Arcane Duelist Thread

I am creating this thread to post Arcane Duelist news that does not get posted on the main site. This is to create awareness about the mod as well as encourage discussion about it. Please check out our Arcane Duelistprofile or our website at www.de-dev.com for more information. Enjoy.

This update is not your usual media release, instead of showing the updated maps or concept art I want to dedicate this update to the game play of Arcane Duelist. More specifically I want to present the Arcane Duelist spell creation system. Arcane Duelist features some fairly original features and I think that the realtime spell creation system is a good example of something you can expect to see in Arcane Duelist.

So what is this “Realtime Spell Creation” system?
In Arcane Duelist players use spells to deal damage to their opponent and gain the tactical advantage. Realtime spell creation means that during the duel a player will “create” the spells they want to cast. Spells are created by combining various elements into a spell that can then be used. Each spell in Arcane Duelist is some combination of three elements that can be ordered into three slots. Once three elements are selected the spell is cast, and once cast it is ready to be used. This results in a total of 27 spells that a player can create during a duel. With so many spell options players will become more familiar with the spells they use more often, and spells that have more technical applications and are more situational will add an extra dimension to the characters. This moves the uniqueness of characters out of the game and into the minds of the players themselves. Remembering 27 spells during the melee of combat should be difficult, and knowing how to use combinations to get desired effects will reward those players who can think on their toes and have a more complete grasp of the spells available.

Creating spells under the pressure of combat will also add a few interesting aspects to spell casting.
1.) The possibility of fumbling a spell when a player accidentally chooses elements that they did not intend to.
2.) A learning phase where players will, in a way, be able to level up their characters by learning more spells and becoming more familiar with the system.
3.) Creating spells on the fly adds an extra layer to spell casting and makes for a more involved system.
4.) The combination of elements to create spells allows for an extremely streamlined interface.
5.) The elements in the spell have a relation to the resulting spell cast. This in turn contributes to immersion and a coherent game world.

For more information about Arcane Duelist feel free to check out our website at De-dev.com.

Edited by: dbecker

If I even had Half Life 2, I would definately get this. Looks great. I also like the fact of the "combining elements" to give it a light citrus flavor of alchemy.

Thanks, good to know at least one person read the post ;-)
If you enjoyed this I hope you will also enjoy my next game play update: "So what roles does light play in Arcane Duelist?"
Stay tuned :-)

Edited by: dbecker

I have decided to post up another game play update. This one will focus on the role of light in Arcane Duelist. While the actual implementation of this system is a ways off I thought people might like to hear what our vision for the mod is. With some luck and skill we should be able to pull it off and create something quite new.

So what roles does light play in Arcane Duelist?
There are three major roles that light plays in addition to the natural effects of light in an environment. The normal roles I am thinking of include simply visual effect and the utility of shadows.

The first change involves the ability to target spells. Normally the lighting in your environment can be a tactical advantage if used correctly. For Arcane Duelist we wanted to take this concept a step further. Some spells that the characters can cast require the opponent to be targeted. When I say targeted in this sense I do not mean that the player doing the targeting would need to have pinpoint accuracy, nor do I want to imply that the player merely selects a target and can automatically hit it. The targeting system for non-projectile and non-environment spells relies on a few different factors. One of these factors is light levels. The ability to target an opponent with these types of spells will be affected not only by factors such as range and cover but also by how dark the area of the map is where the target is standing. A player hidden in a shadowy corner will be much more difficult to target with these spells than if they were to be standing in a well lit area. While the light levels do not add any extra protection from environment or projectile spells they will provide significant protection from these targeted spells. The maps in arcane duelist are designed with this lighting in mind and it creates an extra layer of complexity within environment.

The second change to lighting is related to spell casting as well. However, in this instance the tactical application of each spell is modified by an additional attribute. Each spell in Arcane Duelist gives off some degree of light. The light could range from a small flickering glow to a bright flash of light. The actual effect depends on the spell cast and each effect must be taken into account when choosing a spell to cast. A spell that creates a large amount of light is likely to give away your position as well as obviously show which spell you may be casting. In addition to this the light can also affect your environmental light level and leave you open to being the victim of targeted spells that previously you had protection from. The spells in Arcane Duelist are balanced with this light attribute in mind. Many spells are designed to reduce light levels and other function primarily as illusionary effects to confuse your opponent. A powerful attack may come at the cost of a large amount of light being generated, depending on the situation it may be wiser to use a stealthy attack, one which gives of less light. Light is not the only extra effect that spells will have, but it is certainly a major one.

The last important new effect that light will have in Arcane Duelist has a double effect on gameplay. When a character takes damage during a duel they will begin to lose their sight. A characters vision will becomes blurry and dark in relation to the amount of damage they sustain. Lightly wounded characters may have a hazy border in their field of vision with a slight darkening effect; a heavily wounded character near death may be barely able to see at all. The first result of this is a tactical consideration directly tied into the previous two applications of light in Arcane Duelist. A player with dimmed vision will be at a disadvantage when casting targeting type spells in addition to the hindrance darkened vision would naturally imply. Secondly, the use of light producing spells becomes an even more crucial point. Players with darkened vision will still be able to detect sources of light relatively easily. Players will want to carefully consider their spell choices in an effort to prevent the opponent from being able to target and attack them. The other effect that this vision dimming has is tied into the interface. Arcane Duelist does not have a traditional interface; as a matter of fact it has no graphical interface at all. Every statistic about your character is represented visually and aurally within the game. The indication that your health is running low is the condition of your sight. Clear sight indicates good health, while blurred and darkened sight indicates you are near death. Once a character’s sight goes completely dark they will have been defeated.

