ELDER REALMS: An Endgame Idea by Puffagod

#224

… no :flushed:

Just kidding. She was inspired by that uncomfortable passage from H.P. Lovecraft’s The Shadow over Innsmouth where Zadok Allen describes the ‘intermixing’ of island folk with things that came from the sea: ‘Seems that human folks has got a kind o’ relation to sech water-beasts—that everything alive come aout o’ the water onct, an’ only needs a little change to go back agin […] ef they mixed bloods there’d be children as ud look human at fust, but later turn more’n more like the things, till finally they’d take to the water an’ jine the main lot o’ things daown thar’…

You can blame me for the finer details, sadly.

#225

Damn, I’m still trying to skim the document and having a hard time XD Everything I’ve wanted to say seems to have been said for now though. Huge props for this!! This is a bit off topic but how did you go about making this idea? Like if there was a structure or if you were to structure this sort of thing.

#226

Hello! - a very good question indeed…

I suppose I did use a sort of structure or plan when I was making this thing. After inventing the narrative, the first important thing was to split the Elder Realm into ‘bands’ (the Ocean, Lowlands, Midlands, Highlands, Godlands). Then I split the ‘bands’ into biomes. Then I split the biomes into enemies, which are more or less the atoms of the idea, the most basic units of its design (and indeed its storytelling). I then simply focused on designing enemies, using each higher order of complexity (biomes and bands) as a design goal (‘by the end of the month, the Ocean will be finished’). It was generally a slow and incremental process but a gratifying one that made it impossible to get overwhelmed by the complexity of the whole! I am also a raving monomaniac so that was a great advantage.

Also, I was conscious from the beginning that Elder Realms would be unlike any other ‘idea’ that had been done before, because it was trying to be an artistic artefact in itself. It was very gratifying not having to worry about templates or the conventions of ‘dungeon design’. At all times I did precisely whatever I felt like doing, and that was immensely liberating - to invent a structure as I went along.

I hope that answers part of your question at least? C:

#227

Hello everyone! Today is my 9 year account anniversary (hooray! C:) so - for those who care - I thought I’d share some major behind-the-scenes Elder Realms cut content! These things probably won’t ever be added but I think its fun to reminisce and speculate…

  1. The Cult system was originally very different. There were originally going to be three themed ‘nexuses’ embedded in the Elder Realm itself, each stashed with NPCs including cult figures and questgivers (originally SPACE, TIME and DEATH never spoke to you directly until you beat their respective ELDER GODS). There was going to be a subplot about inter-cult conflicts and alliances (including an alliance between the cults of SPACE and TIME resulting from a rather unexpected SPACETIME ship). This was cancelled and the whole Cult system streamlined purely because of the excessive amount of work the original vision would have involved…

  2. Elder Realms was originally intended to have an endgame loop for Unaligned players involving the Many Eyed Men and the Deep Chaos Absureth… which I just never got around to :3

  3. There was at one point an additional biome planned for each band. The OCEAN was going to get the Jungle Island (and possibly also the Midnight Zone around its very furthest reaches). The LOWLANDS were going to get the Temple Complex, the MIDLANDS were going to get the Lake, the HIGHLANDS were going to get the Necropolis (the concept for which was converted into my early-game dungeon idea of the same name). And finally, the GODLANDS were going to get Vestige: Archetype’s Incursion. There’s a minuscule chance I’ll revisit these in the distant future once I figure out a good way to make sprites for them, but I wouldn’t hold my breath…

  4. There are quite a few cut enemies or unreleased versions of existing enemies… Here’s one…

    image

And that’s about it for now :slight_smile: The project is still in suspension but I’ll be very sure to let you all know when something starts brewing again! Thanks for all your support, always happy to answer any questions & here’s to 9 more years! <3

#228

• The cult system sounds like it could have been fun, but that’s a lot more work, and as much as I hate to say it, I actually prefer the way that realm cycles as it is. A nexus in the realm feels like it goes against a fundamental part of the current game. (A SPACETIME ship sounds cool, though XD)

• That is something I never got around to asking about. The cult system obviously takes some effort, with a fair bit of distance needed to be traveled (potentially) without active teleportation and the drudge of fighting difficult enemies on the way there, potentially by yourself if you nexused early out of a group. There’s enough space in each cult for precisely a third of these Elder Realms, but I doubted that everyone was going to be included in that count. I do think that after whenever you complete your next goal for the document (as it happens), that is a worthy pursuit. (This also has totally nothing to do with me being bugged about wanting to know more about those blasted [number] eyed men and their cryptic messages/origins).

