Nation Mod Release: Gollarn (latest version)
 

Nation Description:

The Gollarn are pale, amphibious humaniods from the waterlaced caverns deep below the earth. When the long dwarven mining tunnels of Vanhiem ran into the sacred Gollarn burial caverns, the Gollarn leader caste organized a crusade that ended with the capture of the Halls of Andvare and the abandonment of Vanhiem. Gollarn are stealthy and have keen reflexes, but are in general frail and do not value bravery. They have hunted and domesticated many of the strange creatures of the deepest watery caverns. While Gollarn tend to be isolated, many have banded into small underground settlements that constantly raid each other. The leader of each settlement is the Keeper of Secrets - the only Gollarn with the sacred right to make and read maps of the caverns. Ancient hermits known as Watchers of the Depths are philosophers and powerful mages of Earth and Sorcery. A guild of craftsmen mages, known as clayformers, have recently gained much power by harnessing the power of enchanted clay from the lowest depths of the caverns.



Some features that are not obvious from the unit descriptions:

*The trapper entangles enemies striking it, like a vine shield.

*The spirit walker can change shape to a mental form with 1 HP and an enslave mind weapon.

*The clayformer generates earth gems.

*There is a special benefit to casting to Gift of Reason on a depth diver.

Also, thanks to Eternal_Spearmen for drawing the images.

Please let me know what you think.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

A very nice Mod with an innovative Nation http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif . Reminds me of Goblins and Gollum http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif .

Two questions :
Is it on purpose that the Depth Mind pretender has only 1 hp ?

The Depth Divers radiate both heat and cold via heat and chill abilities . Both abilities on one single Creature is imho a bit unthematic .


Otherwise well balanced in my Opinion http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif . The Gollarn will be a difficult but fun nation to play with http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif . The idea with the earthgem generating mages is cool also .

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

The Depth Mind pretender is supposed to have 1 HP, he is intended to be a phantasmal projection (thus why he is also immortal, the real creature just creates a new one). The heat and cold auras are intended to be a representation of the chaotic magic used by the depth divers. Thanks for the comments; I'm aiming for it to be useable in MP, so I'm glad you think it is balanced.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

So, it appears the only reason to ever buy a depth diver is to GoR it...

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

I actually toned them down a lot based on feedback from my mod concept thread. They have high MR, and resist everything, I think with a few buffs cast by mages they could be a force to be reckoned with all the way to the late game. They were originally sacred, I could put that pack on if everyone agrees they are not worth it as they stand.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Sacred would be good; then you could get them an air bless effect so they quit dying to anything with a projectile...

Watcher of the Depths is lifeless? Why?
Bat Rider's sling is pretty useless...

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

I have no idea how they ended up as lifeless, I'll remove it in the next version. The bat rider's sling is mostly useless, but it gives more versatility with orders.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Also, he's not stealthy, but that may have been intentional. So, if he spends all his time watching stuff, he should have good eyes, right http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif Then why is his precision lower than the other units?
The raider seems kind of weak. They sure pack a punch, but die alarmingly quickly. Maybe you could increase their stealth a bit to give them a better niche use.

Well, everything seems to be fairly well-priced (except Im still not sure about the Depth Diver) after playing a quick test game. Its difficult to say how much the clayformer, spirit walker, and burrower are really worth, what with their cool unusual abilities (very intriguing http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif), but I think youve done a good job.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

I took off the stealth and prec. for Watchers because they are supposed to be quite old (the way crones of avalon lose stealth that mothers of avalon have). I think it might be good to idea to give raiders a slight boost, either make them 9 gold or have better stealth. Thanks for your balancing help.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

The master hunter may need some toning down. Stealth +25 for an assassin is
a bit over the top, and the armour piercing daggers make him quite deadly
even against armour.

As for the clayshapers, I wonder how that will turn out. I know that in all
my games there comes a point where cash is meaningless. Being able to buy
a gem generator for 400 gold, and get a modest researcher... it's probably OK.

They have a great researcher, but I cannot think how he could be used in battle.
As a matter of fact, I think this nation is a bit light on battlefield mages.

All in all, I do not think the race is overpowered, but I would sure hate to
piss off anyone who can get assassins like this for 90 coins.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

I'm not that worried about the master hunter, a few bodyguards will take care of him, unless he is equipped, at which point his built in weapons don't matter as much. I will also be interested to see how the clayformer will work out in a long game. BTW, what do you consider their great researcher?

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Almost forgot to mention: theres a typo for the gollarn guard: his 2nd sprite is entered as "./gollarn/gollarngaurd.tga" when it should be "./gollarn/gollarnguard.tga", causing the game to crash when you watch a replay where it attacks something.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Ah, thanks for catching that.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Oh, the weapons matter only against the indies in the very beginning. The
reason I am worried about him is the high stealth, because a properly equipped
assassin is a true pain, and a stealth 25 one is very hard to find. How do you
justify a guy out of his element having the stealth of a van with glamour?

