Written by Jorgandar

Legend of Gaia Game Design/Philosophy

Welcome to Legend of Gaia.  This guide will serve as an overview into the game mechanics and the game’s vision.  It is not meant to be a “how-to” guide, but a philosophy/vision paper.  You will find little specific details in this guide.  Please see the manual if that’s what you’re looking for.

THEME/STORY :

Please refer to the theme/story section of this website to read the game history.

RACES/CLASSES:

There are now 4 types of races in the world: Human, ancient, cyborg, and monster.  Cyborgs are good at mechanical weaponry such as laser guns and explosives.  Monsters evolve into several different forms depending on their surroundings. 

The game mechanics support up to 4 characters in a single party.  These characters are chosen at the beginning of the game and may be disbanded and replaced later if a faction provides the new character.  Your main character is the first character you choose, and can never be replaced.  He begins his career out at level 3, while his companions begin at level 1.

HUMAN: The human race excels at manipulation of their physical world.  They are fast and somewhat strong.  They are excellent with hand held weaponry and armors.  They also possess keen psychic abilities (called ‘techs’) that can give them an edge in battle.  They are the most dynamic of the races.

ANCIENTS: The ancients are a very old race on Gaia.   They have learned to master Gaia’s ancestral and runic magics.  They are similar in appearance to humans, with finer features and a smaller build.  Ancients are identifiable by strange symbolic markings across their forehead and down their arms/back.  Their eyes can be pure blue, glowing yellow, or white.  Ancients are weaker fighters than humans and possess no tech abilities.  However, they possess a wide variety of magical abilities.  Some of their magic can devastate an entire battlefield.

CYBORGS: Cyborgs are the newest race on Gaia, and represent the future.  Once human, they have become their own race -- half mechanical and half biological.  Cyborgs are easily identifiable.  Some of their body parts and limbs are robotic, made of metal.  Cyborgs have lost the tech abilities that humans possess.  They are too slow and no longer have the reflexes of a human.  They excel at heavy weaponry and have immense defensive capabilities.  Some of their explosives rival the destructive power of a mutant’s magic.  The cyborg race has not yet been implemented.  This will be in a future game release.

MONSTERS:  It’s hard to say what a monster is.  At any point it could be something different.  Examples of monsters include goblins, dragons, fairies, giants, worms and slimes.  They are found throughout the world of Gaia, and there is no place on the planet untouched by monsters.  Some are evil, some are good.  Rarely do they interact with other races.  Legend of Gaia allows recruitment of monsters as a party member.  Monsters CANNOT LEVEL UP.  They are meant to be somewhat temporary and to be replaced when another stronger monster becomes available.

THE GAME WORLD

The gaming world consists of various maps interconnected by entry points.  Some maps allow characters to use special teleporting objects to teleport around.  Others, particularly indoor maps such as fortresses, do not allow teleportation. (except by faction leaders)

There are 3 modes of transportation: Walking, by boat, or by air. (note: only walking is implemented right now…with future plans for flying airships and/or mounts)

Boats (when implemented) can be rented and provide sea transportation free of encounters.  Flying (when implemented) requires the use of a special device, and allows movement over most terrain types.

CHATTING & TRADING’

Legend of Gaia supports 2 types of arenas:  Chat arenas & Trade arenas.  A summary of the arena types is below:

CHAT ARENA: A basic chat room the player may set up.  Other players may freely join and leave a chat arena.  Messages sent inside this arena are broadcast to every player also inside the arena.

TRADE ARENA:   Trade arenas provide a chance for buying and selling items among players.  There are 2 types of trade arenas, regular trade arenas and merchant trade arenas.  Only bots may run merchant arenas.  A regular trade arena is structured such that 1 on 1 communication is possible between arena participants.  The arena also makes it possible to trade items for items, or items for money.

COMBAT ARENA --OBSOLETE:  Combat arenas have been replaced by combat zones.

COMBAT’

Combat in Legend of Gaia takes place within Combat Zones. A combat zone is a special area that contains all combat participants. The boundaries of the zone are hilighted in red. It is dynamically created whenever the player attacks or is attacked. Combat zones allow turn-based combat to take place. They also allow other players to join the zone. When this occures the zone expands. Therefore, there is no limit to how big a combat zone can grow, essentially allowing combat between any number of forces, against any number of other forces (n by n combat).

CHARCTER DEATH & GAME OVER

If all your party members are reduced to 0 HP, your characters are dead.  At the moment, there is no penalty for death.  Combat will end and your characters will being regenerating health/mana once again. 

In the future, you will be sent back to the spirit world, where you can revive once again in the neutral city.  There will be an XP/gold penalty.