• Extra Biomes are always nice, but finishing what’s already been started seems logical. (I know those sections take a lot of work).

• (A Two-Eyed Man!? What blasphemy is this?)

Anyhoo, thanks for sharing, and happy 9th! I always love seeing notifications for this thread. :confetti_ball:

#229

every man has 2 eyes. and the enemy is the urgalohumanoid

#230

What happens if a Witch’s Brew calls for multiple of Elder Theriac?

#231

Very good question. I’d say (judging from the logic of how Pumpkin Bombs stack) that the Theriac’s radius would be increased to 4 tiles. While extremely strong, the absurdly small chance of this happening (and the relative difficulty of aquiring the Theriacs) makes it fair enough imo… :)))

I’m always impressed with your sharp eye and attention to detail with questions like this!! Many thanks indeed and do keep them coming if you stumble upon any more C:

#232

What about the canopic cocktails, would it have a doubled duration?

#233

I’d say so, following the above logic - although I get that rapidly popping two Canopic Cocktails out of the context of Witch’s Brew (much like Elder Theriacs) would not work that way. Of course Witch’s Brew could have some hard-coded quirks for combinations that wouldn’t stack naturally :slight_smile:

#234

I feel like the swamp onion could be used in the nexus to DC any player with ally projectiles on on crowded servers.

#235

So it could - although that particular sort of server-trolling was not in vogue when the item was invented…

Perhaps the Swamp Onion could be marked as unusable in the nexus, like a few currently existing consumables - although I fear that updating the document to reflect the modern state of realm in such high resolution is a slippery slope, considering how significantly the game’s mechanics have changed since its inception & publication.

#236

Beyond the process it would take for rebalancing, I stand by thinking that this document is strictly for the lore and flavors of ideas. Some of the fight ideas were cool in and of themselves on paper, but putting them into practice (even back in the version of the game when this was created) would likely take some balancing anyway. Trying to edit anything that isn’t obviously broken feels like a less effective use of time.

#237

“That awful King Alexander and his enviable abdomen"

Is SPACE seriously jealous of a slurp’s 6-pack?

#238

That made me laugh back when I read it as well :joy:

#239

Ngl, I feel like the Archetype being able to deal 650 damage with a fast moving projectile is pretty overkill, I kind of feel like having 200 damage per halve second beams like Feral’s, would more appropriately demonstrate the power of this attack. The beam could even have infinite range, and be telegraphed via a thin indicator beam instead of two shoots as with Feral’s.

#240

Yep I totally agree with you there. However I don’t believe there was an in-game precedent for such an attack while I was designing the Archetype. Where possible I tried to use existing in-game analogues for enemy attacks (ie, the splitting shots that appear throughout the Elder Realm are justified by O2’s exploding suns, contact damage is justified by Manor Bats etc). This isn’t always the case (inwards-moving shots like Uruthaguruthag’s terrene accretions are an example) but even then I tried not to rock the boat too significantly - I never imagined they would add a beam attack like Feral’s…

Editing the document to include newer mechanics is a slippery slope (if I change the Archetype, then why not go back and spend modernise everything else?) so I can’t promise to include the change - although I really like it and probably would have gone with it in the first place had I known!

#241

Not gonna lie, those psychic attacks that used the terrain as a weapon might’ve been a little weird for the game back in the state it was as well, but it was very creative.

I’m not pushing for updating, but you weren’t shy for trying out new ideas, conceptually!

#242

oh yes that too is a good example :slight_smile: On the whole though I did try to be more or less conservative with the attacks - heaven knows there would have been a few very different fights if I wasn’t!!

edit: nice profile pic too!!

#243

Honestly, the entire game is currently in this state where we have a sort of grey area between old and new content, and if the game’s code continues to evolve with new bullet types and enemy behaviours, we may end up in a scenario where stuff like the nest, fungal and crystal caverns and ocean trench will start to look outdated. All in all, I don’t really see the problem with modernising specific parts of the elder realms whilst not doing so for the others, especially given the length of this document and the fact that it would only make sense to modernise the parts of document that feel kinda broken, like the aforementioned quantum quiddities .