The EDHHH guy that costs 160 or so. Researchers that can be used for domain
push are great in my book, but as I said, it does not seem to matter that much
because they really have NO battlefield mages to speak of. I am starting to
think that maybe this mod is underpowered, at least when it comes to magic.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

I would justify the stealth as a combination of using tunnels unknown to other nations, superb training, and natural reflexes and stealth. I could swap them for the depth diver or watcher in being capital only though.

As for being under powered in magic, again this is a result of toning down since the concept thread. The original watcher of the depths had 2E and 4 sorcery randoms (2 linked 2 unlinked).

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

The Bat Riders really need a commander to excercise their full potential, and it would be nice to have a Guard Commander without stealth but with armor. Dunno if its possible to add new commanders with the modding tools, though, as Ive never done any modding...

The PD is about as worthless as that of Machaka... even worse if the enemy has any ranged units. At least it does get a mage at 20, though.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

It is quite possible to add more commanders, my reason for not having a flying commander was that I didn't want bat rider only stealth squads to edge out other gollarn stealth forces. Having an armoured commander couldn't hurt though. The PD seems ok as it is, as you say other nations have weak PD as well (I only use 1-2 points 90% of the time anyway).

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Interesting and innovative so far. I'm not really an expert on costs so I won't say much, but how did you determine the cost of the Clay Spirit pretender--to me, at first glance, he seemed a bit cheap at only 20 creation points.

<< Edit >>
Oh! I figured out (exactly) what the problem with the newlines in the summaries is. The standard newline sequence CRLF (stands for Carriage Return, Line Feed from a standard typewriter) on Linux (i assume) is LFLF or a sequence of (hex) 0A0A. Most editors produce the standard carriage of 0D0A. Use 0A0A (if you like hex editing or have a program that allows this) instead to insert the linefeeds.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Sounds awesome, but... is the link broken for anyone else? I can't download it.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

He may be a bit over-cheap, but I think the lack of slots, mostly bad stats (for a pretender) and high magic path cost limit his use as anything but a bless pretender (which gollarn can't use as it stands...). Thanks for the tip about the summary.

EDIT: The link works for me, I'm not sure what the problem is.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

I think the mod overall looks very cool. It is extremely unique. Just here to say it is very cool. Also, there are two "and"s in the Giant Bat Rider text right next to eachother. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

The Depth Mind is, by the way, in my opinion one of the coolest pretender ideas ever, mod or not. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

EDIT: Also, the Clayformer, in my opinion, ought to be capital only. In a Faerun game or similarly large map, a hugh gold income + some castles = massive gem income. Plus, you can convert earth gems directly to gold, so you can explosively grow your earth gem income after a time.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

This is only true if you've found an alchemist site, or have the alchemist's stone, as a gold cost of 400 means that their upkeep is 13.3, which is 3.3 more than the 10 gold you get from each earth gem.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

One could also look at it as reverse alchemy 13.3 gold to 1 gem (less research/casting abilities of course). I agree with the cap-only restriction. Their usefulness is extraordinary--no one else has such a thing, so it should probably be confined to a single province.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Thanks for the feedback, from everyone's comments here is what I'm thinking for the next version:

*Depth Diver again sacred, possibly a cost increase to go with it.

*Switch clayformer and watcher of the depths capital only status.

*Possibly change watcher of the depths paths to 2E1S1B and
two linked sorcery randoms.

*Make Raider 9 gold.

*Fix bugs and typos.

BTW, anyone who can't make the attachment work, send me a PM and I will E-mail them the file.

EDIT: I updated the attachment with the changes.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Great mod.
Very innovative and unique.
I immediatly fell in love with the depth mind. very very cool ::)

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Great mod, great feel! Truly original. Nice!

- I think this would be thematically even cooler: Let the burrower be able to burrow underground: it could have stealth 30 (that is: never be found, basically, except by freak chance); however, reduce their protection down to 6 or 8 at most -- they dont wear armor (obviously!), because not only is it nearly impossible to armor such a beast but because when burrowing, they would whiddle it away in moments. Give it 70 HP or so. Reduce Morale to 14. I think they should cost a bit more. You could even do this: "When these beasts become seriously injured, they return to their underground caverns to nurse their wounds in the darkness, contemplating their revenge upon the creatures of light." -- in other words, they could have recuperation (when stealthy, which doesnt work currently, but you get the idea). Ideally I could also picture them as blind, but with a new weapon, Worm Bite, which has decent attack to make up for that.
- The assassin needs to have stealth 10 or 15 maximum

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Maybe I could make it two units, a burrower with armour plates for war (like the current one), and one more like the wild burrowers you describe. One problem with your burrower design though, they need a 30 stealth commander to make use of the stealth (and you already didn't like the master hunter's stealth...). Also, I feel they might end up competing with, rather than complementing the current gollarn stealth forces.

@izaqyos: Thanks http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

First of all, sorry: I should have said that I imagine the Burrower to be a *commander* (with 0 leadership and 0 slots, like the Vastness), I imagine single pricey huge lurking underground beasts burrowing around, lonesome and strange.
I didnt like the Assassin's 30 stealth only because he is an assassin. The Worm, when Burrowed, won't be doing anything but recuperating, lurking, or eating rocks; he wont be killing people.
I love the idea of a burrower, but since dom2 doesnt support a WarcraftIII-like "Burrow" command (quelle surprise!), I think giving it high stealth would be the next best thing.