RECRUITING PARTY MEMBERS

Characters shall begin the game in the neutral faction, with no additional party members.  Characters pick one of:

·         Human

·         Ancient

·         Cyborg <not yet implemented>

They cannot choose:

·         Monster <not available as a primary character>

A character must then complete some quests in the neutral town before being allowed to recruit additional party members.  The neutral faction will provide party members of level 1 once a player establishes himself as a leader by completing the required quests.  

CLASS TREE

Human - Fighter

·         Commander

·         WeaponMaster

Human - Blade

·         Assassin

·         Monk

Human - Psionic

·         Mystic

·         Telepath

Ancient - Mage

·         Warlock

·         Sorcerer

·         Summoner

Ancient - Acolyte

·         Druid

·         Shaman

·         Necromancer

Cyborg - Armor

·         Tank

·         Destroyer

Cyborg - Cannon

·        Seeker

·         Lazer

Brief Description of each Race/class

Human – Since the fall of the ancients, the human race is dominant on Gaia.  Humans are the most diverse type of race.  They can specialize in fighting, psionics, or a combination of both.  They can also use a variety of weapons.

Ancient - Ancients are an ancient race of magical creatures.  They once ruled Gaia, but are now rare to find.   They are skilled at magic, but physically weaker than humans.  They have no psi or tech capabilities and no psionic defenses, but their magic very powerful. 

Cyborg - Cyborgs are half human and half machine.  They are a technological triumph of humans, perhaps the next step in human evolution.  They specialize in ranged weaponry and have excellent defensive capabilities.  They cannot use psionics or magic.

Monsters - Monsters come in all shapes and sizes.  A monster is defined as "Anything that's not a human, ancient, or cyborg." 

HUMAN :

Fighter - A fighter is the first step to becoming an excellent weapon master.  Fighters are sturdy warriors, with good offensive and defensive skills.  They can use only limited psionics.

WeaponMaster – A weapon master is highly skilled in all arts of combat and can weild the most deadly of weapons.  Weapon masters can deal devastating damage to even the strongest enemies.

Commander – Second only to the weapon master, a commander is still an excellent fighter.  They also have devoted part of their studies to leadership and diplomacy.  They have special skills that can be used on the battlefield to rally their allies and discourage enemies.

Blade - A blade represents a good balance of psionics and fighting skills.  These warriors prefer quick weapons to brute strength.  They learn an array of psionic skills they will use to complement their fighting.

Assasian - An assasian specializes in speed and agility, useing only quick, specizlied weapons to deal large amounts of damage to enemies.  Their psionic powers serve to help them with quick attacks, stealth, movement, and even instant kill attacks.

Monk - A good fighter, but uses offensive psionics as a primary weapon & to complement their fighting skills.

Psionic - A psionic character chose to spend the majority of his training developing his mind and psionic powers.  As a result, he has plenty of mental skills to utilize.  He is physically not a good fighter.

Mystic - A psionic that specializes in boosting other party members while decreasing the effectiveness of his opponents. He has learned specialised psionic defensive powers. 

Telepath - Although physically very weak fighters, the telepath can master almost any psionic skill and use it effectively.  Their destructive powers of the mind rival those of the Ancients magic.

ANCIENT :

Mage – An ancient mage begins to study Gaia’s powerful elemental forces and runic magics. 

Summoner - An offensive spellcaster.  The summonner can summon powerful minions to fight on his side, or he can summon powerful elemental storms and magics to crush enemies.

Warlock - An offensive spellcaster.  A warlock specialises in curses and hexes and other forms of witchcraft and lore.  Like the necromancer (see below), the warlock is an outcast in most ancient socities. 

Sorcerer – The most powerful offensive spellcaster.  The sorcerer can conjure far-reaching elemental magics to devistate a battlefield. 

Acolyte - An acolyte is the first step in the path of ancient Gaia lore and magics.  The acolyte can restore and heal allies, and stop enemies.

Druid – The druid specialises in nature magics of Gaia.  Using the planet’s energies, the druid can bend the very forests and earth to his will.

Shaman – An ancient shaman is deep rooted in Gaia’s spiritural ancestors and spirit lore.  They can call upon ancient spirits to serve their needs, and strengthen their allies.  Using their knowledge of the spirit world, a shaman can even recall the departed spirit of an ally, restoring them to life.

Necromancer- The necromancer is an outcast among the Ancients.  They have turned to the study of Gaia’s dark & undead energies.  They may animate corpses to serve as undead protectors, drain the energy from the living, and even slay them with a single spell.  

CYBORG : (not yet implemented)

Armor - Cyborgs that specialize in defensive abilities. 

Tank - The ultimate defender.  Tanks have some offensive attacks, but are excellent for withstanding damage.

Destroyer - Good combination of defensive capabilities and ranged attacks.

Cannon - Cyborgs that are excellent in offensive weapons.  Weaker in defensive capabilities, however.

