely have I seen a Sov die when not in his territory.

Reply #8 from Elemental Forums Top

I don't think they will change how sovereigns currently die. Losing your sovereign will still be a game over, the changes only effect what happens to the sovereigns old stuff. Occasionally an AI sovereign will wander out of his territory and die but ya it's rare. However it will fix situations like when a AI attacks you and takes a few cities but then loses a battle and their sovereign resulting in all his cities including your old ones totally disappearing.

Reply #9 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting oera, reply 5
Can we see some of this addressed in 1.3 (or 1.4)? Also, I know there was mention of being able to look at every dynasty's Tree, could we get that too, or at least one big tree that includes every team? Please? .... Pretty please?

While most of these ideas are pretty interesting, I doubt that anything of this will be address for a long while. It has already been stated that FE is removing this system completely.

Reply #10 from Elemental Forums Top

Personally I don't care as much if it's not in FE (i mean it'd be nice, but, you know...) I'm just saying i'd like to see it improve because it's a great, fun, and  brilliant (if minor) aspect of the game (and i'm sick of watching fun parts of games get axed because "they're not central/pivotal/important/etc." [see, e.g. the trend of attributes and skill in the last three elder scrolls games. (give me back medium armor, you jerks! XO )]).

Reply #11 from Elemental Forums Top

I realy like points 6 and 8, and agree with the rest. These would add some real depth to the system.

Reply #12 from Elemental Forums Top

As a question, how large have you people gotten your dynasties? I've gotten down to great-great-great-grand children with no blood based inbreeding. I currently have a "37th in line for the throne of." Needless to say I sort of plan for large dynasties in my games.