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"..and so began the Age of Despair! From her throne of tormented souls in the Abyss, Takhisis - Queen of Darkness - once again plotted the domination of the lands of Krynn.

'Minions, it is time to awaken my dragons, and again raise dark armies of which the lands have not seen in Ages!' she roared triumpantly to the abyssal fiends cowering at the foot of her throne.

Sibilant responses of concordant supplication and agreement was broken by a gruff 'Ahhehm' amongst the fiends, where a stout black-bearded dwarf stood.

'What is it, Master Forger? Can you raise my armies?' queried Takhisis with the timeless irritability only the gods possess.

'Well my Queen... where would you like me to start?'

'Create me two armies that reflect my two most powerful children, the armies of the red dragon and the armies of the blue dragon.'

And so, the Master Forger drew forth his mighty Hammer and smited a star - gathering its stardust and seperating into two piles for the creation of the powers these two armies would possess.

'My Queen! What powers shall the armies have?' asked the Master Forger.

'Allow the armies to summon dragons as steeds!' responded the Dragon Queen.
'Very well!' stated the Master Forger, and set aside a portion of each pile of stardust for dragon summoning.

'Allow the armies to call upon the fear of dragons upon their enemies!'
'Very well!' stated the Master Forger, and set aside a portion of each pile of stardust for dragon fear.

'For those of the Red, give them the ability to stun and damage those who attack them!' stated the goddess.
'Sure!' stated the Master Forger, and set aside a portion of the pile set aside for the Red army for an autostun and autodamage.

'Also for those of the Red, give them the ability to wound their enemy with a nasty cut that bleeds a lot!' stated the goddess.
'Err... righto...' said the Master Forger, as he set aside another portion of the dwindling pile set aside for the Red for a bleed.

'Oh! Yes!! Fire and lightning! And dragon attacks! The armies must have that?' opined the Queen.
'Um.... sure.' said the Master Forger, apportioning a healthy pile to the Blue while sweeping the remainder of the Red pile into dragon attacks.

'And put the remainder of their powers towards a special attack.' finished the Dark Queen.

'My Queen, that is no problem for the army of Blue...' started the Master Forger, looking at the healthy pile of stardust still remaining for the Blue army.
'But there is no stardust left for such an ability for the Red.' he finished.

'DO I LOOK LIKE A STARDUST ACCOUNTANT?? NOT MY PROBLEM!' roared the Dark Queen. 'Take from the other piles! Make it happen!'
And with that, the goddess transformed into the form of a five-headed dragon and took wing, vanishing into the mirky-red distance of the Abyss' horizon.

And so with two great mighty swings of his hammer, the Master Forger smashed into shape two armies as outlined by the dark immortal.

And thus, the Dragonarmies were formed."


Thought i'd start with that. It's not really how it happened. But its a nice narrative that gives you an idea of one of the issues we currently face now, and will help explain the changes I plan on implementing for the Dragonarmies.

And that is something I want to share with you, the players, before I do it. I figure you all appreciate wizards sharing, as well as offering our reasoning. You get to have your say here on your thoughts of the changes, although that say may not influence the outcome. But then again it may.

So... there are a few issues needing to be addressed:
1. There is an imbalance between the two Dragonarmies when it comes to player participation. BDA are a relatively active and popular guild. RDA are practically inactive... 3 days in from armageddon, and their special attack files haven't loaded, indicating no RDA has gone hunting since the last downtime. And I don't think that is a great surprise to anyone... they suck. As I stated in my plans for 2017, our longterm goal is to revamp and re-engerise the Krynn warfare system... but that can only happen if we have healthy participatory guilds.

2. Thematically, the Dragonarmies are a group of mercenaries supported by dragons... making them one of the most fearsome forces in Krynn. Without their dragons though, they really are no more than your average soldier... and I think that is something that has been missed in the most recent recode of the guild. That is one element I plan on addressing.

3. Playability almost requires everyone to be officers. The playability of anyone at the soldier rank or under seems to have a noticable drop off in skill access and are limited in accessing the 'dragon' abilities, relying essentially on their special attack only. This is something I want to realign.

4. Looking globally (donutally?) at more big picture stuff, the Dragonarmies have some skill levels they really shouldn't have. Confident veteran awareness is an unreasonably high level for a specialist fighting guild that holds the title of the apex solo evil melee guild in the game.
I actually don't believe it appropriate for any of the apex fighter guilds to hold an awareness level above superior journeyman. It isn't fair to those non-apex guilds such as the rangers or Army of Angmar who sacrifice damage for stealth, and impacts on the ability of the coders to create viable ranger / rogue guilds when the playerbase have high base awareness skills.
So this awareness change is something that will also be applied to the Knights and Neidar, also as respective apex fighting guilds.

Anyway I am starting to get into the granular, so I am just going to outline my proposed changes. While the guild set-up is no secret, i'll try and avoid being too specific.

What I would like to point out at the start is that the guilds will both have the SAME amount of stardust they started with when it comes to special abilities. Skills, not so much.

SPECIAL ATTACKS
Special attacks for RDA and BDA (slash and impale) to be aligned to have the same output. Right now the RDA's special attack is considerably weaker... which is thematically bizarre for the strongest dragonarmy.