Anyhow, it is YOUR mod, so you do what YOU want! (I just thought this would be a spicy enhancement to your already excellent idea, and anyhow I cannot imagine putting armor of any kind on a 90 foot burrowing worm.)

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Ah, now I see what you're suggesting. That could work, though I had already imagined that the burrowers were quite simple minded and not really capable of doing anything useful on their own. Maybe I would add a different burrowing creature to fit the niche. As for the armour, since there are many very large creatures leaving bones in the caverns, I assumed finding some to plate the burrower in would not be that hard (also the high resource cost accounts for this, though I could make it 100 or something, and lower the gold price). The assassin is only +25 stealth, but I will think about taking it down to 15-20. Anyway, thanks for your input.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

I just wanted to comment...

WOW Enslave Mind is a hoot. I think those commanders are rather undercosted. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

I'm kind of 'meh' on the rest of it, though... their troops aren't exactly the best in the world.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

By 'meh' do you mean the price? Because in my (biased) opinion they have more troop variety than the average nation. I have noticed that many mods tend to come out far over powered, so I wanted to reverse this trend and make a nation that starts conservatively and work up from there. The spirit walker may well be underpriced, if it were possible I would make a lot more gollarn units capital only.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

It's not the price, it's their crappy nature. Their 'best troop' is the entangling one, IMO. I haven't tried the burrowers yet, but their cost basically precludes an army of them.

The best strategy I've found so far is to recruit Spirit Walkers at every opportunity while using the Entanglers as a (quite effective) wall.

Don't get me wrong. I think it's a pretty fair nation. It's just their troops aren't much to write home about.

Would you like me to send the mod's commanders through my 'commander rubric'?

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Most of the troops are supposed to be used as stealth raiders, so I guess a good question to ask is: Do you consider the troops as good as Pangaea's stealth troops? I may lower the price a lot on trappers and make them immobile if they are becoming the main front line troops (which they shouldn't). As for the commander rubric, I would be interested to see the results, though you will just have to invent a price for mind enslave.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

I don't use Pangaea's stealth troops. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Pangaea (base): Revelers or (more normally) Maenads.
Pangaea New Era: Dryad Hoplites are 'da bomb'.
Pangaea CW: Enh.

I'll run them through. Enslave Mind I won't ignore, but maybe I'll just skip that guy. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Hmm, thinking about it, I only use revelers and centaur warriors for stealth troops myself. Maybe boosting the stealth on slingers, raiders and raider commanders would help. Also the gem generator will be hard to price...

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

FYI, I don't think stealth level on non-commanders has any effect. You could test it, though.

If you want to boost small, Gollum-like units, defense skill seems like a logical choice to me.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

The defense is a good idea, infact I might boost attack and defense by one across the board for gollarn infantry. Here is what I'm thinking for the next version:

*Fix summary.

*Make a national specific spell to summon a burrower commander, I was thinking of stealing either the Siege Golem, or Serpent Fiend spells to do this.

*Make trapper immobile, 4 gold.

*Reduce assassin stealth to +15.

*The aforementioned attack and defense boost.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

This is a very nice nation. Not too powerful, but with a neat feel to it.

The trappers are insanely useful currrently, at least in the early game. I doubt they would be any at all if they were truly immobile. Is it possible to give them strategic movement but no motion on the battlefield? That might reduce their usefullness.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

I think they would still be useful immobile, at the right price. Imagine a enemy army coming to your undefended mage research fort. At 4 gold 1 resource, you can afford a lot of meatshield for your casters.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Ok, new version up. A lot of tweaks and polishing, a new national spell (had to steal telestic animation to make it) with tinkthank's idea.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Er, do you mind if I ask what the tweaks are?

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

*immobile, cheaper trappers

*better att/def on many units

*lower stealth on assassins

*clayformer 10 gold less

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Grr. I liked the trappers mobile. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

I could not think of another way to keep them from displacing the roles of gollarn guards and raiders.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

I guess. It's a hard task.

Of course, I find them all displaced by the Mind Enslaver. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

While they are quite usefull, it takes time to build up enough of them that only they and their thralls are needed for expanding. And if you continue to focus on them instead of mages throughout the game, other players will not have much of a problem fighting you. I would certainly consider a price raise though, if they seem too much in MP.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

I dont think the spirit walker is unbalanced, simply because he is a commander. You are limited to one per turn, and only that to the exclusion of any other mages.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

You can always put down another fort and temple. Still, I'm not sure if they are any worse than, say, Pythium's communicants.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

Do Spirit Walkers cost as much upkeep in their Spirit form as they do in their normal form? I seem to recall it didn't have the buyable form's gold cost in some version, but I'm not sure anymore.

Re: Nation Mod Release: Gollarn
 

No, I think both have always had the same gold cost.