Seeker - A fast moving, highly mobile melee fighting unit.

Lazer - A fast moving offensive unit, primarily using ranged weapons.  Weak defensive capabilities.

FACTIONS

Note: factions are not yet implemeneted .  The following explains Legend of Gaia’s vision for factions.

Perhaps the most important driving force in Legend of Gaia will be the various political factions.  These factions will be created and run by actual players.  The various factions will have different ideologies about the world, and of course, different means of gaining power.  The faction’s leader and his direct underlings will be especially powerful in the game.

There will be one pre-determined faction, created and maintained by the game creator.  This faction will be known as the neutral faction.  All players begin the game associated with the neutral faction.  The faction cannot be defeated.  The neutral faction provides basic services to its players and dominates the starting town in the world, and the immediate map area around it.  The neutral faction is just that –neutral.  It will not help nor hinder other factions.   Although a player may stay in the neutral faction his entire career, but there are truly special and unique skills to be acquired that only other factions can provide. Therefore, it is not recommended that the player remain with the neutral faction for an extended period.

FACTION LEADERS/STARTING A FACTION:

To start a faction, the potential leader must email become very high level and accumulate many followers, sign and forward a petition to the creator or moderators.  The request may be rejected based on character behaivor and/or other factors.  A faction leader is defined as a demi-god – and they are powerful indeed.  Such leaders become moderater/GMs in the game itself.

When a new faction is started, the potential leader must choose an unclaimed place on the world map where he will build his first town and a small fortress.  New places on the map will constantly be added, and so land space shouldn’t really be a problem.  Building a town is very, very expensive, and the character must have enough personal funds to sponsor its construction.  Fortresses/towns will be built by the map makers but with input from the faction sponsor.  The role of a faction leader is to sponsor,  grow and defend his faction empire.  His secondary role is that of a game moderator (booting bad players, etc).  As a faction leader you are then given special privileges in the game, including:

·         Moderate/post on the faction forums

·        Build additional fortresses, and towns (see note below).

·        Purchase vendors, merchents, guards

·        Teleport anywhere

·        use money in the faction treasury for the construction of additional towns, fortresses, or the purchase of more characters.

·        Attack other players who your faction is not at war with.  (use this ability with discretion)

·        broadcast messages across the server

·        boot/ban an abusive player from the server

WARNING: Abuse of any of these powers will result in removal of faction leader status, and possible deletion of your character. 

FACTION ECONOMIES:

A benefit of running a faction is the production of your own economic system.  Here’s how it works:  You purchase merchants from the game moderators, and we add those to your towns that you presumably built somewhere outside your fortress.  These merchants will sell various items to general players, and forward the profits to your faction treasury.  You can then use those funds to purchase more characters, more guards, or build another town/fortress.

FACTION BOTS: GUARDS AND MERCHENTS

Legend of Gaia supports server-generated NPCs.  These are not real players; they are simply entities that perform simple tasks.  A merchant, for example, is simply an NPC that always runs a trade arena.  (More on arena’s below).  A guard is a NPC that can be programmed to always run a combat arena, or aggressively attack members/monsters of another faction.  Only the faction leader can use and purchase bots, and only the game map makers can actually add them to the game world.

FACTIONS: DEFENDING YOUR EMPIRE

All towns and fortresses will have a number of guard bots and guard 'towers' that defend the area. In order to defeat the faction, all guards and towers must be destroyed. When this occures, that particular town or fortress will also be destroyed. Some funds from razing the town/fortress will be added to the opposing faction's treasury.

In order to actually attack a faction, you must finance and construct a 'siege weapon'. The siege weapon will then proceed to the opposing faction and begin an attack. These attacks will be announced in advance. This makes surprise attacks impossible; however, it's fairer to defenders as they have a chance to be online during the siege. I think this represents the fairest way to go about it.

The siege weapon will engage in combat with the defending town's guards. At that point, additional players may join the combat arena through the regular game's mechanism. Pvp combat happens only when players join combat involving the siege weapon vs. the guards. Otherwise it would quickly spin out of control and become confusing, as there is no player limit.

Like all empires, they must be defended or they will surely fall. Your first and foremost line of defenses is your faction players.

Secondly, guard bots and guard towers will attack an opposing siege weapon, opposing faction players, and defend certain parts of the town. All guards and towers must be defeated to raze the town. So, it would be wise to purchase powerful guards and station them strategically.

Thirdly, if hard pressed, the faction leader may find himself on the front line against an invading force. Faction leaders, by definition, are powerful. It will take quite a few players joining forces to defeat one.

The undead and sometimes monster clans will also periodically stage attacks against factions. These attacks will also be announced about 3-4 days in advance and (more or less) randomly be determined by the server. So even if your faction is not at war, it doesn't mean you can ignore defenses.