psychicsoftware
June 2, 2022
sam
The Necromancer
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Trust and Tension in the Necromancer’s Tale

June 2, 2022
sam
The Necromancer
1 Comment

The Necromancer’s Tale has a strong focus on the social aspects of RPG gameplay. The player secretly operates as a black magic practitioner in a medieval city (in 1733) where to be caught would mean certain execution. A lot of play revolves around the social aspects of conversation, coercion, blackmail – and even seduction – whatever it takes for the player to progress their cause. We wanted a game system which would involve decision-making during conversation as well as during more action-oriented play. In short, a system where choices matter – where the player wouldn’t feel that they could just mindlessly click through every conversation option without getting punished. Our system involves two related concepts: Trust and Tension.

Trust

Trust represents the attitude of the NPC townsfolk to the player. Through the use of ‘Trust Groups’ we simulate the behind-the-scenes gossip through which one NPC’s changing attitudes to the player propagates around their social network. For example, if the player acts cruelly to an NPC, then the Trust value will reduce for each of the Trust Groups that that NPC belongs to.

The Trust Groups are:
1 Workers
2 Educated
3 Military
4 Gentry
5 Orphans
6 Outsiders

The player’s uncle Jervase (militaristic baron of the city), for example, belongs to the Military and Gentry trust groups.

The overall trust of the city to the player is calculated from the average of each of the first four trust groups (since no-one really listens to orphans or outsiders). If this overall city trust value drops too low, the player will be tried in court, punished, and perhaps hanged. In the meantime, conversation options are affected by Trust values.

Transgressions

As well as conversation, the game also involves physical activity, of course. The player interacts with objects in the world, moves around, fights (on occasion), and sometimes drags dead bodies back to their home laboratory. Whenever the player is doing something illegal, line-of-sight arcs are displayed for all nearby NPCs. If the player falls within the arc of an NPC, then Trust is affected by the witnessing of the transgression (for the appropriate Trust Groups).

Tension

The second concept in our social system is Tension. This is a number which represents the overall atmosphere of fear in the city. Actions taken by the player which they were not actually witnessed doing will raise Tension but not directly affect Trust. So the player should be careful not to leave dead bodies lying around or bump off too many NPCs – even though they may get away with it at the time.

As Tension rises, the city becomes more heavily patrolled by guards, which in turn makes Transgressions harder to get away with. A high tension value also means that people are more suspicious, harder to deal with in conversation, and more likely to jump to conclusions if the player ends up in court.

The Necromancer’s Tale is in development and you can wishlist it on Steam now, to keep up to date on development progress!

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April 22, 2022
sam
Newby Chinese
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Newby Chinese – Multiplayer Game-Based Learning in the Classroom

April 22, 2022
sam
Newby Chinese
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I’ve been working on Newby Chinese since 2016 together with Richard McCurry (who is a linguist as well as a great communicator and teacher) and with several part-time artists. The goal of Newby Chinese is to take Mandarin Chinese — widely regarded as being almost impossible to learn as a second language — and make the learning experience more well structured and above all fun.

 

[Read our 2022 book chapter on the Newby Chinese approach]

 

Our approach really took shape in 2018 when we started developing multiplayer minigames – whereby the teacher projects their screen at the front of a classroom, and the students — perhaps 30 of them or more! — log in using browsers on their smartphones/tablets in order to learn, compete and have fun. Each student’s device takes on a variety of input roles as appropriate — at times joystick, at times freehand drawing pad, at times a private device displaying information to that student alone as part of a wider multiplayer game.

 

 

Richard has delivered the Newby Chinese system in Irish secondary schools (typically as a Transition Year experience) since 2018, with around 100% growth year on year. We are reaching the stage where the platform is ready to be used by other Chinese teachers – either representing Newby Chinese, or within a school hiring our platform for their own direct use.

 

 

Richard’s work has involved development of a unique pedagogical approach which breaks down the components which make up the thousands of arcane-looking pictograms in the language. Together we have built a range of multiplayer games and interactive media within the platform to help students collaboratively learn reading, writing, and speaking the language.

 

 

We have published several academic papers on Newby Chinese since 2018 and won the ‘best overall presentation’ award at the Irish Game Based Learning Conference 2019. There’s a lot more detail on Newby Chinese in a book chapter which we have recently published in Handbook of Research on Promoting Economic and Social Development Through Serious Games (2022). You can read the full chapter here if you’d like to learn more.

 

 

Here’s a bunch of 15 year old boys jumping around excitedly, shouting and hugging each other – that’s right, hugging each other! – while learning new Chinese words in our Pacman/musical-chairs mashup game Maze Hunters.

