RWL: 3.0 "Worker's Paradise" Development Thread

[Shadow]

Leaders

Leaders have been changed the most in the new game. We completely scrapped the direct production missions, as well as race specific spells (for now). Instead, as already mentioned, leaders provide "buffs" to your worker production. The exact power of the buffs is an ugly and complex formula and doesn't need to see the light of day, but the punchline is that you get stronger buffs up to 20 leaders/land, and after that, any more leaders you get are purely offensive/defensive in nature and represent a low to your economy since huts hold very few workers.

The buffs mostly server to multiply the output of your workers and buildings. You can increase your cash and food income, or decrease cash and food expenses, by at most somewhere between 25% and 35% depending on your race. You can increase the rate at which workers are converted into troops, or decrease the number of workers lost when recruiting, or the rate at which workers join you. Finally, you can increase your hut capacity to 120 leaders/hut, or heal at twice the rate you normally do.

You can use up to three buffs per turn - one from each category: economic, which includes the income and expense, industry, which includes the troop and worker buffs, and warlord, which include the leader and health buffs. More may be added later.

This makes the economic game very rich, since there are many combinations you can use, depending on the game situation you find yourself in. It also means that pure leader play is completely dead - since leaders only multiply the power of your worker economy, if you are all leaders your economy sucks, and so multiplying it really had no effect. You will need to balance your buildings to get the most from your workers, and balance your need for defense against a strong economy.

The rate at which leaders join has also been changed a lot. If you build very few huts compared to land, you can fill them entirely in a few turns. If your hut count is high compared to your land, it takes much, much longer to fill them, and at 100% huts, you might spend several entire runs filling your huts. Leaders also cost 5 workers each, so when you first build a lot of huts your economy tanks - this means that it is in your best interest to defend your land and your leaders, because recovering them can significantly impact your productivity.

Finally, most of the offensive leader missions are changed. They are now buffs to attacks, and succeed depending on the power of your leaders versus your opponent's. Leader power is now displayed in army status, and has almost nothing to do with the ratios that they are currently. While a high leader/land ratio does give your leaders a boost, it is not nearly as drastic as currently, to the point where a rat with a fair chunk of land can break a wolf if they don't mind sacrificing some economy in so doing.

The buffs are:

sack - as it is now - no loyalty cost
chaos - as it is now - no loyalty cost
drive - as it is now - no loyalty cost
capture - as it is now - no loyalty cost
offense - if your leader power exceeds your opponent's, your troops get a 20% offense boost and both players lose leaders
murder - if your leaders win, you destroy a percentage of your opponent's remaining health
pillage - sack on steroids, but is affected by raised defenses
sabotage - destroy enemy towers
enslave - capture enemy workers

These all cost more loyalty than you can make in 2 turns, so there is no such thing as gaining loyalty while beating on someone anymore.

The punchline here is that leader defense is no longer invincible, and there is a tradeoff between leader offensive and defensive power and economy. Leader power is much less dependent on leader/land ratio, and while it still has some effect, it caps at 175 leader/land, which means that getting hit to low land no longer provides invincible defense like it does now. The slow join rate and destruction of economy when gaining leaders adds yet more incentive to hold onto land.

[Durza]

Rejoice all ye' player of RWL.  The age of the pure leader is over.

[The Masked Wolf]

cooolo

[Shadow]

My hope is that we will be able to hide most of the formulas behind the scenes and make it unnecessary to use them - ideally the information will present itself in a way that makes it possible but largely unnecessary to actually do the math. So if this all sounds complicated don't worry - it will work itself out in a way that basically means that you don't need to worry too much about it.

Also bear in mind that both the buff turn and buff attack list are open for additions, so if you have ideas for these after trying them out, by all means suggest them, particularly in the area of race-specific abilities.

[Rakefur]

So basically, leaders are purely secondary, something everyone will have. I don't think ANY pure strats will exist.

[The Masked Wolf]

yeah

[Pippin]

i havent read through it all but im just wondering how this will affect magpie now that the loot option has gone and its effectiveness.

[The Masked Wolf]

maybee everyone wsill use ferret

[Shadow]

i havent read through it all but im just wondering how this will affect magpie now that the loot option has gone and its effectiveness.

loot option is not gone at all, it is now essential for pretty much all strategies. It is just a turn buff instead of a separate page - the underlying functionality (gaining cash from workers) is the basis for all cash gain in the game. Looting has been made quite a bit simper though, so tax micro is not really required on a per turn basis.

I suggest you read through it all ;) It should clear up your question.

[Pippin]

ok cheers for the answer i'll read through when i got some time

[The Masked Wolf]

so...when will this wonderfull thing be open

[Shadow]

There are a few more things to polish off before, and school/work has started so I won't commit to a timeline. But I would expect it in the near future.

[Durza]

Which translates to in a month or two

[Shadow]

That's my hope :)

[The Masked Wolf]

cool