I hope that this has been an interesting read and I really hope that we are able to realize this vision in Arcane Duelist. If you have any questions or comments about the system feel free to ask here or on our forums. We welcome you to keep an eye on our mod and if you want to know more please don’t hesitate to visit our website.

Edited by: dbecker

Sounds cool enough, I put it in my MW

Cool, thanks. I'll try to make it worth your while. :-)

I just want to announce a new addition to the Arcane Duelist team. Whitfield will be taking the very important coder position and is already hard at work. I'm looking forward to some great progress and a possibility of an internal alpha in the near future. We are still looking for a modeler and texture artist but I am sure we'll pick one up soon. Aside from that stay tuned for some new fiction and feel free to drop by our forums and say hi.

Another team announcement... I know they are not very exciting but I waited until the whole team had assembled this time to put it all in one neat little post.

We now have a fully working mod team working on Arcane Duelist. Brian and Sulz are signed on as the new art team, and they are already making progress which you should be able to see soon. We also have three programmers working on the project now, Brad has joined Sean and Mike to round out the team.

There are still a couple positions we are looking to fill though. We would like a highly skilled animator as well as an effects programmer. While we still have some time before we are going to need these talents it's best to get on board early to take part in the overall game's design and feel.

So keep your eyes open, add us to the watch list, swing by our forums and get ready to see some cool updates (With media) soon.

Arcane Duelist

De-dev.com

Wilhelm_III wrote: Sounds cool enough, I put it in my MW

So did I. Keep it up

This hardly qualifies as a behind-the-scenes look at what we are doing, but I want to assure you that there is progress being made behind "closed doors" so to speak. We welcome anyone interested in details at this time to visit the forums. We have decided to remain somewhat quiet on the publicity front until we can show an exciting barrage of new content. While we enjoy and support or interest in the mod there is no concentrated effort to bring attention to our game at this time. The intial media releases and publicity have provided us with a great team and in an attempt to be slightly more proffesional about the entire affair we will only be releasing select quality samples rather than whole collections of works in progress or concept work. If those types of things interest you and you can't wait for an official release feel free to visit the forums.

Arcane Duelist
www.de-dev.com

Edited by: dbecker

same as my mod were working very very very very hard to get a map finished
just cant works some stuff out how do you do lights and props and code maps like do i need visual basic i think james or chis said i need visual basic to make windows in maps

You shouldn't need anything outside of Hammer to make a decent map. Light just takes a lot of play testing to get right since they don't show up in the editor :-( Props can be taken from HL2 or built in a modelling program. I don't know that any code is required for mapping, unless you mean stuff like soundscape files.

In any case, thanks for the bump :-)

Edited by: dbecker

Geesh what makes you think youd need visual basic for models or maps ?

Whoever told you that you needed visual basic was taking the piss out of you.

A small update about Arcane Duelist for those of you not fortunate enough to be watching the mod or checking the forums :-)
We hit 1,000 views of our mod profile recently, while I know that's not really all that much and most of those probably came from the team it's still nice to see that some people are checking Arcane Duelist out.
I put up weekly updates on the forums as a sort of dev journal that will hopefully be useful or interesting once the mod get finished. We will probably be doing our first real media release sometime in January which hopefully will generate some interest in the mod.
Progress is slow during finals but we hope to make some good progress during the break, and with luck an animator will join our team as well. I also want to welcome bluepowder to our team, he will be responsible for the music of Arcane Duelist and we are looking forward to seeing his work. That's it for now, feel free to swing by our profile or website.

Edited by: dbecker

I'm working on a nice concise piece for Arcane Duelist. I thought I would share it and invite any comments or suggestions you may have.

Arcane Duelist places you into the role of a mage in a world where magic is new and different from anything seen before. You can duel against other players in epic battles across a deteriorating, futuristic cityscape using magical attacks and abilities. As a mage, you can choose from several spells each with their own distinct effects. The magic itself, however, is dark and difficult to control. You will need to use quick reflexes and quicker thinking to find the right spell for the right situation; just one mistake could leave you wide open to attack.

Arcane Duelist takes place after the people from the wasteland invade the spire in an effort to take control. The people from the wasteland have broken through the outer defenses by way of a water treatment facility and have spread out through the lower layers of the spire. As a response to the attack the governing officials have sent in special troops to counter the attack. These troops and the invaders confront each other in battles through out the lower spire. The defending Special Forces are the only capable line of defense the spire has against the invaders and the invaders are the only chance the people from the wasteland have of escaping their harsh environment. The fate of the city lies in the hands of these opposing forces.

Arcane Duelist

You could always mod the upcoming Dark Messiah of Might and Magic (an enhanced version of the Source engine) and throw in the potion-making powers onto there. It'd be a small piece to add to it, but everything else would be there for you to use, and it'd be a lot easier. You could also streamline the RPG interface, and still have a lot of people playing your game.

That's what I think, anyway. Check it out: Pc.gamespy.com

I'll check it out, thanks for the tip.

EDIT: While their game looks interesting I don't think there would be any advantage to using what they have done the the source engine over what we are planning to do. Our game is quite different from theirs and it would probably be more trouble to work with the edited engine. While there is magic in their game that is probably the only similarity, aside from ones that we share with the original Half-Life 2 game, that there is. However it would be interesting to see how they handled the grahical effects of the magic.

Edited by: dbecker