Dragon attacks (swoop/breath) are going to be equalised across the two armies and enhanced - right now I don't feel the dragons are the 'game changer' thematically they are supposed to be.

Soldiers will be able to summon dragons for battle, but not as mounts.

RDA Autoimpale is going to be reworked, reducing the stardust allocated to it.

RDA wounding attack is going to be removed and turned into stardust.

BDA intimidate is going to be removed for thematic reasons.

SKILLS
Skill progression will allow full access to skills and guru quest from soldier rank.

Re-align parry and defence skills to mirror that of a dismounted knight.

RDA provided a bonus to defence to compensate for being required to use a predominantly two-handed weapon and losing access to shield.

OTHER STUFF
Look into the mana use of summoning dragons... reduce or remove.


So there you go. I haven't a planned timeframe for when I will implement this, however I expect to roll it out by mid year.

Regards,
Arman Kharas

Might I suggest something?

Its a mercenary army more or less wich where then made into regular army, make them able to use atleast 2 weapons per army that they can choose from, they need to be revised, I agree completely, but an army that uses 100% swords isnt an army to me, its a mercenary band that has a special style.

The reason RDA is weaker is cause of the INSANE notion that the bleed is worth.... anything, give them "pin" or something, making people unable to move, but still fight for a few seconds, atm only magic guilds have a "real" run stopper.

Dragonsummoning shouldnt cost mana, it should cost alittle fatigue, you're blowing a horn, not mentally summoning it, it could make you alittle winded, the biggest people still wouldnt notice much but it could be enought to be an effect

I would suggest include align factor to the guild. Dragon Army soldier should not be "holy".

Draugor wrote:Might I suggest something?

Its a mercenary army more or less wich where then made into regular army, make them able to use atleast 2 weapons per army that they can choose from, they need to be revised, I agree completely, but an army that uses 100% swords isnt an army to me, its a mercenary band that has a special style.

The reason RDA is weaker is cause of the INSANE notion that the bleed is worth.... anything, give them "pin" or something, making people unable to move, but still fight for a few seconds, atm only magic guilds have a "real" run stopper.

Dragonsummoning shouldnt cost mana, it should cost alittle fatigue, you're blowing a horn, not mentally summoning it, it could make you alittle winded, the biggest people still wouldnt notice much but it could be enought to be an effect

If playing a harp cost mana, why should summoning a dragon not?
But yes, I tend to agree. It is a game, but it should try to be logical if possible.

kirsach wrote:I would suggest include align factor to the guild. Dragon Army soldier should not be "holy".

Alignment is a pretty crude metric. While the armies work together for a common goal, the goals of their respective Highlords aren't aligned... there can only be one Emperor of Krynn! My intent is for their to be some conflict drivers between the two armies... so i'd have to put a lot of thought in to any restrictions that were influenced by alignment.

Draugor wrote:Might I suggest something?

Its a mercenary army more or less wich where then made into regular army, make them able to use atleast 2 weapons per army that they can choose from, they need to be revised, I agree completely, but an army that uses 100% swords isnt an army to me, its a mercenary band that has a special style.

The reason RDA is weaker is cause of the INSANE notion that the bleed is worth.... anything, give them "pin" or something, making people unable to move, but still fight for a few seconds, atm only magic guilds have a "real" run stopper.

Dragonsummoning shouldnt cost mana, it should cost alittle fatigue, you're blowing a horn, not mentally summoning it, it could make you alittle winded, the biggest people still wouldnt notice much but it could be enought to be an effect

Thanks Draugor, all valid points.

I am open to the idea of alternative weapon options, but will need to discuss it with some others and think it through a bit further.

I think the bleed/wound "could" be cool... but it would have to be the feature special of the guild. Right now it is just one of a number of diluted specials. So a nice concept, but it hasn't worked as intended and its addition is impacting playability elsewhere. So i'll be removing it. My original viewpoint of autoimpale was the same... but after discussion with a few people i'll be keeping it.

Agree on dragon summoning.

Arman wrote: RDA provided a bonus to defence to compensate for being required to use a predominantly two-handed weapon and losing access to shield.

If i read it right RDA would be able to use two-handed polearms only, and with no two weapons combat skill for wielding two one-handed and no acess to shields... that seems way too limiting in terms of wielders/holders configurations -> there would be only one. Boring.

Syrk wrote:

Arman wrote: RDA provided a bonus to defence to compensate for being required to use a predominantly two-handed weapon and losing access to shield.

If i read it right RDA would be able to use two-handed polearms only, and with no two weapons combat skill for wielding two one-handed and no acess to shields... that seems way too limiting in terms of wielders/holders configurations -> there would be only one. Boring.

A one handed spearand shield is however widespread, there are even weapons that angle towards it, tempered spear, shimmering, medicine stick for instance might aswell be removed then since its mainly rda that use em

I'm pretty sure he didn't write they weren't able to use a one-handed and shield.
All he wrote was that RDA would get more defence since most polearms are two-handed.

It doesn't take another skill to use either a one-handed weapon or a shield, at least not yet.

Thalric wrote:I'm pretty sure he didn't write they weren't able to use a one-handed and shield.
All he wrote was that RDA would get more defence since most polearms are two-handed.

It doesn't take another skill to use either a one-handed weapon or a shield, at least not yet.

Yeah, I don't think Arman mean to remove RDA's ability to use one-handed polearms.