Dear nobles,
we are back with the first Dev Diaries this year (how time flies!) and in accordance with our preview we'd like to tell you about one of the most important characters in Noble's Life - the city.
We have already covered the certain level of autonomy of the capital of the player's estates (in Dev Diary#12 - Power and faith), we showed its appearance, we promised free exploration, but today we are explaining some of its functions.
There can be many villages, but rather a dozen than several dozens. Additionally player's character has the ability to create new ones, and even conquer others or lose them. Some of the villages can even come close to the level of a small town. In addition, it is possible to increase or decrease the land's borders or even search for resources, but the city will remain one. In Noble's Life we assume the role of a small landowner.
Due to its uniqueness, city will have its own economic system (that we are going to cover another time) separate from estate map. Industry will appear only in the capital, because it is there that the craftsmen's workshops will be established (that's another subject we are going to return to).
Additionally, shutting yourself in the castle and ruling from there is not always a good idea. That's why a trip to the city and examining the situation that you are supposed to decide about, may allow you to acquire new information coming in handy during the audience.
Consequences of the decisions
However, the main purpose of the city will be to illustrate the player's decisions made as part of the main mechanics of the game, i.e. the audiences (described for example in Dev Diary #11 - Audiences).
One of the easy-to-picture examples of decisions: if the player decides to support the inn's rebuilding, they will see it actually rebuilding in the city. If not… its ruins will blemish the city. At the same time, the renovated building itself will not only be a nice-looking gold generator for the player's character's treasury. If the player feels like it, they can enter the inn and hear about their generosity from the inn's owner, listen to the gossip or have a beer.
You won't help people in need? Expect to see beggars in the city. You help wounded veterans, you will see a hospital where they are recovering. Moreover, you may visit them, and once they are healed they might even be recruited again.
Additionally, shutting yourself in the castle and ruling from there is not always a good idea. That's why a trip to the city and examining the situation that you are supposed to decide about, may allow you to acquire new information coming in handy during the audience.
This is the aspect of city that we want to show during the next playtests the most.
The estate's capital is supposed to be developing. At first it's recovering from the damage caused by the invasion (if you don't know what that's about, check Dev Diaries#8 - Kingdom Reborn out) so with every month there will be new places available to see, while others' conditions will change. The latter means that the clues that are available in one round, may be gone in the next one.
Gradually, there will also be more places to visit inside, such as the above-mentioned inn. And it's worth mentioning that by going out we don't stop being a baron. We can, for example, call for our soldiers to do something. This aspect is something we are working on and we will do our best to make it available in some form during the playtests.
Second playtests
And finally, a few specifics about the upcoming playtests. We still want them to take place soon. The most probable term is September 2023, although it's unlikely going to be the beginning of the month. The sign-up will again start in advance.
We assume the playtests will last about two weeks, maybe a little longer, maybe shorter.
As part of the available content, we are going to share the first two rounds (two months) of the game and probably a fragment of the third one. As part of this, you will be able to visit the city described in this DD, although still in a rather unfinished version. In a nutshell: we want to share almost twice as much as we showed in the first playtests!
We believe that this will help you see how many options the full game will have to offer and how much the decisions you make can affect the gameplay.
We will cover the details of the second playtests soon, most likely in the second half of August.