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May 7, 2021
sam
The Necromancer
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Combat in The Necromancer’s Tale

May 7, 2021
sam
The Necromancer
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In The Necromancer’s Tale you will be involved in various combats – including early-game fisticuffs, skirmishes with the city guards, wild animals, ambushes from unsavory creatures such as gūls which haunt places of death – and some more magical foes. You’ll be supported by various undead minions as well as some mortal allies – depending on your choices in the game.

 

 

Combat is turn-based and both sequencing and the number of action points available to a combatant is based on their Agility. The combat system draws on my own tactical combat game Darkwind: War on Wheels, as well as on my other prototype (unreleased) games and ultimately an Amiga game called Critical Hit which I released back in 1995. The combat system is simple and quick, yet nuanced and augmented by a critical hits system which adds a lot of descriptive flavour along with mechanical effects.

 

 

Energy and Activity

Energy and Activity are two very important ratings related to health, which every character has. Each is displayed as a percentage (0% – 100%).

Energy refers to the amount of stamina which a character has remaining. Being hit in combat reduces this, and mortal characters regain energy as time passes. When energy drops to zero, a character falls unconscious. An unconscious character is not necessarily in imminent danger of death, but significant continued damage beyond this may kill them. Certain injuries cause bleeding (unless the character cannot bleed), which causes a continuous loss of Energy as time passes. Without bandaging or rest, a bleeding character will die.

Activity refers to the ability of the character to move about and fight. It is temporarily reduced by certain critical hits (e.g. a broken leg) and by being stunned. When activity drops to zero, a character falls unconscious. When a character’s activity is less than 100%, every physical action they perform (e.g. attacking, defending, or moving – as well as their number of action points) is reduced in proportion. Thus, being stunned can seriously impact a combatant for a few turns.

Energy reduces through physical exertion and becoming tired, while Activity reduces through more serious injury such as broken bones, torn flesh, or concussion.

 

Weapons

Melee weapons (such as swords or halberds, fists or teeth) are those which are used to physically hit an opponent (at a distance of 1 or 2 hex tiles depending on length of reach), while ranged weapons (such as crossbows and muskets) are used to attack from a distance.

When a combat starts, all ranged weapons are considered to be loaded. After firing in combat, they must be reloaded. The time taken to reload depends on the type of weapon. Muskets, for example, while being the most powerful weapon in the game, are very slow to reload – they take several turns of uninterrupted attention. The game does not track ammunition: a character never runs out of it.

 

To-Hit Rolls

To hit an opponent, the attacker must have a line of sight that is not blocked by obstacles. The following factors determine how likely an attack is to strike its target:
– The base ‘to hit’ chance of the weapon.
– The distance between attacker and defender (ranged weapons only)- this is moderated by the distance accuracy of the weapon: some weapons are excellent at short range but terrible at long range, while others retain their accuracy at distance better.
– The agility and activity ratings of both the attacker and the defender. The agility factor is more important for ranged weapons than for melee, and beyond 12 metres range this importance increases (essentially, at longer ranges it becomes possible for an agile target to dodge a missile attack or for an agile shooter to counteract that or anticipate it).
– The body size of the defender (i.e. a tiny creature is harder to hit than a huge one)
– A hit is much more likely if the defender is unconscious and close to the attacker

 

Combat Damage, Critical Hits and Injuries

An ineffective strike will merely cause a small Energy reduction to the defender. An effective strike may also cause one of over 330 different Critical Hits, which include such injuries as broken bones, stun effects, ripped flesh and torn muscles. Critical Hits typically cause both Energy and Activity reduction. These effects will be for a limited time duration, ranging from a couple of combat turns (mild stunning) to several days (broken bones). Some injuries recover in steps: for example, broken ribs will become bruised ribs after some time, with a lesser Activity penalty.

 

 

For melee weapons and some ranged weapons, the amount of damage caused is also affected by the Strength of the attacker. If the defender has high Constitution, all damage received is reduced.

 

Weapon and Armor Types

Each weapon is classified by the type of injuries it causes, as well as its relative effectiveness against unarmored opponents or those wearing leather or metal armor. For example, edged weapons are good against leather but poor against metal, while blunt weapons are moderately good against each.

The types of injury are: bashing, explosion, fire, piercing, and slicing. Bashing weapons will for example tend to cause more broken bones while slicing weapons will tend to cause more bleeding.

 
You can wishlist and follow The Necromancer’s Tale on Steam:


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December 3, 2020
sam
Conferences & Events, Demon Pit
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Demon Pit Wins Two Awards

December 3, 2020
sam
Conferences & Events, Demon Pit
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Demon Pit was nominated for a number of awards at the annual Irish Game Awards (for games released in 2019) hosted by Imirt.

Imirt 2019 Irish Game Awards Page

We took two first prizes: Best Technical Achievement and Best Game Art.
We also took two runner up prizes: Best Game Design and Best Game Audio.


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Sam Redfern indie games developer and university academic